Fast Food, Fox News and Minimum Wage

Apparently Fox News is to news, what A Taco Bell Steak is to a Ruth's Chris Filet:

 From the Daily show!

Walker's Gaffe Within A Gaffe

Today the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Patrick Marley was all a-titter that Scott Walker made a Freudian slip regarding something that is old news - that Walker wants to be president:

Speaking to reporters at the National Governors Association in Milwaukee, Walker was asked
about the idea of Republicans trying to block the federal budget to halt the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.

“Right now I’ve got my hands full being governor. I’m not real involved yet at the – strike that last word – at the federal level,” Walker said to laughter.

Wisconsin’s Republican governor is named frequently as a potential 2016 candidate for governor, though Walker has largely downplayed such talk. Walker’s own response to his use of the word “yet” shows he’s aware of how his comments can be read when speaking on national issues.

This gaffe prompted a press release from Mike Tate, head of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, including a pretty good zinger:

Even as he denies it, everyone knows Scott Walker is running for president -- he’s never here to govern Wisconsin because he's too busy raising campaign cash at Tea Party gatherings all around the country. So it’s pretty ironic that Walker's Freudian slip came on a day he was visiting Wisconsin.”

But Marley's article contained a more subtle, but more significant gaffe.

Per the article, Walker went on to talk about Obamacare and Walker, predictably, took the insane, inane and wrong-headed approach:

“I’ll let them work that out for right now,” he said. “Obviously I have concerns on principle about he Affordable Care Act, not only in terms of the implementation, but I don’t think it’s good pubic policy to have the federal nor the state government dictate to me and my family what we do or what any other family in this state or this country does on health care. But I’d have to look at all the different options are going forward.”

It's odd that Walker would take that stance, since dictating what poor people did regarding health care was exactly what Walker was doing for the vast majority of his time as Milwaukee County Executive, when he administered the GAMP program:

The program was called the General Assistance Medical Program orGAMP for short. The best description I've found of GAMP, and the benefits it gave to its consumers and to the taxpayers, comes fromThe Commonwealth Fund (emphasis mine):

Wisconsin's General Assistance Medical Program (GAMP) provides health care coverage to indigent Milwaukee County residents who are not eligible for other forms of public coverage (such as Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program) and are not enrolled in private coverage. The county redesigned the GAMP program into a community-based primary care model in the late 1990s to achieve two interrelatedgoals: to provide increased primary care services, and to do so via community-based clinics. The new design was intended to improve effectiveness and efficiency of care. Prior to this, indigent patients relied on the emergency room of the county hospital, which created access barriers for enrollees and cost inefficiencies for the county. Under the redesigned model,GAMP enrollees select a participating clinic as their primary care provider, which is then responsible for providing andcoordinating services. The clinic coordinates specialty care for the enrollee by working with specialists and hospitals that participate in the GAMP network. The program covered a total of 24,000 individuals in calendar year 2003, with some 10,000 to 12,000 individuals enrolled at any given time. All in all, GAMP estimated that it saved $4.2 million in 2000 (in comparison to the projected costs had the previous system remained in place). Administratorsbelieve that inpatient and outpatient costs have been controlled largely through a Utilization Management program that ensures delivery of care in the appropriate settings and using appropriate resources.

In other words, the County designed and ran a health care system that limited people's choices by having to go through a community clinic first, and only if it was covered in the network. Yet, instead of leaving people without insurance and forcing them to go to hospital ERs, it saved $4.2 million. That's a big chunk of change for a relatively small amount of people.

Other descriptions of the program include the one from Milwaukee County itself and a report(pdf) from the state after the program just started. The County page calls the program as "nationally recognized." The state's report summarized the program with this sentence:

Inpatient hospital and specialty services constitute the majority of the GAMP budget
although, the program has successfully used primary care services provided in community based clinics and selective utilization management techniques to control and reduce inpatient and outpatient hospital costs over the last two years.

The only reason GAMP ended was because Governor Jim Doyle was able to expand BadgerCare to cover these individuals, taking the load of the county.

Given that he has experience running a government-controlled health care program and knows that it saves taxpayers money and provided affordable health care, there is no valid reason for Walker to reject it on a higher level.

In fact, the only reasons that Walker would have for turning rejecting Obamacare is that he is using the poor as political pawns (something he has done before) , pure malfeasance or both.

