Wisconsin Mayor To Union Leaders: You Have To Pay For Labor Day Parade If Republicans Are Banned…
The mayor should expect a few slashed tires and maybe a brick thrown through his window.
(Reuters) — The mayor of a Wisconsin town said on Tuesday a local labor council would have to reimburse the city up to $2,000 for a Labor Day parade if organizers exclude Republican lawmakers from attending.
The move in Wausau, Wisconsin, came after a county labor official said last week that Republican politicians were not welcome at the event due to their party’s stance against collective bargaining when state lawmakers voted to curtail it earlier this year.
Wausau Mayor Jim Tipple told Reuters on Tuesday that the decision to exclude elected Republicans “flies in the face of public policy.”
“This is not a political rally, it’s a parade, for God’s sake,” Tipple said, noting that taxpayer money is used by the city to pay for staging the event. Tipple’s office is nonpartisan, and he claims no affiliation with either political party.
He said the annual cost of the parade, including insurance, setting up and taking down a stage, and police personnel, runs anywhere from $1,500 to $2,000 each year.
The Republican-backed collective bargaining limits made Wisconsin the center of a battle over union power this year.
The fight propelled the state to the forefront of a wider national struggle as Republicans who took control of many statehouses in last year’s midterm elections moved aggressively to shrink government and made reining in public unions a top priority.
“It should come as no surprise that organizers choose not to invite elected officials who have openly attacked workers’ rights or stood idly by while their political party fought to strip public workers of their right to collectively bargain,” Marathon County Labor Council President Randy Radtke said in announcing the decision.
Posted by ZIP on Tuesday, August 30, 2011, at 10:36 pm | 
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Touche’
Put yer money where your big mouth is.
Yea for the show of sanity by the mayor!
Do the unions exempt Republicans from paying union dues? In my case when I complained about one sided politics,they promptly made me a “fee paying non-member” and no longer entitled to union perks. Gee,I wonder how I survive.
NOBODY speaks to unions this way! In an Obama regime,
how can this happen?
Hint: Maybe both are losing their clout.
“This is not a political rally, it’s a parade, for God’s sake,”
———-
If the city was helping to pay for the event, how could they exclude anyone?
This is a leftist rally. Taxpayers shouldn’t have to pay for partisan political organizing.
.
OK, serious love felt here….
The mayor is correct.
.
What’s that catchy song about the union label again?
Sumptin about…. oh gawd I’m just too old I suppose.
Why do those parasites think that it’s a right to collectively bargain? Why would any private business allow a union in, in the first place. I worked in a plywood mill in another lifetime, and the mill manager simply told us that if we voted to go union , he’d shut down the mill. The union reps threw whiskey bottles through the mill office windows as a result. Nice folks.
Union goons just keep diggin’ that hole. You’re half-way to Hell now.
DUMB MASSES
Someone should clone Mayor Jim Tipple, and put him in every town in the USA.
Way to go Mayor Tipple….way to go!!!!!
Apparently in these union thugs minds everyone who works in Wausa is a public employee, the next question of course is; if they are all public employees who is left to pay their wages?
Wisdom, in Wausau, Wisconsin.
AHAHAHA!
Atta boy mayor tell them whats for to those union brownshirts ether invite the republicans or pay 2000 semolians
That is hilarious, and well-deserved.
Unions suck, and that includes my friends and neighbors.
Alice visits the DNC headquarters in WI.
“’But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ Alice remarked.
‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the Cat. ‘We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.’
‘How do you know I’m mad?’ said Alice.
‘You must be,” said the Cat. ‘or you wouldn’t have come here.’”
Unions need to to investigated and brought under RICO laws
…it is a yellow hammer and sickle on a red flag.
Still wondering how union folks can use terms like “collective” and “workers’ rights” and not make any connection whatsoever with communism.
Hey, die-hard union people: Get a clue. Read some history. Check out Cuba and Venezuela— real workers’ paradises, eh?? Or are you still operating under the delusion that you’re “more specialer” and can make it work “this time.”
Kudos to Mayor Tipple.
Republicans will still be allowed to come watch the parade, won’t they? lol
“This is not a political rally, it’s a parade, for God’s sake,” Tipple said…
What? A Mayor in an American city mentioned God?
Someone call the ACLU immediately!!!
It should come as no surprise that Marathon County Labor Council President Randy Radtke is a simpering butt-munch.
Dems have been exposed in Wisconsin for the criminal enterprise they are. Unions are nothing more than a money laundering operation for Democratic politicians, who in turn keep the taxpayer trough open so public employees can gorge themselves.
Wait a minute. When this broke I remember thinking: well if they are paying for it and absolutely no tax payer money funds it in any way then that is their douchbag prerogative. But now all bets are off.
Originally the WAOW ran with this:
“The parade is sponsored by the Marathon County Labor Council. A Wausau city spokeswoman said the city does not contribute any money to the parade.”
http://weaselzippers.us/2011/08/28/wisconsin-labor-day-parade-organizers-says-no-republicans-will-be-allowed-to-participate/#comments
But now we find out that they DO contribute to the parade and in fact have contributed tax payer money every year?
““This is not a political rally, it’s a parade, for God’s sake,” Tipple said, noting that taxpayer money is used by the city to pay for staging the event…
He said the annual cost of the parade, including insurance, setting up and taking down a stage, and police personnel, runs anywhere from $1,500 to $2,000 each year.”
Not to take away from Tipple. He stepped up and did the right thing, and I will add he did it with style. But this was big time damage control because that “city spokeswoman” was busted big time. Not only is that labor council big, giant douches, they’ve got a douche stooge spokesperson working for the city too.
Them Unions is just bitter clingers! Clingin’ to their voter taxes and slaves.