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The Capitol Square in Madison is again packed with union members of every stripe, enraged by the surprise passage of a bill to gut public employee unions. A hundred were dragged from a sit-in inside the Capitol.

Stunned and outraged, thousands of Wisconsinites forced their way into the Capitol tonight after Republicans suddenly passed their bill attacking unions, without Democrats.

Governors cry, “There’s just no money.” But some people have plenty, while taxes on corporations and the rich have fallen for decades. Fair taxes could stop the financial hemorrhaging and make up all the deficits.

Were the leaders of the Wisconsin state employees and teachers unions wise to announce, as soon as Governor Scott Walker introduced his “budget repair,” that they were happy to take concessions on benefits, as long as they could keep the right to bargain?

Wisconsin showed its lively protest colors with 7,000 protesters joining a jazz funeral march. They challenged the governor's anti-union measures and service cuts, and also concessions offered by public sector union leaders.

Steve Early’s new book The Civil Wars in U.S. Labor tackles the series of messy internal disputes that wracked the labor movement for much of the last decade, many involving the Service Employees (SEIU).