Republicans continue to lie about the reason protest started~Wisconsin

[Pharaoh]

– August 9, 2011Posted in: Mass Media, Press

National GOP leader, Reince Priebus had this to say in an interview on CNN on the day of the Recall Election:

ANCHOR: Is there buyers’ remorse in your home state of Wisconsin with Republican/Tea Party policy making?

PRIEBUS: No. I don’t think there’s any buyers’ remorse at all. You have a leader in Scott Walker who asked state employees to pay just a little bit more in pension and healthcare benefits, which was about half of what the rest of the state pays in those benefits. And that’s all he did. Now, in reaction to that, the public employee unions took $25 million, they put together a petition drive, and now they’re dumping millions of dollars on television trying to recall the senators for trying to balance a state budget. It’s the same type of tough choice that was made in Wisconsin that the Republicans are trying to present to Americans in Washington.

In response, Greg Sargent of the Washington Post writes that Republicans have consistently falsified the reason labor and the Democrats have waged this battle so bitterly.

This is a completely false rendering of what actually happened. In reality, the protests from Democrats were prompted by Scott Walker’s proposal to strip public employees of their bargaining rights, protests that were later sustained by the deep cuts in his budget, leading to the recall drive. Priebus doesn’t even mention the collective bargaining piece of the story, only citing the demand for pension and health concessions as the reason for the entire standoff. In the real world, of course, labor unions actually agreed to those concessions, yet Walker pressed ahead with his union-busting proposal anyway, which is what prompted the whole battle.

Why do Republicans consistently lie about what happened? The answer, according to Sargent, is very simple:

The real reason Republicans and conservatives need to continue dissembling about what happened is that poll after poll has shown that the American people sided with public employees in this standoff, and don’t think their bargaining rights should be taken away. It’s fitting that the public face of the national GOP is seeking to elide this inconvenient fact and falsify the history of events in Wisconsin one last time on national television for all to see as this whole affair comes to its conclusion.


http://www.defendwisconsin.org/2011/08/09/republicans-continue-to-lie-about-the-reason-protest-started/

[Ruby the Liberal]

1. The only thing I hate more than greed is lying.

This stunt is the ace: Lying for the pure purpose of greed and power.

[Lifelong Protester]

2. Lies, lies, and more lies.

Wow. I'm glad I don't have to get through my day that way.