Notorious Pro-Corporate Group ALEC's Hidden Role in Stoking Class War in Wisconsin and the Rest of America

The current anti-union campaign being implemented in Wisconsin and other states has the fingerprints of the American Legislative Executive Council (ALEC) all over it.

AlterNet writer Joshua Holland recently identified ALEC as one of the behind-the-scenes players in the Wisconsin showdown. It's important to shine a bright light on ALEC to reveal how one aspect of the class war gripping America today is being fought out.

ALEC has unprecedented influence in Washington and state capitols throughout the country. According to Jonathan Williams, ALEC's fiscal policy director, "Wisconsin has become ground zero." He adds, "What happens could serve as a domino, win or lose, in either direction."

Williams, like Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, hides his union-bashing politics behind the threat of fiscal crisis. In an interview of PBS's New Hour, he elaborated: "Wisconsin is a state in serious fiscal problems right now. So, the question is, is, you know, the budgeting as usual isn't working here, and, so, what are the major reforms that we can accomplish to solve this budget shortfall without going back to the taxpayers and asking for more?"

Union busting is part of the broader campaign to eviscerate the middle class. Corporations and right-wing ideologues are promoting stringent right-to-work provisions. In Virginia, along with Montana, Ohio and Wisconsin, bills have been introduced to incorporate such laws into the respective state constitutions.

Efforts are also underway to end the union dues check-off, which the right-wing calls "paycheck protection" laws. Such legislation has been passed in Alabama, Utah and Idaho; it is being pushed in Wisconsin as well as in Arizona, Kansas, Mississippi and Missouri.

The assault on the middle-class taking place in Wisconsin involves an attack on their wages, their right to join a union, their self-esteem and the very future of America. The same battle is being played out in different forms throughout the country. In Wisconsin and Indiana, Republicans are aggressively wagging the class war campaign; in California and New York, Democratic moderates are implementing a softer version of the same campaign.

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If you think the battle over labor rights now being fought out in Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee and other states is purely a matter of coincidence or budget shortfalls, I've got a bridge to sell you.

The Wisconsin showdown is a result of an economic crisis precipitated by bankers, financial speculators and intentionally inept regulators. In line with Naomi Klein's argument in The Shock Doctrine, America's Great Recession served to destabilize the nation's economy so as to facilitate the systematic expropriation of the personal and social wealth of the middle-class. The effort by Wisconsin citizens opposing Gov. Walker's anti-labor campaign is an attempt to halt this ongoing plunder.

The Republican campaign being waged against the rights of middle-class Americans, particularly government employees, is surely part of a well-financed, orchestrated and coordinated campaign. If our legal system recognized class war as a crime, many of today's most reactionary but celebrated public figures and organizations would be arrested, tried and judged for the crimes they committed against the well-being the majority of Americas. Alas, class war in America is merely another name for libertarian freedom.

Republican forces are collaborating in the massive robbery of the collective wealth and precious self-esteem amassed by the America middle-class since it took shape following World War II. And ALEC is at the center of this political campaign. Its programs fashion the legislative agenda of class robbery that defines American politics today.