Unions

Andy Stern - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Chicago - Cook County - Crime - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - Government - Jobs - Media - Media Bias - President - Public Employees Unions - Rod Blagojevich - SEIU - Senate - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Andy Stern: Union Chief Fleeing Ahead of Illinois Indictment?

April 26, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Until recently, Andy Stern was the President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), a union that has served as one of President Obama’s biggest donors as well as filling the ranks of his ground troops. In a surprise move, Stern resigned his post this month and no one is really sure why at this point.

Andy Stern has been one of the closest union chiefs to a president in history. Along with SEIU treasurer Anna Burger, he was one of the most frequent visitors to the White House. He was even chosen by President Obama to serve on his Deficit Reduction Commission — a sort of contradiction in terms that.

Upon his resignation, it has been learned that Andy Stern’s leadership of the SEIU has not brought financial solvency. As F. Vincent Vernuccio reports in the Washington Times, Stern has left the SEIU in pretty shabby shape.
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Andy Stern: Union Chief Fleeing Ahead of Illinois Indictment?”

Budget - Business - California - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Jobs - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - Senate - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Mickey Kaus, Union Fighter?

April 24, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

For the Washington Post’s Post Partisan Blog Charles Lane’s somewhat irreverent, perhaps even dismissive treatment of the admittedly quixotic Senate campaign of journalist Mickey Kaus painted the would-be candidate as a union fighter. Interestingly, he isn’t far off the mark, which is odd for the fact that Kaus is a pretty straight down the line liberal.

Could Mickey Kaus be the “harbinger” of a new, mildly anti-union Democrat that might replace the sold out, in-the-back-pocket sort of Democrats we’ve seen for decades and decades?

Recently City Journal writer Steve Malanga wrote a great piece detailing how the public employees unions are killing California. “The unions’ political triumphs,” Malanga wrote, “have molded a California in which government workers thrive at the expense of a struggling private sector.”
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Mickey Kaus, Union Fighter?”

Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Government - Illinois - Illinois State Government - Public Employees Unions - State Government - Taxes - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

AFSCME Official’s Threats

April 23, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees chief Henry Bayer addressed a rally of Illinois unions members on April 21. During his harangue this man revealed the exact sort of logical disconnect in which union thugs everywhere wallow.

Bayer noted that 10% of the workforce in Illinois is out of work. OK, then what was his prescription to solve this situation? More taxes! How even higher taxes on the few lucky enough to have a job could help enlarge the workforce is the $64,000 question. The answer, of course, is that it can’t.

Catch this complete lack of common sense and logic in Bayer’s spittle specked rant…

“… so they (the legislature) can’t do their job, ‘you know we can’t raise taxes because people are hurting.’ And they are absoroo…lutely right. People are hurting. But let me ask you this: if we raise revenue for senior programs will it hurt the elderly? If we raise revenue for childcare will it hurt working families? If we raise revenue for community colleges and universities will it hurt students? If we raise revenue for programs for the disabled will it hurt will it hurt those individuals who get those services? If we raise revenue for public safety will it hurt our communities? If we raise money for schools will it hurt our kids? Yes people are hurting that’s why we need a tax increase!”

If this isn’t the most stupid blather I’ve yet heard from a union tough, then I’ve never heard any. Where does this guy think all those taxes are coming from if not the very people he invokes? Does he think no one that he is interested in pays state taxes? The very people he mentioned are already losing their services because government has spent itself into a hole the size of the Grand Canyon!
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AFSCME Official’s Threats”

Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Elections - Government - Michigan - State Government - Taxes - Tea Party - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Warning to Mich Teachers Unions: ‘The Time to Stand up to the Unions Has Arrived’

April 23, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Universally, teachers unions cry for more money and insist on raising everyone’s taxes to get it. And in an era when government spending needs to be reined in, unions are dinosaurs in the modern age, outmoded and wasteful.

Kyle Olson of the Education Action Group, an education reform organization based in Michigan, spoke to the Lansing, Mich. tea party rally on April 15. He had a few warnings for the profligate spenders in teachers unions.


