As the fights in Wisconsin and Ohio rage on over efforts to strip workers of their rights, everybody has an opinion. It's interesting to see the difference.

Rich Lowry's op-ed in the Columbia Tribune was most representative of the disdain the right has for union workers. Here's a taste:

No, the most important measure at stake in Wisconsin is the governor’s proposal for the state to stop deducting union dues from the paychecks of state workers. This practice essentially wields the taxing power of the government on behalf of the institutional interests of the unions. It makes the government an arm of the public-sector unions. It is a priceless favor.

Wisconsin doesn’t collect dues for Elks lodges or the NRA. What makes these organizations different from public-sector unions is that people freely choose to join them and freely choose to pay their dues. They are truly voluntary organizations that don’t rely on the power of the state for their well-being. Walker wants to give members of public-sector unions a measure of this same autonomy.

[...]

Public-sector unions are a creature of government, and the Democrats are the party of government. The two of them have identical interests and worldviews, and both want to leverage government to swell their campaign coffers. How to characterize this? The word “shame” comes to mind.

Lowry of course fails to note that unions must disclose each and every penny they spend on campaigns, independent ad expenditures, and other political activity. That doesn't seem to faze him as much as the outrage that union dues are collected by payroll deduction. Is he also outraged that insurance companies' coffers are fattened by private corporations who take payroll deductions for their employees' health insurance? Of course not.

Now here's the view from the left side of the aisle, via Thos Payne at MyAuburnJournal:

The fact that Americans for Prosperity is now going on the air makes it clear that this is about something far larger going on than getting Wisconsin's finances under control; it underscores the degree to which this has become, for the Republicans, an ideological battle of elite corporatism verses the working class - oil industry billionaires are pitted against union workers; their ideological ally a rented governor who is intent on destroying trade unions. This kind of struggle needs to be called what it is - class warfare.

What's happening in Wisconsin is no accident. Class warfare depends on the suppression of democracy. The Koch brothers depend on corruption within the Supreme Court. The extreme right-wing judicial activism that was the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision was just the opening salvo.

[...]

Buying elections didn't stop in Wisconsin and the agenda isn't confined to the Koch brothers. It's the entire Republican agenda - an agenda that is threatened by America's demographic evolution. This agenda has always has depended on suppressing the vote, and now it depends on the suppression of democracy itself.

Make no mistake, this is class warfare. It's a war on democracy itself, and Wisconsin is just the first battle.

Wisconsin is symbolic to both sides. To the right, it's an effort to weaken the power of collective voices by de-funding unions. To the left, it's a class war.

The right wing takes away. The left wing gives back. In Wisconsin, they're looking to take away people's voice and their power. The left (and most independents, too) are giving back that voice and power by the only means available to them -- protest.

Which is why it shouldn't surprise you to discover that Jim DeMint is hedging Governor Walker's bet by introducing a federal right-to-work bill. Evidently states' rights only matter when they're exercised to rob ordinary people.

“No American should be forced to join a union and pay dues to get a job in this country,” said Senator DeMint. “Many Americans are already struggling just to put food on the table, and they shouldn’t have to fear losing their jobs or face discrimination if they don’t want to join a union. Forced-unionism shields unions from member accountability and has a detrimental effect on the economy. In states where companies are forced to hire only union workers, businesses have struggled to compete while they deal with counterproductive work rules.”

Funny thing. Statistics prove that workers in states which are not right-to-work states have more job security, and those states have lower unemployment rates, which means Senators DeMint, Coburn, Hatch, Lee, Paul, Risch, Toomey and Vitter are big fat liars.

But we knew that.

The Seminal: Grassley brings the crazy...

Apoliticus: Top Five Campaign Mistakes

Mother Jones: George Bush, appeaser?

Submitted to a Candid World: Objection! Republican talking points and prior inconsistent statements

ANNALS OF JOURNALISM: Rich Lowry has lot of s'plaining to do...Gibbs To Media: How about reality?...Facts are stupid things...WaPo scraping bottom...Lane violation...Shrill...Whiney, Self-Serving Crapola....The New Yorker thinks Savage is just misunderstood...Our liberal media...Lou, you're an as*hole but we'd still like to see your birth certificate...Here's ours!...Humungous Hypocrisy at The Atlantiic

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I'm so sick of the false equivalencies and lack of context of the conservative commentators and pundits out there, who get opportunity time and time again to spin their failures as somehow the fault of Democrats.

On Meet the Press, David Gregory notes that the tone of the Bush administration changed from the promised "compassionate conservative/uniter, not a divider" to its take-no-prisoners partisanship reality. Rich Lowry acknowledges that it was so, but blames it on the sixteen year warfare of Democrats and Republicans refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of the other party's president.

