Politics as budget policy

If you're following the situation in Wisconsin right now you're probably feeling a surge of emotion. Most likely you feel a surge of sympathy for the state workers who are unfairly being targeted as the source of all the state's budget woes.

Or you are excited by the crusading Governor who's going to reign in those unions and right the ship!

Well, hang on. Let me illustrate for you how this is nothing but a power grab and will do a little, but not much to help fix their budget.

First, this is nothing more than a chance to essentially destroy the unions in Wisconsin that primarily vote Democrat. By stripping unions of the power to collectively bargain on anything but wages, taking away their right to collect dues, and forcing them to apply for recertification every year they are pretty much saying "We want you to go away."

Interestingly enough, the police, firefighter and state trooper unions aren't going to be effected under this law. Those unions tend to vote Republican in higher numbers. Oddly though, those are the unions that also wrack up the most money in overtime as teachers and most state employees (outside of DOT employees and a few others) generally do no get paid any overtime at all no matter how many hours they work.

Second, this smacks in the face the Republican ideal of "people's rights to make decisions." There is no effort being made to go to the unions and work with them and letting the union's members speak. Its an all out assault on them, stripping away what was agreed too, rightly or wrongly, without actually attempting to work out the issue.

Remember back when everyone was upset the AIG bankers were still getting their multi-million dollar bonuses as AIG was bailed out. But Obama said that they couldn't break the contracts? Well, apparently Wisconsin has no such qualms. And this isn't about multi-million dollar bankers. This is about average everyday people. People who are being unfairly targeted by those jealous that the economic situation hasn't struck them as hard.

Are certain state contracts stupid? Yup. 30 years and then you can instantly start collecting your pension doesn't work. (Note, that's not teachers, who work as hard if not harder than pretty much anyone outside of law enforcement. They have to work between 35-36 years to get their full pension.) However, making radical attacks on these union contracts (and actually the unions themselves) with no attempt to negotiate is 100% political, because let's get to the numbers.

The Republicans claim that by doing this they will be saving the state 300 million over the next two years. Ok, that's nice, but the financial concessions are being accepted this goes way beyond that.

Let me put this out here: Wisconsin, Illinois, many states, and our federal gov't, are in ugly financial condition. The states even more so as they have fewer options on what to do about things.

The "budget cutting" in Wisconsin is every bit as much a political ploy as the Texas redistricting of 2003. However now, it directly effects people's lives, every day working folk, simply because a legislature wasn't able to control itself in the past.

Now, I'm not blindly pro-union. They too often are ancient behemoths, out of touch with reality. They need to reform themselves to the new way of the world. But we the worker NEED them. We need them as almost as badly as we did in the 30s. This blatant political assault on public unions is a BAD THING and sadly just another case of the two-party system utterly failing its constituency.

*Edit:Fixed a numbers mistake

Perspective

Now, everyone talks about a balanced budget, but here's a bit of real perspective on it.

From Chris Weigant on Huffingtonpost.com

Last year's budget, for instance, spent $3.55 trillion while it took in
$2.38 trillion, for a deficit of $1.17 trillion. [.....] Four items -- the
Pentagon, Medicare/Medicaid, Social Security, and the interest on the debt --
together add up to roughly the money the government takes in. Meaning that
everything else the federal government does would have to be cut completely --
zeroed out -- in order to balance the budget.

So, there you have it. And, umm, good luck trimming ANY of those significantly enough to make a difference. Old people vote.

"Big" Government

So, my brother has an interesting post on cutting government spending. Its interesting, and here's some of my thoughts on it.

Going off of the Havoc Pennington post, I suppose I'm more in the "cut government by 10-20%." I like the general ideals of libertarianism, but since I view man as naturally flawed, not naturally good (and very distinct from naturally evil) I can never truly support libertarians because I don't trust people enough.

I don't trust the government much either, but they tend to slow things down enough that nothing totally insane happens that often.

It would seem that 21% of the budget going to Defense/War on Terror is high, I personally would much rather see that at 10-15% with no Iraq war, but you can't turn back the clock.

But, as my dad points out, that's only about 1/3 of what is going to programs that only suck more money out of the system. That is the underlying problem of socialist styled programs. France is going broke over its healthcare/welfare/retirement system. Sarkozy has all but said that they can't afford to keep doing things the way they have been.

The problem with entitlement systems or government funded programs is as people live longer and longer, you get more people getting payed out and fewer paying in. It also doesn't help that Congress can't help but raid the "surplus" for things like Social Security as extra spending money. That it hasn't been legislated illegal is only proof of how completely screwed our government is.

Case in point. Listening to NPR the other day it was a story on how the SEC missed the AIG mess. Well, the SEC along with the Commodities watchdog have overlapping duties. But, they don't/didn't communicate well so AIG just played them off against each other. They were interveiwing an excongressman who said he tried to combine them, but the Agriculture committee chairman didn't want to give up the power (and money) from the position.

Why do I share this story? Because the system is broken. Since both parties get elected mainly to stay elected (and attempt to push through what their lobbyists pay them for) real change isn't going to happen.

Our political system, and many of the rulings on "free speech" pertaining to politics almost insures that any plans the government comes up with will eventually end up broken, bloated, and pandering to the rich and or corporately connected.

Don't get me wrong. We spend far too much money in this country as citizens and government. We're going broke. This isn't just our leaders fault.

What IS their fault is they are too interested in getting reelected and/or getting cushy high paying lobbying jobs down the line to do what is right, not what is politically convient or expedient.

The statement both sides want to spend 105% is true. And its going to bankrupt us and slowly push us to 2nd nation status.

Honesty with Deficits

I feel posty today I guess.

I was having an interesting discussion with my dad the other day on such things as the budget deficit, the bailout, etc. He was pointing out how with the deficits we will be running, added to the debt we have, there is pretty much no hope of ever getting the country out of debt.

I pretty much agree. But I might have a more fatalistic view then some people. Currently the talk is of how this debt will bankrupt our children and grandchildren. HAH! I laugh at you! I'm 29 and I fully expect to never see a penny of what I pay in social security. I just don't. I'm not planning for a future that relies on it. I just don't expect it to be there.

That is why I am not overly concerned with the massive deficits Obama's budget will be running. He's honest about it. He says we have to spend now to get out of this crisis. He might be wrong, but at least he is being honest that its going to cost a lot now.

A problem I have is the Republicans have now reared up and are whining about how much this is all going to cost. Now, I'm pretty sure they had the majority Congress AND the Presidency for 6 of the previous 8 years. During that time a modest surplus was squandered into the largest deficits we had seen until now.

Now, don't think I'm letting the Democrats off the hook because the previous 2 years they did nothing to stem the flow besides whine. And boy did they whine.

So, I guess what I'm saying is this: I believe we as a nation have been financially screwed for about the last 5 years. Do I hope to be proved wrong? Yes. But at least I'm expecting the worst to come.

And at least Obama is saying he's going to spend like a drunk sailor to "fix" this mess.