GOP Takes Aim at Collective Bargaining

It's not just happening in Ohio--it's happening all over the country. In what can only be called either an organized GOP campaign or a very improbable coincidence, Republican governors and legislatures across the land are aiming at disemboweling public employee unions. In Ohio, Senate Bill 5 was just introduced which would:

"Among other things, the law would eliminate final binding arbitration as the means for local governments to settle contract disputes with police and fire employees, prohibit the use of seniority as the sole factor in determining the order of layoffs, and allow the hiring of permanent replacements by government to replace striking workers. It would also remove health-care benefits as a factor in negotiations, allowing government to offer a single plan to all public employees who would have to pick up at least 20 percent of the cost."

But Ohio Republican Governor John Kasich feels the bill does not go far enough and "said the budget he will propose next month for the next two years would go even further, outlawing strikes by all public employees."

It's not just happening in Ohio, similar actions are being taken across the country. In Wisconsin, things are exploding as thousands of people have converged on the state capitol to protest GOP Governor Scott Walker's plan to gut collective bargaining--a plan the Governor hopes to have signed, sealed, and delivered in a matter of days:

"Thousands of public employees and supporters converged at a hearing at the capitol here that ran into the wee hours of Wednesday morning to voice their objection to a proposal to cut their benefits and remove most of their unions’ ability to bargain. The show of anger was powerful. Madison schools were closed on Wednesday after scores of teachers called in sick and appeared headed to lobby exhausted-looking lawmakers, who had heard more than 17 hours of comments in a public hearing that began on Tuesday morning. More buses of public workers from other parts of the state were still pulling up near dawn on Wednesday. The target of their fury was a proposal by Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican elected in November, to press through a “repair bill” that would help solve the state’s $137 million budget shortfall by requiring government workers to contribute significantly more to their pensions and health care, while limiting collective bargaining for most state and local government employees to the issue of wages, excluding an array of issues like health coverage and vacations."

This is what dictatorship looks like, not democracy. The democratic process would include real debate and a thoughtful give-and-take (I think given the economic circumstances of the states, the unions would be fairly reasonable in giving up some benefits). Instead, this is an organized campaign by the GOP to kill the teachers’ unions--and eventually tenure—something they’ve wanted to do for a long time. And to do it fast before the opposition can organize. Governor Kasich said on the campaign trail that one of his main goals as governor was to "break the back" of the teachers unions. He’s well on his way.

Are we going to see people in the streets just like happened in Egypt? Is the National Guard really going to be used by GOP governors across the land to put down the protests? I hope not. We had a little incident here in 1970 at Kent State people might remember…