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Warning to Mich Teachers Unions: ‘The Time to Stand up to the Unions Has Arrived’”

Budget - Business - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Government - Illinois - Illinois State Government - Jobs - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - State Government - Taxes - Tea Party - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Union Thugs at Capitol Demand Illinois Gov’t ‘Raise Our Taxes’

April 22, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

In the late morning hours of April 21 dozens of rented buses streamed into Springfield, the Illinois capitol, and began spewing out hundreds of tax-gorged union thugs. It was as if the Illinois Hog Producers association had pulled up to the capitol and thrown wide the doors to their livestock carriers.

Some estimates say the unionists mounted some 15,000 participants all there to wave their professionally printed signs and wear their gang colors… er, I mean wearing their T-Shirts bearing their union’s signature colors.

And what did they want? They wanted the Illinois legislature to raise taxes on everyone in the state so that those few union members could get even more undeserved bennies, richer pay scales and even higher pensions than anyone in the private sector could ever expect — all things they already enjoy.

But, a protest is all American, right? These guys are just like the tea partiers, aren’t they?

Not so much.
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Union Thugs at Capitol Demand Illinois Gov’t ‘Raise Our Taxes’”

Britain - Democrats/Leftists - Government - Jobs - Liberals - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Brit Union Strike Over Severance Pay Might Soon Hit in U.S.

April 22, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

A few weeks ago several British civil service unions launched a two-day strike over cuts in severance pay that the government authorized for workers that were let go because of reductions in the government work force (called a “redundancy cut”).

The cap in “redundancy pay,” said British government unions, could see workers losing a third of their “entitlement.”

Government officials said that the new pay scheme could save the government £500 million. Starting in April “anyone earning £30,000 or less will be entitled to a maximum of three years’ pay or £60,000, whichever is lower.”
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Brit Union Strike Over Severance Pay Might Soon Hit in U.S.”

Budget - Business - California - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Jobs - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - State Government - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

How Unions Are Destroying California

April 21, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Steve Malanga of City journal has a great piece detailing how California’s public employee unions are destroying that once great state.

Malanga starts by repeating the ominous warning to the politicos at the state capitol in Sacramento made by a Service Employees International Union chief. “We helped to get you into office and we got a good memory” the official said on to California’s pols. “Come November, if you don’t back our program, we’ll get you out of office.”

To me this is reminiscent of the warning by the old Soviet Union’s Nikita Kruchev who said that “we will bury you.” Only, the SEIU has far more power to bury our governments than the old Soviets had!
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How Unions Are Destroying California”

Budget - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Liberals - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Unions Killing U.S. Post Office

April 16, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Union contracts are killing the U.S. Post Office, making it uncompetitive and driving costs through the roof according to the Government Accountability Office.

The U.S. Post Office lost $12 billion between 2007 and 2009 and has reached its borrowing limit of $15 billion already. On top of that the union pension fund is underfunded. Even as Congress cut benefits by $4 billion the agency faces a $3.8 billion loss.

The GAO report also states that one of the reasons why the Post Office has lost so much cash is because it doesn’t have the freedom to close fiscally inefficient offices. Politicians have stepped in and prevented a logical, financial sensible reassessment of the Post Office’s operations.
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Unions Killing U.S. Post Office”

Anti-Americanism - Budget - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Liberals - Pensions - President - Public Employees Unions - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Unions’ Big Shift to Government

April 13, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Unionism is failing miserably in this age of a greater world market and an increase in competition for business across the globe. More nations than ever have left behind the 18th century and are taking bold steps into a world made smaller by technology. No longer is but a handful of nations leading the world in manufacturing while the rest wallow in abject poverty. This greater competition is increasing the standard of living in nearly every corner of the earth but because there is so much competition, unions in the U.S. are dying out.

American unions are not conducive to the 21st century and companies shackled by them are finding that either unions have to lose their once overpowering control over production or the businesses simply have to shut their doors as foreign competitors beat them up in the world market place.

