Despite the cold weather, Austin progressives gave a warm welcome to worker-hating Wisconsin governor Scott Walker today in front of the Austin Hilton. Walker was in Austin to speak to the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a right-wing group that advances an extremely conservative agenda.
A large crowd of people from labor organizations, progressive groups, and allied organizations showed up at 11:30 to send a message: Scott Walker's anti-worker policies won't be tolerated in Texas! We know what Walker is doing in Wisconsin to teachers, police officers, firefighters, and public employees. We know Walker is slashing funding from higher education and trying to balance the budget on the backs of working people. We don't like it when Republicans do that here in Texas, and we sure don't like it when folks like Scott Walker do it in Wisconsin.
Despite the low temperatures (Wisconsinites, how do you stand it? It was in the 30's here today!!) the crowd was fired up, chanting anti-Walker rhymes across the street from the hotel. At one point, a group of TPPF guests peered from the window. Perhaps they were surprised to see that the 99% actually cares when the 1% tries to stomp out the worker protections and regulations that created the American middle class. Some of the TPPF folks even came down to talk to a few of the protesters.
To the right is TPPF Vice President of Communications Josh Trevino taking in a sign that reads "Unions: the folks who brought you the weekend. Scott Walker: that guy that makes you work the weekend!" If you like having weekends, fair wages, relative income equality, no more child labor, employer-based health coverage, and the family and medical leave act, you have labor unions to thank.
Labor unions work hard to help all workers retain basic protections, and have set standards for workers in the public sector and several unionized industries that in turn have helped all other working folks do better. Labor organizations provide a way for workers to band together and demand fair treatment: living wages, safe working conditions, basic benefits, and a way to seek redress against employers who exploit their workers. I wish every worker, public and private sector alike, had the protections that labor union members receive. Sure, a few CEO's may make a few million dollars less a year, but isn't it worth it for the rest of the 99% to do just a little bit better?
During the rally, organizers, including Becky Moeller, President of the Texas AFL-CIO, at right, reminded the crowd of Scott Walker's close relationship with the Koch brothers, conservative billionaires who fund right-wing and conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation, Americans for Prosperity, and organizations linked to the Tea Party. The crowd chanted back, "Show me what plutocracy looks like!" "This is what plutocracy looks like!" Scott Walker's administration is certainly what the plutocracy looks like: he serves the leaders of massive corporations that care more about executive profits than their workers. Rather than helping to grow the middle class and give more Americans a chance to these folks push for policies that widen our income inequality and force working families struggle to get by with less and less.
It's no surprise to see many of the current GOP presidential candidates standing up for Walker -- they all want to perpetuate his anti-worker policies on a national level. Walker's denunciation of workers' rights has become a rallying cry for the entire Republican Party.
Here in Texas, progressives watched as Wisconsinites stormed their state capitol last spring to stand up for worker's rights. We cheered as Democrats won two special recall elections to the Senate last fall. Now we're excited to see the citizen-driven effort collect hundreds of thousands of signatures to force a recall election. Walker has been forced to raise over $7 million dollars to combat the effort, half of it coming from people outside of Wisconsin. There's no doubt that the 1% will fight tooth and nail to keep Walker in office.
Wisconsin organizers, what y'all are doing to kick out your failed Governor is inspiring to all of us here in Texas, who wish we had the ability to recall our own disastrous Republican, Rick Perry. We're happy to stand with you in your fight against policies that hurt working folks, and we're inspired by your effort to send a real message to Republicans who pursue rabid union-busting efforts.
Keep up the good work. As far as many of us at the rally today are concerned, the only person in Wisconsin who needs to lose his current job is Scott Walker!
The anti-choice movement is not about abortion, but then again, the pro-choice movement is not about abortion either.
Today marks the first day of 40 Days for Life, an anti-choice movement that began in College Station, Texas. In 2004 the Coalition for Life began protesting outside of the Planned Parenthood in Bryan, Texas for the forty days of Lent. Protest of Planned Parenthood is nothing new, however, this protest was held for twenty-four hours a day for forty straight days. Throughout the day and night protesters stood in front of the fence with their heads bowed, or stood on the sidewalk holding up protest signs. Over the last several years the 40 Days for Life protest have expanded to twice a year, and according to the web site has spread 212 cities throughout the United States and in two other countries. Word has spread through social networking sites, and also through church communities.
