Whut

[Content Note: Class warfare; worker exploitation.]

During a recent speech at Netroots Nation, Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren said: "Fast food workers deserve a liveable wage—and that means when they take to the picket line, we are proud to fight alongside them."

And former Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin had a pretty terrific response to that:

"We believe"?! Wait, I thought fast food joints—hurnh. [motions with her thumb over her shoulder] Don't you guys think that they're, like, of the Devil or somethin'? I's like— Liberals, you wanna send those evil employees who would dare work at a fast food joint that ya just don't believe in [waves hand dismissively]— Thought you wanted to, I dunno, send 'em to Purgatory or somethin' so they all go vegan —and, uh, wages and picket lines, I dunno, they're not often discussed in Purgatory, are they? I dunno. Why are you even worried about fast food wages? Because meh. [throws up hands]

Well, we believe [in] an America where minimum wage jobs, they're not lifetime gigs; they're stepping stone...

Yiiiiiiiikes.

Listen, I'm not posting this to make fun of Sarah Palin. I'm posting this because this is a pretty typical response to liberal support for unionization and workers' rights. That is: Dismissive mockery without any actual substantive argument. Because there is no substantive argument against allowing workers to unionize, if they want to unionize.

At least no substantive argument that makes sense for workers.

Honest conservatives will say, straight up, that they don't support unionization because it's bad for business. And at least I can respect that. (The honesty, not the position.) But when conservatives try to bury policy that exclusively supports business inside the veneer of population, and pretend that that policy somehow makes sense for workers, and all they've got is "HAR HAR LIBERALS, AMIRITE?" that is just contemptible.

I know there are plenty of workers who buy it, for reasons. But fuck if workers don't deserve better than this shit. Even those inclined to vote against their own best interests.

[Via Joseph.]