Hard at work

What has the Republican party been up to? Well they have been working on lots of things. Things that include cutting taxes to their lowest levels in 80 years (for the wealthy that is), fighting to remove "burdensome regulations" for the financial industry as well as the gas and oil industry. There have been a slew of proposed bills both on the national and state level by GOP-controlled government on abortion-related issues ranging from defunding Planned Parenthood to the extreme of giving people the right to kill doctors in the name of self defense.


There have been a few bills proposed that were fiscally related, but despite their campaign promise of creating jobs, they have been shown to do the opposite and result in job losses, not create them. At one point, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, came out and reported that based on the proposed budget cuts by the Republican Congress, this would result in 200,000 job losses. When Speaker Boehner was asked about this, his response was "so be it." Also, the bill overall would actually increase our debt.

I have seen the so-called "small government conservatives" increase government to such levels that it would grant certain state govenors dictatorial type power (these states not surprisingly all GOP controlled). One stark example is Michigan govenor having the power to declare a "financial emergency" and abolish entire towns, dismiss all elected officials and hand over power to whom he chooses. Also, the governor of Maine is looking to abolish child labor laws.

They are also trying to give corporations unlimited, unregulated powers, and undo all the progress made over the last century on workers rights by way of busting unions. GOP knows the only tool we as employees have to use against corporations is our ability to join together. Our strength is in numbers. By busting unions workers lose the ability to band together and force corporations to operate responsibly and treat employees fairly.

The combination of deregulation and the busting of unions give corporations the ability to conduct business in reckless ways by disregarding worker conditions and operate in environmentally irresponsible ways. Corporations have a main goal and that is to make money for their shareholders, and the way to do that is with minimal regulation and the ability to pay employees as little as possible with as few benefits as possible, i.e., health insurance, worker's compensation, etc.

The Grand Ol' Party is working hard all right, but for who.