Thursday, February 17, 2011

The Revolution is not being Televised

In Wisconsin roughly 30,000 protesters have swarmed the Capitol Building to protest Governor Scott Walker's all out assault on the rights of the middle class. This is the type of protest that gets coverage around the world, except here in America where it gets the briefest mention in the TV and Print News. This protest is larger in Wisconsin than the famous Haymarket Affair of 1886 that established the 8 hour work day and is celebrated as May Day.
For videos of the protest I've had to turn to one of my local bloggers The Hillbilly Report because no one in the MSM is covering it.

I want to say I am 100% in support of the protesters. What Scott Walker is doing is nothing less than an attack on 90% of Americans.

It is true that even at labor's peak during the Great Depression union membership was only 20% of the workforce, but that was enough to force companies to give their workers basic rights. The 40 hour workweek, grievance procedures, the right to refuse to do hazardous work and a minimum wage are all a result of union activism in this country.

As Scott Walker launches a direct attack against the unions in Wisconsin and has threatened to turn out the national guard on the unions, other Republicans have launched similar attacks on the middle class.

In Missouri they are trying to repeal child labor laws. In the House of Representatives they are trying to layoff all the inspectors for workplace safety and food inspection, and of course they want to take the $2.5 Trillion dollars that Social Security has in surplus and use it to finance the massive tax cuts for the top 2%.

The middle class in this country has already been under constant attack as this graph I got from Jobs Anger shows:

Now the GOP and wealthiest 2% are doubling down in an attempt to gut all the progress America has made in the last 100 years.

Right now the protesters in Wisconsin fighting back against this assault on middle class rights. Even though the corporate owned media is not reporting on it, I am hoping that this will lead to protests like in Egypt where the people were simply pushed to far and demanded their country back.

By Darrell B. Nelson author of Alien Thoughts

2 comments:

Greg said...

it is amazing that we are bombarded with the protests in Egypt, and yet we see or hear very little about what goes on in our country. Our leaders realize all to well the same thing could happen here if to many people realize what is actually happening.

It's outrageous to me that the taxpayers bail-out the banks, and yet most of the cuts in the budget are those that benefit the poorest that were hurt the most.

Darrell B. Nelson said...

In Wisconsin it is even worse, the state had a balanced budget until Walker came in and gave it away to special interests that supported him, then expects the workers to pay for it.
It's the kind of corruption we hear about from 3rd world countries.