AZ senate president and Koch-brother-lover recalled!



Nah nah nah nah, hey hey, goodbye...

Ohio's thumping defeat of SB5 was a big loss for the Benedict Arnold Koch brothers, who poured money into the lobbying group that wrote the legislation. The Koch-funded group Americans for Iranian Prosperity also paid for misleading pro-SB5 ads that twisted the words of an Ohio great-grandmother.

But the Benedict Arnold Koch brothers also suffered a loss in Arizona, where a lawmaker was recalled for the first time in history. Senate President Russell Pearce lost a special election to fellow Republican Jerry Lewis by a solid 53-45 percent.

The recall election was triggered by a voter petition drive to recall Pearce, who is unpopular for his stance on immigrant detention and was recently mired in a campaign contributions scandal.

Pearce is called the architect of S.B. 1070, Arizona’s controversial immigration law and is a long-time whore member of ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council. The Koch-funded corporate front group arranged secret meetings between Arizona legislators and Corrections Corporation of America, a private prison company, to craft S.B. 1070. It's all detailed in this NPR article.

The law would have allowed police to request immigration papers at stop if they had a “reasonable suspicions” that the person was undocumented—clearly a potential windfall for private prison companies in the business to make a profit by locking more people up.

Pearce is part of a growing trend of state legislators pushing for prison privatization, which feeds mass incarceration to the detriment of safety standards, communities and workers.

Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) officers are currently fighting back against the Legislature’s efforts to private more than 30 prison facilities in 18 southern Florida counties. Privatization could impact 4,000 officer jobs, lower safety standards and devastate dozens of communities. There are more than 20,000 correctional, probation and parole officers with the FDOC.

The officers are seeking aggressive Teamster representation in the fight against privatization and are voting in the Teamster election now. Ballots will be counted Nov. 16.

So, what does democracy look like? Today, Ohio, Maine, Iowa and Arizona is what democracy looks like!

Today's Teamster News 11.09.11

Unions see Ohio victory as springboard for resurgence, boost for 2012 election  Associated Press   ...Labor unions are celebrating one of their biggest victories in decades after turning back an Ohio law that curbed collective bargaining rights for the state’s public workers...
Author of Arizona Immigration Law Loses Recall Election  Associated Press   ...Senate President Russell Pearce conceded defeat Tuesday in an unprecedented recall election, a stunning turnabout for the author of Arizona's tough immigration law and one of the most powerful politicians in the state...
Liz Mathis Wins State Senate District 18  KCRG-TV9   ...Linn County voters extended Democratic control of the Iowa Senate by electing Liz Mathis to fill a vacant seat in Iowa Senate 18 ... Mathis ... made jobs, improving the business climate and education the basis of her campaign...
Union message in Scott defeat  Detroit Free Press   ...State Rep. Paul Scott, R-Grand Blanc, became the first state legislator in a generation to be recalled from office Tuesday, losing a close vote that was called after Scott and his Republican colleagues in Lansing enacted sweeping tax and budget reforms earlier this year...
Mainers vote to continue Election Day registration  Bangor Daily News   ...By a relatively wide margin, Mainers on Tuesday overturned a recently passed law that would have ended a 38-year-old practice of allowing voters to register on Election Day...
2011 election results: Steve Beshear wins in Kentucky, Phil Bryant elected in Mississippi  Politico   ...Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear cruised to a second term over Republican David Williams Tuesday in a win that offers Democrats a 2012 template for how to run in a dismal economic environment...   

Today's Teamster News 09.01.11

Wisconsin facing teacher exodus  Associated Press   ...teachers chose retirement over coming back following the passage of a bill that would have forced them to pay more for benefits and taken away most of their collective bargaining rights...
As Labor Day looms, the battle over SB 5 is joined (opinion)  Toledo Blade   ...the measure is not reform. It is extreme political posturing masquerading as responsible policy making...
State takes first steps to placing Emergency Managers in Flint and Highland Park  eclectablog   ...With only a $2 million deficit, (Flint) is still undergoing the initial review process. This is odd because ... other cities with much larger problems have had their requests for an EM denied...
Tea partiers join chorus vs. N.H. chair  Politico   ...New Hampshire Republicans are uniting ahead of embattled state party chairman Jack Kimball’s impending ouster — a marked contrast to the deep divide between the tea party and establishment wings Kimball warned would result from the efforts to remove him...
Russell Pearce recall: State's high court to consider appeal  The Arizona Republic   ...The Arizona Supreme Court will decide whether the Nov. 8 recall election for Senate President Russell Pearce will go forward...
The farmworkers are marching to Sacramento  San Francisco Chronicle   ...this march has drawn public attention to the union's cause, energized its members and current supporters and doubtless added to its many supporters worldwide...
The 10 States With the Worst Economies In America  Alternet   ... Mississippi, the Carolinas, Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama are cheap-labor “right to work” states...

Whoa! AZ senate prez recalled!

Pearce.

Wow. Sen. Russell Pearce, the Arizona lawmaker who authored the state's "papers, please" immigration law, is being recalled.

It's the first time anyone can remember a senate president being recalled in U.S. history.

Talking Points Memo reports,

State election officials say that the groups working to recall Arizona's state Senate President Russell Pearce (R), the man behind the state's controversial immigration law, have successfully collected enough signatures to force an election.

On Friday, Elections Director Amy Bjelland certified 10,365 signatures from the recall petititions. 7,756 were needed to force the election.

The election will happen on November 8th unless Pearce successfully challenges the recall in court. And though Pearce's attorney is reviewing the signatures, he said is will not likely mount a legal challenge. "I'm ready for an election," he said, the Arizona Daily Star reports.

Huffington Post says Pearce could choose to resign in five days. (Not likely.)

"No one expected this or picked up on this political earthquake," said (Randy) Parraz, one of the main organizers behind the extraordinary grassroots campaign, which electrified a bipartisan effort in Pearce's Mesa district. Parraz credited a "dramatic shift" over the past six months due to Pearce's often extremist leadership in state senate.

"We had people pouring into the office," Parraz said, citing the role of Republicans, Democrats and Independents in the door-to-door canvassing initiative, "and they told us: Russell Pearce is too extreme for our district and state."

Beyond his self-proclaimed key role in the state's notorious SB 1070 law, Pearce oversaw a near circus-level of extremist and reckless legislation in the Arizona senate this past spring, including draconian cuts in education and health care. Mired in various scandals, Pearce infamously accused President Obama of "waging jihad" on America. And last month Fox News Phoenix explored his widely denounced connections to neo-Nazi hate groups. In a recent interview with FOX News, Pearce dismissed the recall effort as the work of "far left anarchists."

Looks as if we're still in a "throw the bums out" mood. Wisconsin Republicans ought to be worried.