Cathy Stepp vs. Bambi: Round 2 - Overkill

The story of a DNR raid on a wildlife shelter in which no less than 13 officials needlessly killed a young fawn is not only disgusting but has now gone national, appearing in the Washington Times:

Two weeks ago, Ray Schulze was working in a barn at the Society of St. Francis no-kill animal shelter in Kenosha, Wis., when officials swarmed the shelter with a search warrant.

“[There were] nine [Department of Natural Resources] agents and four deputy sheriffs, and they were all armed to the teeth,” Mr. Schulze told WISN 12. “It was like a SWAT team.”

The agents were there to retrieve a baby deer named Giggles that was dropped off by a family worried she had been abandoned by her mother, the station reported. Wisconsin law forbids the possession of wildlife.

“I said the deer is scheduled to go to the wildlife reserve the next day,” Mr. Schulze told the station. “I was thinking in my mind they were going to take the deer and take it to a wildlife shelter, and here they come carrying the baby deer over their shoulder. She was in a body bag. I said, ‘Why did you do that?’ He said, ‘That’s our policy,’ and I said, ‘That’s one hell of a policy.’”

This is not the first time that Cathy Stepp has taken on Bambi. The first time had the same bloody and horrific results, but without the overkill in getting there:

The Unfortunate Reality of Act 10.

 

By Jeff Simpson

We warned you at the beginning.  Act 10 has been devastating to WI.  

First a look at ACT10 from Scott Walker's far right extreme point of view.

Scott Walker is delusional enough to actually think that if everyone had used his ALEC written agenda, that everyone would be thriving.

The Journal Sentinel says Walker likened his public union philosophy to that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, saying the former president felt "that there wasn't a need for collective bargaining in the public sector "because the government is the people."

Walker says if Detroit were in Wisconsin, Detroit wouldn't be declaring bankruptcy. And if Chicago were in Wisconsin, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel would be successful with his school reforms.

Contentious legislation passed in Wisconsin in 2011 repealed collective bargaining for most public employees

Apparently in Walker's fantasy land, public workers making a living wage was more costly to Detroit than the outsourcing of millions of jobs.

Say it with me, but wait - there is more!

As if Scott Walker has not done enough damage with ACT10 he is ready to expand it!

Two-and-a-half years after mostly sparing police officers and firefighters, Gov. Scott Walker said this week he is open to the idea of limiting their ability to collectively bargain.

Such a move would undercut the few unions where he has found support. The unions for Milwaukee officers and firefighters, for example, were among those that endorsed Walker in 2010 and in the 2012 attempt to recall him from office.

The problem with ACT10 is while it worked well for its intended purpose(which was to punish his enemy and cut funding to the Democratic Party), it has not worked out well for the people in Wisconsin who actually work for a living!  

John "Sly" Sylvester actually gave a forum recently to the voiceless in this fight.  The people who paid dearly for ACT10, the people who you see everyday who are struggling mightily while you sing the praises of your $20 tax cut.   The people who do not ever get a private audience or even within site of Scott Walker.  

These are the stories you need to hear!






 

Scott Walker: Unintimidated Part 3 - Vietnam Vet Edition

Scott Walker is in the business of giving us photo ops, which could be the picture on the front cover of his future ghostwritten autobiography.  He gave us option 1, option 2 and option 3 and today we have a video.

Will Williams has been a Madison resident for about 40 years.  Will Williams is a Vietnam Veteran.  Will Williams has received a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star.   Will Williams was 2nd Battalion, 27th Infantry Wolfhounds Vietnam U.S. Army, 1962-1970). When Will Williams was in Vietnam, fighting for our country, he watched his best friend die and sat overnight with his friends body in a bomb crater.  Will William's used to be full of hate and now fights for peace.  Will Williams is a person whose lifestory is so interesting that a documentary was made about his life. 

Today Will Williams was the guy the Capitol Police hand cuffed and arrested for singing peacefully in the Rotunda of the Capitol.  Today, Will Williams is the person who, while in the care of the Capitol Police, they let fall, handcuffed, down the marble staircase.     Will Williams is the guy, who while down,  the Capitol Police let stay down, and would not even afford him the dignity of uncuffing him.







