Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

It’s the corruption, stupid.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

“Alexa, change the president.”

The world has changed, and neither one recognizes it.

Finding joy where we can, and muddling through where we can’t.

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

Mediocre white men think RFK Jr’s pathetic midlife crisis is inspirational. The bar is set so low for them, it’s subterranean.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

the 10% who apparently lack object permanence

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

To the privileged, equality seems like oppression.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Indiana Again

Indiana Again

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This is the Indiana bill that breaks private sector unions, which is what follows immediately after conservatives destroy public sector unions.

Now Democratic lawmakers from another state seem to be leaving their homes for Illinois.

House Democrats in Indiana are leaving the state rather than vote a bill that would modify collective-bargaining for some workers there, according to the Indianapolis Star.

A source told the paper that Democrats from that state’s lower chamber are headed to Illinois, though the paper notes that some might go to Kentucky. Only two of the 40 Democrats were on the Indiana House floor when the chamber convened Tuesday. The lack of Democratic House members showing up at the Capitol in Indiana prevents the Republican majority from having a quorum.

I don’t know if they’re gone yet.

This is a better source if you want to follow it.

Reader Interactions

26Comments

  1. 1.

    shortstop

    What’s in western Kentucky besides barbecue?

    I kid! Much of my family is from there. Still, we got plenty of room and a hell of a lot more sympathetic liberals in Illinois.

  3. 3.

    Kay

    @shortstop:

    I think they should all leave Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana and meet in Kentucky.
    It’s coordinated on the GOP side. Democrats should organize too :)

  4. 4.

    shortstop

    Well, I don’t eat meat these days, but if I did, I’d stay near Paducah and eat pit barbecue all day. The pit ‘cue of western Kentucky and western Tennessee is the best there is, IMO.

  5. 5.

    shortstop

    @Kay: No, ma’am. Illinois is really enjoying our newfound status as an asylum state. We’ve had enough political embarrassment in recent years and this could be our rebirth.

  6. 6.

    Davis X. Machina

    Hope this cuts off President Mitch Daniels off at the knees.

    Oops, someone seems to have already done that. Or maybe he really is that short.

  8. 8.

    Another Commenter at Balloon Juice (fka Bella Q)

    @shortstop: Illinois, where pro- working people politicians go for asylum. Needs some work, but it’s an idea.

  10. 10.

    Southern Beale

    Why is no one talking about the role of ALEC in all of this? The industry/corporate-funded group which pushes its boilerplate legislation on the state level? I mean, it’s no coincidence so many states are tackling the SAME legislation right now.

    Here’s their model legislation page:

    One of the most important resources ALEC provides to its members is model legislation. Through the combined effort and unique partnership of public and private sector members, model legislation is drafted, deliberated and approved by one of ALEC’s eight Task Forces. These bills provide a valuable framework for developing effective policy ideas aimed at protecting and expanding our free society.
    __
    While ALEC provides the resources, our members, long known for their legislative activism, introduced hundreds of bills based on ALEC model legislation. During the latest legislative cycle, dozens of ALEC model bills were enacted into law

    .

    Thanks a lot. Who is ALEC? Check out their funding:

    Defenders of Wildife and NRDC reported that companies “like Enron, Amoco, Chevron, Shell, Texaco, Coors Brewing, Koch Industries, Nationwide
    __
    Insurance, Pfizer, National Energy Group, Philip Morris, and R. J. Reynolds pay for essentially all of ALEC’s expenses”. Corporate membership fees are reported to range between $5,000 and $50,000 with additional fees of $1,500 to $5,000 a year to participate in ALEC’s various task forces.
    __
    In 2002 , Exxon donated $193,200 to ALEC. [15] The following year this had jumped to $290,000, including $140,000 specifically earmarked for “global climate change” and a further $50,000 for “energy and climate change”. [16]
    The total from Koch stands at $408 000 according to Greenpeace [6]

    I started writing about ALEC a long time ago. Used to be you could actually access their “model legislation” on their webpage. Now you need to be a member.

    I wonder what they are hiding?

  11. 11.

    Southern Beale

    And by the way, anyone wanting to know about ALEC’s agenda need just look at their “Employment Policy and Regulatory Reforms” legislation. Some if it quite radical. Again, you used to be able to click on these and read the actual legislation. Now it’s protected, but just looking at the titles gives you an idea.

    Here’s an example:

    At-Will Employment Act
    Living Wage Mandate Preemption Act
    Breach of Personal Information Notification Act
    Omnibus Common Language Act
    Civil Rights Act
    Prevailing Wage Repeal Act
    Employment Reference Immunity Act
    Starting (Minimum) Wage Repeal Act
    Full Employment Act
    Professional Licensure and Certification Reform Act

    These are all conservative wet dreams for paying workers shit, taking away their rights, being allowed to discriminate, etc. It’s all pro-employer, and destructive to employees.

    Why is no one talking about this? This is class warfare right here. This is corporations abusing their workers.

  15. 15.

    Ash Can

    ::Proud Illinoisan iz proud.:: :)

    Attention all Indiana State Dem refugees: You are invited to join WI state refugees at my house for free beer. Offer good through however long it takes for Mitch Daniels to shit himself on national TV. (At which point beer will be replaced by champagne.)

  16. 16.

    Legalize

    Come on over to N. Ky., guys! Take I-71 East and I’ll meet you at the Waffle Hose in Covington. Although when I leave the office around 6, you’re on your own for the night. This is kind of like a diagonal underground rail road.

  17. 17.

    cat48

    The twitter updates of that one reporter from Indianpolis Star are funny:

    Governor not commenting on labor rally that he surely hears through his oak door. Chants include “Ditch Mitch.”#INlegis

    Dem chair Dan Parker says Democrats will return to House when Republicans drop their “assault on the middle class”

  18. 18.

    kay

    @cat48:

    It sounds like they’re having fun. Yesterday, the assembled protesters “broke into laughter” when the GOP House member told them ‘this won’t affect you”.

  20. 20.

    cat48

    I’m getting really excited. There’s an impressive crowd at the rally in OHIO.

    RT @progressteve: Fuck yes! RT @thinkprogress PHOTO: Union protesters at the Ohio State House today yfrog.com/h7lwwxdj //nice

  21. 21.

    kay

    @cat48:

    It’s going to get bad, I’m afraid. They’re not letting them into the statehouse. They had 4,000 in there for last week’s protest, and now they’re limiting it to 750. It’s 32 degrees.
    They have to let them in.

  23. 23.

    cat48

    They may be afraid that they can’t get them to leave if they let them in today Or maybe it’s the firecode. This is making me a nervous wreck. We must win.

  24. 24.

    Interrobang

    Wow, SoBeale, that’s, um…really something. Thanks for the heads-up on that. The more paranoid I get, the worse it feels to get confirmation over and over again that there really are conspirators.

  25. 25.

    Erikthe Red

    The Governors of both Wisconsin and Indiana have been saying that businesses in Illinois are welcome to move to their states.

    Illinois is just saying, “Fine, we’ll take in your rogue legislators”.

  26. 26.

    cat48

    Good news, Mitch is killing the Bill…believes in Right to Work, but has other priorities! President.

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