Showing posts with label michael moore speech in Madison. Show all posts
Showing posts with label michael moore speech in Madison. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Wisconsin -- Live Podcast Inside Madison Capitol State Building and Reactions to the Vote in Madison..

By Kathleen


Protesters sleep in the Madison Capitol Building -- photo from twitpic taken by News3David click on the link for more.

++++++++++++++++++

In "Experimental America", and in direct defiance of the State of Wisconsin's Open Meetings Law, Scott Walker today had the audacity to remove all the fiscal material from his Budget Repair Bill which will affect the rights of state employees to collective bargaining and split it in two. The non fiscal part of the Bill (the anti union part) was then passed through the Senate without any Democratic representation. The Bill passed 18 votes to one and the one Republican dissenter, Senator Dale Schultz, issued the following statement:

Senator Dale Schultz
www.senatordaleschultz.com
For release March 9, 2011
Contact: Dale Schultz 800.978.8008

Senator Schultz Statement on Budget Repair Bill Vote

“As someone who as spent the better part of the last four weeks working toward and
hoping for a compromise, this is a difficult night.

I’ve had the honor and privilege of representing folks in Southwest and South Central
Wisconsin for 28 years, and where I come from ‘compromise’ isn’t a dirty word.
I’ve received tens of thousands of emails, thousands of phone calls and letters, and spent
hours meeting with thousands of citizens in my district. I’ve heard personal and heartfelt
stories of friends and neighbors, and they ask for just two things.

First, be inclusive by listening and working with your colleagues on both sides of the
aisle to reach a compromise which addresses our fiscal crisis. Second, public employees
are willing to make sacrifices on things like wages and benefits, but we need to preserve
collective bargaining as a tool which has helped keep labor peace in this state for
decades.

Ultimately, I voted my conscience which I feel reflects the core beliefs of the majority of
voters who sent me here to represent them.

I look forward to working with my colleagues in the days ahead as we now need to join
together to work through what promises to be a difficult budget.”

- 30 -

Senator Schultz is a Republican from Richland Center representing Wisconsin’s 17th
State Senate.

The Bill now has to go before the General Assembly tomorrow.

I think that the biggest question surrounding Walker's latest tactic is just why did he have to rush through the non fiscal part of the Bill? Walker has stated that the Bill was a budget repair bill directly related to the State's finances. The non fiscal part does not affect the State finances.

Protesters inside the building have been asked to leave as the session has now closed. It looks as if there will be a stand off as the protesters are determined to stay the night.

UPDATE:
More reactions to the vote in Wisconsin yesterday

Watch live streaming video from theuptake at livestream.com

UPDATE:
Rachel Maddow addresses the "nuclear option" employed by Scott Walker in Madison yesterday.

Rachel Maddow and Michael Moore discuss the "desperation move" by Scott Walker in Madison last night.
Part 1
Part 2


at
Labels: , , , ,

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Open Post -- Michael Moore's powerful speech in Madison: "America is not Broke" - UPDATE: Pictures from Sacramento

I will post late tomorrow evening -- we need a little break and will attend a parade on Sunday which should be a lot of fun.

Michael Moore gave a speech in Madison today entitled "America is not broke." His view is that money is in the hands of the wrong people ie the "bankers and the super-rich."

Here are some great photos from Michael Moore's speech today in Madison...



...and the video of his complete, very powerful speech, in which he pulls no punches:


Excerpts from Michael Moore's speech:

America is not broke.

Contrary to what those in power would like you to believe so that you'll give up your pension, cut your wages, and settle for the life your great-grandparents had, America is not broke. Not by a long shot. The country is awash in wealth and cash. It's just that it's not in your hands. It has been transferred, in the greatest heist in history, from the workers and consumers to the banks and the portfolios of the uber-rich.

Today just 400 Americans have more wealth than half of all Americans combined.

Let me say that again. 400 obscenely rich people, most of whom benefited in some way from the multi-trillion dollar taxpayer "bailout" of 2008, now have more loot, stock and property than the assets of 155 million Americans combined. If you can't bring yourself to call that a financial coup d'état, then you are simply not being honest about what you know in your heart to be true.

And I can see why. For us to admit that we have let a small group of men abscond with and hoard the bulk of the wealth that runs our economy, would mean that we'd have to accept the humiliating acknowledgment that we have indeed surrendered our precious Democracy to the moneyed elite. Wall Street, the banks and the Fortune 500 now run this Republic -- and, until this past month, the rest of us have felt completely helpless, unable to find a way to do anything about it.

I have nothing more than a high school degree. But back when I was in school, every student had to take one semester of economics in order to graduate. And here's what I learned: Money doesn't grow on trees. It grows when we make things. It grows when we have good jobs with good wages that we use to buy the things we need and thus create more jobs. It grows when we provide an outstanding educational system that then grows a new generation of inventers, entrepreneurs, artists, scientists and thinkers who come up with the next great idea for the planet. And that new idea creates new jobs and that creates revenue for the state. But if those who have the most money don't pay their fair share of taxes, the state can't function. The schools can't produce the best and the brightest who will go on to create those jobs. If the wealthy get to keep most of their money, we have seen what they will do with it: recklessly gamble it on crazy Wall Street schemes and crash our economy. The crash they created cost us millions of jobs. That too caused a reduction in revenue. And the population ended up suffering because they reduced their taxes, reduced our jobs and took wealth out of the system, removing it from circulation.

The nation is not broke, my friends. Wisconsin is not broke. It's part of the Big Lie. It's one of the three biggest lies of the decade: America/Wisconsin is broke, Iraq has WMD, the Packers can't win the Super Bowl without Brett Favre.

Bill O'Reilly believes that Michael Moore is a crazy socialist who is dumb because he is suing the Weinsteins because an independent auditor found that they had re-routed millions of dollars belonging to Moore. I'd love to know what O'Reilly would do if he were to find out that he had been cheated out of millions of dollars.



Treat this as an open post.

+++

Please re-tweet:



UPDATE:

HonestyinGov took the following photos in Sacramento last Saturday at a demonstration in support of the protesters in Wisconsin. He has kindly given us permission to post them here at Politicalgates. Thanks a lot, Honestyingov!

These photos remind us that citizens all over the USA are taking to the streets to protect the collective bargaining rights of themselves and others.

Special thanks also to GinaM for helping make the photos available.

Click on the photos to enlarge them.












at
Labels: , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)