Tuesday, March 10, 2015

Randy Bryce - International Man of Solidarity

The Independent, from across the ocean, did a story on Scott Walker's latest attack on Wisconsin working families.  Featured in the story is none other than our own Randy Bryce, Ironworkers Local 8:
Randy Bryce, 50, was high above a muddy construction site welding together steel beams when Mr Walker signed the law. He is among the Wisconsin angry. Just ask his family. It was last week when he was in a book shop in Caledonia, where he lives, when from the corner of his eye he caught his son, Ben, eight, letting fly at a book he’d seen on a table. It was a memoir by Mr Walker, the governor’s face on the front.

A member of Ironworkers Local 8, Mr Bryce called the Right to Work law a “blatant political attack” against him and other working men and women. Last week when hearings on the law were scheduled in the legislature in Madison, the state capitol, he took a day off to testify to senators. But the Republican leadership cut them short and he didn’t get the chance. The next day he took to the public gallery and gave them a piece of his mind. “You’re turning Wisconsin into a banana republic,” he yelled.

Mr Bryce, an Army veteran, was ejected by police that day, a symbol of the helplessness of the unions and the once mighty progressive left in Wisconsin to resist the conservative juggernaut that began rolling here in 2010 when Mr Walker won the governor’s mansion and Republicans took control of both sides of the legislature. “If someone had told me in 2010 all this could happen in Wisconsin, I’d have laughed in their face,” Mr Bryce mused this week. “And now it’s a reality.”

[...]

“States that have enacted this legislation have a 52 percent higher fatality rate among workers,” Mr Bryce asserted. His ironworking job is one of the more dangerous out there.  “One of thing the union stands up for is workplace safety and safety will be one of the first things to go, because it costs money.”

An option, of course, is to move to a different state. But that would never cross Mr Bryce’s mind. “I’m going to stick around for as long as it takes to get all those sons of bitches voted out of office.”
I was always proud to call Randy my friend and my union brother. Now, I am just more proud.

24 comments:

  1. Capper, with this Right-to-Wrong transition, and SKeW's presidential ambitions, it's time to update the "Recall" PNG, and start a vocal "Scott WaNker" meme while we're at it! This would make good T-shirts, yah?

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  2. There is no "book shop" in Caledonia. Well unless you consider the magazine aisle at Walgreen's or Pick N Save a book shop. That was some fabulous creative writing.

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  3. Is the other half of the country that has RTW a Banana Republic too?

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  4. Anonymous let's get technical here, You can't even put your name up when you sit here and bash a Man that is standing up for you and for everyone else in this once great state! All you can do is talk shit you make me fucking sick!! Why don't you just shut the fuck up if you have nothing nice to say. I hate people like you that all you are trying to do is "Divide and Conquer" like POND SCUM WANKERAND HIS KOCH WHORE CRONIES!!! Fuck off ASSHAT!!! Oh and by the way, my name is Christine Ballewske and I am not afraid to put it up!!!

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  5. Christine Ballewske,
    You claim Anonymous is bashing someone? Pot calling the kettle black?

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    1. The difference between me bashing you and you bashing Randy Bryce is that you deserve it, he doesn't!! You no name chicken shit!!

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  6. @Anonymous: "Is the other half of the country that has RTW a Banana Republic too?"

    Well, let's see:  • Is this also the same half of the country that's gerrymandered its Congressional districts so that even a Democratic popular majority vote will send a Republican majority delegation to Congress?  • That's tried to make it harder for likely Democratic voters (blacks, students, elderly) to cast a ballot?  • In short, trying to become a "One-Party Government" region?  • If the answer is "yes", then "banana republic" is a rather kind term for what we have growing here.

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  7. You Libtards are a whiny bunch. Both parties change the districts when allowed. You want different rules now? Have you looked at the USA political map? It's all RED. That's not because of district changes. That's because the American Public do not trust Liberals. Whos next after Hillary is deemed un-electable? Biden?!?!? LMAO Good luck with that!

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    1. Can someone translate this into English....and reality?

      Quick hint, empty land =/= people

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    2. Jake, as soon as anon used the word libtard you know he was getting his salivating rants from the Republican Coloring and Dot to Dot Activity book. As they would say "yawn".

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    3. You are confusing acres with people. Dirt doesn't vote, at least the kind that corn grows in

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    4. If acreage voted we would be in the second term of a McCain presidency, or, Heaven help us, the first term for President Palin.

      I don't suppose anyone has a link to a redrawn map of the US that represents the population of each state by it's size on the map? Preferably one that also shows how each state voted in the 2012 Presidential race? Just to give Anon 8:53 some idea of how that contest really turned out, and why.

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  8. @Anonymous: "Both parties change the districts when allowed."

    Up to 2010, the districts were not gerrymandered; the states' political delegations pretty much echoed the states' popular votes, which is how the parties kept swapping majority control of each House of Congress. In 2010, that changed.

    "Have you looked at the USA political map? It's all RED. That's not because of district changes. That's because the American Public do not trust Liberals."

    Actually, no, compare the geographical map to the population map, and you find, amazingly, that many of those big RED land areas still had populations that voted majority BLUE.

    But creative gerrymandering disperses a former district's majority into minorities among districts where the opposition is the majority — as happened to Milwaukee: "pie-sliced" into the urban "tips" of surrounding rural districts, so that urban voters are always a minority.

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  9. I would like to ask all these wanker supporters what do you do for a living ? Because if you say work for a living , how the fuck can you back a liar a cheat , a man who would sell his mother if it meant getting him closer to the White House . He is planning on selling the name to our national parks , what next ? The state ? If you answered your a working class then know this. He wouldn't invite you to dinner unless you were serving it ! Oh and my name is Tony mutha fucking Berrones a proud retired Teamster !

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    1. "what next ? The state ?"

      Well, it would have to be renamed Kochindustries (KI), wouldn't it? Milwaukee KI, Madison KI, etc.?

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  10. Dear Tony,

    You're a loser.

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    1. No Anon..you are the loser...and a rather unintelligent one at that. Frankly, you're not fit to lick Randy's boots. You're nothing but a troll and so much less.

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  11. Not enough blue to beat Walker in Wisconsin though? That statewide district is a tough one to win.

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  12. Walkers approval rating is the lowest in years. I know guys that backed him " no questions asked " are starting to ask questions. Why did he flip and say RTW was not a priority, and sat meekly by to watch it be rushed through? Why did he say jobs were priority one, then turn down thousands in Kenosha? Why did he try to ban ethanol from gasoline here, then go to Iowa and say he fully supports corn ethanol? He'll say anything to anyone just to get a vote. He'll sell you out in a second. Just watch.

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    1. Yep. Those people just realize they've been played for SUCKERS, and I bet they're none too pleased about it.

      Hate to say "We told you so," but now do you get what Randy and others have been saying about this guy?

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  13. Bryce is a hack who managed 38% of the vote. He's unpopular because what he stands for is unpopular. And he stands with you. Follow thehighlighted clues.

    And yes, "Christine" is certainly a hypocrite.

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    1. Anonymous: "Bryce is a hack..."

      It's obvious why you stay anonymous.

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