Union leaders in Wisconsin guarantee concessions from their members if employers will just let them keep a seat at the table

By most estimates another 40,000 public sector workers, students, parents and supporters swarmed Madison Wisconsin Saturday in opposition to the Wisconsin governor's assault on public sector workers.  I say "assault" because I am not exactly clear on the what the majority of the demonstrators are against.  I know what the Union officials and their friends in the Democratic party want to be the focus of the protests.  They want the issue to be about one thing and one thing only; collective bargaining rights. This means the right of an employee organization to negotiate with the employer on the issues of wages hours and working conditions.

The governor of Wisconsin is introducing legislation that will take this right away. He has also threatened to call out the National Guard if workers take any job actions to prevent this.  This attack on public sector workers' rights is part of the general assault on workers by US capitalism.  The auto workers, who once set the standard for what meant a decent and secure life for American workers have had their living standards savaged by the auto bosses with the help of the leadership of the United Auto Worker Union.Wages have been cut in half in some areas with massive job losses and layoffs in others.

Fresh off this victory, the bosses are now after destroying the livelihoods of the public sector workforce and the top leaders of the public sector Unions are helping them.  This can be no clearer than the comments made by top public sector Union officials made in Wisconsin in the last few days. (see previous blogs)

There has been an incredible rank and file opposition to the Wisconsin governors plans as thousands of public sector workers have taken to the streets to defend their rights.  Such numbers have not been seen in the US in 50 years. This frightens the Union leaders who are in complete agreement with the bosses that their members have to make concessions.

The Union officials are defending collective bargaining rights because their social status comes from being able to sit down with the employers at a negotiating table. Without such rights, they have no social power.  So they are doing what they can to ensure that the only demand that the unprecedented movement that has arisen in Wisconsin makes, is that they get to sit down with the boss at the negotiating table. As for their members' wages hours and working conditions; they have no qualms about giving them away.

In the video above, the speech by the president of the Wisconsin State Employee Association Council is primarily directed at the employers. She lets them know that she is "the child of a small business owner" appealing to the small capitalists. 

She says that it is "Tough times for  Wisconsin".  She appeals to the employers and the politicans that represent them, saying "We are doing our part to help the state recover." But it is not "tough times" one only has to read the Wall Street Journal to discover that.


She pleads with the bosses, ingratiates herself further, assuring them that "This is not about protecting our pay and our benefits, it is about protecting our right to collectively bargain."

What nonsense.  What is the point of protecting your right to "collectively bargain" if you are not bargaining for a better life?  All we are defending here is the right to give away our livelihoods.  This Union official goes on to talk about the "Third grade teacher who stays late to help her students with their math".  Well why should she not be paid?  Why should a teacher stay late and not get paid?

It's not about money?  Why not? Money for wages, money for school supplies money for education money for living.  Of course it's about money.  It's about money for the CEO's and  the hedge fund managers, 25 of whom made $15 billion between them in 2006, and it's about money for the defense contractors.  Why shouldn't it be about money for teachers and other public sector workers?  Money is important for all of us, it pays the rent. What is this nonsense that its not about money? Warren Buffet isn't ashamed to say its about money and he as $55 billion of it.

The speaker calls people to come to Madison to put pressure on the bosses. And what for?  Concessions.  "We have been open to concession and solutions since before this was brought forward last Friday" she assures the bosses.  But the bosses are very confident that the Union leaders will not fight back and refuse to bend. They are "not listening" the exasperated Union official says, they are "not willing to engage". She appeals to workers to come to Madison to pressure the bosses to allow the Labor leaders to negotiate concessions, to negotiate the demise of their members' standard of living that took a century of heroic struggle to win.

This is what is classically called a sell out. The Union leaders from the heads of the AFL-CIO on down are orchestrating yet another defeat.  The movement is ahead of them, the anger is expressing itself. They have to contain it, render it harmless and send people back to their homes. They must  exit this with a defeat that they will describe as a victory and keep their seats at the table.

A defeat seems most likely. Union members, students and their allies have mobilized in numbers not seen in half a century to ensure that the Union officials can meet with the boss to cut their pay and benefits and weaken Union power on the job.

I am not on the ground there and I hope that this is not the case.  There are dangers when a movement arises and workers begin to find our feet.  This movement, like the uprisings in the Middle East, can get a life of its own, can break the stifling hold that a conservative leadership can have on the members.  In Wisconsin today, there were counter demos led by the Tea Bagger crowd and conservative groups like Americans for Prosperity funded by the billionaire industrialist brothers David and Charles Koch, our enemies are more resolute in many ways.

As workers are facing this frontal assault by big business, trade Union leaders like the woman in the video above are offering our livelihoods to the employers on a platter. They are the enemy within; there is no other way to describe it. 

The protests in Wisconsin could be the beginning of a movement that can can reverse the decline that US workers have faced over the past period due to the Union hierarchy's  collaboration with the employers' agenda. Let's hope we have learned some hard lessons; we are fighting  a war on two fronts; one against bosses who are our main enemies, and the other against the concessionary policies of our leadership.

Thousands of workers in the streets of Madison is a good start; we shouldn't let a good crisis go to waste.