Your modern-day Republican Party, as represented by Bobby Jindal wants to privatize the excellent state employees health insurance fund so that Jindal can spend its significant surplus in other ways. This will hurt state workers, but it's not like Republicans in 2011 could possibly care about that.
Sometimes, it's just hard to have hope for this country. Democrats continue to give and give and give on increasingly extreme Republican budget demands. The budget "compromise" was yet another huge win for Republicans, with the vast majority of cuts coming from traditionally Democratic programs. Obama has now embraced the absurd Simpson-Bowles budget proposal. Republicans are already demanding more cuts to raise the national debt limit, which I am sure they will receive.
Is there anything to be optimistic about in this country? Anything at all?
Meanwhile, here in Ohio, John Kasich and the Koch Brothers' budget begins to have its desired effect of impoverishing working people. In Pickerington, somewhere between 50 and 120 teachers will be laid off next year. I'm sure that those left will still be blamed for our kids not learning. And it seems that about 30 workers at the Job and Family Services Department in struggling Stark County (Canton) will lose their jobs. 1/6 of Stark County families receive food aid from Job and Family Services.
This is kind of liberal way of thinking about the country's past, but I wonder what things were like to live in the 1940s-60s, in the sense that people like me saw the country improving day by day. Of course, "people like me" means white dudes and I realize the complex history of that period and the problems of postwar liberalism.
But today, each and every day, this country gets worse. Everything I value in this nation, at least when it comes to economics, labor, environment, protection for women, etc., is falling apart. And it makes me want to cry.
The Republican Party--pro-life until the precise moment someone is born. Then they don't give a shit what happens to you.
Literally minutes after writing that post on Republicans wanting to bring back the Gilded Age, here's a story about a Missouri state legislator introducing a bill to eliminate child labor legislation.
This act modifies the child labor laws. It eliminates the prohibition on employment of children under age fourteen. Restrictions on the number of hours and restrictions on when a child may work during the day are also removed. It also repeals the requirement that a child ages fourteen or fifteen obtain a work certificate or work permit in order to be employed. Children under sixteen will also be allowed to work in any capacity in a motel, resort or hotel where sleeping accommodations are furnished. It also removes the authority of the director of the Division of Labor Standards to inspect employers who employ children and to require them to keep certain records for children they employ. It also repeals the presumption that the presence of a child in a workplace is evidence of employment.
By now, most of you have heard of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's threat to replace state workers with the National Guard if he can't unilaterally destroy worker benefits and create a right-to-work state.
I want to emphasize Walker's specific intent in bringing up the National Guard. Conservatives have done their homework. In their desire to recapture the plutocracy of the Gilded Age, they know how their ancestors crushed labor--through government sanctioned force. The Great Strike of 1877, the Homestead Strike of 1892, the Pullman Strike of 1894--these were all solved with state or federal violence. As Lila Shapiro wrote today, the last time a governor called out the National Guard to end a labor dispute in Wisconsin was in 1886 when soldiers fired into a crowd of unarmed picketers in Milwaukee fighting for an 8 hour day.* I don't know anything specific about this episode, but it was clearly related to the Knights of Labor-led struggle for that cause that ended with the Haymarket bomb.
Here's the thing--Republicans want Haymarket back. They want Pullman. They want Homestead. They want excuses to use the military to fire into crowds of protesters. Now, I don't think Walker is going to be successful. Unions and their supporters have come out in droves to protest Walker's actions. On the other hand, his extremist rhetoric may still force significant setbacks to state workers. For Republicans, those setbacks are but a step on the road to return America to 1886.
*Yes, I understand the irony of linking to an article about unions on a purportedly progressive website that treats its writers like academic adjuncts. I hate Huff Post with 12 shades of passion. But the article was good. So I link to it with this explanation.
By now, you've all read about the Texas State Board of Education's history standards that eviscerate any reasonable interpretation of American history in favor of right-wing talking points. I should be talking about this more. But plenty of people are reporting on it. And I am not good at expressing outrage. I think that's because very little that happens in this country actually surprises me. We could whole-heartedly embrace fascism in 2020 and I would not be surprised in the least. Mostly, I feel resignation about these things and want to move on to analysis and problem-solving.
Anyway, I do think these right-wingers are way overreaching. I don't know if textbook companies will actually conform to these standards. I certainly don't know what self-respecting historians will actually write these books, except maybe for these bozos. Moreover, by moving so far to the right, the Texas BOE has drawn unwanted attention to their agenda. The extremists have been voted off the Board, though they get to serve until the end of the year. I wouldn't be at all surprised if some of this crazy stuff gets overturned, if other states choose not to adopt these textbooks (even conservative states, given just how embarrassing most of these directives are), and if liberals strike back at this hard, ensuring that textbooks are something we pay attention to going forward and working to ensure legitimate interpretations of the American past are taught to our students.
Also, I'd really like to see the American historical establishment take a harder line against the Texas BOE than it has. Major organizations like the American Historical Association and Organization of American Historians have been far too quiet.
I am with Steve M. and against Paul Krugman in saying that Obama probably shouldn't expend his political capital on prosecuting Bush Administration officials. One or two perhaps, but not a lot. Like Steve, I think that prosecutions are going to expend Obama's political capital at the expense of actual issues. I know I'd rather he use that political capital getting us out of Iraq, pushing through policies on climate change, or expanding health care coverage.
Sure I'd love to see Dick Cheney die in prison. Who wouldn't? But is revenge worth the cost? I say no.
