Prank call proves billionaire David Koch owns Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and the GOP

Friendly reminder, might want to separate the quotes so we can read what you wrote from what you are quoting.

The Koch gave 46K directly, then another 65K through their pac, then spent a whopping 3.5 million in TV ads for the governors election. That's big chunk of change from any single donor.

Listen to the crank call again too, and you'll hear Walker come right out and ask Koch to spend some more money on ads "for those other guys" (the other governors they were speaking of.

Sounds like politics as usual in the land of the corrupt and power-mad.

reply to post by VitriolAndAngst


That is an excellent post, and a great summary. Too bad more people don't get it.

Everything repubs like Walker have done has lead this country to one disaster after another.

If the people of Wisconsin have any brains, they will recall Walker, and vote him out of office.

reply to post by zappafan1

Originally posted by Blackmarketeer
Friendly reminder, might want to separate the quotes so we can read what you wrote from what you are quoting.

Amen. Far too often on ATS I feel like sometimes I may be missing things that could be educational, interesting, enlightening, or even at least engaging because trying to make my way through it on this flat little screen just gives me a headache.

reply to post by zappafan1


Collective bargaining is the backbone of the Market economy, and was the basis for the rise of market economies during the Renaissance with the trade guilds. It is through collective bargaining that the guides gained economic independence from the aristocracy.

You support principles that would have kept the monarchies in power.

If anything, corporations are the true from of a communist collective, in their constant effort to undermine markets and eliminate competition, establishing themselves as the one power controlling all.

You have been turned into a modern day communist, and you are too foolish to recognize it.

Originally posted by Daughter2
Zappa: I'm not asking you this as in insult but as a real question. You're like in your 60-70's right? Either that or you were born rich.

REPLY: Yep.... I'm turning 60 in March. But I own my own company (three employees right now, which I'll be able to keep employed until/unless the health care crap kicks in. And, the first person I'll let go is the person with the Obama sticker on his bumper. I came from immigrants who worked for what they have/had, just as I do. I've never been on welfare, although there have been times it would have helped a lot. Why did I turn it down? .... because it's money that came from the hard work of other people.

".... The whole be afraid of communism argument is from the 1950's. Trade unions were much more active than they are now and existed during the height of communism’s influence. And guess what, the US didn't turn to communism."

REPLY: True; I agree. Communism, Marxism and socialism is but a hair's breadth apart. The AFL-CIO is currently run by a Socialist, as was Sweeney before him. We currently have 78 or 79 members of congress or the House of reps. who are avowed Socialists (all Dem's.)

"....Funnily you talk about people complain about someone making $2.00 more than they do but then you go ahead and blame school teachers for negotiating good benefits."

REPLY: 50 years ago America was first in the world in reading, science and math. In 2009 (the last year for which complete figures are available,) of the 40 countries that participated, America placed 23rd in science; 17th in reading and 32nd in math. Why do they deserve what they are making now, let alone a raise of any kind?

"Just as business can merge in order to charge a higher price, so can school teachers. This is not redistribution of wealth when either side does it. It's free market - and markets are not free when just one side is free."

REPLY: No. Freedom is not where I'm forced at the point of a gun to give money to someone who hasn't earned it, or just because they belong to a certain special interest group (which includes teachers and/or unions.)

"Why do you want to take away rights?"

REPLY: And where are my rights, and those of all non-union workers? Where are the rights of union members (of which I was one for a few years) whose dues money goes toward politicians they don't support? Besides, they are not "rights." It's power, if anything. The only "rights" we have are those enumerated in the Bill of Rights.

edit on March 2nd 2011 by Daughter2 because: (no reason given)

reply to post by Blackmarketeer

The Kocks gave a total of $9 Million total, and a small pittance of that went to Walker.

reply to post by poet1b


".....Collective bargaining is the backbone of the Market economy."

REPLY: Not the free market economy. How can it be the backbone of the entire economy if only 12% of the private workforce (and growing smaller) is involved in it? The rest of your post.... waste of time. And, yes, I;ll work on the reply thing. I've just been doing it this way for so long.....

reply to post by zappafan1


If you knew anything at all about the problems with U.S. schools then you would know that it isn't the teachers, but the grossly overpaid school administrators whose main goals seems to be to destroy what was once an exceptional public school system.

The curriculum set up by these school admins do not aim to teach children, they aim to indoctrinate them and weed out any non-conformists, and discourage any original thought.

You have really bought into the propaganda nonsense hook line and sinker.

reply to post by poet1b


"...If anything, corporations are the true from of a communist collective, in their constant effort to undermine markets and eliminate competition, establishing themselves as the one power controlling all."

REPLY: There can be no such thing as a corporate Communist collective, because there cannot be a free market Communist entity; not in the true sense of the idea. Just like there's really no such thing as a Socialist economy; socialism goes against the very idea of a true economy.

