Naked Capitalism Link of the Day

Today's link: Public Employee Unions Failing Badly at Public Relations, by Rick Ungar.  From the post:

In fact, state and local employee unions around the country have been extremely responsive to the economic realities of their state. In many states and localities, these employees have stepped up by forgoing pension and benefit opportunities that were gained through years of trading larger salaries for a better pension and benefits program. They have accepted the ever increasing number of furlough days that have hit their families hard in the pocketbook.
While the public at large may not know it, the members of the public employee unions have been suffering through these hard times right along with workers in the private sector.
The question is why doesn’t the public know it?
While it is being widely reported that public employee unions contributed some $200 million to democratic party campaign coffers in 2010, where are the pieces telling the stories about how much money unions have contributed to worthy and important charities? I know that America’s unions do make sizeable charitable contributions to their respective communities, but try a Google search to locate some specific instances and you’ll find it a very difficult task.
We are in an era where the nation’s unions have formidable enemies who are spending huge sums to bring the modern union movement to an end. These entities have already been remarkably successful in diminishing the power of unions in the private sector and now they seek to finish off the movement in the public sector – the only area where the unions have experienced growth in the last thirty years.

Why are middle class public sector workers the scapegoats for the folks at the top of the economic food chain who are most at fault for the Great Recession?  Not only were those guys running the Wall Street banks who issued so many terrible loans, they were also running the corporations who have decimated the private sector middle class by offshoring jobs.  They are also the greatest beneficiaries of the tax cuts at both the state and federal level, which have made the deficits much worse.  We shouldn't let them finish off the unions, which are one of the few checks on their power.  Unfortunately, the folks with the money have done a damn good job of convincing folks that your neighbor who works at the school is your worst enemy, because he hasn't lost benefits which were a staple of the middle class 30 years ago.  Things are going to get worse before they get better.