In Boston yesterday union members came out to protest in support of the public employee unions of Wisconsin. I am not really sure why they feel it accomplishes anything to stand out in the cold and demonstrate a lack of basic economic intelligence, but they seem to have nothing better to do. I really don’t think these people realize that to those of us paying ever-higher taxes to support the public sector's plush lifestyle, the union protesters might as well have a cone hat on saying “Dunce”. They really don’t have an argument to make, so they throw out non-sensical statements.

Here are some great ones:

“Walker said his plan is needed to ease a deficit that is projected to hit $137 million by July and $3.6 billion by mid-2013. But union members pointed to the billions spent on bailing out Wall Street banks that went on to award bonuses to their employees.”

Um, Governor Walker, in Wisconsin, had nothing to do with bailing out Wall Street banks. It’s a complete non sequitur. Wisconsin is broke because of the public sector unions, not because President Obama bailed out Wall Street.

Here’s another great one:

“This war is about everyone in the middle class. ... If (Walker and his supporters) claim to love this country, why do they hate democracy?”

Hate democracy? Where does that come from? An election is held, the Republicans win, the Democrats flee the state, and somehow it’s Governor Walker that hates democracy? Really?

I am still waiting for one of these union morons to make an intelligent argument as to why public sector employees should be making so much more than their private sector counter-parts. If a private sector union demands too much from their employer, the employer goes out of business. If public unions demand too much, the tax payer just keeps on paying.

The unions fund the Democrats into office, the Democrats return the favor by giving public unions big pay and big benefits, and the unions funnel that money back to support Democrats. Nice cozy circle of support going there, right up until the state goes broke.

Here’s another quote:

"This is a fight about this country,” said Ben Wikler, 30, of Madison, Wis. “If we lose in Wisconsin, other states are next.”

I would argue that other states are next whether Wisconsin escapes the unions or not. There simply is no money to keep the cycle going. But if Wisconsin CAN slip out of the union noose, it will certainly give encouragement to other states to do the same. Massachusetts is too much in the union bag to lead the revolution, and will likely be one of the last to wake up. But even in Massachusetts, economic reality will eventually assert itself.

This is what I'm taking about!

It appears the Massachusetts tourism office was asleep at the switch - Rockford Illinois beat us to those tourism dollars.

Tourism Opportunity being missed!

Massachusetts is missing a golden opportunity to bolster tourism. What the state should do is run advertising in Wisconsin and Indiana and any other state with a Republican Governor and offer a place of respite for state Legislators that find they must flee their home state to avoid, well, legislating.

It would be a perfect match – Massachusetts is as left-leaning as you can get, I am sure Governor Patrick would welcome the fleers with open arms. They could attend a sporting event, experience some wonderful Italian food in the North End, visit some museums. And we certainly have history to show, just send them off down the Freedom Trail and show them Boston as the cradle of Democracy. Oh wait, sorry, that would certainly be in bad form. But I’m sure we could put together some tours that do not remind our visitors of the Democracy from which they are fleeing. I think it could drive a huge increase in tourism dollars (at least in the short term, I expect the number of such fleeing Democrats will decline with each election).

We could run with the tag line “Democracy got you seeing red? Flee to where the politics are blue!”

I think it would be a huge winner! Now, if we can just figure out how to get our State Legislature to flee to Rhode Island….

The Tipping Point

There comes a moment when the apple cart that looked so solid suddenly gets tipped over, and the path of history changes dramatically. We saw such events unfold in eastern Europe in 1989 when the Berlin wall fell, and then the USSR. We appear to be seeing it again in the Middle East, as one lone protester set himself on fire, and became the tipping point. A dictator in Egypt falls, and half a dozen other dictatorships appear on the brink, including Iran and Libya.

While international tipping points are likely to have significant long term consequences for the US, the more dramatic domestic tipping point is occurring in Madison Wisconsin, of all places. The voters in Wisconsin decided in November they had had enough of out-of-control spending, and they voted for a Republican Governor and a Republican Legislature. The effects of that vote are now materializing in the form of a significant effort by that Governor and Legislature to curb the benefits of public sector unions. Wisconsin is the tipping point, and everybody realizes that although the apple cart is wobbling, it still hasn’t tipped: the unions are shipping in protesters from around the country to support the status quo, President Obama has jumped in to support the unions, and the Tea Party is rallying troops in support of fiscal responsibility – to tip the public union cart over. Wisconsin is Egypt, and if the people can rise up and defeat public unions there, the revolt will spread to other states. The unions know that. With DemocRat legislators fleeing the state to thwart the will of the people, democracy is truly in the balance.

Massachusetts, once at the leading edge of political changes in the country, will likely be one of the last to throw off the public union tyranny, because the stranglehold is so strong here. But I have high hope that if the liberal bastions of the mid-west can succeed in their revolt, the forces of fiscal sanity will be in ascendance even here. If not, Massachusetts will continue down the path to irrelevancy, continuing to lose people, continuing to lose representation in Congress. So for the sake of the future of Massachusetts, support the forces fighting the public unions in Wisconsin any way you can.