Illinois Public Pension Legislation - News Articles' Comments Need Some "DU Love"

[Gidney N Cloyd]

(crossposted to Labor Movement group)
Illinois' pension problem is that for decades the government has been redirecting funds from the pensions to general spending rather than raising revenue or cutting back on spending (there's been some abuse of course but it's a drop in the bucket in comparison). Legislation is about to be introduced that would balance the solution on the backs of workers by trimming constitutionally promised benefits and gradually moving away from pensions to 401k plans. As usual the articles covering it are getting swamped with comments by anti-labor types and ALEC trolls repeating the memes of their corporate masters. Talking points include
- Unions evil
- Workers lazy
- Nobody else gets pensions anymore so why should public workers
- Don't make 'the tax payers' pay for this
- If you raise taxes the wealthy and businesses will flee the state
- 401ks are more affordable than pension plans
- The pensions are way too generous
Little of which stands up to factual analysis. Unfortunately these people are either ingenuous or relentlessly misinformed and impervious to reality. I've tried to defend the progressive pov but I'm outnumbered so I'm appealing to DU to check out some of the articles and lend your voice to the rights of workers and retirees.
If you google news for "Illinois Pensions" you'll see a variety of current articles from the
Chicago Tribune, Sun-Times, Crains, Reuters, and various regional Illinois papers. The Trib seems to attract the most trolls.
Here are a couple samples:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-29/illinois-legislative-leaders-try-to-sell-pension-agreement-1-.html
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-illinois-union-leaders-bash-pension-plan-20131129,0,5474819.story
And this last one is a guest piece in the Trib by a fabulously wealthy hedge fund manager who of course knows what's best for working people:
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-11-29/site/ct-illinois-pension-reform-financia-ruin-1129-20131129_1_tax-increase-state-income-tax-bill

Any DU love we can put out there in these discussions could go a long way to helping the soon-to-be-screwn.

[Scuba]

1. Kick for Illinois workers, even the Bear fans.

[Peregrine Took]

2. Local WLS "hosts" hit on this topic every few minutes these days.

Jeez - how can even their ill informed amen chorus stomach this swill over and over?

I have a "dog in this fight," so to speak, but their yammering and harping non-stop on this subject just puts me to sleep.

"Union bosses" "unfunded liabilities" "lowest state in the nation" "Democrats caused this crisis" "retirement funds are ready to capsize" yadda yadda yadda - one guy hollering like his hair was on fire this morning "We will be another DETROIT (!!) "if something isn't done about pension reform!!!" "greedy pensioners" bankrupting the State".....

zzzzzzzzz.........zzzzzzzzzz........zzzzzzzzzz

[Gidney N Cloyd]

3. I haven't listened to WLS (at least intentionally) since they fired Ski Anderson around 10 years ago

It's an echo chamber of 'stoopid' and truthiness.

[Peregrine Took]

4. I utterly loathe them with their half truths and out and out lies but I feel I have to listen lately

as I want to be privvy to their vile machinations.