But these antiquated, jobs killing unions won’t go quietly into the night and they’ve found their path to existence: government. Unions are growing wildly in the public sector because there are no market forces to curb their excesses.
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Unions’ Big Shift to Government”

Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Free Trade - Government - Liberals - President - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Obama’s Assault on Non-Union Businesses

April 13, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Donald Lambro has a great piece discussing the new rules that Obama wants to impose on every single business in America that derives even the tiniest part of its income from the federal government. In essence, Obama wants to impose Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) on everyone.

As Lambro says, Obama wants to “shatter decades-old, competitive contract rules that seek the best quality work at the lowest price” and this would cost government untold billions in higher costs as well as destroy untold thousands of small businesses that won’t be able to support the wild increase in their expenses. This will also cost thousands of jobs and give great payoffs to unions.

In the still-little-known initiative taking shape in the White House, senior officials are working on regulations that would use the full power of the government’s vast $500 billion a year contracting business to favor firms ,that offer higher wages and economic benefits, while ruling out firms whose wage, pension and even environmental record may not meet with the administration’s approval.

The Obama Administration is perpetrating the absurdity that this policy of forcing every business that does business with the government to increase wages and benefits to come in line with union benefits will somehow save the federal government money.
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Obama’s Assault on Non-Union Businesses”

Andy Stern - Jobs - SEIU - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Breaking News: SEIU’s Stern Resigning

April 12, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

According to The Politico, Andy Stern, the President of the Service Employees International Union, is resigning his post.

The news come to Politico from the President of an SEIU local based in Seattle, Diane Sosne. Politico is taking her word as true.

No reason for the resignation is known and Stern has yet to actually make an official announcement.

I expect that Stern is moving to some position in the Obama Administration. Remember that Stern was the number one most frequent visitor to the White House.

More news as it becomes known…
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Breaking News: SEIU’s Stern Resigning”

Anti-Americanism - Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Government - Immigration/Immigrants - Jobs - Liberals - SEIU - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

SEIU Union Chief: My White Union Members are all Racists

April 12, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

On a panel talking about immigration on April 6, 2010, union chief Gerry Hudson of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) said that his white union members are “so fuc_ing rabidly racist” that is scares him.

I am also a bit amused that this nut is shocked that there is “significant worker opposition to comprehensive immigration reform.” I mean, isn’t that logical? Union workers are afraid that this flood of illegals will take all their jobs away from them! It seems like a “Duh!” to me and I don’t understand why he doesn’t get that? Hudson is so sold out to the Democratic agenda that he doesn’t even understand his own members. The man fails utterly as a union representative.

Democrats/Leftists - Elections - North Carolina - Public Employees Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Unions Now Starting Their Own Political Party

April 11, 2010 by 4 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Apparently the Democrats in North Carolina aren’t sufficiently leftist enough for the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). It appears that the SEIU, one of the largest and most powerful public employees unions in the nation, don’t have their hand deep enough in the taxpayer’s pockets so it is starting its own political party in the Tar Heel State, by passing the Democrats altogether.

The party is being called North Carolina First, by which they actually mean North Carolina’s Taxes to the SEIU First. Here is what the union says about their new party:

For too long parties and politicians in Washington have worked more for their own political self interest, or worse, corporate special interests, instead of the hard working families of North Carolina.

That’s why members of progressive groups across North Carolina, including the State Employees Association of North Carolina (SEANC) and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) began work to form North Carolina First to ensure that politicians put middle class families first and not their own special interests.

I mean imagine what this faux political party means, here. It means that we could have an elected official whose first loyalty is to the members of a union that makes its living off the backs of the taxpayers!
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Unions Now Starting Their Own Political Party”

Budget - Business - Children - Economy/Finances - Education - New Jersey - State Government - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Teachers Union Prays for the Death of NJ Gov. Christie

April 10, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Sadly, wishing for the death of a political opponent is so typical of the left. Pol Pot, Stalin, the Democrat sponsored KKK, the chief tool used by such folks has been terror and violence. While obviously not as murderous as the aforementioned, unions have also been a violent force in history. And in New Jersey, the teachers union has lived down to the violent tendency unions have always evinced.

