Government Employees and Collective Bargaining

Kimberly Strassel weighs in on the public employee union issues in Wisconsin by helpfully comparing their bargaining rights to those of federal workers under Obama. Full disclosure, I am an employee of the federal government, but I do not belong to a union nor to a "collective bargaining unit." Remember how Obama froze federal pay by executive order, without so much as an act of Congress? Under the proposed legislation in Wisconsin, Scott Walker won't even get that power. Like many politicians before him, Obama has been caught in his hypocrisy (which is seems the only sin remaining, according to the left.) More from her excellent summary:

Fact: President Obama is the boss of a civil work force that numbers up to two million (excluding postal workers and uniformed military). Fact: Those federal workers cannot bargain for wages or benefits. Fact: Washington, D.C. is, in the purest sense, a "right to work zone." Federal employees are not compelled to join a union, nor to pay union dues. Fact: Neither Mr. Obama, nor the prior Democratic majority, ever acted to give their union chums a better federal deal.

According to Strassel, this disparity explains why Obama has stopped talking about the issue, but in my opinion, the cat's out of the bag, and this is just one more issue where the President looks silly. Who in America is going to believe that Organizing for America isn't involved at his behest.

By the way, does this mean that Scott Walker should press on with the issue of collective bargaining? Not so fast, just being right on the issue doesn't mean that it is tactically or politically smart to push forward at this time. Personal opinion is that Walker should drop just the collective bargaining portion of the bill, get his budget passed, along with right to work and no union dues removed through the paycheck. Then he should come back on the collective bargaining issue. Hold hearings, make the comparison to the federal government and then pass the bill because you still have the votes.

Only one day left to vote in the poll.