Will Williams sat in the blazing heat of a jungle, on the other side of the world, and faced death practically hourly to defend the UNITED States of America.  Scott Walker flies around the country and attends $2500/ plate fundraisers and brags of his strategy of "divide and conquer".

Scott Walker will not let the death of a 15 year old child get in the way of his ambitions, so there is no way he will let a national hero do it either! 


Wisconsin deserves better.


Will Williams DEFINITELY deserves better!  

PS:  If you think this is bad, wait until you see what Robin Vos and Scott Fitzgerald have in store for Mr. Williams when he tries to vote next year!  

The Ghost Of John Doe Haunts O'Donnell Park

On June 24, 2010, the unthinkable happened.

In a tragic course of events, a concrete facade fell off o O'Donnell Park fell and landed on top of Jared Kellner, a teenager on his way to the opening day of Summerfest.  The slab killed him instantly.  It also severely injured another boy and amputated part of the leg of the second boy's mother.

Since it was opening day, both Mayor Tom Barrett and then County Executive Scott Walker were at the Summerfest grounds when the tragedy occurred.  Barrett went straight to the site when he was informed of the incident and gave free reign to his police chief.  This is a great example of Barrett's compassion and humanity.

Walker, on the other hand, also revealed his true nature. It was considerably more base than Barrett's:

Within hours of this tragic incident, Milwaukee County Board Chairman Lee Holloway issued a statement remembering the victims and calling for an immediate inspection of all county structures and buildings. Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker criticized Holloway’s actions and called them “irresponsible.”

[...]

What makes Walker’s accusations even more egregious is that the first thing Walker did was to check in at the courthouse to see if there was any deferred maintenance. At the press conference that occurred shortly after the tragedy, after appropriately expressing his sympathy for the victims, Walker felt it necessary to keep repeating that there was no deferred maintenance that he was aware of. It was as if his first concern was that he didn’t get blamed for this catastrophe.

Regardless of whether this tragedy was caused by poor design, faulty construction, deferred maintenance or something else, the only responsible action would be to inspect all of the county-owned buildings and structures, especially given their history, before anyone else is injured.

For Walker to argue for anything else would make one wonder if he is really concerned about the public safety or if he is just worried about how this might effect his gubernatorial campaign.

As the days and weeks progressed, Walker continued to try squelch any discussions of the subject by saying "it was too soon," just like gun nuts say every time there is a mass shooting. But there were other questions that remained:

On the day of the incident, Holloway released the above linked document showing the findings of the result of the survey from last year. The very next day, Walker produced the same document, but with an added column showing that the issues raised had been addressed. What is not clear is when those issues had been addressed and why it had not been reported previously. Those two things also need to be looked into.

Another question that needs investigated is whether the fact that Walker has been raiding the capital funds, which had historically gone into building inspections and maintenance and similar projects, and using that money to cover the holes in the operational costs of his budgets, contributed to any possible deferred maintenance issues. Likewise, does the fact that he had cut the number of building inspectors down to one have an impact on all of this is worthy of further consideration.

Sure enough, Supervisor John Weishan found that Walker had taken over $112 million from capital funds and used it to cover the budget gaps left from his tax giveaways.

As a result of the tragedy, the families have filed lawsuits against the county and the contractors.  One of the lawsuits alone is for $20 million.

Stemming from these lawsuits came a request to resurrect and reopen the John Doe investigation into Scott Walker, his county staff and his campaign staff, which was commonly referred to as Walkergate, and had suffered a much too early demise.  The judge whom presided over the John Doe investigation, the Honorable Neal P. Nettesheim, decided to reopen the case just so that the ADA Bruce Landgraf and the O'Donnell Park attorneys could go through them to for any emails prevalent to their case.  Even this isn't going smoothly and there are concerns of a cover up within the cover up.

They release the O'Donnell Park-related emails in four parts.

One is called "gopfran" for Fran McLaughlin who was doing a helluva lot more than editing a press release, as we had been led to believe from the Walkergate investigation.  The bulk of this release has the historic documents regarding O'Donnell Park.

The next packet is called "breakfast" and shows how Walker's campaign manager Keith Gilkes was the one calling the shots and giving orders, including to Walker's county staff.

The other two are rather duplicative, but each does have some choice tidbits which we will look at later.  One is titled "Donnell" and the other is "maintenance."

While all of these don't have much new information contained within them, they do serve to confirm four important points which Team Walker and the Republicans have been denying all along.