With a memo to its membership, the New Jersey Education Association prayed that its political opponent, Governor Chirs Christie, would die. The memo featured this:

“Dear Lord … this year you have taken away my favorite actor, Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite singer, Michael Jackson, and my favorite salesman, Billy Mays. … I just wanted to let you know that Chris Christie is my favorite governor.”

Nice sentiment, eh?

But this sort of violence infused, hate-speak is so typical of unionism. Whether in the rarefied air of the teacher’s lounge, or the backroom of some smoke-filled auto worker’s union hall, this sort of violence is espoused with gusto by unionists everywhere. And it is given a pass by Democrats, excused with a wink and a nod.

And they say that the Tea Party folks are hate-filled and violent! Show me a Tea Party advertisement, event advertisement, or newsletter with such a sentiment emblazoned across it.
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Teachers Union Prays for the Death of NJ Gov. Christie”

Banks - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Jobs - Liberals - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Pot Calling the Kettle… Unions Say Banks are Corrupt

April 9, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Hill Newspaper is reporting that unions are “amping up” for a battle against America’s big banks when Congress is next in session. Uniopns want Congress to institute financial regulatory reform because they feel that banks need to be “held accountable.”

The first thought that comes to mind is to wonder when Congress will ever hold unions accountable for anything! Perhaps unions should avoid throwing stones in that glass house of theirs!

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) head Anna Burger railed against the “greedy actions of the financial industry” and announced that the SEIU was scheduling protests against banks in San Francisco, Kansas City, Charlotte and on Wall Street.

It is a hoot to see the SEIU saying that other people are “greedy.” Seriously. A union thug railing against other’s greed! It’s just a hypocrisy beyond belief.

The SEIU is also upset at the executive pay of several bankers. One wonders that if the SEIU is so against high salaries, when they will cut the salaries of their own chiefs that make hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars a year?
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Pot Calling the Kettle… Unions Say Banks are Corrupt”

AFL-CIO - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Free Speech - Government - Health - Journalism - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Union Chief Claims He Witnessed ‘Racism’ At Tea Party…Yeah, Riiiiight

April 9, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Not long ago Andrew Breitbart issued a challenge to the anti-tea party left to show proof that the “N” word was thrown at black members of Congress by Tea Party protesters in their walk to Congress just prior to their passage on Obamacare. In fact, Breitbart has offered $100,000 for video or audio proof of any racism during that incident. No one on the left has been able meet the challenge.

On the April 7, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka was giving a speech at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and in the audience was one Andrew Breitbart. During the question and answer phase of Trumka’s appearance, Breitbart asked the Union Chief about the supposed racism of the Tea Party movement and asked if he, Trumka, would denoucne the violence that union thugs perpetrated against Tea Party folks at the event in Searchlight, Nevada.

In answer to Breitbart’s charges of union thuggery, Trumka claimed that he was a witness to the “N” word being cast toward black members of Congress during the Democrat’s solidarity walk previous to their vote on Obamacare. “I watched them spit at people, I watched them call John Lewis the n-word,” he said. “I witnessed it. I saw it in person. That’s real evidence.”
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Union Chief Claims He Witnessed ‘Racism’ At Tea Party…Yeah, Riiiiight”

Anti-Americanism - Business - Capitalism - Card Check - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - EFCA - Elections - Government - Health - Jobs - Liberals - Pennsylvania - State Government - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Unions Cutting off Noses To Spite Their Faces

April 5, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Despite all our talk of CommieObamie being a socialist, it is a straight out fact that the far left in America are mad that Obama didn’t turn us into the U.S.S.R. lite the second he took office. His pace at selling us out and turning us into a social democratic system ala France isn’t happening fast enough for them. For unions the fact that Obama hasn’t summarily castrated the business community and forced card check down everyone’s throats yet is a downer. And with that in mind, unions have announced that they are taking their ire out on those mythical “Blue Dog” Democrats that are trying to run for reelection in conservative districts in the upcoming midterms.