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by zappafan1

 

If you knew anything at all about the problems with U.S. schools then you would know that it isn't the teachers, but the grossly overpaid school administrators whose main goals seems to be to destroy what was once an exceptional public school system.

The curriculum set up by these school admins do not aim to teach children, they aim to indoctrinate them and weed out any non-conformists, and discourage any original thought.

You have really bought into the propaganda nonsense hook line and sinker.

REPLY: None of the teacher or educational related unions have taught a single child anything, 'nor has the federal Dept. of Education. I agree with the rest of your post..... almost. The "indoctrination centers" called schools has been very successful in their long-term goals. If they can't read, write, do basic math, or have enough education to make an informed decision, they will fail in life. And who do they turn to for help? ..... government, which is the entire idea. It also takes America from being an exceptional country down to the level of the rest of the world. Geez... look at the United Nations, one of the most corrupt organizations in the world; it looks like the bar scene from star Wars.

reply to post by zappafan1


There is no such thing as a "free market" economy. It is idealistic nonsense.

If there is such a thing as a free market economy, then I dare you to name it. If you can't, then you might want to start re-thinking your positions.

Once you wake up to this reality, then you are on your way to once again embracing the realities of this world.

Your inability to respond to the rest of my post is just more proof that you are as programmed as I have pointed out.

Here is another clue as to why unions are the backbone of a market economy. As Union influence in the U.S. has dwindled, so has our standards of living. As union influence has dwindled corporations have chipped away at our individual rights, and as a nation we have sunk more and more deeply into debt.

That things have gotten worse and worse in the U.S. as the influence of Unions has fallen, should be a clue as to how important Unions are to a healthy market economy.

Rather than support that which creates the Middle class, you have chosen to side with those whose aim is to destroy the middle class.

reply to post by Daughter2


Check it out. Still think Communism/Socialism isn't around and doing it's damage?

reply to post by zappafan1


Our schools were unionized fifty years ago, when we had the best schools on the planet. It isn't unionization of our schools that has changed.

What has changed is the rise of corporate control over our lives, which desire among many things to destroy our public school system, and thereby re-instate a class system.

How do you not get this?

reply to post by zappafan1

There can be no such thing as a corporate Communist collective, because there cannot be a free market Communist entity; not in the true sense of the idea.

There can not be a "free market" entity nor a Communist entity, in the true sense of the ideals, because they are both unrealistic ideals that will never exist.

Once you realize this, it will be like opening your eyes for the first time in years.

I just heard this on tv - perfect quote which explains the situation.

There is a union member, corporate executive, and tea party member sitting in a room. A plate of 12 cookies is on the table.

The corporate executive takes 11 cookies and then turns to the tea party member and says:
"the union member wants yours"

reply to post by poet1b

I did answer your posts, if you had understood what you read. The earning power and "real wages" (of non-unionized workers) have dropped because of excessive taxation by your side of government. Unions were and are still heavily influenced by those who believe in Socialism, AKA Sweeney and Trumpka. If what you said was correct about levels of learning and union involvement, then why is America in the crapper when it comes to the grades of our kids, especially when the class size has dropped to an average of about 16 kids? For one, the teachers of today aren't as intelligent as teachers were back in the day. All of my teachers in junior and senior high, and most during elementary school, had college degrees in the subjects they taught. They had a passion for their subject(s) which helped them to make it interesting, and the kids wanted to get involved.

If what you said was true about unions and teacher performance, why are so many of the countries who are kicking America's collective butt on test scores, non unionized? Slovenia, China, even Poland are eating our lunch when it comes to education.

Today there are colleges that merely instruct soon-to-be "teachers" how to teach to groups of kids; they could be math teachers one year and history teachers the next, or even month to month. So, what's your excuse for the failure of the kids today, when more teachers are unionized than ever, and especially when the learning gradient has been lowered from where kids in my day needed a 75% or better to pass, but now 60% is a passing grade? Teachers back then taught because they wanted to be a part of the education process of young kids. As is very obvious today, and brought to light in Madison, it's all about money and benefits, and the heck with the kids. There have been a few instances where, as in New York, a teacher was charged with molestation, but it took over a year, and lots of taxpayer money, to get her fired. There's your union's concern for the children for 'ya..... it's all about union power and dues money. It's still money laundering no matter how you slice it.

Listen, I'm all for giving good teachers a decent wage, but it's the old (failed) union mentality that, if someone has to be let go, it's the person with the least seniority, who just might be the best teacher there; you think that's fair? I wish there was a way to determine a teachers wage based upon the future productivity of their students. Of course that isn't possible, but I'm quite sure you'd see scores go up in a relatively short time. A couple of years ago a study was done across the country, asking teachers to take the same test they were giving their students, and only 30-some percent passed. damn.... now THAT'S money well spent on wages and bennies, isn't it? Kids in the 1880's received a better education than kids do today; no calculators, no computers, and the tests were much more difficult. I've seen one test that I doubt many college professors would be able to pass (I have it on my PC here somewhere, I'm sure.)

