36 Reasons Why You Should Thank a Union

This past June as Tea Partiers in state governments attacked Union rights this list of 36 reasons why you should thank a Union was published here. And today it is Labor Day and I think it is appropriate to repost the list. Appropriate because I just watched my President address a Union audience in Detroit, Michigan, where he repeated several of these very same points: It wasn’t corporate America that came up with the 40-hour work week, sick leave and pensions. It was the Labor Movement.

A movement that has been increasingly attacked by the uberright.  

36 Reasons Why You Should Thank a Union

1. Weekends
2. All Breaks at Work, including your Lunch Breaks
3. Paid Vacation
4. FMLA
5. Sick Leave
6. Social Security
7. Minimum Wage
8. Civil Rights Act/Title VII (Prohibits Employer Discrimination)
9. 8-Hour Work Day
10. Overtime Pay
11. Child Labor Laws
12. Occupational Safety & Health Act (OSHA)
13. 40 Hour Work Week
14. Worker’s Compensation (Worker’s Comp)
15. Unemployment Insurance
16. Pensions
17. Workplace Safety Standards and Regulations
18. Employer Health Care Insurance
19. Collective Bargaining Rights for Employees
20. Wrongful Termination Laws
21. Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967
22. Whistleblower Protection Laws
23. Employee Polygraph Protect Act (Prohibits Employer from using a lie detector test on an employee)
24. Veteran’s Employment and Training Services (VETS)
25. Compensation increases and Evaluations (Raises)
26. Sexual Harassment Laws
27. Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
28. Holiday Pay
29. Employer Dental, Life, and Vision Insurance
30. Privacy Rights
31. Pregnancy and Parental Leave
32. Military Leave
33. The Right to Strike
34. Public Education for Children
35. Equal Pay Acts of 1963 & 2011 (Requires employers pay men and women equally for the same amount of work)
36. Laws Ending Sweatshops in the United States

Jim Hightower Speaks to Union Supporters in Austin

Jim Hightower, former Texas Agricultural Commissioner and now a progressive populist columnist and radio commentator, spoke to a crowd of supporters of the public sector union workers in Wisconsin whose cause and plight have riveted the country’s attention for 2 weeks now. I captured the entire six or so minute speech on video.

I was well back in the crowd and getting a clear shot of him as he spoke was challenged by the many hand-lettered signs that people brought to the rally. But at least you get to hear what he said.

Yes, he did. He said “Let’s get nekkid.”

Austin Texas In Solidarity with Wisconsinites

My friends lead me where I would not myself trod. Austin is a long, long way from where I live, but Move-On.org organized the rally in Austin, Texas' capitol, and my friends, Don and Susan, were going come H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks or high water, and they offered me a seat in their American-manufactured vehicle.

Couldn't resist.

The rally was in support and in solidarity with the Wisconsin 14, the 14 Wisconsin state senators who have fled their state, their homes and their families so that the hated bill that would strip public sector employees of their right to collective bargaining would not pass. Not pass without a quorum. A quorum that they lack by one lone senator.

The rally was also in solidarity with the public sector union employees, of which I count myself in their number. The cheeseheads that won the 2011 Superbowl are now leading the nation in a rebirth movement to restore the middle class.

Imagine that.

I loved it that the union rally followed, and therefore included a rally in support of Planned Parenthood. Pink T-shirts blended with red ones. We were one. We are one and the same in mind, I think. Young women proudly sporting amazingly colored tatoos mingled with we unionist old farts.

It was heaven.

Fotos follow, naturally.

My favorite. Notice the sea of red. This was the entertainment before the speeches. This was taken from the south steps of the Texas capitol building. They played a lot of Woody Guthrie songs.

A sign I liked. One thing we all noticed was that not one of these hand-lettered signs had mis-spellings. We progressives, if anything, know how to spell. We even know how to turn a phrase. As one sign read, "If you can read this sign, thank a teacher."

And this seems to have been a family effort. Husband, wife, daughter all carrying umbrellas, and all bringing up the fact that Texas has a 9 billion dollar "rainy day fund" for when we can't pay our bills . . . like now. The day threatened to rain and these three were the only ones in the crowd to have a pretext to bring umbrellas.

Progressive Texans, I think, have a corner on the market in sheer smart signage.

As opposed to our opposition.

Pragmatic Politician Sharp: No Unions, No Women, No Hispanics

According to Judge Jim Sharp as quoted here (with video, to boot), Texas Democrats made one huge mistake in nominating Linda Chavez-Thompson as the Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor.

Not because she is a union labor leader – the highest ranking woman ever elected to her position in the union movement.

Not because she is a woman.

