Thanks, Big Labor: Senator Bob Casey’s $165 Billion Union Bailout

by SusanAnne Hiller

Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) has trouble remembering his roots as Pennsylvania’s state treasurer and auditor general. During his Senate campaign, he claimed to be a fiscal hawk and to have saved Pennsylvanians $1 billion of taxpayer money.  Casey is and always has been a big government progressive and will finally no longer be able to use the conservative, fiscal hawk meme with the introduction of the $165 billion union pension bailout bill, coupled with his rubber stamp approval of every plank of Obama’s agenda, Casey is now fully exposed.

Let’s review some of Casey’s recent steps.  Casey met with the Teamsters union back in March 2010 and the “Create Jobs and Save Benefits Act of 2010” bill’s branding became apparent:

Casey, a Pennsylvania Democrat, explained that his legislation is important to protecting pensions and saving jobs. It’s also important to keep promises made to retirees, he said.

“We have to fulfill our obligations,” Casey said. “Pensions are a basic commitment to workers and their families that they will be there for them.”

The bill will strengthen the trucking and other industries. It will change the pension funding rules so employers won’t have to make payments that could force them into bankruptcy. Employers can use their savings to hire and retain workers.

In addition, according to the press release, Teamsters Local 776 shop steward Dave Wolf added:

“It was fraud and corruption on Wall Street that caused the crash,” Wolf said. “Now working people are losing their jobs and their pensions because of it.

John B. Taylor, professor of economics at Stanford and senior fellow at the Hoover Institution would disagree with Wolf on the cause of the crash citing the federal government as the leading cause of the crash.  There are many others who would agree with Taylor as well.

Moreover, why not allow these companies to file for bankruptcy protection and restructure?  The answer, simply, is that when bankruptcy happens, the union contracts can be renegotiated.

When you look at his family history, the Casey’s always championed the unions and big government, but managed to recently package it rather inconspicuously.  When, in fact, Casey realizes the power of the unions and their money as seen in this video:

My, how “blessed” he is indeed.  And it’s also nice to know his loyalty goes to the unions as it clearly is not to his non-union constituents.  Maybe if the unions would demonstrate some fiscal campaign donation discipline of their own, they could fund their own pensions instead of taking it from their neighbors.

Casey may have an uphill battle to retain his Senate seat if he treats his constituents like ATMs to protect the unions using hard-earned taxpayer dollars.  When the non-union wage earners get hit and have to continually make adjustments to their budgets, but the unions get a blank check on the backs of the private sector, it is going to be very hard for Casey to effectively fool the voters again.  I’m sure he’s hoping PA voters will forget by 2012.  They won’t, because we will remind them.


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Posted Jul 31st 2010 at 3:01 pm in Big Labor, Congress, Federal Spending, Politics | 120 Comments