The Coalition for Life likes to characterize the protest as peaceful, and emphasizes the prayer and display of protest signs. However, protesters regularly verbally target patients, volunteer escorts, and Planned Parenthood employees. The medical staff that works at Planned Parenthood has regularly been targets of verbal abuse, and some of the staff has received death threats. The volunteer escorts, who walk patients from their cars and are there as a welcoming presence, are also targeted by the protesters. The moment that a patient opens their car door the protesters begin shouting through the fence, and giving false information about reproductive health care and Planned Parenthood. In the past the Coalition for Life has distanced themselves from actions taken by protesters at Planned Parenthood, and does not take responsibility for the actions of the protesters.
Bush's veto of the CHIP funding increase has really gotten some of us in Galveston County riled. Nick Lampson, one of our congresspersons voted yes. Ron Paul, of course voted no. So we are going to have a protest this Monday. The Daily News will be there to cover it. I want to invite everyone to join us if you can.
I am a lifelong Democrat who used to be excited about Kinky Friedman. He seemed intelligent and charismatic. I agreed with many of his written positions. I saw a vote for Kinky as a symbolic finger-lifting gesture to the establishment. Let’s stick it to the man. But after meeting him in person and seeing the candidates debate, there is something hinky about Kinky that has changed my mind.
Politics is about people. A good governor has to be able to work with peers and manage subordinates to have any hope of keeping campaign goals and promises. These people skills are especially important for an “independent” governor who cannot use the stick of party discipline when carrots fail. Such a governor has to be an exceptional communicator and committed to reaching out. Kinky is not.
Kinky is about himself. When I met him in person, it was by happenstance in the Lubbock airport. He was with one other fellow, waiting for a plane. I introduced my family. He did not introduce his companion. We chatted. But it was weirdly like a private stand-up performance. He was cute. He was funny. But he was performing, not relating. He was acting; it was surreal. I just put it down to a long day of campaigning.
The gubanatorial debate solidified my doubts. Kinky defended his careless comments about Katrina evacuees by basically saying that “words don’t matter” and that he was just being “realistic.” What bull. Kinky’s whole career—as a songwriter and jokester—is about words. He knows better than most of us how much words matter. But they matter in a different way to a performer than to a governor. Performers entertain, governors explain. Performers enrage, leaders engage. Performers joke, politicians stroke. Especially in Texas, where the governor has far less actual power than in other states, words matter. Words that are “realistic” to one group may be fighting words to another. A governor has to deal with that. While the Kinkster uses words really well as a performer, he does not seem to understand how to use words as a leader or collaborator.
Worse, Kinky does not even respect those who support him. He showed this during the debate when he called his campaign staff a “small, young, rather irritable group of people.” He said “several” African Americans were in this small group, but when asked to name one, he fumbled, finally fishing out a single first name. He could not even come up with a full name. Even a protest leader must be a leader. What kind of protest is it to vote for a fellow who does not even care enough to know the names of his most dedicated supporters and publically disparages them as “irritable”? I do not want to vote for someone so arrogantly into himself.
Kinky’s remarks reveal what is hinky: he does not care. He does not care about people, about reaching out, about the issues, about his own supporters, or even about sticking it to anyone. It’s all about him. It’s fodder for future routines. He’ll probably write a book and a couple of songs.
If I am wrong and Kinky is serious about winning, then I seriously question whether he has the people skills to govern. But if I am right and Kinky is just larking around, then a vote for him is meaningless. It’s not a protest vote. It’s an ego-stroke. Either way, while I do not mind casting a protest vote for a losing candidate, I refuse to cast one for a loser.
During the rally, organizers, including Becky Moeller, President of the Texas AFL-CIO, at right, reminded the crowd of Scott Walker's close relationship with the Koch brothers, conservative billionaires who fund right-wing and conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation, Americans for Prosperity, and organizations linked to the Tea Party. The crowd chanted back, "Show me what plutocracy looks like!" "This is what plutocracy looks like!" Scott Walker's administration is certainly what the plutocracy looks like: he serves the leaders of massive corporations that care more about executive profits than their workers. Rather than helping to grow the middle class and give more Americans a chance to these folks push for policies that widen our income inequality and force working families struggle to get by with less and less.
