Category Archives: Organized Labor

Media, Obamacare, Organized Labor, Politics

Congress Asks For, And Gets Exemption From Obamacare

Taxpayers will continue to subsidize the health insurance of members of congress and the staffers that work for them at 75% of the premium. Contrary to what the legislation says, they won’t have to get the same Hear no evil see no evil speak no evil post no evilinsurance that we do. It’s more thumbing their nose at the folks by this administration. Not only has the word “fair” been stricken from the issue, but breaking the law to do it is no big deal. Obama is above the law, and no media is holding him to account.

It’s hard to find any sympathy for the members and their aides when they make from $75,000 to $170,000 a year. And they can’t afford the Affordable Care Act?  And we have to continue to pay 75% of their health insurance? Really?

The scandal is just exacerbated by the silence of the mainstream media. Can you imagine them being quiet about this if there was an R in The White House?

Oh but wait! There is another group in line for a quid pro quo from the President when it comes to Obamacare, aka the Affordable Care Act. Big Labor can’t afford it either. You know, those workers that sold their souls to union bosses and make upwards of 20 and 30 dollars an hour? Now that they’ve found out what’s in it, they don’t like it either. They don’t want to lose the health insurance that Obama said they wouldn’t lose. And they don’t want to have to pay an additional tax because they have a so-called Cadillac plan. Yep, they’ll be next, and Obama will break the law and exempt them. And the media will just grin at that one too.

Link: Congress’s ObamaCare Exemption

Economy, Energy, Organized Labor, Politics

Only The Names Have Changed In Dept. of Labor

Labor Secretary Perez is hitting the ground running with a new and improved Department of Labor 2014-2018 Strategic Plan Outreach. I think it would be a mistake to think that President Obama picked Thomas E. Perez for Labor Secretary for the purposes of helping to turn this sorry economic situation around.

20130723-PerezBioPhoto-200

On the contrary, through the smoke and mirrors of his bullet points, the message is clear. The government has no intention of taking its boot off business’s throat. “Ensuring” access to opportunities that are already there means more government intervention.

Ensure access to opportunity . . .

  • to earn a fair day’s pay
  • for workers and employers to compete on a level playing field
  • to retire with dignity and peace of mind
  • opportunity for people to work in a safe and healthy environment
  • and with the full protection of our anti-discrimination laws.

The names have changed, but the agenda? Not so much. A higher federally mandated minimum wage that won’t be a minimum wage, but a “living wage.” Undermining the employer/employee relationship through government intervention. Increasing labor union membership, bailing out labor union underfunded pensions. And other than putting more pressure on the coal industry, working in a safe and healthy environment isn’t an opportunity. It’s not only to the employer’s benefit to have a safe work environment, but is required. The antidiscrimination issue is code for lowering or eliminating job qualification standards, forcing employers to hire more people to make up for the loss in productivity.

To his credit though, Sec. Perez says he will allow you to take part in a live web chat starting Monday Aug. 5 at 2 pm. Make sure you are heard. And let’s see how sincere he really is in his method of finding common ground via “collaboration, consensus-building and pragmatic problem-solving.”

Link: Department of Labor 2014-2018 Strategic Plan Outreach

Economy, Energy, Florida, Gun Control, Immigration, Judiciary, Obamacare, Organized Labor, Politics, Race Relations

“Could Have Been Me 35 Years Ago”

2 Comments

Two can play that game Mr. President.

If you were Trayvon 35 years ago, it would have spared the country from . . .

  • record unemployment
  • a stagnant economy
  • high energy prices
  • high food prices
  • union bailouts
  • a move towards socialism
  • Obamacare
  • the dilution of “equal justice under the law” with your inclination toward “social justice” and “racial justice”
  • your lawless administration that selectively enforces laws, especially current immigration laws
  • your Attorney General ignoring voting rights laws (New Black Panthers in Philadelphia)
  • your dozens of unaccountable Czars
  • using the Federal Govt. and its agencies to oppress (and attack, George Zimmerman) the citizens
  • abuse of voting and first amendment rights (IRS)
  • attacks on second amendment rights
  • racial tensions fueled by you not seen since the 60’s.
  • Did I mention voting rights abuse?

Media, Organized Labor, Politics, Race Relations

Unreported Scandal Of The Day, Zimmerman/Martin

I’ll bet you a cheesesteak that you haven’t before heard of the Community Relations Service within the Department of Justice. Not in the American media establishment anyway. That would be President Obama’s and Eric Holder’s Department of Justice. What a misnomer for a department’s name.

According to their Mission Statement . . .

