15,000 Illinois Protesters Chant "Raise My Taxes"; Unions Getting More Aggressive and Obnoxious; Record Turnout in N.J. Tells Unions to Go to Hell
Courtesy of Mish
In Illinois, union protesters staged a huge rally in Springfield, demanding higher taxes for their self-serving agenda.
Please consider Thousands of protesters at Illinois Capitol to press for tax increase.
Thousands of protesters bused down by labor unions and social service advocates rallied at the Capitol today in an attempt to pressure state lawmakers into raising the income tax to avoid more budget cuts.
A spokesman for Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White estimated the rally crowd at 15,000, with more than 12,000 marching around the building. That would appear to make it the largest Capitol protest since the Equal Rights Amendment crowds a quarter-century ago.
Bus after bus pulled up on streets surrounding the Capitol complex and dumped sign-waving protesters clad in purple, green, red and blue shirts that represented a show of strength from a variety of public employee unions and dozens of groups that formed what they named the “Responsible Budget Coalition.”
"Raise my taxes! Raise my taxes! Raise my taxes!" they chanted, lined up shoulder to shoulder for a few hundred yards stretching a street in front of the Capitol.
Springfield Pro-Tax Rally
Save our Schools is a farce. Save our Salaries is what the protest is all about.
The union does not give a damn about the kids.
Click here for a series of 15 Tribune Images of the Pro-Tax Rally.
SEUI Union Thugs
Unions Getting More Aggressive and Obnoxious
To appreciate just how obnoxious union thugs are in Illinois, please play the above video. I had to play it a few times to make out the key chant from a woman on a megaphone. Here it is.
What do we want?
More money.
What do we want?
We want more money.
When do we want it?
Now?
When do we want it?
Now?
The Ace of Spades blog commented on the rally in "Raise My Taxes! Raise My Taxes! Raise My Taxes!"
So chanted thousands of bused-in ACFSME union "grassroots" agitators to Illinois state congressmen, urging them to "raise [our] taxes!" so that their salaries and benefits wouldn’t be cut.
The rest of the public is finally starting to notice that, and that the public — 20% of whom are out of a job or working part-time when they want a full-time job — is basically paying their employees more than they themselves receive in salary, and with far better benefits and job-security, too.
People are finally starting to understand that they are, ultimately, the boss, and all these 4%-per-year raises and ridiculously huge pension plans are coming out of their own hide.
I don’t think the unions understand this. They are getting more aggressive and obnoxious about their undeservedly high salaries and pension plans rather than being conciliatory about it. They are continuing to demand salaries and benefits that most of the rest of the country could only dram of without even offering even the slightest apologies to the strapped taxpayers whose incomes they are reducing in order to increase their own.
I don’t think that’s going to play well in 2012. I don’t think these guys are understanding that things have changed, and that the public is no longer willing to uncritically bless 4%-a-year-regular-as-clockwork raises when their salaries have been more or less flat for a good long time.
Huge Anti-Union Backlash Starting
If unions think these outrageous tactics are going to bring them sympathy from the public, they are sadly mistaken.
Thus, as disgusting as those rallies are, I am grateful for them. Anyone in the private sector out of a job, or with a 401-K chopped to bits, or anyone who has had to take a huge cut in pay is going to be disturbed and angered by those union images and videos.
The Ace of Spades said "I don’t think that’s going to play well in 2012".
Forget about 2012, I don’t think it will play now. In fact, I know it does not play now.
NJ voters in ‘no’ mood for school tax hikes
Once again, New Jersey and Governor Chris Christie are leading the way. Moreover record numbers of voters are fed up and agree with the governor.
Please consider NJ voters in ‘no’ mood for school tax hikes.
With record-breaking turnouts for a school board election, tax levy proposals in Monmouth and Ocean counties mostly went down in flames on Tuesday, as a backlash against school spending won the day.
Less than 30 percent of the Monmouth districts saw their budget questions approved, according to unofficial results, the lowest in at least a decade. In Ocean County, the passage rate was 39 percent, with 11 budgets approved and 17 defeated.
The voter turnout in each county was approximately 24 percent of registered voters. For comparison, the statewide turnout in the school vote was 13.4 percent a year ago. No statewide turnout has topped 18.6 percent in the 27 years of records compiled by the New Jersey School Boards Association.
The march to the polls came in the wake of a contentious dialogue between Gov. Chris Christie and the leaders of the state’s teachers union, which fought Christie after he rolled out a proposal to cut $820 million from local education. The cuts left school districts juggling the options of layoffs, tax increases or program cuts.
Residents finally got their chance to weigh in. They mostly said they wanted no part of tax increases. For the defeated budgets, more cuts of programs or personnel, or both, may be required, with rejected spending plans being sent to a town’s governing body for review and possible changes.
With record-breaking turnouts for a school board election, tax levy proposals in Monmouth and Ocean counties mostly went down in flames on Tuesday, as a backlash against school spending won the day.
View the school budget election results for Monmouth, Ocean counties
Also at stake Tuesday were seats on local school boards, with Brick voters allowing Warren H. Wolf, 82, to return to the spotlight as he won a three-year term.
Wolf is a retired township deputy schools superintendent. He was also a longtime football coach in the district who retired, only to end his retirement in January when he was named the football coach at Lakewood High School. Wolf has also served in Brick as mayor and township councilman and has been an Ocean County freeholder and state assemblyman.
The march to the polls came in the wake of a contentious dialogue between Gov. Chris Christie and the leaders of the state’s teachers union, which fought Christie after he rolled out a proposal to cut $820 million from local education. The cuts left school districts juggling the options of layoffs, tax increases or program cuts.
A two-decade high of Neptune Township voters for a school election, 19 percent, voted on the school system’s $33.96 million levy. They defeated it.
"It’s the highest turnout I’ve seen since I’ve been here and I’ve been here for 20
years," Municipal Clerk Richard J. Cuttrell said.A $44.7 million tax levy for the Matawan-Aberdeen Regional Board of Education was defeated 2,189 to 1,645. Matawan resident John Lupi, 74, said he voted against the levy because "there’s already too much waste and I think the teachers union (New Jersey Education Association) is nothing but a propaganda machine. Once I saw the NJEA putting ads on television, I said enough is enough. Those ads are paid by dues that come from tax money."
It’s good to see record turnout in New Jersey. It’s even better that the public is finally sick of being taxed to death for the benefit of ungracious, overpaid, public union members.
The message from New Jersey voters to the public unions is "Go To Hell". It is a fitting and well deserved message. Politicians in the rest of the country better be listening.