Friend to the blog David Denholm gave us a delicious example of this cutting off of the Democratic nose to spite the union’s face going on in Pensylvania’s 17th Congressional District.

There the AFL-CIO is refusing to support “Blue Dog” Tim Holden. Why? Because he voted “no” on Obama’s take over of American healthcare, that’s why. Ridiculously enough, Pennsylvania’s AFL-CIO front man, Bill George said that Holden has “been good to us on a number of bread-and-butter issues,” but that they have refused to support him because Obamacare was a “revolutionary, historical vote.”

Viva la Revelucion.
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Unions Cutting off Noses To Spite Their Faces”

Budget - Chicago - Democrats/Leftists - Illinois - Liberals - Mayor Richard Daley - State Government - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Unions Killing Chicago Convention Biz

April 3, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Chicago Tribune has an editorial that shocks for the outrageousness that is the corruption and overcharging that unions have forced upon the convention business at Chicago’s McCormick Place. It is so bad, the costs are so outrageously higher in Chicago, that conventions are fleeing the city in droves (as we’ve discussed here several times).

But even though we understand as a matter of course that unions are bad for everyone, it is still shocking to see just how bad they are in Chicago. In fact, the Trib notes that convention organizers are charged fully 40% more in Chicago than they are anywhere else. Yes, it’s almost half again as much to put on a convention in Chicago than anywhere else in the nation. Even left-wing infused San Francisco costs less to set up conventions!
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Unions Killing Chicago Convention Biz”

Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Free Trade - Jobs - Liberals - President - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

HALT THE ASSAULT, Help Stop Obama’s Assault on America’s Jobs

April 1, 2010 by

The good folks at the Free Enterprise Alliance has launched a new site to encourage people to join the effort to stop this out-of-control, anti-jobs, anti-business climate that President Obama and the Democrats are ginning up in America today.

HaltTheAssault.com

So, pass the site around to those like-minded folks that want to stop intrusive government. Let pro-business folks everywhere know that this site has been launched and let’s

HaltTheAssault!

Anti-Americanism - Banks - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Energy - Entertainment - Government - Health - Hollywood - Liberals - Lobbyists - Media - Military - Movies - Oil - President - Public Employees Unions - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Obama’s Biggest Lobbyist Winners from Left-Wing Advocacy Organizations

April 1, 2010 by 3 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston


On the campaign trail, now President Obama regularly excoriated lobbyists. He said he’d make the government “open and transparent” and said he’d make it hard for lobbyists to “curry favor” with his administration “based on how much they can spend on a fancy dinner.” Once elected, John Podesta, a member of his transition team, said that Obama would be implementing the “strictest ethics rules ever applied” to those scoundrel lobbyists. In his 2009 State of the Union address Obama puffed up his chest, proud of himself that he “excluded lobbyists” from important jobs in his administration.

With all that bombast and populist wind from Obama and his cohorts, then, one would expect to see a dearth of lobbyists in important positions in Obama’s Washington. One’s expectation, however, would easily be dashed by the truth.

Remember the rarefied air of Obama’s campaign for president? Wanna see some, shall we say, “broken promises”?
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Obama’s Biggest Lobbyist Winners from Left-Wing Advocacy Organizations”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Business - Communism - Craig Becker - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Free Trade - Government - Jobs - Liberals - President - Socialism - Warner Todd Huston

Obama’s Appointee Has Attacked Worker’s Right Group

April 1, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Mark Hemingway of the Washington Examiner had another piece on Obama’s appointee to the National Labor Relations Board, union hack Craig Becker. Hemingway wrote about Becker’s past articles ripping the worker’s rights group National Right to Work and wondered if Becker could be fair to them now that he’s in a position to adjudicate between them and big labor?

