John Bauters
is cutting the minimum wage and he
Saved a Puppy
To 'wag the dog' means to purposely divert attention from what would otherwise be of greater importance, to something else of lesser significance. By doing so, the lesser-significant event is catapulted into the limelight, drowning proper attention to what was originally the more important issue. The expression comes from the saying that 'a dog is smarter than its tail', but if the tail were smarter, then the tail would 'wag the dog'.
Opinion
Poor Emeryville City Council member John Bauters. He touched the third rail in Bay Area politics. After kicking over a hornets nest, a couple of weeks of very public self inflicted wounds with his plan to cut Emeryville's minimum wage, he's now facing an accountability moment. He's not taking all the resultant insults lying down however. Councilman Bauters brought a cute puppy to the fight.
It all started when, taking a leadership role among his colleagues, he tried to cut the Emeryville minimum wage by Council fiat without warning and done so quickly that the Bay Area labor community would be caught unawares. The issue has instead blown up in his face. The labor community rapidly formed a coalition with residents to push back against the plan, starting with a city-wide mailer sent to every voting Emeryville household warning them about the planned wage roll back. Now, Mr Bauters is facing another PR nightmare; his minimum wage cutting scheme has been petitioned for recall by over 850 Emeryville residents. The successful petition drive means he's going to have to make a new decision; to give up on his plan to roll back the minimum wage or give the decision to Emeryville voters, probably next March.
Most politicians, facing such an onslaught of push back from a constituency he publicly claims allegiance with would attempt to get out in front of the mounting controversy. Mr Bauters instead is telling us all he recently saved a puppy.
Did you know that? You could barely miss it. He's been telling everyone all about it on his most recent blog entry made after the labor/community pushback kicked into high gear. He rescued the pup from a hot car. He's got pictures of the dog wagging its tail after it was saved. Or is it instead the tail wagging the dog?
In the midst of a boatload of self inflicted embarrassing news, his hand now forced by a legally binding petition drive of outraged residents, Mr Bauters is silent on all that. He's using his City Council blog instead to make everybody know what a hero he is because he saved a puppy.
John Bauters is a really smart guy. But his response to the blowback, what anybody could have guessed would come as a result of such a public blunder, leaves us baffled. It's so overt, you have to wonder if he's totally guileless and he screwed up or is he totally calculating and shameless and this is all part of some grand scheme. What's really wagging here?
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| Awwww! Minimum wage cut? What minimum wage cut? Look at this instead! |
I'm not for the min wage cut/change. But I don't see how diggin on him for posting about something totally not related does much for your argument. It does however show your opinion of him as a person. Not really news. Glad you disclaim it as opinion.
ReplyDeleteHe's got nothing on his blog to say about why the lowest wage in Emeryville should be cut but he's down with the puppy story? Yeah, that's a narcissist.
ReplyDeleteAside from the irony of John's personal website post to the well-known "wag the dog" idiom related to politics, it seems a bit unfair to criticize him for doing somthing that was right, and may very well have saved the dog's life.
ReplyDeleteIt is entirely fair to disagree with John on some issues, but to mock him on this issue is crossing a line.
I'm not sure I see your line. I'm seeing a politician who ran as a progressive that would protect working poor people in our community attempt to obfuscate his terrible record on that account by refusing to acknowledge to the citizens his remarkable turn around. Then there's a line apparently I crossed when I asked for accountability from the public official. You need to clarify if you want me to see the line crossed. It all seems standard journalistic fare to me.
DeleteWhy is minimum wage a litmus test issue? I consider myself a progressive who supports universal healthcare and housing for all, free higher education, a robust carbon tax and zero carbon emissions. But minimum wage is a tricky issue to wade into. We are being intellectually dishonest to pretend that a higher-is-better minimum wage is better for an economy when the interactions are complex. It is the one issue that progressive economists do not endorse because of these ripple effects. I appreciate John Bauters' pragmatism and willingness to hit pause if something is not working and re-evaluate.
ReplyDeleteI've lived in Emeryville for 12 years and I love that our little city is a leader in so many ways-- housing, racial and gender equality, biking, quality of life goals, etc. BUT I do not feel as comfortable saying that we should lead the way on minimum wage: it's a complex issue that I'd love to see studied and tackled on a larger level-- state or federal.
Also, If John saved a dog, I think that's wonderful. There's no need to impugn his motives in a conspiratorial way. That way of thinking doesn't further the debate or educate readers.
The minimum wage issue IS a litmus test for progressives because no other single issue strikes at the heart of inequality and poverty and right wing America’s distorted and racist system of suffering and degradation like this existential public policy. The only people making the kinds of statements you have presented are those who get their information derived from right wing think tanks or corporate PR arms. There’s nothing ‘tricky’ about the minimum wage. Any economist that’s a Keynesian (and that’s all but those few bought and paid for) agrees about the minimum wage in America. Empirical studies are all in agreement that raising the minimum wage doesn’t have the negative effects that right wing world says it does. As recently as Tuesday, economists at the University of California at Berkeley’s Institute for Research on Labor and Employment released a new study that directly undercuts common conservative arguments against a higher minimum wage: Policies that raise minimum wages don’t appear to cause significant job loss. In fact, they reduce poverty. The IRLE study showed 51 minimum wage increases of varying extents in what they classified as low-wage counties, located in 45 states, including Alameda. This issue is a non-issue for all that look towards evidence-based public policy as being foundational.
DeleteMoving on….Your list of things you love about Emeryville are all specious BTW. The only category you list that Emeryville can rightfully claim ‘leadership’ status on is housing, specifically affordable housing (something that John Bauters did take the lead on). Your placing bikes on the list is especially egregious. Emeryville can’t even implement its own Bike Plan when it comes to our network of bike boulevards.
As I’ve said many times, Council member Bauters is not a cartoon character. He has done good things for our town but also clearly, bad things as well. The Tattler doesn’t have loyalty for any elected official and they should never come to expect it. We’ll praise them when they deserve it but we’ll take them to task when they have that coming.
We did not impugn Mr Bauters’ motives with the saving of the dog. We only criticized him for how he rolled out his PR campaign after he saved it. He should own up to the minimum wage cut he was responsible for and not try to change the subject with the dog story. He owes us an explanation on the minimum wage cut. He doesn’t have to tell us about the dog issue….especially right after he cut the pay of the poorest Emeryville workers.
Thanks for the thoughtful response. I'll definitely read up more on those references regarding minimum wage.
DeleteI suppose some of my thinking goes like this: if we had a strong social safety net with universal healthcare, guaranteed housing, free or heavily subsidized higher education, then there wouldn't be a need to mandate a minimum wage-- simply put, people won't need to take jobs they don't want or that don't pay well because they are desperate. Your job no longer should have anything to do with healthcare. Then businesses can also pay market rates and not worry about being dictated how to pay employees. Perhaps a minimum wage is a bridging mechanism until we get to the robust social safety net I'd like to see. I would still like to see minimum wage at least at the county level, if not state level. Imagine if Alameda county implemented the minimum wage, then Emeryville business owners won't feel like they are are a disadvantage to immediate neighbors like Oakland and Berkeley?