Sorry State

Updated on Dec. 24 in second paragraph with layoff statistics

My mother put food on the table through her metermaid job despite enduring regular harassment from the public so I have a soft spot in my heart for government workers. But regardless of my family history, the scapegoating of local and state workers for our nation's debt and deficit is disgraceful and the upcoming givebacks and layoffs involving them will be disastrous for us all.

As I made a white knuckle, teeth-gritting, 425-mile journey through an Ohio snowstorm to a job interview in Pennsylvania last week - having covered a lot of road carnage as a reporter I'm extra paranoid when driving - I was grateful for the state employees manning the plows and wondered if I would've made it safely without them. Some 300,000 local, state and federal workers have been laid off since January of 2008 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/24/opinion/24krugman.html?src=ISMR_AP_LO_MST_FB

And then on Sunday I was treated to a smear job on local and state workers masquerading as journalism on the once great 60 Minutes http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7166293n To watch the segment - I confess to screaming profanities at the television screen as I worked out at a gym - you would've thought that the massive budget shortfalls of our states http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/snapshot_20091118/ were due to government overspending and greedy public sector unions like the Amercian Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the union my mother was a member of.  The reality is the shortfalls are due to the housing bubble bursting as economist Dean Baker of The Center for Economic Policy and Research notes http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/cbs-news-joins-the-attack-on-public-employees.

Baker also points out that the 60 Minutes piece is not only misleading but inaaccurate. Local and state governments spent $45 billion more than they took in, not the half a trillion figure cited by 60 Minutes reporter Steve Kroft without attribution. Baker goes on to note that "if revenue had increased in step with normal growth (2.4 percent real growth, plus inflation), state and local governments would have had an additional $290 billion since the start of the downturn."

The most infuriating part of the segment on arguably the nation's most respected and influential TV newsmagazine is how Kroft gave Christie a free pass. Christie insisted he cancelled a rail tunnel project that would've created 6,000 construction jobs and eased congestion in New Jersey and New York because the state can't afford it.

"Where am I getting the money? I don't have it. I literally don't have it," Christie said. And sadly because Kroft didn't challenge him and the average viewer doesn't have all the facts, Christie sounded very reasonable and came off as a governor who inherited a mess he didn't create and is now forced to make tough choices.

In fairness, the project could cost some $11 billion, about $2.5 billion more than projected but federal taxpayers were covering at least $3 billion and Christie had options. He could have bonded the project or raised taxes  to help pay for it, options that Kroft never asked him about.

Nor did Kroft ask how a Republican whose party is largely responsible for the massive tax cuts for the rich over the last 30 years that have shrunk local and state revenue and for the lack of financial policing that allowed the housing crash to occur, can blame the red ink on overspending and greedy union workers. How the guy whose party says liberal policies are responsible for the nation's nearly 10 percent unemployment rate can put thousands of teachers and other state workers on the unemployment line. How that's good for taxpayers who will have to cover the costs of their unemployment benefits and other social costs when the jobless have their homes foreclosed on and end up out on the street.

No, according to Kroft, Christie is the "canary in the coal mine" sounding the alarm about overspending and overly generous pensions. Never mind that the average yearly AFSCME pension is $19,000 and 80 percent is paid for by employees and investment returns http://www.afscme.org/press/33924.cfm Or that pension values nosedived due to risky financial bundling of them with junk bonds in "collateralized debt obligations" applauded by Republicans as an example of free market innovation by Wall Street which can police it self and doesn't need government regulation. Self-policing that is about as effective as voluntary speed limits.

Christie, a self-serving, grandstanding bully even resorted to the classic race to the bottom mentality in arguing for slashing benefits and pensions. "The general public thinks, 'I can't believe anybody gets a pension anymore. I've got a 401(k). It got killed in the stock market. I don't know what I'm gonna do for my retirement. I can't believe people get a pension anymore."

That's right governor. If I don't have heat or indoor plumbing in my home, why should my neighbor? Instead of fighting for decent benefits and pensions for all Americans, lets take them away from the few middle-class people who do have them. Why should someone else get to retire if I have to work until I drop?

As a reporter, I've seen my share of government incompetence and yes there are always a few lazy workers who get protected by a union just as there are a few lazy workers in union less jobs. But when we adapt the mentality of leaders like Christie, we pit neighbor against neighbor.

Who are these supposedly greedy and overpaid union workers? They're firefighters, police officers, postal workers, soldiers and teachers. They're the people who educate our children, clear our roads and keep us safe. They're our family and friends like the young woman I know who goes to work every night in an understaffed Ohio veterans home while juggling a full course of college classes to better herself.

When we sacrifice them for the sins of others it is a classic case of split and divide and blaming the victim. We punish them at our own peril because we are ultimately punishing ourselves.