One does not hold out much hope for Becker to be fair, though.

Hemingway reminds us that the NRW is involved in a lot of worker’s disputes with labor and Becker has attacked them mercilessly in past opinion pieces and appearances. Apparently he’s called them the “anti-union fringe” and are “ideologically driven” (as if Becker isn’t??).
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Obama’s Appointee Has Attacked Worker’s Right Group”

Budget - Chicago - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Illinois - Illinois State Government - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - State Government - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

PROillinois: New Pension Plan Idea Debuts

March 30, 2010 by

MADIGAN PENSION BRIDGE NOT FAR ENOUGH

PROillinois New Grassroots Campaign to Unshackle Local Governments From Unfunded State Pension Mandates

(March 30 – Northbrook, IL) Runaway government employee pension costs is the hot topic, with average taxpayers and the press starting to take notice of this looming public finance disaster. A more dramatic, yet simple pension reform effort known as “the PROillinois plan” is gaining momentum, and is being promoted by a grassroots group of Illinois residents and local government leaders who want to put an end, once and for all, to the unworkable Springfield practice of dictating to local governments the retirement benefits paid to local government employees.
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PROillinois: New Pension Plan Idea Debuts”

AFL-CIO - Barack Obama - Bret Jacobson - Business - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Jobs - Liberals - NLRB - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - Socialism - Unions

Putting Employers ‘Out of Their Misery:’ A Round-up on the New Union-Controlled NLRB

March 29, 2010 by

-By Peter List

Yesterday, President Obama recess-appointed SEIU and AFL-CIO attorney Craig Becker, along with union attorney Mark Pearce to the National Labor Relations Board, making the “bi-partisan” board a tool of union bosses.

[NLRB Chairman Wilma Liebman is an attorney formerly employed by the Teamsters and Bricklayers’ unions.]

With only one Republican Board member to three union-friendly Board members, even a modicum of “neutrality” on the Board is finished.

The following is a round-up from around the web [my emphasis added throughout]:
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Putting Employers ‘Out of Their Misery:’ A Round-up on the New Union-Controlled NLRB”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - EFCA - Government - Jobs - Liberals - NLRB - President - Warner Todd Huston

Union Hack Becker Gets Recess Appointment

March 29, 2010 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

President Obama is determined to misuse his office to payoff unions and to that end he has given union goon Craig Becker a recess appointment as the head of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the agency tasked with implementing fair and responsible federal rules to govern labor and employers.

The U.S. Chamber of commerce has slammed Obama’s appointment of union hack Becker to such an important position. The Chamber was disgusted by Obama’s actions. According to The Hill the Chamber slammed the decision because it “‘disregards the Senate’s bipartisan rejection’ of Becker and ‘contradicts the president’s claim to change the tone in Washington,’ said Randel K. Johnson, the chamber’s senior vice president of Labor, Immigration and Employee Benefits.”

“This is the first time since 1993 that the Chamber has opposed a nominee to the NLRB,” Johnson said. “The Chamber’s opposition is based on Mr. Becker’s prolific writings, which suggest a radical view of labor law that flies in the face of established precedent and case law and is far outside the mainstream.”

Now unions can likely expect Becker to re-write NLRB rules to allow the things that unions want to get implemented even though Congress has in a bi-partisan manner refused to do so thus far. Obama is, in other words, warping our process, subverting Congress, and using back doors to get his radical, left-wing agenda passed above the desires of the people’s representatives and the will of the voters.
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Union Hack Becker Gets Recess Appointment”

Barack Obama - Business - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Immigration/Immigrants - Jobs - Liberals - President - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Obama’s Appointee Supports U.S. Business Hiring Illegal Aliens

March 28, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

This weekend President Obama implemented a recess appointment for Craig Becker to head the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

On January 8th, 2001, Becker told a radio audience that he was a supporter of American businesses hiring undocumented, illegal aliens.

The man that will be implementing rules to govern labor relations in America is a supporter of breaking America’s labor laws to hire illegal workers.

