Red State vs. Blue State: AL vs. Anti-Union Andy, Round 1

Today I debate one of the wealthiest guys I know who’s always been vehemently anti-union. He’s also an all around fiscal conservative blowhard who routinely interrupts me whenever we have a conversation about economics (more theories to him than an actual impact on people’s lives), and usually to quote some Libertarian think tank or post a link to some BS article from them. My strategy for today’s debate was to interrupt him as much as possible. Otherwise, the debate would be me asking one question and a 20 paragraph monologue from him in response. So just call me Brody O’Reilly this week.

Brody: Thanks for coming on.

Anti-Union “Andy”: You’re welcome

Brody: You should say ‘thanks for having me,’ but whatever dickhead. [Anti-union Andy is not amused]. So you’ve always been a corporate blowhard that hates unions, do you feel like Wisconsin’s Governor Scott Walker and his defenders are now copying you?

Anti-Union Andy: I take offense to your word choice, but actually, I’m thrilled that they’re copying me. There have always been informed opinions that see unions for what they really—

Brody: Yeah, yeah, who gives a shit? I’ve been making a big push to have more people that do debates come on as themselves and have their actual name run. Last week a Russian spy agreed to be listed under his real name, why won’t you?

Anti-Union Andy: I don’t like that you’re insinuating I’m hiding—

Brody, interrupting Andy for once: I’m not, I just want to know.

Anti-Union Andy: Ordinarily, I’m never shy about my views—

Brody, interrupting again, a guy could get used to this: Oh I know it.

Anti-Union Andy: But the unions are very powerful and usually have ties to organized crime, there’s an article on—

Brody: Before you start quoting “Libertarian” websites that are really just so conservative Republicans won’t claim them, I have to ask, you think the Wisconsin schoolteachers are mobbed up? When gang members flash a W I always thought it stood for west side, not Wisconsin.

Anti-Union Andy: I’m saying historically organized crime and the unions have been very close. That’s not just me saying that.

Brody: That is you saying that. You’re the one saying it.

Anti-Union Andy: But I’m not the only one, far from it. There’s well documented evidence the mafia and unions collaborate, that’s fact. Even including people as powerful as the Kennedy family, who also had ties to unions and organized crime. Organized crime has directly profited from their association with unions.

Brody: You really believe that?

Anti-Union Andy: Yes, it may not be a popular fact or one that hasn’t been white washed out of history but there are a few still brave enough to speak the truth [Andy laughs, cracking himself up at how brave he is].

Brody: I don’t know if people who think that are brave so much as wrong, but I would like to ask—

Anti-Union Andy: If you’ll allow me at the end of the interview I can link to anything I mention—

Brody: God no Andy, I’m telling you straight up nobody wants to read this debate and then go hunt for “truth” on websites written by closet neo-nazis who run “think tanks” that feature the minds of 8 people. Now let me ask, you are a white male, you are Christian, you are rich, you are, I believe, heterosexual even though I have never seen you want to fuck anything that wasn’t a pile of money, and yet you always make it seem like you’re the brave one standing up for a power system that has always been in place in America. Why is that?

Anti-Union Andy: I think there is a conspiracy afoot in the media and elsewhere to silence white males and discredit them at every turn.

Brody: You have got to be fucking kidding

Anti-Union Andy: I won’t respond well to cursing.

Brody: Oh shit, are we going to get into fisticuffs Andy?

Anti-Union Andy: I will say that there is no affirmative action for white males, no scholarships for white males, if you speak your mind as a white male you are going to be labeled—as you just did a few seconds ago—a Nazi. There is a lot of discrimination and bias against white, Christian males. All Christians are silenced by organizations like the ACLU and others—

Brody: But are extremely vocal through the 5,000 Christian organizations that are also politically active and the Christian political lobby in—

Anti-Union Andy, completely unfazed: And as for being wealthy. Well, I do not feel that way as I am taxed almost half my income.

Brody: You are taxed 36 percent on an income that’s more than 99 percent of America makes. 64 percent of a million is still better than a hundred percent of 500 bucks a week.

Anti-Union Andy: I work for it! If others would work as I do instead of taking handouts from the government and refusing to work—

Brody: So somebody who is on food stamps can just up and get a job at JP Morgan tomorrow pulling in six figures? It’s just a simple matter of them showing up to work every day and they too could be a millionaire?

Anti-Union Andy: Education is a big part of that. My degrees in finance reflect the wages I’m paid—

Brody: WELL then why don’t you support schoolteachers in Wisconsin making 65,000 a year when they have as much education as you do? Aren’t you pretty full of shit to suggest they shouldn’t make that much, when you make at least 4 times that amount with the same education?

Anti-Union Andy: First, you don’t know how much I make—

Brody: I know it must be at least 250,000 or you wouldn’t be complaining about taxes of 36 percent. That’s why I said you make at least 4 times their salary.

Anti-Union Andy: I’m sure I also work more hours than they do with less time off—

Brody: You work at least 4 times their hours? You work a workweek of at least 160 hours a week?

Anti-Union Andy: I’m not going to dignify anything about my salary as a response because this is about unions milking the taxpayer dry. My salary is paid by a private sector employer and completely different—

Brody: The only difference is that it’s your money instead of theirs. Conservatives always think somebody else’s money should be less and their money should be more.

Anti-Union Andy: An average Wisconsin schoolteacher makes 80,000 a year—

Brody: Wrong

Andy, unfazed: That is significantly higher than the national average.

Brody: The answer isn’t to lower Wisconsin wages, but to raise them nationally.

Anti-Union Andy: So your suggestion is to bankrupt states by raising teacher wages?

Brody: My suggestion is that tax cuts for the rich racked up these debts, not a schoolteacher in Milwaukee.

Anti-Union Andy: That’s false, because half the state budget in Wisconsin goes towards education—

Brody: Tax cuts take away from the state budget. Lowering taxes on the wealthy and corporations inside a state insures states won’t have the operating budget to pay teacher’s salaries. It’s a revenue problem that’s been spun into an overspending problem.

Alabama Liberal Note: The debate goes on longer, much longer actually, but I decided to divide it up. Join us next week for Round 2 where we discuss if corporations are blondes and brunettes are the middleclass, if Scott Walker is a fascist (answer: yes), and union busting as a means to wipe out the political competition.