Naturally after Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker managed to survive his recall election this Tuesday evening, Fox just had to bring in former half-term governor and failed vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin to weigh in for her perspective. Palin
June 6, 2012

Naturally after Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker managed to survive his recall election this Tuesday evening, Fox just had to bring in former half-term governor and failed vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin to weigh in for her perspective.

Palin told Fox's Greta Van Susteren that Walkers' win showed that "responsible austerity measures" and and reigning in the size of government, have proven effective. I'm not sure what's so "effective" about firing teachers and making classroom sizes larger and busting unions as an excuse to give your corporate buddies tax breaks, but that's their talking points and they're sticking to them. Palin also called the union leadership in Wisconsin "thugs" and said maybe they're the ones who need to be "recalled and replaced." I guess Palin believes they were acting without the support of their membership, because otherwise I'm not sure just who she thinks is going to be doing that "recalling and replacing."

Palin also went after President Obama for failing to campaign in the state and used the win by the Republicans as proof that "his goose is cooked" for the general election, ignoring the fact that the exit polling there showed the state would still support President Obama's reelection in the state by a margin of 52-43 percent over former Gov. Mitt Romney.

We're going to have a lot of hand wringing over whether President Obama showing up there would have made any difference in this recall election. I don't think it would have made a bit of difference unless we had some parity with the amount of money poured into the state. Sadly what this recall proves is that when you've got millionaires and billionaires willing to pour what's pocket change for some of them into buying an election and there's nothing to counter it on the other side, along with voter disenfranchisement, and dirty tricks, that all of us have a huge uphill battle facing us in the age of post Citizens United.

This was a big loss for labor unions in America since this recall election will be looked at as a model to further bust unions and push for more right to work for less laws and Palin won't be the only one out there ready to rub salt in that wound. It's shameful that she can talk like this and at the same time talk about her and her husband's former union membership as though she has an ounce of respect for the labor movement. Anyone who plays the divide and conquer game with unions and their elected leaders doesn't understand that the members are the unions and when you go after the people they elected to represent them, you're going after the members as well. Neither exists in a vacuum.

h/t Media Matters

Can you help us out?

For nearly 20 years we have been exposing Washington lies and untangling media deceit, but now Facebook is drowning us in an ocean of right wing lies. Please give a one-time or recurring donation, or buy a year's subscription for an ad-free experience. Thank you.

Discussion

We welcome relevant, respectful comments. Any comments that are sexist or in any other way deemed hateful by our staff will be deleted and constitute grounds for a ban from posting on the site. Please refer to our Terms of Service for information on our posting policy.
Mastodon