From my email inbox comes this little nugget (titled “Holiday Spirit”) from Tonette Walker, the wife of Republican Gov. Scott Walker:
Zach
Scott, Matt, Alex, and I wish you and your family a blessed holiday season.
While we may differ on how to address the challenges we face together, there are many things we share. It’s important to focus on those things, such as our sense of community and service to our friends and neighbors. The holiday season is a time of giving and rejoicing in the blessings we have as both Wisconsinites and as Americans.
Our family recently joined about 200 other volunteers to help prepare the Milwaukee Rescue Mission’s Christmas celebration. Our family is blessed to have so much to be thankful for and it is important for us to give back to those in need.
Here’s my response to Tonette Walker:
Tonette:
Thank you for your holiday wishes.
You’re absolutely correct that we differ on how to address the challenges we face in our state, because you and your husband seem to believe in an ideology that works to put more money into the pockets of corporations and the rich at the expense of so many middle and lower class citizens and families here in Wisconsin. The holiday season is indeed a time of giving and rejoicing in the blessing we have, but thanks to the ideologically extreme policies of your husband, far too many Wisconsinites are finding they can’t give as much and have less to rejoice about.
No doubt your family is blessed to have so much to be thankful for because your husband not only draws a healthy six figure salary from the taxpayers of Wisconsin, but he also received a raise earlier this year. Unfortunately, my family and I don’t have as much to be thankful for, because while your husband got a nice raise, he made sure to cut my take-home pay by thousands of dollars this year alone. If you and your husband were so concerned about “giving back” to those in need, I’d strongly encourage you to engage in an open, honest dialogue with just a few of the many middle class public employees who are now struggling mightily just to make ends meet thanks to the steps your husband has taken in the name of his political ideology.
Zach W.
Husband, father, and public employee
Taxes went down $10.00. Take home pay went down $5,000.
Over the last five years are property taxes went up over A thousand ,this year no increase. Thank you,gov Walker
You all quibble about the Governor making a little over $144,000 running our state and making some very tough decisions. What did Doyle do other than shuffle money around while continuing to funnel money to bloated special interests? And by bloated I refer to the obscene wages your union leaders and their surrogates rake in. McEntee’s $555,000 plus or his secretary treasurer Lucy’s $840,000.00. Whine and quibble is all you do. Get a job that produces something, or better yet, try starting your own business to rake in the millions and billions you all assume the evil employer is making. But no, we HAVE to have a recall election, one of many, because a government subsidized group that votes in their own graft has been asked to give back a SMALL portion of their income to fund THEIR retirement! It’s not like you’re actually giving the money to the needy or anything. You’re funding your own accounts. How terrible. You all sound like 2 year olds with your whining and quibbling.
So Bruce, are you opposed to all public jobs that don’t “produce something?”
Not at all. Some public jobs produce policy, others cleared roads or educated children. It seems to me that when you are employed by the public, and the public votes for change in the administration of payroll and benefits, you would abide by the majority decision of your neighbors rather than stammer and fume over the ball being taken away from you. You have another election cycle coming in which you may want to try and effect change. But of course, the greed of your leadership would not permit this. Your leadership is jumping all over the recall now in order to take advantage of the ‘mass’ indignation felt by its Wisconsin membership. You’re really just a bunch of puppets feeding the coffers of a national organization trying to protect its life blood- public money. You complain about the bogey men Koch brothers buying policy and feeding the rich. Your organization is no different, just feeding rich people who don’t produce anything other than antagonism and indignation.
That really could be the biggest piece of dribble i have seen since NOTALIB was here.
Drivel, not dribble.
Bruce, I won’t argue your point about how much compensation union leaders receive, because I do believe they’re compensated entirely too well.
However, let’s not forget that the folks that are affected by the policies of Scott Walker by and large aren’t making anything close to six figures. I’ve been a public employee for ten years, and I make under $50k per year for the job I do. While you’ve made it clear that you think public employees should just be happy with what’s happening to them, I’ll just point out that in my situation (and I can only speak for myself), I’m upset about all this because of the impact it has on my family. I live modestly, and all I want is to be able to take care of my kids, something that’s getting harder and harder to do as my take-home pay gets cut year after year. I’m fighting for my kids here; not for myself.
Zach, I understand whole heartedly your anxiousness for your kids and their future. I have a couple myself, probably earn about the same as you, and I enjoy the quality of life Wisconsin can show us. I do not brush off the concerns of public employees and their families. I started my business 20 years ago and still have apprehension over what Monday morning will bring. I have 6 employees and have not missed a payroll, though i’ve really had to scramble to do so. I pay them well but I can’t afford health insurance for them. We do have a small retirement program. Property taxes, UI insurance, 941 tax matches kill us and really hamper what I can continue to offer to my employees. I am afraid to raise their wages as then my tax rate climbs as well as my business workmans comp insurance rate. This has to stop. I want to continue to reward my employees and improve their quality of life, as I know most small business owners do. I’m sorry to see families impacted by government decisions which deminish their quality of life and make their lives more apprehensive. But Zach, that is what I and many in the private sector have been living with- well- forever. Zach, what is fair? Where can we go to get an equitable measure of what is fair in public policy. Perhaps you can understand why so many of the silent majority applaud the governor for DOING SOMETHING. But we certainly don’t like to see families like yours suffering. We’ve seen enough of that ourselves. By the way, silent majority reflects a very real number of people who have held their tongues over this whole recall business because they are in business and do not want to offend their good customers. Let alone having some union come along and picket their business. So we get testy and vent our frustrations in places wholley unexpected- like your blog. 😉 I wish you and your family the best in the future, and I guess we’ll see where this all shakes out.
What’s fair?
Is it fair that public employees have been demonized and financially punished for the poor decisions made by politicians from both parties? After all, Democrats alone didn’t create the mess we’re in – it was the combined effort of both parties.
One of the problems I have with Gov. Walker is that he’s gone out of his way to help foment the portrayal of public employees as the enemy of taxpayers, when the reality is we’re taxpayers just the same as everyone else. I pay sales taxes, income taxes, property taxes, etc. just like you do.
I’m also sick and tired of the whole, “public employees don’t produce anything” meme that you recited earlier. Sure, I don’t produce a tangible product, but that shouldn’t negate the importance of what I do to try to keep communities as safe as possible. I think you and I can both agree that safer communities are far more likely to be economically productive and vibrant, so in a roundabout sort of way my efforts to protect the community produce (hopefully) some economic benefit.
And here I thought Silent Majority stood for those small business owners and private sector workers who know that Scott Walker is unethical and incompetent and disagree with the full Koch brothers agenda, but are scared to speak up because they dont want to be attacked and boycotted by the extreme hate right talk radio and blogs:
http://bloggingblue.com/2011/12/21/thugs-threaten-boycotts/
Bruce,
Over 600,000 people are said to have signed recall petitions. The Wisconsin Constitution says this is enough to trigger a recall election.
You’re the one who is quibbling and whining.