ok thrax, ill test your limits this time:

understandable that you want arizona to dictate its border law, and wisconsin to bring down its unions... those are republican/conservative stances. but what would you think if connecticut voted to legalize gay marriage? constitution says nothing about marriage, so it would be a state right, ... right?

if you say okay to that, then i respect your statements more btw.

Being a state of the union, I'm well aware of the role and purpose of government.

To preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

Now granted, I'm a smaller state, and regularly get roughed by Texas, and frowned upon by the Bible Belt, but at least I'm perpetually hooked up with New Hampshire, that sexy vixen.

I don't personally think gay marraige should be allowed, but I am glad that the federal government is keeping it's distance on the subject. Each state is being allowed its own discourse on the subject and making their decisions accordingly. I can respect that.

Vermont tangent: saw this exchange on facebook the other day...

"Still not sure why you went to law school. That comment may or may not apply to three quarters of the people at VLS."

"Vermont Law School: The place where people who should never go to law school go to law school."

I'm saying it's the closest thing we have to a referee in life and if you want it to do less refereeing and more taking your money and giving to its friends I have no problem with that either.

Thraxle, you do realize that Gov. Walker, the governor of Wisconsin, is refusing to negotiate with the protesters because he wants to bust the union, not because he wants to balance the budget. He gave discretionary tax breaks to corporations this year that amount almost exactly to the deficit in question to corporations that didn't need or ask for them. 61% of the country thinks the unions shouldn't be busted, according to a gallup poll referenced on Fox and Friends. Fox and Friends accidentally reversed it and said 61% wanted the unions busted, but it later corrected itself... honest mistake. 33% thought the unions should be busted and 6% were unsure.

The real reason Walker is trying to bust the unions' collective bargaining rights is because these unions are among 3 of the top 10 political campaign financiers in Wisconsin, and all of them give almost exclusively to democrat candidates. If the issue was really about balancing the budget then Walker would accept the protesters' concession to give up bargaining rights until the budget is balanced, which is what they have offered. But Walker doesn't actually care about balancing the budget, as I noted above, it seems like he actually put the budget into a deficit by giving out unnecessary handouts to corporations in the first place (OMG HANDOUTS!).

If you want I can find the articles citing all my claims but I am sure you'll take my word for it. Anyway, here's a youtube of Mr. Walker being prank called by a journalist pretending to be Mr. Koch, a billionaire right wing activist and financier of Walker's campaign.

http://www.buffalobeast.com/?p=5045

He basically admits that this has nothing to do with balancing the budget and everything to do with busting the unions.

Oh and I haven't even talked about how getting rid of these unions would damage Wisconsin as a whole. But I'll just leave you with this: teachers unions are illegal in five states. These states rank 50th, 49th, 48th, 47th, and 44th in SAT/ACT test scores.

Ignore that first sentence
***Monte: I'm saying the government is the closest thing we have to a referee in life and if you want it to do less "refereeing" and more "taking your money and giving to its friends" then I sort of have a problem with that.

http://www.businessinsider.com/states-where-teachers-unions-are-illegal-2011-2

47th, 45th, 39th, 26th, & 25th

haha, that bit about teachers union is funny.

coworker is originally from wisconsin, and he didnt state whether he was pro- or anti- unions, he just stated that wisconsin actually had a SURPLUS in their budget in recent history.

Oh and correction on the teachers unions fact, this is from a 1999 aggregate (when the last round of teacher union busting happened), I'm not sure what the rankings for these states are today, but I'd wager there is still a pretty negative trend.

Heh, thanks thrax, I missed your post right as I was writing my addendum.