Things didn’t end well for the last guy…

  • collapse_already@lemmy.ml
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    8 days ago

    Ruining the holidays for a bunch of government employees, not just TSA. I am more worried about air traffic controllers, NASA, NOAA, FDA, the VA (yeah they suck, but a lot of people depend on them and making them work unpaid is definitely not going to improve anything), and thousands of other government employees that will go without pay. The longer it lasts, the worse it will be for the economy.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      8 days ago

      Damn. Imagine just showing up to work knowing you won’t be paid, with a bunch of other coworkers who are in the exact same socio-economic hostage crisis.

      Gotta wonder if there’s some kind of organizational remedy. Like… a collection of workers who could all respond together as a single labor unit to demand a different set of policies on pain of withholding their labor until their demands are met.

      • collapse_already@lemmy.ml
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        8 days ago

        I am old enough to remember when Reagan used military and scabs to bust the air traffic controllers’ strike. Hopefully this time people won’t cross picket lines.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          8 days ago

          There’s no picket lines, because there’s no organizing and no threat of a strike. Reagan did his work and Clinton/Bush/Obama/Trump/Biden made sure it stuck.

          More likely what we’re going to see isn’t a single unified organized effort, but a bunch of individuals just walking off the job or phoning it in because they’re too demoralized to continue doing these thankless jobs. Then we may well still need to send in the military as scabs, just on a more permanent basis, since military scabs can’t legally quit.

          • collapse_already@lemmy.ml
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            8 days ago

            Mandatory military service in exchange for free public education is already being floated. Canada should build a wall and make America pay for it, cause they are about to have a serious illegal immigration problem.

            • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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              8 days ago

              Mandatory military service in exchange for free public education is already being floated.

              Excited to see the biggest rug-pull in US history when that back half fails to materialize.

              Canada should build a wall and make America pay for it

              The Canadian far-right is such a fucking joke. They want to be American so badly. Far from building a wall, I suspect they’ll be the ones shoving open the gates if we ever get a President deranged enough to try an annexation.

                • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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                  8 days ago

                  Two sides of the same coin. The distinction between the two is primarily whether you consider the information conveyed beneficial or nefarious.

                  Either way, Americans are already the most propagandized people on earth. You don’t need to send people to college to indoctrinate them. You’ve got consumer-grade mass media doing the job just fine.

          • Kitathalla@lemy.lol
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            8 days ago

            Then we may well still need to send in the military as scabs, just on a more permanent basis, since military scabs can’t legally quit

            The big difference will be that those jobs can’t be replaced as easily. ATC had quasi-analogous people in the military, and the only real match there is the VA. The issue is the amount of military doctors/nurses working in the armed forces does not compare to the civilian side. For the rest? NASA/NOAA/FDA have one-if-not-none person that may be able to substitute in.

            With that thought, I’d be more than willing to place money on this being one of the thrusts of the idiotic doge. Why have national parks? Why care about food and drug quality? Healthcare for vets? Bahahaha, the money overlords care about their own supply, which they can ensure with their money. Everything there is focused solely on the peons, which have no meaning to the people pulling these strings.