The first point is that Walker was much more concerned about the political ramifications from this incident than he was in the well-being of the families, public safety and that he doesn't feel the slightest remorse for his responsibility for the incident.  His sole focus was that it not allow to hurt his campaign.  If that doesn't show Walker truly is a megalomaniacal sociopath, I don't know what would.

Secondly, the emails show that there was not a permeable line between his campaign staff and his county staff.  There was no line at all.  We now see that Walker and county staffers Tim Russell, Cindy Archer, Tom Nardelli, Kelly Rindfleisch and Fran McLaughlin were working as hard on the campaign as hard as the campaign staff.  Maybe even harder.

Thirdly, in the "Donnell" and the "maintenance" emails, we see that everything had to be run past Walker for his approval.  These emails show that Walker was fully aware of and approving of everything from the secret router to the illegal politicking.  Nothing happened without his approval.  There were no over-zealous staffers.  There was no rogue workers acting on their own.  It was all Walker all the time, and he didn't give a damn about the laws he was breaking.  Indeed, there is more.  There is always more.

Fourthly, the emails remove any reasonable doubt that Walker is/was John Doe.

There is still one lingering questions that hasn't been exorcised by these emails.  If anything, the emails actually gave more substance to the question.

Just why did Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm suddenly drop the investigation and court proceedings against Walker and his crew?  It appears to my layman eyes that there is undeniable and overwhelming evidence that Walker and all of his crew was up to no good. Is it that the millions of dollars Walker collected for his legal cooperation fund was enough that his high profile high crime attorneys would be able to muddy the waters enough?  I sure hate to think that Chisholm was somehow compromised.

Maybe it's time for an autopsy on John Doe to find out exactly why he died long before his time, leaving just his ghost to wander parking garages.

The Walker Agenda Is Still Working! Part CXCIV

Scott Walker has had help from the corporate media to push his agenda from the get go.  Sometimes that help is a little more direct than others.

Gannett announced that they were laying off 31 employees from their papers around the state.  One of the biggest blows is the editorial cartoonist, Joe Heller:

A new round of job cuts by the Gannett Co. Inc. includes 31 layoffs at newspapers in Wisconsin, the unofficial Gannett Blog is reporting.

Nine positions are being eliminated at The Post-Crescent in Appleton and seven at the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Among those cut was longtime Press-Gazette editorial cartoonist Joe Heller, sources said.

The layoffs include both journalists and non-newsroom employees.

This isn't just a blow for the 31 people losing their jobs or to the economy. It also means that the voice of truth gets a little quieter as the corporate media continues to tighten down on those who would report the truth, much less oppose their scheming.

It should also be noted that when the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel did the same thing, the quality of their news - and their circulation numbers - dropped like rocks.

Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin Fund Raid

From the weekly e-newsletter from Senator Chris Larson:

In the past two budgets, Governor Walker has attempted to eliminate the popular Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin program. In each of these cases, legislative Republicans have swooped in to save this successful, proven program in order to receive praise from Wisconsinites. Little did the public know that this act was all for show.

Unfortunately, it has come to light that legislative Republicans have not been investing in the Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin program as promised. Instead, they are raiding the program funds to cover the costs of a tax cut for the wealthy and expansion of the unaccountable voucher program statewide. In a recent Joint Finance Committee hearing, Republican members voted unanimously to break the promise made in the 2011-2013 Republican budget to invest in the Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin program by pulling the funds.

Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin is a $200,000 grant program administered by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection. This comprehensive economic development program was designed to increase the local sales of agricultural food products grown within the state by supporting efforts of farmers to develop additional markets for agricultural products. In the first two years of the Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin program, grants resulted in $2.7 million in new local food sales and $600,000 in new investment. Additionally, over 1,200 Wisconsin producers have benefited from the grants, and dozens of other jobs have been created and retained in the state.

Click here for more information about buying local from the Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection.

Farmer's markets are the most prominent example of the development of local and regional food systems. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Marketing Service, which annually catalogs all operating farmer's markets in the U.S., farmers markets increased nationally from about 2,900 in 2000 to approximately 6,100 in 2010. As of the 2010 survey, Wisconsin ranked 8th in the U.S. in the number of farmers markets it offers with 204.

