Sen. Ron Johnson
It's one thing for people to speculate as why the city of Detroit ended up in this awful awful financial mess.
Some blame Coleman Young or Kwame Kilpatrick. Some ay it was the result of a downward spiral for 60 years. Then there's the knee-jerk, politically-tainted responses that come from folks like U.S. Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin.
In a guest column in USA Today, he not only urges Congress to avoid any temptation to help bail out Detroit, but he offers his myopic evaluation of the situation:
Detroit's failure is rooted in an unholy alliance between politicians and public sector unions. Its 47 municipal unions spent their members' dues to elect public officials who then "negotiated" with those same unions for overly generous contracts that resulted in bankruptcy.
Yes, what's that saying? Ignorance is bliss. Well, this is one blissful politician.
He writes in his column:
The dominoes have been falling for years:36 municipalities have gone bankruptsince 2010. Last Thursday, the biggest domino yet fell. The City of Detroit -- withdebt of $18 billion-- filed for protection to reorganize under Chapter 9 of the federal bankruptcy code.
American taxpayers need to watch their wallets. Next will come a call for a federal bailout to alleviate Detroit's pain. Congress should act now to ensure taxpayers aren't forced to pay for decades of mismanagement by liberal politicians and public sector unions.
Translation: Screw Detroit.
Not to say that bailing out Detroit is a popular sentiment on either side of the political isle. Even the White House has indicated it has no plans to step in and help, and plenty have good reason not to want to step in and help.
But it seems more annoying when someone with so little knowledge of the situation weighs in and offers an uninformed view when telling people why they shouldn't help Detroit.
