Situation in WI is a working class circular firing squad.

The popular sentiment for taking away the collective bargaining rights and pinning the blame for a state’s budget on middle and working class state employees is truly disheartening. It’s sad that the primary motivational factor hear is one working class group trying to eliminate rights and opportunities for another working class group. The idea of spreading the pain around is almost like hoping to make a desperate situation shared by everyone. Misery loves company I suppose.

Instead the middle class could choose to focus their energies on having the wealthy pay their fair share. The fact that the wealthy are being allowed to skate is really a sad commentary on the classist state of our society. By one group of middle class pitting itself against another group in the middle class rather than focusing that angst against the affluent is like accepting of the class divisions we have in the US. It’s like saying that the wealthy don’t have to make any sacrifices because they are superior to us, but we want the other members of the middle class to all have to suffer together. It’s really unfortunate to me that so many people are so supportive of a status quo of inequality.

This shouldn't be surprising. The Nazis had Jewish police to do their bidding. Every strike has its scabs. The revolutions in Egypt and Libya have their paid thugs. Right-wing paramilitary fascists in Latin America pull from the working class. The success of the Russian Revolution in 1917 depended on all the working-class armies of the world (particularly Germany) standing down. Didn't happen. (Although there was a general strike in Seattle in 1919 over the US sending troops and money to fight the Bolsheviks.)

Painful but true.

That sums it up pretty nicely too. Of course as readmoreoften pointed out in this thread, it's also classic capitalist strategy. They ALWAYS pit the non elites against each other in every way they can. Maybe I'm just being optimistic, but that doesn't seem to be working as well now as it used to.

We're late to the point, but we are still in an educate/agitate stage in a lot of areas and a lot of places. I think that race to the bottom is a pretty snappy way to answer this particular complaint. Ask if they want THEIR earnings cut to Bangladeshi levels.

union wages and bennies...but who would represent them? That would be the better way to get the rich to pay up. Corps are posting hugh profits and have $$$ socked away, don't tell me they can't AFFORD to pay more and give some bennies.