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Many Republicans outside of Wisconsin, after protests exploded in Madison last month, have been guarded in describing their own interest in changing the collective bargaining laws in their own states. When you’re feeling the heat of a nearby conflagration, you don’t douse yourself with kerosene.

But Alaska State Rep. Carl Gatto (R-Palmer) suffers from no such hesitancy. He’s introduced a bill in the Alaska House that, like Walker’s budget repair bill, would bar collective bargaining on health insurance and retirement benefits. Also like Walker’s bill, Gatto’s would permit bargaining on wages and exempt public safety employees.

carl gatto

“It is the Wisconsin arrangement,” Gatto said in an interview on CNN.

House Democratic Leader Beth Kerttula, a Democrat, told the Associated Press that Gatto’s proposal was “rather foolish,” which sounds sort of ominous.

With less than a month left in Alaska’s legislative session, observers don’t give Gatto good odds on ushering his bill through the Democrat-controlled House. (The state senate, however, and governorship are in Republican hands.)

A few other states have taken on bills similar to Wisconsin’s, most notably Ohio, where the state Legislature is still debating (and protestors are still fighting) a bill by Republican Gov. John Kasich’s curtailing bargaining rights for public employees.

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