I wish I was in Michigan today

The Right to Work legislation is being taken up for final passage today. As of 6AM, when the State Capitol doors were unlocked, people were already lined up to get in.


This is legislation that will put an end to "closed shops" where people are forced to join the union in order to work there. It doesn't abolish unions (like some of it's detractors are screaming), it merely says that from now on, union membership will be voluntary and each employee will be free to decide for him/herself whether or not to join and write those checks to the union fund. Unions naturally fear a dramatic loss in revenue from workers who don't feel that they need or benefit from a union or who don't want to see their dues turned over to one political party--the Democrats--every election. The Republicans, who control the state's legislature, support this, and the Democrats, predictably but hypocritically, oppose it. Scott, over at Providentia, nails it when he points out that the Democrats always claim to be about "freedom to choose" when it comes to choices like abortion or other "lifestyle choices" like homosexuality, but here they actively fight against allowing citizens to decide for themselves whether or not to give money to Union, Inc., just because said union has established itself in whatever business that they wish to work in. Clearly the Democrats' so-called love of "freedom for the little people" takes a back seat to their desire for union campaign money every election, and they know that if the unions can collect less money, they'll get less union money next election cycle.

The Republican Governor Rick Snyder has been out there front and center, making this an issue about employee freedom, (And it's about time that we see the GOP talking about such concepts again.) and the unions and their Democrat puppets have no arguments against that position so they are resorting to the old tricks that they always use: personal attacks against any supporter or employee who is in favor of it, coupled with lots of screaming and threatening, property damage and assaulting behavior. The Democrat/union message is clear: Give us what we want or we'll disrupt everything and cause holy carnage and make you regret it.

And it's already started. 8 of them were arrested at the Capitol last Thursday for attacking police and charged with felonies by prosecutor Stuart Dunnings, no friend of any Republican.
Meanwhile, other union drones are training for "civil disobedience" and planning to create havoc, even it it means that they get arrested.

Shunya Cleveland is a long-time union supporter.

"I've supported the Detroit Federation of Teachers, UAW, Uniroyal and now AFSCME," said Cleveland of Sumpter Township. "This is just wrong. Isn't that our building up there in Lansing? Don't we support it with our tax dollars? We are going to throw barricades around that building.

"I'm going to jail today!"

Such selfishness. Union members are only 17.5% of Michigan's workforce, which means that lots and lots of other workers and taxpayers who are not union drones own that building, too. But then again, unions have always been about creating tyrannies of the minority, so this is really no different than what they usually do at work--demanding that their point of view be the only one heard or considered.

Thousands of protesters are expected at the Capitol today, many of them riding buses provided by the unions. I, of course, point out that this is a work day and most of these thugs, goons and drones are supposed to be at their jobs, but apparently the need to actually show up at work takes a back seat to a desire to ape around screaming and threatening people on the orders of the union officials. So now we've got nurses abandoning their patients wholesale, and so many teachers have fraudulently called in "sick" that at least four metro Detroit school districts have canceled class. (Suck on that one, working parents.) Speaking as a taxpayer, I'd hope that school administrators require a doctor's note from each and every allegedly sick teacher, and I'd hope that the schools send investigators to the protests to try to identify school employees who are there instead of home sick where they said that they'd be, and then taking disciplinary action against those lying employees.

Oh, and union sheep? This isn't how you make your case to the rest of the citizens--by lying and skipping work. That just tells people like me that you personally are about as essential at your job as your union is.

But no matter how stupid, how loud or how violent the union-led animals get today, it appears as if it's already a done deal. Michigan's legislature, elected by the people, has voted and the man that Michigan voters chose as a governor has pledged to sign it, so barring anything un-democratic, Michigan will likely become the 24th state in the country where people are free to choose for themselves whether or not to give their money to labor unions.

I wish I could be there today to enjoy the spectacle, but I salute Michigan's pro-freedom legislature today and I relish the thought of both parties of the corrupt Democrat Party/Labor Union alliance getting a long-overdue poke in the eye.

Edited to add: Looks like the unions couldn't even muster enough of their own members to make a decent showing, so they've imported union thugs from states like Maryland, Missouri, Iowa, Indiana and Ohio. Remember that when you see the crowds, Michigan legislators. Remember that many of those gibbering, screaming toadies aren't even from your state. Then go in and do the right thing and pass this puppy!