Whimsical Wisconsin Madness

Turns out I have had plenty of opinions about current events lately, but I haven't had much free time to lay pen to paper and get those opinions out in the open. So today, while I sit at home in honor of Presidents Days, I wanted to say something about Collective Bargaining for public employees and hopefully beat Blake to the punch.
First, let me admit that for all the negatives that some want to throw at unions, they have done some good, albeit in the private sector. Unions can be thanked for child labor laws, the 40 hour work week, and even weekends off among other things. I don't want to get into private unions though and I don't want to debate the positive and negatives of private unions, I want to address public unions.
Public Unions really make no sense at all. Why might you ask? Because the public votes for the government officials. There is a terrible conflict of interest when the public unions can vote in their favored politician and then that politician can work to funnel money and benefits to that union. I work in the private sector, and unless I go buy a sizable amount of stock, I have no say in who my boss is, the public sector does, they have elections for their top bosses. So again, what I want to harp on is Conflict of Interest, the root of the problem. The issue in Wisconsin that is causing the largest uproar right now is not so much that the public employees might have to pay a little more towards pensions and health care, its the loss of collective bargaining. The ability for a group of professionals to combine their individual voices together to create a group that has more power than each individual on their own, or in reality, a group that gives up their individual voices in favor of a small group of leaders who speak on their behalf. But again, this group already has something that their private sector counterparts don't have, a vote. In no way is taking away collective bargaining taking away the voice of public employees, it is simply fixing the conflict of interest that has corrupted the government and will limit the power of public unions over elected officials. It will stop the abuses that have allowed politicians to buy votes with public money. Public union members already have a voice, getting rid of collective bargaining is not taking away their right to be heard, it is fixing a problem in the system that unfairly allocates funds from the tax payers to those with the most powerful unions. I am all for the public sector employees and what they do for this country, and I believe that they should be compensated for their work, I have no problem paying taxes that goes towards their paychecks. I do have a problem when the system is corrupted and unions and elected officials have the ability to collude and dictate policy in a nondemocratic fashion.
That's all I got, see you again in another 3 months or so.