Washington Times:
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker excoriated Democratic state senators on Sunday for “walking out on their job” in an effort to thwart his attempts to rein in unions, saying the missing lawmakers should return to the state Capitol in Madison if they want to participate in democracy.
The political stakes also escalated Sunday when the top Republican in the state Senate threatened to reconvene Tuesday and start passing bills in the Democrats’ absence.
Mr. Walker, who was just elected in November, said a proposal that would do away with most of public union employees’ collective-bargaining rights is essential to closing a $3.6 billion long-term budget shortfall.
“We’re broke,” Mr. Walker, a former Milwaukee County executive, said on “Fox News Sunday.” “It’s about time somebody stood up and told the truth, and the only way for us to balance the budget, not only at the state level, but at the local level, is to make sure we give those local governments the tools they need to balance the budget, and that’s what we’re proposing.”
Mr. Walker said the Senate bill, which would also require government workers to pay a bigger share of their health care and pension costs, would prevent layoffs of up to 6,000 state employees.
The measure has sparked a high-profile political showdown at the Wisconsin state Capitol, where thousands of union supporters and tea party activists have been bused in to protest against or in favor of it.
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While the union thugs are making an assault on government in Madison, Wisconsin, Democrats in the Senate and in the
White House are conspiring to shut down the US government rather than deal in good faith with the cuts that need to be made to runaway spending in the President's proposed budget. It is a cynical ploy to blame the shutdown on Republicans who are doing what they were elected to do.
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