Buying local is good for all of us, as it not only helps inject our economy with a much-needed financial boost, but it also increases job opportunities for our neighbors. In the end, buying local has benefits that greatly outweigh the costs. This commitment to buying local products and frequenting locally-owned businesses is exactly what Wisconsin needs during this time of economic uncertainty. This recent bait and switch by legislative Republicans to raid the Buy Local, Buy Wisconsin program is bad for local businesses and bad for our Wisconsin economy.

The Walker Agenda Is Still Working! Part CXCIII

As Scott Walker goes around trying to convince people that his agenda is finally working, for real even, the reality of how is agenda keeps hitting people, one company at a time.  The most recent victims of Walkernomics are the workers at PolyOne:

PolyOne Corp. said Thursday that it will permanently close its Portage operations in Columbia County, resulting in 86 lost jobs, according to a letter to the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development.

The layoffs will begin around Oct. 1 and finish by May 1, 2014, the company said.

Employees are represented by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union.

We keep losing good paying, family supporting jobs and all Walker can offer us is a fascist regime that doesn't allow people to sing and the few jobs available are part time and pay at the poverty level or lower.

Yeah, it ain't freakin' working, already.

Paul Ryan's, Love/Hate Relationship With Obamacare!

By Jeff Simpson

We all know that Paul Ryan hates Obamacare, he has voted to overturn it some 345362 times so far this year.  Hey for $174,000/yr + Cadillac benefits you have to do something with your day.  Paul Ryan, along with his mentor John Boehner sent a letter to the President asking for updated costs!

House Speaker John Boehner, meanwhile, called on the administration Tuesday to grant individuals a reprieve from the healthcare law's coverage requirement — just like the White House did last week for larger employers.

In a letter to the president Tuesday, the Ohio Republican and 10 other GOP leaders said  "we also believe American families need the same relief."

The Republicans gave the president until July 16 to come up with answers as to why he chose not to delay the mandate for individuals, who will face a fine if they do not have health insurance by Jan. 1.

The letter frames a new Republican argument against the law, one that could gain traction in next year's congressional elections.

Yes Paul Ryan(R- Wall St.) wants President Obama to tell him the "truth" on Obamacare numbers.  The problem is we are not sure.  With people like Paul Ryan(R-hypocrisy) continually writing him OTHER letters asking for more Obamacare money!   

 

You won’t believe what The Nation magazine obtained through a Freedom of Information Act Inquiry: a list of 17 Republicans who secretly pursued Obamacare’s medicaid expansion dollars while hypocritically slamming the law in public, as well as all of their letters begging for the funds from the big, bad federal government.
Every single one of the Republican congresspeople listed below, including master hypocrite Paul Ryan, have voted over 30 times to repeal the law while privately begging for its funding from the federal government.

Letter can be read here:

In a 2010 letter [pdf] signed by Paul Ryan and obtained The Nation through a Freedom of Information Act request, the GOP's VP nominee — a major opponent of President Obama's healthcare reform — asked the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to use Affordable Care Act dollars to fund a new health center in his district.

"The proposed new facility," Ryan wrote in his recommendation letter, "will serve both the preventative and comprehensive primary healthcare needs of thousands of new patients of all ages who are currently without healthcare."

New Access Points, the grant requested by Ryan to pay for the Kenosha Community Health Center's new facility, is paid out using money set aside by Obamacare.

Hard to believe this is the same Wisconsin lawmaker who has vowed to repeal every last provision of Obamacare because "[our rights] come from nature and God," not "the government."

Then again, this is the same Ryan who privately sought stimulus funds while condemning the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in public.

Publicly criticizing government programs while quietly milking them for every penny.  How very Ayn Randian of him! 

 

Hypocrisy, Thy Name Be Wigderson

James Wigderson - who is a blargher and a contributor to the propaganda sites MacIver Insitute and White Wisconsin - laments that the killer of a two year old child was sentenced to only six years in prison, which was a year more than prosecutors had recommended.

I cannot say that I could argue with him on that point.

But Wigderson jumped in the deep end of the hypocrisy pool with his last line:

The lives of children are cheap in Milwaukee County.

That is pretty ballsy talk from a man who actively participated in the political cover up of the death of fifteen year old Jared Kellner.  Kellner was killed when a facade fell off of the O'Donnell Park parking garage and fell on top of him.  

If I recall correctly, not only was Walker not charged - much less receive any jail time - he was elected governor.

