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Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Public Policy Blogger: Christie, Walker & Scott. Scaring and dividing us is not governing. #WIunion

Public Policy Blogger: Christie, Walker & Scott. Scaring and dividing us is not governing.

Christie, Walker & Scott. Scaring and dividing us is not governing.

Every day, there's new commentary on two evolving news stories. One, the braggadocio of Republican governors to diminish, even eviscerate, the bargaining rights of public employees. And two, the fall of autocratic governments in the Middle East, as so many dominoes, the revolutionaries saying, enough, enough.

And I keep finding myself making connections between the two.

In a recent post, I encouraged public-sector employees to understand the resentments toward them, and to get ahead of the attacks by contributing more to their pensions and health care benefits to more closely align with private-sector contributions. I challenged top public-sector officials and private-sector executives to look in the mirror and scale back their own excesses and privileges. I asked all of us to scrutinize our whole economic