Nothing a teacher, or any government worker does, makes their job worth more than a non-union worker. ANY job is only worth so much. Bagging groceries is not worth a $10.00 per hour wage, union or not. Assuming, of course, that today's graduates would remember day to day how to do it the right way..... and forget about being a cashier, when so many couldn't even work at McDonalds if they didn't have the graphic keyboards.

I've seen signs about the union workers wanting a "level playing field." OK, I'm all for it. All state union workers "rights" should be the same as federal workers get; how's that? Better yet, we give teachers who have proven themselves able to actually teach....... we pay them $60K, a very decent wage for only working 9 months; but no benefits and no pension. That way the playing field would be level, right alongside non-union workers. Let them save for their own retirement, and pay for most of their own health care, just like "regular" folks.

I've been in the UAW, the IBEW and the PSA, and have been a union steward for two years, so I've seen the corruption that goes on. And it's not just the taxpayers money that gets wasted on wages and bennies. The 2008 Ford/UAW contract was 22 1/2 pounds and over 2000 pages. Do you actually think it costs nothing for Ford, or any company, to meet those type of demands? Who do you think pays for that.... Ford, or ? It gets passed on to the end user, the person who buys the car. What about the "jobs bank" in Detroit? ever heard of it? 3500 "employees" who every day sit around in a lounge or cafeteria, watching movies, playing video games, all the while making $26 per hour, full bennies with health care. Why is that? because back in the late 70's, when the auto companies were trying to compete with foreign auto manufacturers, and turning to using robotics for better quality and time savings. The unions said "ok, you can do that, but you can't fire anyone." So there your "job" bank for 'ya. It adds about $2500 to the price of a vehicle, and there's your typical union work ethic.

Back to teaching...... here's a close-up and personal experience for 'ya; three years ago I sponsored a foreign student from Germany for the junior year. Three weeks later he approaches me and asks if it was a joke of some kind. I asked what he meant. He said he didn't even have to study because he already knew everything that was being "taught," and actually had to correct the teachers almost on a daily basis. He even pointed out many errors in the school books, and he know infinitely more than our kids about... wait for it..... American history, our Constitution and Bill of Rights (and most everything else... HE could have done a better job of teaching. Near the end of the year, he expressed concern about going back to Germany, wondering if they would make him take his junior year over. Well, they didn't. When he returned to Germany, bringing with him a copy of the curriculum from the school, they made him start over from his his SOPHOMORE year.

Yeah.... our union teachers are just wonderful.

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by zappafan1

 

Our schools were unionized fifty years ago, when we had the best schools on the planet. It isn't unionization of our schools that has changed.

What has changed is the rise of corporate control over our lives, which desire among many things to destroy our public school system, and thereby re-instate a class system.

How do you not get this?

Sorry, but you're talking about the left. corporations are sending jobs overseas not because they want to, but because they can't find graduates with the level of smarts they have over there, and lower taxes to boot.

75 percent of young Americans would be unable to enlist in the military for reasons physical (usually obesity), moral (criminal records) or academic (no high school diploma).

A quarter of all ninth-graders will not graduate in four years. Among the 34 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development nations, only four (Mexico, Spain, Turkey, New Zealand) have dropout rates higher than America's, whose 15-year-olds ranked 23rd in math and 25th in science in 2006.

For now? "We go where the smart people are," says Howard High of Intel Corp. "Now our business operations are two-thirds in the United States and one-third overseas. But that ratio will flip over [in] the next 10 years."

Annual federal funding of research in mathematics, engineering and the physical sciences is equal to the increase in America's healthcare costs every nine weeks.

A National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report says that in 2000, more foreign students than American students were studying engineering and the physical sciences in U.S. graduate schools.

The Education Department sits at the foot of Capitol Hill, where many new legislators consider "federal education policy" a constitutional oxymoron. They have a point.

Forty-some miles northwest of Mad City (Madison), in the town where the nation’s first Progressive Party presidential candidate, Robert La Follette married his leftist, feminist wife, in 1881. Yeah, 1881. Politically precocious, we are, here in Badgerland. “Fighting Bob” learned his social justice from U. of W. president, John Bascom, who came from Massachusetts’ Andover Seminary (essentially of the same United Church of Christ denomination as the so reverent Jeremiah Wright). Those Congregationalists stem from the Puritans, whom, as the name implies, had a soft spot for utopianism and legalistic perfectibility.