I wonder how Wigderson feels about his help in cheapening Jared's life.

The Blues Are Singing The Walker Blues

On Monday, Scott Walker gave a speech to the Governmental Research Association in which he said that he was open to the idea of expanding Act 10 to include the police and fire fighters in the state.

This took the police unions aback in shock.  They had supported Walker in both the 2010 election and the 2012 recall.  They supported Walker because he promised he would lift the residency requirement as well as promising to spare them from the full brunt of Act 10.

The other unions tried to warn the police union that Walker could not be trusted and that he would turn on them.  The police unions guffawed at the other unions, shrugged off the notion of solidarity and went with Walker.

They are singing a whole different tune today:

“Upon the introduction of his Act 10 legislation in 2010, Gov. Walker publicly expressed his belief that because public safety was so fundamentally important, police officers and fire fighters ought to maintain their rights to bargain over their wages, hours, and working conditions. If his comments yesterday were a trial balloon for a possible presidential run, then Gov. Walker has made a serious misstep. Law enforcement across the state supported the Governor in his last budget because he clearly had made law enforcement a top priority. Given that law enforcement officers and firefighters are almost universally paying towards their pensions and can no longer negotiate over their health insurance, there is no genuine need for a further expansion of Act 10. It is disappointing that public safety now appears to be taking a back seat to partisan presidential politics, and we hope the Governor reconsiders his unfortunate position on this issue.”

While I don't want to see anyone suffer one minute longer under the failings of Act 10, I have to admit that it is hard to feel bad for the police unions.  They should have known what they were setting themselves up for.  Their myopic urgency to get the residency laws lifted set them up for failure.

None of the police unions fought as hard for Walker as did the Milwaukee Police.  And, at least for right now, they got their residency rules struck down.  I wonder how they are feeling right now.  It's going to be awfully hard for them to pay their mortgages when their pay gets slashed like the other public sector.

Breaking: Walker Creates Jobs

That is if one considers panhandling a job:  

The Walker Agenda Is Still Working! Part CXCII

For the past day and a half, Scott Walker and his apologists have been trying to tell us that everything has gotten better even though one look around will tell you otherwise.  Case in point are the dozens of more people who are feeling the impact of Walker's "success" (emphasis mine):

BizLab Inc. has cut 34 jobs at its Menomonee Falls headquarters, according to a notice sent to the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development on Tuesday.

BizLab said the 19 salaried and 15 hourly positions constitute about 34 percent of its total staff. The job cuts took effect Tuesday.

BizLab employees are not represented by a union and don’t have bumping rights, the company said.

BizLab, formerly known as Consult Sales, starts or acquires small Web-based businesses and works to grow them. The company is a past winner in The Business Journal’s Fastest Growing Firms awards in 2010 and 2012.

Even more so, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is also reporting that BizLab was also named one of the "Future 50" by the MMAC.

With this level of success, the Solidarity Singers will soon be singing a dirge for the state.

Pocan Urges Minimum Wage Hike

From Worker's Independent News:

Congress is starting to wake up to the movement of low wage workers demanding an increase to the federal minimum wage. Wisconsin Rep. Mark Pocan is one of the legislators who is leading the campaign in the House of Representatives. Jesse Russell reports.

Pocan said one of the greatest issues facing the country is the growing income inequality gap:

[Pocan] “In the last 40 years adjusted wages, 90 percent of Americans have seen an increase of $59, the top 1 p[percent of the top 1 percent has seen an increase of about $18 million. Measured out that’s like one inch versus five miles of a difference.”

Pocan said in addition to raising the minimum wage he believes giving workers more tools for organizing as a union are fundamental to turning around the economy.
[Pocan]: “If we can get people back into an economically sustainable position it overall helps the economy. It’s growing the economy from the middle out and bottom up which has always been the most sustainable way.”

He said the increase should be to between $9 and $11 per hour.

[Pocan] “Around the $10 figure seems to be where we should mathematically be and where we can probably provide the best bump to lift people out of poverty and make the increase still in a range where most people are paid anyway.”

It's a nice thought, but alas, I'm afraid that not enough people are paying attention and of those few who are, too many are paying attention to the snake oil salesmen of the right.

Maybe more people will wake up after another direct action hits the fast food restaurants and Walmarts in seven cities across the country on Thursday.