The Community Relations Service is the Department’s “peacemaker” for community conflicts and tensions arising from differences of race, color, and national origin. Created by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, CRS is the only Federal agency dedicated to assist State and local units of government, private and public organizations, and community groups with preventing and resolving racial and ethnic tensions, incidents, and civil disorders, and in restoring racial stability and harmony.

. . .   CRS does not take sides among disputing parties and, in promoting the principles and ideals of non-discrimination, applies skills that allow parties to come to their own agreement. In performing this mission, CRS deploys highly skilled professional conciliators, who are able to assist people of diverse backgrounds.

zimmerman_martin_2Come to find out that the CRS spent taxpayer’s money and other resources to add fuel to the fire over Zimmerman not being charged in the clear self-defense shooting of a guy who beat on him. The campaign the DOJ participated in, along with their buds at the SEIU, stoked racial tensions and, after a period of time, ended in the Sheriff being fired over it, and Zimmerman being charged with murder.

Seems to me they chose sides, and did the same community organizing agitation that is trademark for this administration. There is no justice in Obama’s Department of Justice.

Link: Revealed: How taxpayers paid for Justice Department unit to ‘support protests after killing of Trayvon Martin’

Economy, Organized Labor, Politics

ATU Walkout, Depriving San Francisco Of Basic Transportation

SEIU transit workers still standing on the throats of San Francisco workers who depend on public transportation. Holding out for a three-year contract with raises of 5 percent each year, plus an automatic cost-of-living increase, each year, which adds up to about a 23 percent raise over three years.

A letter from Democratic state officials said the strike has caused “widespread personal hardship and severe economic disruption,” and it noted they were disappointed “about the lack of productive proposals and counterproposals in the days leading up to the strike.”

If they really care about working people, the solution is simple. Care about them more than your big contributors and drop the union.

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Big Labor, the boil on Democrats’ ass.

via Weary commuters face 3rd day of transit strike | Nation & World | The Seattle Times.

Economy, Organized Labor, Politics

ATU Local 1555 Holds Up San Francisco Taxpayers

Making the case for ending public sector labor unions is the strike by the transportation union in San Francisco.

The strike will derail the more than 400,000 riders who use the nation’s fifth-largest rail system and affect every mode of transportation. Transportation officials said another 60,000 vehicles could be on the road, clogging highways and bridges throughout the Bay Area. Not to mention the environmental impact from more vehicles on the road. All of a sudden, the SEIU isn’t so green.

The unions, which represent nearly 2,400 train operators, station agents, mechanics, maintenance workers and professional staff, were asking for a 5 percent raise each year over the next three years. BART said that train operators and station agents in the unions average about $71,000 in base salary and $11,000 in overtime annually. The workers also pay a flat $92 monthly fee for health insurance.

antonette_bryantAntonette Bryant, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 says “Our members aren’t interested in disrupting the Bay Area, but management has put us in a position where we have no choice.” After all, they are really being put upon.

Who in the private sector got a 5 percent raise last year, and the year before that, and the year before that? That’s what they are on strike for. They are demanding a 5 percent raise each year for the next three years. It’s not like they’re making $40,000 a year for operating a train or selling tickets. No. They’re making $71,000 a year, not including an average of $11,000 of overtime. Are you paying $92 a month for your health insurance policy like they are? $82,000 a year for operating a train and selling tickets, and they have the nerve to strike and demand that taxpayers pay them more?

Why does the SEIU think that they deserve to be paid better, and have better benefits, than the people forced to pay their exorbitant cost? More to the point, isn’t it time to put an end to the use of organized labor in city and state government?

Link: SF Bay Area traffic picking up with transit strike

2008 Election, 2012 Election, Economy, Energy, Immigration, Media, Obamacare, Organized Labor, Politics, Race Relations

So You Think Republicans Are Racist?

That anyone who opposed anything Barack Obama would do would be labeled a racist came as no surprise. This was obvious long before his 2008 election. Playing the race card is what democrats do. It’s their way to dismiss the issues because of skin color, rather than debate them. That republicans don’t stand up against the hateful attacks is another subject. Basically, and to their detriment, their moral standards prevent them from going there. But this is what needs to be said.

Here’s what people would have to believe of republicans if they fall for the classless playing of the race card.

