Letters: Mention of Wisconsin National Guard doesn't bode well for workers

[Joanne98]

Our politicians were elected because ‘jobs’ were the focus of our latest election. The voters decided that a change was necessary to accomplish that. While we have seen no jobs created to date it is admittedly early on.

By contrast what we have seen is the most aggressive anti-worker legislation in decades introduced in our state. We have also been told by our leader that he has contacted the National Guard in case of an uprising. Wow! The National Guard?


The last time the National Guard was called out against public employees was 1968 in Memphis, Tenn., when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated while supporting the striking sanitation workers.


In Wisconsin, the last time the National Guard was called out was in 1934 against the strikers at Kohler Company in Sheboygan. Before that, the Woodworkers strike in Oshkosh in 1898 and the Bayview protest in Milwaukee in 1886 when workers were protesting for an eight-hour work day. Seven workers were killed on May 5, 1886, the darkest day in Wisconsin’s labor history.


I don’t believe that I am overstating the facts when I say our political leaders are declaring war on working families.


Our public servants are our friends and neighbors. We insist our streets are plowed, trash picked up, streets maintained, drinking waters clean, sewerage disposed of, prisoners locked up, taxes collected, streets safe, teachers deal with society’s ills in our schools and heaven forbid don’t make us wait for a bridge to open when we are boating during the summer.

http://www.thenorthwestern.com/article/20110215/OSH0603/110215040

[KansDem]

1. Amy Goodman pointed this out on "Democracy Now!" this morning...

Essentially, Gov. Walker is using the Wisconsin National Guard as strike breakers. Something really unheard of (she did mention the 1934 strike). But it really brought home what we are confronting in the country: when governors can use the state militia to put down strikes, then something is terribly wrong.

Another point is this: how many members of the Wisconsin National Guard are working as federal, state, county, and city employees? How many National Guard members are ready to go up against fellow public employees?

I don't think Gov. Walker has thought this through...