A couple of things…one, Bush had a very simple view of how this works. You run on your agenda, and then you’re elected and you try to pass your agenda. And that seems pretty straightforward and basically admirable to me. But a couple things happened with the tone. One, he had entered into Washington where there is this ongoing revenge warfare, between the parties. Where Republicans were going to get revenge for Iran-Contra with Whitewater and the Monica scandal and the Democrats were going to get revenge for that. And you had about a sixteen year period where neither side would really accept the legitimacy of the other party’s president.

Um, Rich? Was Bill Clinton legitimately elected to office? Was there an extraordinary and so-legally-questionable-that-SCOTUS-specifically-limited-the-precedent-to-that-one-case decision that placed Clinton in office? No? So what was the basis of the lack of respect of the legitimacy of Bill Clinton's claim to the presidency? Sour grapes over Iran-Contra.

Let's remember, Mr. "History in a Vacuum" Lowry, were the Republicans guilty of crimes in the Iran-Contra scandal? They were? Quelle suprise! Was Clinton guilty of anything besides bad investing in the Whitewater scandal? Hmmm....isn't that funny...he wasn't. So the last eight years have been bad for poor George Bush, forcing him to be the nasty partisan war criminal that he is because of a sixteen year partisan war based on reality on the Democratic side and on the Republican side based on what? Being pissed that they've been caught outside the law? Well, to quote another blogger, boo-freakin'-hoo. How typically Republican.

And for the record, it's unadulterated crap that the left would never accept Bush. In the days after 9/11, Bush coasted on record approval ratings, ratings that showed that the WHOLE country--right, left and sideways--were all pulling for him. He pissed it away with declaring war on a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 and ignoring the entire Gulf Coast during Katrina. The left looked at his actions, not some made-up reasoning of entitlement to the office.

Figures that once again, Lowry doesn't know his ass from his elbow. Why does he keep getting on these programs? Isn't it about time we get someone who knows what they're talking about?

Transcripts below the fold

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the Media Matters strip off the right side of my site because it was messing with my home page so I'll be linking them up more often.

Rich Lowry just lies and lies and lies...

"Lowry falsely claimed poll shows most Americans support sending more troops to Iraq."

We want out of Iraq.

When is a lie "inartfully worded?"

Howard Kurtz:

"Howell's column Sunday said that a number of Democrats "have gotten Abramoff campaign money." That was inartfully worded. I believe what she was trying to say, and I have not discussed this with her, is that some Democrats have received campaign cash from Abramoff clients, and that this may have been orchestrated by the convicted lobbyist. That's why you have a number of Democrats (as well as many Republicans, now including Denny Hastert) giving back the tainted dough or donating it to charity. Even National Review Editor Rich Lowry says this is basically a Republican scandal -- we are talking about a Bush fundraiser and Tom DeLay pal -- but where the tangled web has extended to Democrats, we need to mention that too."

Howard, how can you speak about her motives without actually talking to her? This was a major column for the Washington Post covering a crime that is rocking the Hill and is indeed a Republican scandal. Howell needs to mention Democrats as long as they are part of the illegal activities involved (taking legal contributions is not part of the story)- not because she is being pressured by Republicans to do so. That is ethically challenged reporting.

So says Rich Lowry watch.

Rich Lowry: Fyi, I'm guest-hosting tonight--and yes, I've been trying to get up on the Holloway case...

Nuff' said!

SOCIAL SECURITY UPDATE

via Kevin Drum: ...From Rich Lowry over at The Corner:

Just had a conversation with a Republican senator. A few things he said:

....On Social Security, it's looking “not great.” Grassley will try to get a bill out of his committee that has the progressive indexing, but no personal accounts. If that doesn't work, it’s a sign that there's no support for reform whatsoever. He guesses that Frist will end up using — excuse the Senatese — Rule 14 to get a bill with personal accounts onto the floor. The Democrats will filibuster and that will be that. Chances for a deal are very low: “In this environment, I just can't see it. The Democrats are so negative. Even people who will normally look at things, are saying, 'No way on this one. We're blood brothers.'”

That's good news, and it sounds about right to me. I just don't see Dems suddenly turning into good hearted compromisers on this after Bush has spent the past six months trying to cram private accounts down everyone's throats.

Drudge reports that columnist Maggie Gallagher repeatedly defended President Bush's push for a $300 million initiative encouraging marriage as a way of strengthening families.

But Gallagher failed to mention that she had a $21,500 contract with the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the president's proposal, reveals Howard Kurtz in Wednesday runs of the WASHINGTON POST.

"The Bush marriage initiative would emphasize the importance of marriage to poor couples" and "educate teens on the value of delaying childbearing until marriage," she wrote in National Review Online, for example, adding that this could "carry big payoffs down the road for taxpayers and children." Gallagher explains to Kurtz: "Did I violate journalistic ethics by not disclosing it? I don't know. You tell me." She said she would have "been happy to tell anyone who called me" about the contract but that "frankly, it never occurred to me" to disclose it.
National Review Editor Rich Lowry said of the HHS contract: "We would have preferred that she told us, and we would have disclosed it in her bio."