Obey: Wisconsin Gov. Walker Is Channeling Mubarak

[babylonsister]

Obey: Wisconsin Gov. Walker Is Channeling Mubarak
Susan Crabtree | February 17, 2011, 4:23PM


As Democratic legislators flee the Wisconsin state capitol in protest of Republican Gov. Scott Walker's proposed budget and its limits on bargaining powers for public employee unions, one of Wisconsin's most prominent progressive leaders is coming out swinging.

Former Rep. David Obey (D-WI), a 41-year veteran of the House, the former chairman of the Appropriations Committee and an icon in Wisconsin politics, assailed Gov. Scott Walker for engaging in "political thuggery" and accused him of channeling toppled Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak before his fall.

snip//

"I think what Gov. Walker is trying to do amounts to political thuggery," Obey continued. "It is one thing to say that these are tough times -- everybody's got to cut back and public employees are going to have to take cuts like the rest of us ... but he's using it as an excuse to gut the ability of workers to organize and bargain collectively. In my view that's outrageous -- and what is especially outrageous is his demand that the legislature pass this in a week's time."

snip//

"This is a brutal, cynical political power play, and I really believe the state of Wisconsin is not going to stand for this ...," he said. "What Walker is trying to do is to undercut one of the last vestiges in our economy that produces any kind of upward pressure on wages at all...

"If he succeeds in getting away with it, you'll see lots of people trying to follow suit in other places around the country. ... Are we going to return to the primitive, pre-Teddy Roosevelt way of workers being treated?" he fumed.

more...

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/02/obey-wisconsin-gov-walker-is-channeling-mubarak.php

[Lifelong Protester]

1. He can channel Mubarak, we'll channel the protesters.

[AnotherDreamWeaver]

2. RECALL Time. The last paragraph:

"We're celebrating what happened in Cairo because it represented the desire of the masses and average working people in Egypt to finally gain say so in the way they are treated," he said. " is pushing a reverse mission -- to deny basic, middle-class workers any ability to defend themselves economically. ... If the legislature supinely follows him with respect to taking away these bargaining rights, they've declared war on their own middle-class constituents and I would hope they would pay for it at the ballot box."

The next 'ballot box' it a long time away, why not "Grey Davis" him, start the recall petitions now.