Wisconsin’s War With Union Represents Progress: Amity Shlaes

Targeting public unions is unwise, rash and retrograde. That’s the take in some quarters on Republican Governor Scott Walker’s plan to curtail collective bargaining for public-sector unions in his state, Wisconsin.

In a tone reminiscent of a Madison professor pouring cold water over an ill-judged dissertation, President Barack Obama recently admonished: “It’s important not to vilify them or suggest somehow all these budget problems are due to public employees.” On Salon.com, contributor Stephanie Taylor described Walker’s effort to strip away long-standing public-sector bargaining rights as “a step backward, not forward, in the march of American progress.”