  • We would be more than willing to welcome cap-and-trade with open arms, even if we paid a thousand dollars or more extra every year for our energy use, if Barack Obama were only white.
  • We would be dancing in the streets celebrating the dawning of government control of our health care if only Barack Obama were white.
  • It would be just dandy if government bureaucrats rationed health care for our parents, as long as the president is white.
  • We would jump at the chance of the government owning ALL of the auto manufacturing companies .. not just General Motors … if the president just didn’t have dark skin.
  • We would applaud those ACORN workers giving tax avoidance advice to a pimp and his prostitute if the workers hadn’t been black.
  • Most Americans – even ones that don’t pay income taxes now – would be more than willing to give 70% of everything they earn to the federal government when asked … so long as they are asked by a white president.
  • We would have been thrilled, I tell you … THRILLED to have all of those Islamic goons being held at Guantanamo be not only released, but sent to be school resource officers at our local government schools, if only a white president put that plan in motion.
  • It would be OK if a white president stood back and allowed Iran to build its coveted nukes … we’re only unhappy about that because a black president is doing it.
  • Deficits? We don’t care about deficits! Make our children and grand children and great grand children pay through the nose for our president’s spending habits … just so long as the president isn’t black.
  • Government pork? Like we actually care? Look … you folks in Washington can spend all the money you want – how about more studies of the mating habits of Polish Zlotnika pigs? – just make sure it’s not a black president who signs the spending bill into law.
  • We wouldn’t care if all illegal aliens were counted twice in the next Census … just so long as the president isn’t black.
  • Those Black Panther thugs who threatened voters in Philly? The ONLY reason we’re upset that they were given a pass is because Barack Obama is black.
  • Every single member of the president’s cabinet could be a tax cheat as far as we’re concerned … just so long as the president is white.
  • Forced unionization? Bring it on! We love card check! We love the idea of union goons threatening and intimidating workers to sign a card saying they want to belong to a union! What we don’t like is that a black president is pushing this idea.
  • Single-party talks with that Gargoyle that runs North Korea? It’s about time we legitimized that little pipsqueak. We’re only mildly upset here because the person who is doing that happens to be black.
  • More regulation of the finance sector? We could care less! For all we care you can nationalize the banks and decree that only the government can make home loans .. .and you can even apportion those home loans on the basis of race if you want to … just so long as the president is white!
  • Minimum wage? Like we care about that? Raise it to $15 an hour if you want! Just give us our white president back.

So the next time you hear the racist accusations pour from the lips of the likes of Chris Matthews, Nancy Pelosi, Al Sharpton, Bill Maher, Joe Scarborough, Whoopie Goldberg, Colin Powell, Janine Garofolo, Mike Papantonio, Larry Flint, Chuck Todd, Joy Behar, Ed Schultz, Bill Cosby, Patrick L. Cooney, Karen Finney, Cher, Maxine Waters, Barbara Lee, Julian Bond, Lawrence O’Donnell, Candy Crowley, David Shuster, Rev. William Barber, Jesse Jackson, Charles Rangel, Morgan Freeman, and Mike Malloy, just realize what an imbecile they are.

Economy, Immigration, Organized Labor, Politics, War On Terror

Immigration Reform, The Scam

No offense to the CBO, but their numbers are not based in reality. It’s not their fault, it’s because of the way they must compute the numbers with the assumptions they are given. Flashback to the selling of Obamacare, we were told, by the President and the CBO, how premiums would go down. Not to belabor the point, but every other prediction of Obamacare turned out to be the exact opposite. The Gang of Eight’s S.744 is no exception. It’s deja-vu all over again. Skipping the cost issue for a moment, the bill does not stop the flow of illegals. According to the CBO assessment, the bill . . .The Gang of Nine

  • WILL NOT stop illegal immigration – Despite promises of a secure border, the bill would slow future illegal immigration by only 25 percent. In the next couple of decades, that means 7.5 million new illegal immigrants.
  • WILL drive down wages – For legal American workers, the bill would drive down their average wages. And the outfit that says they’re looking out for working people, driving down their average wages is not a concern of the SEIU. Their priority lies in increasing dues-paying membership from the illegals. Which explains why they are heavily ($2 Million in grants) involved in the Obamacare Health Care Exchange enrollment process. LA County AFL-CIO, $1 Million grant. Their annual budget, with 15 employees is $3 Million. Quid pro quo and community organizing in one sweet package.

Cool, ya with me so far? The cost issue is just as bad. The bill will burden taxpayers with trillions of dollars in welfare and entitlement costs for the newly legalized immigrants under amnesty.  Heritage’s Robert Rector explains:

S.744 provides only a temporary delay in eligibility to welfare and entitlements. Over time, S.744 makes all 18.5 million eligible for nearly every government program, including: Obamacare, 80 different welfare programs, Social Security and Medicare. When this occurs, spending will explode, but nearly all the real costs do not appear in the CBO score.

Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL), ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, explained how the Gang of Eight purposefully hid the true costs of the bill:

The bill’s drafters relied on the same scoring gimmicks used by the Obamacare drafters to conceal its true cost from taxpayers and to manipulate the CBO score. There is a reason why eligibility for the most expensive federal benefits was largely delayed outside the 10-year scoring window: to mislead the public. As Ranking Member of the Budget Committee, I asked CBO to provide a long-term estimate. Sadly, CBO did not provide the long-term estimate as requested. As a result, the score effectively conceals some of the biggest long-term costs to taxpayers contained in this legislation, including providing illegal immigrants with Medicaid, food stamps, and cash welfare. Some members of Congress are already pushing efforts to expedite this eligibility.