Not because she is Hispanic.

Not for any of those reasons, but for all three of them.

Texas, Sharp says, is too racist to elect an Hispanic to statewide office. Texas, Sharp says is to anti-feminine to elect a woman to statewide office. And finally, Texas is too anti-union to elect a “union boss” to statewide office.

Maybe so. Maybe he’s right. I don’t really have a whole lot of regard for the world view of the average Texan, I really don’t. But then again, had I maintained my opinion of the world view of your average American in 2008, I never would have supported Barack Obama for the presidential nomination.

But mainly, what is simply wrong with Sharp’s rather candid remarks concerning Linda Chavez-Thompson’s candidacy, as well as Bill White’s candidacy, is that this isn’t supposed to be the time to give persuadable centrists a reason not to vote for the Democratic candidates at the top of the ticket. They can come up with their own reasons, but why help them out? Why give them a pass?

And why badmouth the top of the ticket, especially when those at the bottom of the ticket are sure to benefit from voters coming out to vote for Bill White? It makes no sense at all.

And why, I ask, decry the union movement in Texas? Sharp says that union members “are my people.” I should hope so.

I should hope, for instance that Jim Sharp appreciates the support of the Texas AFL-CIO, especially after receiving a $1000 contribution from them on February 9, 2010.

I should hope, for instance that Jim Sharp appreciates the support of the Communication Workers, especially after receiving a $5000 contribution from them on March 2, 2010.

One thing you don’t want to do is to take a contribution check with one hand and then give labor unions the back of your hand with the other.

The other thing that you don’t want to do is inflame the base: the leftwing of the Democratic Party, with anti-union remarks. Not unless, that is, you have a plan to attract Republicans to your cause, because, oh yeah, the plan is that Republicans are going to be on the lookout for Jim Sharp’s name there near the bottom of the ballot and cross right over because he slammed the unions because their people are unelectable in Texas.

Now I vote a straight Democratic ticket, something that I think Jim Sharp depends on to some degree. But I am already on the lookout for Kesha Rogers’ name to deselect before I cast my straight Democratic ballot. She doesn’t deserve to be elected dog catcher.

I wonder, now, who else’s name I will be looking for when I do that?

Obama Slaps Import Tariff on China

In a move that I think was meant to keep a lid on this bit of good news getting out to vocal defenders of free trade, Barack Obama has quietly approved an International Trade Commission move to place a stiff tariff on imported Chinese tires.

On Friday evening.

Originally, the ITC wanted a 55% tax that reduced by 10% over a 3 year period, but Obama decreased that in his executive order to 35% the first year, reducing by 5% per year for 3 years.

Still it is a significant action. An action that is past due by at least two rationales that I can think of off the bat.

Rationale 1: The Chinese tire industry specializes in low-end tires that undercut higher quality (and therefore more expensive) American-made tires. This alone is responsible for the loss of over 5000 American jobs since 2002 according to the United Steelworkers union.

Rationale 2: It may be recalled that over 450,000 tires that were manufactured in China were subject to recall by the Feds in 2007. Chinese tires were blamed for a 2006 accident that killed two. The rationale for the recall back then was that the Chinese tires did not have a safety feature, a gum strip that binds the belts of a tire together.

We have heard one story after another about the shoddy work that goes into Chinese manufactured goods. These cheaply-made products have enjoyed years and years of the Bush-sponsored free market. It is now time to step back in to ensure that Americans are not harmed by low-quality cheap products.

Tires are a good start, but you can be sure the Chinese aren’t going to be taking this well, especially when there are so many of their products that can and should also be examined more closely.

It’s Labor Day

Ever wonder how America got a holiday like Labor Day? After all, Labor, in America has been very much the underdog even in its heyday.

Labor unions, while still important in urban centers, have waned in strength nearly everywhere else.

So how did such a day become a holiday celebrated in 50 states?

It all started in Canada.

During a particularly difficult time in their history in 1872, known as the “Nine-hour movement,” an effort to limit the workday to nine hours, Canadian unionists fought hard to gain concessions from capitalists. The movement itself was a failure in that it did not attain its goals, but it did result in the passage of the Canadian Trade Union Act which legitimized unions and protected union activity.

Parades that were once protests against ill-treatment by management became parades in celebration of passage of the Trade Union Act.

And they became an annual thing.

These parades spread to New York, which held its first labor parade on September 5^th 1882.

A short 2 years later, in the aftermath of the deaths of workers at the hands of federal soldiers and US Marshals during the Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland took a page from the Canadian government playbook and pushed through a law proclaiming the first Monday in September as Labor Day. The bill passed 6 days after the end of the strike.

