In many ways, Issue 2 is the same as other state and national arguments over government spending. Leftists work furiously to remind voters they’re saving us from the misery of smaller government, with the assumption we’re too stupid to realize their demands mean higher taxes.The We Are Ohio campaign is not about “middle class jobs,” but about an unsustainable status quo that’s made the unions rich. In a word, union bosses are charitable with taxpayer money. The graphic at left from The Buckeye Institute shows where this leads; orange indicates severe deficits, and red indicates worse.
Stripped of debates over economic forecasting and falling property values, is there any sense in We Are Ohio's position? Imagine living in a city - let’s call it Ohiopolis - with two churches running soup kitchens on opposite sides of town. Both churches have noble goals and similar financial resources.
West Church keeps things simple, providing basic lunches three days a week. The menu is soup, bread, coffee, and water, served in adequate portions. West Church has little trouble funding their soup kitchen. The congregation is happy to help the community but always mindful of their limited time and money.
East Church is more generous. Each day, the needy of eastern Ohiopolis are treated to a breakfast of organic fruit, fresh pastries, and free-range bacon. Lunch and dinner menus feature elaborate fish, chicken, and vegan dishes. Every month, East Church shifts more of its donations to the soup kitchen. The most well-off congregants are pressured to keep operations afloat.
How many hungry will East Church feed when they run out of money? Could you blame members for balking at unsustainable spending, or for leaving East Church to attend West Church instead? Promising the impossible doesn't show you care - it proves you're careless.
Though it takes some serious faith to believe union talking points, We Are Ohio is not a church. Government unions get rich by forcibly taking dues from members, and get away with it by demanding benefits taxpayers are forced to pay.
We Are Ohio acts appalled that taxpayers expect government employees to pay small portions of their health insurance & retirement costs. We Are Ohio claims it’s “unfair” and “dangerous” to consider merit when distributing raises or making cuts. Is it fair or safe to drive Ohio’s businesses and citizens away with smothering taxes to fund unsustainable government?
Follow me on Twitter: @jasonahart
Cross-posted at that hero.
Extremely well said!
ReplyDeleteThe problem on the ground is that there is a group of voters who will swallow propaganda whole instead of doing the responsible thing and research the issue before voting. These are the reason we have a Marxist in the White House.
Articles like this can only help in correcting that situation. Thank you!
Missing in this diatribe... Any evidence that under existing collective bargaining laws, public unions refuse to make concessions to help governments deal with deficits. And that's because they do.
ReplyDeleteAs evidenced by the concessions made during the Strickland Administration. Countless school districts and cities, etc.
Why are these school districts facing deficts? Because the Kasich budget took over a billion in funding away.
Nothing says "I'm not fooled by propaganda" like calling the President a Marxist.
ReplyDeleteGuy, do you even know what a Marxist is, Or are you just spewing what Glen Beck tells you?
ReplyDeleteYeah Modern, a handful of face-saving concessions that nudge the needle from "Insanely Unaffordable" to just "Outrageously Unaffordable" are the answer!
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry Governor Kasich didn't balance the budget as the Plunderbund Pals would have liked, with a passenger rail boondoggle and tax hikes sending even more taxpayers fleeing south. That must be really tough for you to cope with.
Imagine living in an Ohio that doesn't need soup kitchens because all of it's citizens are paid a fair wage for a fair days work!
ReplyDeleteAnd teachers, firefighters, Ohio trasportation workers and prison workers are respected and valued.
Isn't that the kind of Ohio we want our children to be lucky enough to live in? Or do we want to back to the times when people were looked upon and expendable by the rich companies they worked for? Unable to request decent and safe working conditions?
I know it is hard for Ohio farmers - but does everyone have to pulled down to the worst workers situation before we see we are headed the wrong direction?
I would rather pay more taxes and have happy teachers and state employees - I would rather see Ohio's school children supported in their jobs - the jobs of keeping up with the rest of the world and keeping America free -- by being smart/well-educated.
Imagine living in an Ohio that doesn't need soup kitchens because all of it's citizens are paid a fair wage for a fair days work!
ReplyDeleteYes! Because if government employees have to pay a small amount of their health care and retirement, like everyone else, they'll have to eat at the soup kitchen!!
Or do we want to back to the times when people were looked upon and expendable by the rich companies they worked for?
Curse those rich school districts!! Damn those rich villages!! They just want to screw public employees to make their...uh...citizens...RICH!!!
Please read modern's "contribution" carefully. The rhetoric is interesting.
ReplyDeleteToday's liberal/Democrat playbook play is, wait for it, concession! Let's translate that: the unions, seeing that the taxpayers are somewhat miffed at the moment, will deign to deny themselves just a tad of the gravy pouring forth until the taxpayers aren't quite so angry with them. Then, of course they will return to suckling the public nipple with the gusto that got us in the situation to begin with.
Just imagine the nerve of Kasich! Turning down an offer from the all powerful unions! An offer that has NO force of law. so if tomorrow the unions change their minds, oh well.
Oh and modern, a prominent attorney recently called Obama a Marxist on a very popular radio talk show. When you have the same following as Mark Levin, get back to me with an opinion about anything.
Obama is as Obama does. And Obama does as a marxist. The shoe fits boy. Wear it and be quiet about it.
Now the talking points offered by anonymous:
What we have here is the return of the son of "do it for the children". Anonymous asks us to envision an Ohio where the taxpayers are so in love with the civil servants that they beggar themselves so that these civil servants can live better.
I hardly think so.
And soup kitchens? Really? When the largest healthcare problem faced by America's so called poor is obesity we are in no danger of starving anyone. In fact the folks most likely to be scrimping right now are the working taxpayers who haven't seen raises in years while the civil servants get just about everything for free. I wonder how many wives of prison guards are prowling the aisles at Dollar General, like I am.
And the left can't have it both ways. If the unions are the only thing standing between the line employees and sweatshop conditions for poverty wages then we have no need for OSHA, the NLRB, the minimum wage and a host of other expensive and unproductive government programs. Let's pull the plug on all of that and let the unions guarantee safe, clean working conditions and adequate wages.
My respect is earned, not given. I have no respect for ohio's teachers. They are just plain greedy. Ditto the prison guards. The firemen I respect because they are in a profession that self selects for people willing to do their duty on behalf of others. This doesn't mean I'm willing to live without so they can have luxury though.
What the lefties just can't understand is basic human nature. People ask only two questions, but they are important ones: Is everybody else working as hard as I am? How does my pay compare to others doing the same amount of work?
When we see civil servants doing the minimum yet getting paid the maximum our human nature kicks in. When we realize that the civil servants got this deal through out right bribes to elected officials we start boiling the tar and gathering the feathers.
Hey modern, the civil service chickens are about to come home to roost. Don't like it? cry in the general direction of Revernd Wright.
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