Once again all rational people in California cane take a deep sigh – the legislature has finished up it’s regular legislative session.  Things can’t get any worse for us.  Or can they?  The Governor has hundreds of, frankly, very bad bills on his desk and we hope that “Arnold 3.0” will put his veto pen in overdrive (today FR presents its annual Top Twenty Bills The Governor Should Veto column).

As the Governor is busy contemplating of these bills before him, I want to share an observation about an interest group central to many of those pieces of legislation, and an important player in campaigns for Democrats — the unions!

Years ago, a very smart and visionary leader reached out to union and non-union workers and told them that he cared about their jobs and would do all he could to restore America.  Working people responded and joined conservatives to elect and re-elect Ronald Reagan. 

Now, Republicans find themselves in a very similar place as then.  Public employee unions have a vice-like grip on the Democrats who control the Senate and the Assembly.  The liberals that they have placed into the legislature (through vast political might) have been on a jihad to drive industries they don’t want out of California – agriculture, energy, goods movement, and transportation.  All areas, by the way, where union members are employed – but these aren’t government union jobs, but largely non-government union positions.  Unfortunately the leadership of the public employee unions have sold out to radical environmental groups whose goals center on ridding California of industries they don’t want (that have already largely succeeded in driving aerospace, timber, automotive and technology jobs out of state, or out of existence). 

The response from the private union leadership is cowardice – they are afraid to take on the public unions and powerful groups like the Sierra Club. 

A great opportunity exists for Republicans. We need to show working people that while we are focused on their economic well-being, the Democrats are catering to the needs of the public employee unions and environmental extremists – whether through the support of regulations such as AB 32, or blocking offshore oil drilling that would bring tremendous new tax revenues to the state.

You have to have an employer to create a job for an employee. While I don’t think we should approve public works projects (like roads and dams) because they create jobs – it is just a fact that they do create them – a lot of them.  So, let’s convince workers to stand with employers and demand that government approve plans that will create necessary infrastructure.  The environmental extremists who are in league with the public employee unions will fight this with every fiber of their existence.  

Phony lawsuits that delay or kill projects should not be tolerated by non-government unions who do so to shake-down businesses at the expense of job creation.  That perversion of the process should be exposed so that workers can decide for themselves who best represents their economic well-being. And new laws and regulations should help create jobs not eliminate them. 

The legislative session that just ended and the Democrats who controlled it churned out bill after bill – but seemed to ignore that we are in a recession.  Actually, instead of passing bills that could help the economy, the Democrat controlled legislature has passed tax and fee increases, and bills that would create more regulation at a time when we need regulatory relief.

Let’s stand up for working people and provide them an alternative to the public labor union/eco-extremist view of the world.  Let’s show them our vision for California that understands that the free marketplace, if allowed to thrive, will promote the private sector, and create more jobs, union and non-union alike.

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This entry was posted on Friday, September 18th, 2009 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.