Pension “reform,” signed, sealed and delivered

"I can hire one-half of the working
class to kill the other half of the
working class"
-Railroad industrialist
Jay Gould, 1886

Local legislators vote “yes,” Governor signs the bill

By Will Collette

State pension reform has been signed. Public employees have been screwed. Their unions have been put down. Gina Raimondo is the new DINO superstar. Governor Chafee can now forget about every other campaign promise he made. And most Rhode Islanders are happy.

It’s that last part – about Rhode Islanders being glad that they have screwed public workers – that really gets to me. The letters to the editor and talk radio vox populi has sung pretty much the same song – “I don’t get a decent pension, actually I don’t get a pension at all, and  the market crash destroyed my retirement savings, so screw the public employees.”

To me, that’s like a person who has been mugged and robbed saying that the only way for justice to be done is for lots of other people to get mugged and robbed.

Sen Sue Sosnowski & Rep. Teresa Tanzi voted yes.
Delia did not vote.

Private sector workers have steadily lost ground in the fight for better wages and benefits largely because they stopped joining unions, and because their bosses have shipped their jobs overseas. Irresponsible bankers and investment brokers trashed their retirement savings. Irresponsible bankers and mortgage brokers tanked the housing market, wiping out home equity that people banked on for retirement.

So, how do we all want to address these awful deeds? Let’s go screw public workers.

“But they work for US...they work for the TAXPAYERS,” screeches the vox populi. Damned right they work for us. Damned right they work for the taxpayers. They work hard keeping us safe, teaching our children, putting out our fires, keeping the roads intact, keeping public water coming out of the tap, caring for the sick and the elderly, and even taking care of your driver’s license and registration, if you’re patient.

Rep. Donna Walsh voted YES

They do work for us. They signed contracts with us. They carried out their end of the deal under the terms of those contracts. Those that have now retired, planned their older years based on the promises in those contracts.

Damned right they work, and did work, for us. So now we treat them the same way that many private sector bosses have treated their workers. We screwed them. We took back the promise. We reneged on the deal.

We listened to the Tea Party. We listened to the RI Statewide Coalition. We listened to EngageRI. We listened to these groups that are the voice of the rich, the voice of the bosses, the voices of business interests who don’t give a damn about any of the rest of us.

They said “screw the public workers because they deserve to be screwed.” And we trusted the voices of the 1% who told us that justice for private sector workers means to screw public sector workers.

Rep. Larry Valencia voted YES

It’s a repetition of an old formula. Nineteenth Century railroad “robber baron” Jason “Jay” Gould  was famous for the 1886 quote, “I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half of the working class".

What fools we are!

Well, not to worry. The right-wing juggernaut practically held a gun to every legislators head. So Charlestown’s two Representatives Donna Walsh and Larry Valencia voted yes.  Progressive South Kingstown state Representative Teresa Tanzi  agonized over the vote, but in the end also voted yes.

In fact, the only South County legislator to vote NO was Rep. Spencer Dickinson (D-Wakefield)  who will almost certainly face a tough re-election rematch with perennial Republican candidate James “The Colonel” Haldeman.

Rep. Spencer Dickinson
voted NO

I don’t blame Donna, Larry or Teresa for voting YES. As the Borg like to say, “Resistance is Futile.” But I do blame Gina Raimondo for betraying the support that progressives gave her election campaign. I thought she was a progressive; it turns out she’s a DINO (“Democrat in Name Only”).

I blame Chafee for betraying his election promises.

I blame the liars and distorters of truth – the ones who are waging the real class warfare in Rhode Island – RI Statewide Coalition, the Tea Party, EngageRI, talk radio and conservative newspaper editors.

And I think we need to blame ourselves for being fooled again into fighting with each other when the real enemy is so clearly the cause of our woes.