Governor Walker is Caving! Yup, collective bargaining: Back on the table. The Pressure Is Working!

[kpete]

So I was just heading to bed, when I read this.
Cheers!-redhaze
http://news.yahoo.com/...

UPDATE 2: LINK TO THE COMPLETE E-MAIL EXCHANGE HERE (h/t to dk user begone)!!
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/...

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has offered to keep certain collective bargaining rights in place for state workers in a proposed compromise aimed at ending a nearly three-week standoff with absent Senate Democrats, according to e-mails released Tuesday by his office.

Yup, collective bargaining: Back on the table. Folks, we are winning! And its not just on the issue of collective bargaining:

Under the compromise floated by Walker and detailed in the e-mails, workers would be able to continue bargaining over their salaries with no limit, a change from his original plan that banned negotiated salary increases beyond inflation. He also proposed compromises allowing collective bargaining to stay in place on mandatory overtime, performance bonuses, hazardous duty pay and classroom size for teachers.

They are caving left, right, and center. Walker has dug himself into a pit from whence there is no return. And he knows it. He needs a way out. They are still asking for too much. I suggest we make them squirm a bit, give them nothing, then recall their asses for even trying this shit.

Senate Republicans spent hours going over the compromise plan Tuesday morning in a closed-door meeting, Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald said. He acknowledged that pressure was increasing on the senators, saying the recall efforts launched against eight Republicans was "on everybody's minds."

"Everybody's obviously receiving a lot of pressure," Fitzgerald said. "I had people on my front porch before I left this morning."

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/03/09/954240/-Governor-Walker-is-Caving!-UPDATED-WITH-LINK-TO-FULL-E-MAILS!!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110309/ap_on_re_us/us_wisconsin_budget_unions


The pressure is working and it's why the GOPers are dealing in the first place. Apparently the recall efforts are plaguing their minds too.

[Oceansaway]

1. K&R...n/t

[rfranklin]

2. The people of Wisconsin should be as intractable as Walker...

I think he will give up on the collective bargaining as long as the provisions to give away public heating and power facilities is left intact. The real agenda is to privatize as much as possible. The collective bargaining ploy may be the McGuffin.

(The MacGuffin is common in films, especially thrillers. Usually, though not always, the MacGuffin is the central focus of the film in the first act, and then declines in importance as the struggles and motivations of characters play out. It may come back into play at the climax of the story, but sometimes the MacGuffin is actually forgotten by the end of the film.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacGuffin

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. Standing up to bullies almost always eventually works

This needs to be a NATIONAL response,in every city, county and state. Every time.
Enough is enough. There may be still time to turn this country around.

Down here in my little corner of Ala. the people are standing up to a huge out of state group who are trying to put the biggest landfill in the nation in our backyard. All I can personally do is send the opposing grassroots group a few bucks and write to our governor. He is a Republican, but he has just declared a moratorium on landfill permits!

Naturally I am waiting to see what is really behind this moratorium, fearing that there will be a "new law" coming out of the Legislature that allows this landfill to go ahead.
For now, a moratorium, but the opposing group is NOT disbanding.

Trust, but verify, indeed.

[iwishiwas]

16. The Gov and his Repug poodles did a nasty and we lost -for now.

[xchrom]

3. 'The People' didn't bring about this mess. 'The People' shouldn't have to pay for it. nt

[Scuba]

4. If we keep collective bargaining rights and lose everything else...

...in this evil bill, we still lose. It's full of crap based on Squat's Baptist upbringing.

Less money for healthcare and more money of indigent funerals should be a tipoff.

[gratuitous]

5. Senate Republicans, what say ye?

To this point, the Senate Republicans haven't had to do or say diddly-squat. As long as the Democrats held out, and Walker kept acting like a dick (surprise!), the Senate Republicans were just along for a free ride. Being Republicans, of course, they've done a couple of stupid things, but that's to be expected. By and large, however, they haven't been on the hot seat in all this. Certainly not like Walker and the Democrats.

Well, it looks like Walker is that most committed and dangerous of demagogues, and for once the Democrats aren't folding. So, the way out of the impasse is up to the Senate Republicans. Why haven't they been doing anything all this time? What is their proposal? What are they willing to do? They finally (finally!) got levered off the schneid with the recall petitions against a third of their caucus. But they've been missing in action all through this. Are the Senate Republicans all on board with Walker? It sure looks like it. And Walker's chief engineer on the Crazytown Express. Or are there some Senate Republicans who are actually on the side of working people?

Which side are you on, Senate Republicans?

[Lefta Dissenter]

6. There's got to be more than just coll. bargaining

I've figured that's a ploy anyway - something for people to focus on that he'd finally relent on.

We need the rest of the bill picked over. SELLING THE STATE'S POWER PLANTS NO BID, for example. Right after getting in office, he stopped the conversion of the Charter St plant from coal to bio-fuel & nat gas. Then put the provision in the bill that allowed for no bid sale of the power plants to whomever he wants. Do you think the fact that Koch brothers have coal operations in the state has ANYTHING to do with this??? Couldn't be!

Bio-fuel would have provided jobs for Wisconsin farmers and foresters, and would have enabled us to expand bio-fuel processing - you know, bringing jobs in to the state. But we'd rather give our frickin heating plants to the Koch brothers! :banghead:

[no_hypocrisy]

8. Getting there, but not there yet.

[eilen]

9. Kill the bill

It is an anathema. It is no good. Force them to vote against it with the recall process, make the Repub. Senators afraid.

Walker can't do shit without them. He is likely threatening them with Koch funded challengers to their seats. Maybe there are few left there with integrity and not afraid to earn an honest living outside of politics.

[Jester Messiah]

10. We need to punish these bastards.

Whip 'em so hard that they'll never dare try something like this again. Walker and his corporate masters need to feel some real pain!

[deacon]

11. He knows those tractors show up on saturday would be so added neg. pr. n/t

[Faryn Balyncd]

12. How about the deal to "sell" the power plants to the Koch syndicate?

[Scuba]

13. No bid sales help with the budget how???? Thanks for your support.

[Dappleganger]

14. It's a trap.

[Johnny_dollar]

15. The attempted neutering of the unions is not the main goal

The big prize is the planned handover of the power utilities to the Koch brothers. Next will be prisons, roads, water distribution, and possibly, schools. The people of WI will not have won even if he capitulates completely on the union issue; it's the other things planned that will butter the Kochs' bread.

[iwishiwas]

17. The Repug poodles in the Senate of WI crapped all over us. I see

film from the Capitol this am on TV. The police had their hands full trying to clear the building.