WI Union Member Supports Scott Walker Over 'Marxist' Union Leadership

Less than three weeks remain until the June 5th recall election in Wisconsin that will decide whether or not Governor Scott Walker remains in office. Recent polls have been trending in Walker’s direction after showing a dead heat last month. Most of this seems to be the result of sky-high GOP enthusiasm. Dave Weigel reported this week that the enthusiasm is visible on the ground and should be worrisome to both Walker’s opponents and to President Obama.

There are other signs that suggest a groundswell of support for Walker. Today, the Hudson Star-Observer published a letter from Gerry Lancette, a longtime union man who is backing Scott Walker:

Dear Editor,

Scott Walker supporters are repeatedlyaccused of being “anti-union.” This union member of 45 years, son of aunion organizer and supporter of Gov. Walker and his policies, is notanti-union. The real anti-union sentiment, which is opposed to thegenuine, bottom up, pro free-market type of unionism that the GreatestGeneration produced, is coming primarily from the corrupt andillegitimate leadership of the national union organizations. Leadershipgained through deception and outright union election fraud.

Marxist factions within the labor movement were soundly defeated in1955, when the recently merged AFL-CIO formally banned Communists fromholding office within the union. It didn’t deter the Marxists and theirfellow travelers in academia, they just stayed low and kept advancingtheir revolution. Leftist author Paul Buhle, in his book “Taking Care ofBusiness” confirms that “…many ordinary Communists and Socialists actedheroically…to bring new blood into a tired labor movement.” And thatthey did.

In 1995, the “New Voices” stole the AFL-CIO nationalelection. Buhle, matter-of-factly reports the theft: “…more than twicethe usual number of delegates registered to attend the October AFL-CIOconvention….these were not, in large part, ordinary union members oreven chosen by union members, but…counted nevertheless.” The newlyelected Marxist leaders promptly rescinded the bylaw that bannedCommunists from holding office.

The bottom line, as Mr. Lancette sees it, is not about union or non-union. “It’s about whether we defeat those who conspire to’fundamentally transform the United States of America,’ or whether wechoose to be ruled by ‘muscular Socialists.'”