Progressivism, but also unvarnished Marxism made inroads very early here in Wisconsin, including within the state and region’s labor movement. In 1904, the University of Wisconsin became the home of John R. Commons, one of the first progressive incrementalists, a label which tends to cover radical interests of unknown lengths. He was called the spiritual father of Social Security and he specialized in union studies. He was also one of America’s progressive eugenicists.

Here's your 1895 8th grade test, pre union, and passing a requirement to move to the next grade:

Grammar (Time, one hour)
1. Give nine rules for the use of Capital Letters.
2. Name the Parts of Speech and define those that have no modifications.
3. Define Verse, Stanza and Paragraph.
4. What are the Principal Parts of a verb? Give Principal Parts of do, lie, lay and run.
5. Define Case, Illustrate each Case.
6. What is Punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of Punctuation.
7-10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.

Arithmetic (Time, 1.25 hours)
1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.
2. A wagon box is 2 ft. deep, 10 feet long, and 3 ft. wide. How many bushels of wheat will it hold?
3. If a load of wheat weighs 3942 lbs., what is it worth at 50cts. per bu, deducting 1050 lbs. for tare?
4. District No. 33 has a valuation of $35,000. What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?
5. Find cost of 6720 lbs. coal at $6.00 per ton.
6. Find the interest of $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.
7. What is the cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft. long at $.20 per inch?
8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days (no grace) at 10 percent.
9. What is the cost of a square farm at $15 per acre, the distance around which is 640 rods?
10.Write a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt.

U.S. History (Time, 45 minutes)
1. Give the epochs into which U.S. History is divided.
2. Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus.
3. Relate the causes and results of the Revolutionary War.
4. Show the territorial growth of the United States.
5. Tell what you can of the history of Kansas.
6. Describe three of the most prominent battles of the Rebellion.
7. Who were the following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton, Bell, Lincoln, Penn, and Howe?
8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620, 1800, 1849, and 1865?

Orthography (Time, one hour)
1. What is meant by the following: Alphabet, phonetic orthography, etymology, syllabication?
2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?
3. What are the following, and give examples of each: Trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters, linguals?
4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u'.
5. Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e'. Name two exceptions under each rule.
6. Give two uses of silent letters in spelling. Illustrate each.
7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: Bi, dis, mis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, super.
8. Mark diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name the sign that indicates the sound: Card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last.
9. Use the following correctly in sentences, Cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane, vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.
10.Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.

Geography (Time, one hour)
1. What is climate? Upon what does climate depend?
2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas?
3. Of what use are rivers? Of what use is the ocean?
4. Describe the mountains of N.A.
5. Name and describe the following: Monrovia, Odessa, Denver, Manitoba, Hecla, Yukon, St. Helena, Juan Fermandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco.
6. Name and locate the principal trade centers of the U.S.
7. Name all the republics of Europe and give capital of each.
8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the Pacific in the same latitude?
9. Describe the process by which the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.
10.Describe the movements of the earth. Give inclination of the earth.

Originally posted by zappafan1 corporations are sending jobs overseas not because they want to, but because they can't find graduates with the level of smarts they have over there, and lower taxes to boot.

A???

Corporations send jobs over seas because it is cost effective $9.00 a day in COMMUNIST CHINA, THEY and WANT - you speak as if a corporation is a singular man. The "they" that outsource are funding Communism and helping execute economic warfare upon America. Our capital based is extracted, we are undermined each day,
this has been systematic, starting with production, now they are attacking the capital with REAL COMMUNIST partners in tow,

reply to post by zappafan1


How about posting some links to back up this nonsense you have spewn, because you are way off.

Taxation has nothing to do with it. I don' t know where you get your information, but you need to find new sources. we are paying lower taxes these days, especially the wealthy.

What you have spewn about teachers in your rant is pure biased nonsense.

What is funny, is how in the very last paragraph, you prove yourself completely wrong.

He said he didn't even have to study because he already knew everything that was being "taught," and actually had to correct the teachers almost on a daily basis. He even pointed out many errors in the school books, and he know infinitely more than our kids about... wait for it..... American history, our Constitution and Bill of Rights (and most everything else.

Teachers don't set the curriculum! If you had half a clue, then you would know this. Your local school administrators select the books and what is covered, as well as hiring the teachers. Chances are that the school administrators in your district are probably grossly over paid, ones in the worse school districts usually are.

You probably live in a red state. I grew up in a blue state, with strong unions. Our public school system was one of the best in the country. I knew some kids who moved out of state, where one of them had been held back at our grade school. They moved to one of the red states, and were so far ahead of what they were teaching in the red state, they had to be moved up two grades. You get what you paid for, which is why kids get such lousy educations in the red states.

One of my best friends was from Germany. He had friends visited from Germany. Their curriculum was behind ours.