The 1884 Labor Day proclamation bill then, was literally written with the blood of Canadian and American workers.

And I find it particularly poignant, at this moment in history, that we Americans are again poised to adopt another Canadian tradition, something that they hold very near and dear to their hearts, despite what the healthcare and pharmaceutical lobby directed rightwing shrieking handwringers will tell you.

Yet another good idea from our neighbors to the north: Universal Health Care.

Leading me to wonder, for the umpteenth time, what is it in our history that has us so diverged from our Canadian neighbors?

I suspect you could write an entire book on that one.

Pete Olson Responds: Why He Won't Vote For the Employee Free Choice Act

So every once in awhile I get an email blast from my teachers’ union, the American Federation of Teachers (an AFL-CIO affiliate), asking me to take action on this or that bill coming up in Congress. The other day I was asked to send a message to my US Senators and Congressman regarding the Employee Free Choice Act that is coming up for consideration.

The Employee Free Choice Act is an act that will allow trade unions to organize within places of business by amending the National Labor Relations Act.

In its current form, the NLRA allows a union to be certified as the “exclusive representative of bargaining unit employees” that is, the organization that represents employees who want to enter into collective bargaining with their employer, by means of what is called “card check” or by secret ballot. Everyone knows what secret ballot is, but what the H-E-Double Hockey Sticks is “card check?”

Card check is where a majority (50.1%) of workers at a workplace sign a document saying that they want to form a union with union X representing them. This sounds all well and good, but the trouble with card check is that, under current law, the employer need not recognize the express wishes of its workers through a majority sign-up “card check” petition and can require a secret-ballot vote overseen by the NLRB. This allows an employer to refuse to allow employees to form a union, even though a majority of them signed a document saying they wanted to.

The Employee Free Choice Act takes that option away from employers, allowing formation of a union under card check rules. If employees do not want to go the card check route, they may still vote by secret ballot, but in the end, employers are taken out of the loop. Employers will have no say about whether employees will or will not form a union if the Employee Free Choice Act passes.

So I asked my 3 representative in Congress, Senators John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, and my Congressman, Pete Olson, to vote for the EFCA.

Knowing, of course, that they would never do this. No way, no how.

I just wanted to make my political point, and I never expected a response, although I solicited one from each of them.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I received the canned response from Pete Olson, the one written to answer all of those who are, as he believes, stooges of “unscrupulous union bosses.”

Here is his most helpful reply:

March 5, 2009

Dear Friend,

Thank you for contacting me regarding legislation to undermine the secret ballot in union organization elections. It is good to have your thoughts on this important issue.

Under current law, workers deciding whether to form a labor union at their place of employment have the right to cast their vote in secret. The so-called Employee Free Choice Act would allow unions to organize by simply submitting a public list of supporters. Workers who oppose unionization could be bullied and harassed by union bosses to sign public pledges of support, without recourse to the confidentiality of the ballot box.

Let me be clear: I believe this is not only bad labor policy, but un-American. Citizens of our country have died to protect the fundamental right to cast a confidential, freely-chosen ballot. Historically, the labor movement has done much to improve unacceptable working conditions - it's a shame that some unscrupulous union organizers should seek to bring the specter of intimidation and hostility into the workplace to further their own ends.

Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me. I am honored to represent you in the U.S. House of Representatives. If you have any additional questions or concerns, please feel free to contact one of my offices or visit my website at www.house.gov/olson.

Very respectfully,

Pete Olson
Member of Congress

So let me get this straight, Pete. It’s the “unscrupulous union bosses” that bully employees into signing the petitions, and it’s management that serves as a check on these unscrupulous people and invalidates a petition when they feel the signatures were coerced. Is that the picture you are sending me?

If so, I think I smell a rat. In whose self-interest does management act the company or the laborer? I think you are giving management far too much credit for protecting the poor downtrodden worker. It is labor that suffers at the hand of management, not at the hands of unions. Last time I looked it was labor hitting the unemployment lines, not management.

And where did you ever dig up this model of the “unscrupulous labor boss?” Whose book of lies has that myth been hatched? I’ll tell you exactly where this idea came from. It came from a book written by a prolific western writer named Walter V. Woehlke called “Union Labor in Peace and War” published in 1918. One of its chapters discusses how unions in the West are being influenced by Bolsheviks. You can read about it here.

Your information, Congressman Olson, is a little dated.

And I’ve heard of cherry picking the truth, but isn’t this going just a little too far? Comrade Lenin has been gone for some time, Pete. The Soviet Union is now a despotic capitalistic society.

Times change.

Join us, at some point, in the 21^st century. The view is fine from here.