The assumptions that these illegals will boost the economy are flawed when you consider their education level and that of the chain migration that follows. Their education level is a far cry from those under STEM (sciences, technology, engineering, mathematics), which the Democrat controlled Senate rejected.

According to Sen. Sessions . . .

CBO did not provide enough information to assess the assumptions it made about the educational background of illegal immigrants and thus their methodology may be substantially flawed. An accurate analysis would acknowledge that half of that population does not have high school degrees, and is therefore more likely to receive far more in government support than they will pay in the form of taxes. For every dollar a low-income illegal immigrant might pay in either taxes or payroll contributions, he or she could easily receive two dollars back from the government in the form of public assistance for their household. It defies logic and common sense for anyone to suggest there is not an enormous cost in choosing to provide welfare to those who are currently not eligible for these benefits.

As in Obamacare, when you rush into a major piece of legislation, you don’t get what you expect. The very fact that a “Gang of Eight” is ostensibly running the show should be the red flag right there. I’m for a gang of a hundred. ALL our Senators, working in the open on the floor of the Senate chamber, debating and hammering out every step of whatever ‘comprehensive’ immigration reform means. Doing what can be done, one step at a time. Starting with securing the borders, and turning back illegals.

As it is now, Sen. Sessions says “this bill guarantees three things: amnesty, increased welfare costs, and lower wages for the U.S. workforce. It would be the biggest setback for poor and middle-class Americans of any legislation Congress has considered in decades.”

Immigration, Organized Labor, Politics

SEIU Wants Open, Unprotected Borders

Claiming the cost of completing a border fence that was approved by Congress 5 or 6 years ago, and included again in the pending immigration bill, is too expensive, the SEIU (the world’s largest labor union) is broadcasting their activists to call their Senators in Washington to oppose protecting our border.

It’s funny how the SEIU doesn’t seem to recognize that the cost to taxpayers of having an un-secure border is way higher by orders of magnitude. Obviously, their concern about illegal immigrants isn’t the cost to taxpayers. On the contrary, their concern is to capture more dues-paying and/or government subsidized union members out of the millions that are here now and the millions that will follow. See it for what it is.

Organized Labor, Politics

Labor Union Picking On You?

A message from the National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation

“I’m saying if you strike a match and you put your finger in it, you’re likely to get burned.” Long before becoming the top union boss at the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka’s reign as president of the United Mineworkers union was marked by intimidation against independent-minded workers who dared to defy the union hierarchy. The contempt on display in Trumka’s fiery rhetoric for those workers who refuse to toe the union-boss line remains widespread throughout Big Labor.

One of the National Right to Work Foundation’s latest free legal aid cases provides yet another example. Four West Virginia Constellium Rolled Product workers turned to the Foundation for help after United Steelworkers (USW) Local 5668 union bosses threatened them for exercising their right to return to work to provide for their families during a union-boss-ordered strike last year.

Union militants posted signs in public view containing the workers’ names, phone numbers, and addresses.

Not only that, union militants constructed an outhouse displaying nonstriking workers’ names next to a creepy decapitated doll’s head, as seen in the picture below.
union_outhouse
In March, the workers received letters from USW Local 5668 union bosses threatening massive retaliatory fines and placing the workers at the bottom of the seniority list.

Those threats are illegal under federal law. Workers who refrain from union membership are exempt from the union’s constitution and bylaws and thus cannot be disciplined for continuing to work during a union boss-ordered strike. Adding insult to injury, in violation of the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court precedent Communications Workers of America v. Beck, union bosses continued extracting full union dues from the workers’ paychecks.

Because West Virginia lacks a Right to Work law, the workers can still be forced to pay some fees but cannot be required to pay for union activities unrelated to workplace bargaining, such as politics and political lobbying. Foundation attorneys filed federal unfair labor practice charges against USW Local 5668 union bosses last month.

Over the years, Foundation attorneys have won settlements for workers illegally threatened by union bosses with fines up to $40,000 simply for returning to work to provide for their families. Workers should not be forced to abandon their jobs and be denied their right to provide for themselves and their families at the whim of militant union bosses.

Your support helps the Foundation fight back in cases just like this one.

Thank you for helping us stand up for workers who face intimidation by union militants.

Sincerely,

Mark Mix

P.S. The Foundation relies completely on voluntary contributions from its supporters to provide free legal aid.

Please chip in with a tax-deductible contribution of $10 or more today to support the Foundation’s programs.