Tags
Albert Einstein, apathy, Benton Harbor, corporate takeover, Einstein, GOP, integrity, Klok, manipulation, Michigan, Paul Snyder, politics, privatization, Republicans, Scott Walker, Tea Party, Wisconsin
Albert Einstein said that. What does it mean? Do you agree?
I do.
It seems that people today aren’t interested in making an effort to determine the truth for themselves, at least not when it comes to politics. Instead, they hear a catchy soundbite and take it as the final word on the matter. They don’t question it. They simply accept it. Granted, it’s much easier to see the world in black and white than it is to see it in shades of gray. When your world is black and white, everything and everyone is either all good or all bad. No need to worry about having to weigh pros and cons, the proportion and type of good versus the proportion and type of evil in order to make a judgment call about who you think is right and who you think is wrong.
That’s just too much work.
The danger in that, though, is that it allows for politicians to manipulate you into voting against your actual interests by either diverting your attention or outright misleading you about their intentions. After a while, you learn not to believe anything that any politician says. That’s fine. What’s not fine is believing that all politicians lie except when they give you a soundbite with which you agree. Or not looking past what a politician says to see whether that politician’s actions back up his or her soundbites and statements. When those two things have happened long and often enough, it gets to the point that some politicians don’t even bother trying to divert your attention or misinform you. And they get away with it.
Take what’s going on in Wisconsin, for example. Governor Scott Walker did not campaign on the issue of eliminating collective bargaining, so the voters voted for him without knowing that this was his intent. Even a conservative pollster recently reported that a clear majority of Wisconsinites (52%) supported collective bargaining. So why did he not mention this during his campaign? Because he knew that he wouldn’t win the election. He even admitted that it was a “bomb” during what he thought was a private conversation with one of his supporters. Doh!
If you actually looked at Scott Walker’s history, though, you’d see that lying, manipulating the press and others, violating rules and laws are par for the course. He will apparently do anything to make himself look good at the expense of the constituents. Well, the middle and low income constituents, anyway.
In Michigan, House Republicans passed a bill that allows Governor Paul Snyder to end existing contracts (including union contracts), “take over pension plans, reorganize departments, enter into agreements to restructure debt and dissolve or consolidate fiscally troubled towns and schools” by removing elected officials in cities and towns declared by Snyder to be in a fiscal crisis. The elected officials are then replaced by one individual.
This is actually better than the original bill, in which a firm or corporation could have been put in charge–literally a corporate takeover of local government. The other major compromise? A city or town can avoid the dictatorial takeover of their government “by entering into a budgeting consent agreement with the state and becoming exempt from collective bargaining agreements”. In other words, agreeing to crush the unions. And here’s an example of what MI has already done under the current emergency fiscal management bill:
Benton Harbor is the poorest town in Michigan and since last year its finances have been under the control of Joe Harris, the emergency financial manager appointed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm. Benton Harbor is already experiencing corporate-style restructuring. Jean Klock Park, the city’s public lakefront, has been leased to a non-profit associated with the locally headquartered Whirlpool Corp. and turned into an elite private golf course.
They took the public beach away from the public and turned it into an elite private golf course. How’s that for fair? They apparently did this in secret. If Republicans in MI had openly and honestly told voters that this was their plan, do you think they would have won? It’s highly unlikely. But because the voters weren’t looking past the promises to fix the budget in order to see how they were going to do this (by looking at what had already happened under the current emergency fiscal management bill), MI was able to steal a public beach right out from under them in order to give it to their wealthy peers.
Sadly, this terribly undermines the intent of the park’s wealthy donors, Mr. and Mrs. Klock, who donated the land to the city in memory of their deceased daughter, Jean. They wrote a letter to the MI government after deeding the lakefront property to it: Perhaps some of you do not own a foot of ground, remember then, that this is your park, it belongs to you. Perhaps some of you have no piano or phonograph, the roll of the water murmuring in calm, roaring in storm, is your music, your piano and music box…The beach is yours, the drive is yours, the dunes are yours, all yours. It is not so much a gift from my wife and myself, it’s a gift from a little child. See to it, that the park is the children’s.”
Unfortunately, the city willingly gave up the public children’s right to use the park so that wealthy golfers could use it for themselves.
So please, when considering the privatization of public (ie governmental) services, DO NOT forget: Public places and services MUST provide equal access to all citizens. Private places and services don’t. They can keep you, or anyone else they want, out. There may be more on this topic in a future post, but for now it’s just something to think about.
Get informed! Check out Politifact, Factcheck and Media Matters (an organization which monitors and analyzes the media).