… and Barack Obama’s radical agenda rolls ever onward.
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Obama’s Appointee Supports U.S. Business Hiring Illegal Aliens”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Communism - Congress - Conservatives - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - Federalism - Freedom - Gambling - GOP - Government - House of Representatives - Illinois - Illinois State Government - Law - Liberals - Media - Media Bias - Pat Quinn - President - Public Employees Unions - Regulation - Republicans - Senate - Socialism - Society/Culture - State Government - States Rights - Taxes - The Law - Unions - Warner Todd Huston - Western Civilization

Government Is Not Our Friend

March 26, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Small-government conservatives have always been suspicious of government. Whether city, county, state or federal all government is looked on as a troublesome but necessary evil that must be tightly controlled and oft times opposed. This anti-government attitude, of course, is a complete mystery to socialist Democrats. They just don’t understand why conservatives mistrust government and why they eye it suspiciously. So, looking for a way to explain in real terms why conservatives loathe government is sometimes not an easy task as the ideas are often very esoteric. Thank God the corrupt governments in Barack Obama’s Illinois are always there to supply a ready example of why government is often the enemy of a free people.

In that mien, here is another perfect example of how government often does not serve the voters, how it does what ever it wants to do despite the voters, and how government often thinks it knows better than the very voters that it is supposed to serve.

In 2009 the Illinois State legislature in its Springfield-based capitol passed a video gambling law that for the first time legalized video poker machines across the state. The progress of this law was very contentious with most Republicans and some Democrats standing in opposition to this immoral legislation and a sop to the opposers was put in the bill as sweetener to assure passage. An “opt out” clause was put in the bill so that those conservative districts that were so opposed to video gambling could exclude themselves from allowing the immoral act of video gambling in their jurisdiction.
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Government Is Not Our Friend”

Anti-Americanism - Budget - Chicago - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Government - Illinois - Illinois Policy Institute - Illinois State Government - Jobs - Liberals - Pat Brady - Pensions - Public Employees Unions - SEIU - Socialism - State Government - Taxes - Teachers Unions - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

Fox News Chicago Digging Deeper on Illinois Pension Mess

March 26, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

My friend Lennie Jarratt was featured on Fox News Chicago last night. The subject was the $85 billion dollar deficit that the Illinois finds its public employee pensions confronted with. Fox News reports that every Illinois citizen would have to fork over $6,600 to instantly solve the problem. And what has caused this problem? Unions.

Lennie has some great lines in this piece and he’s right on. He is right that education in America has become “legalized theft.” Here are some of his main points:

  • Getting a public sector job is like hitting the lottery
  • The way schools levy is legal theft
  • We have the highest property taxes in the Midwest
  • Nearly all of the top 50 public sector pensions in IL are educators
  • Killing jobs and forcing people to leave the state further cutting state revenue
  • Within 4-6 years most public sector retirees are making more than when working

Illinois isn’t the only state in this union-made morass. Nearly every state in the union is in this mess.
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Fox News Chicago Digging Deeper on Illinois Pension Mess”

ACORN - Barack Obama - California - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Government - Illinois - Law - Liberals - Louisiana - New York - SEIU - Taxes - Unions - Warner Todd Huston

ACORN’s Tangled Branches

March 25, 2010 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

News is all over the country that the often criminal group the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) is dead, folding its tent, kaput. All this is because, as Politico puts it, of a “conservative assault that never prompted any prosecutions.”

But let us not get our hopes up that ACORN is defeated. It isn’t. In fact, most of the groups that huddled under ACORN’s left-wing are just changing their names and moving on with all the same people involved as if nothing ever happened. And this isn’t anything new. The fact is, ACORN activists have always hid behind dozens of false front organizations and corporate identities to disguise their criminal network.

In California, for instance, one of the ACORN affiliates is changing its name to “Californians for Community Empowerment” and one of the New York offices will now be known as “New York Communities for Change.” But all the same people that ran these former ACORN offices in these states are still there, no change has been made but the name.

We also saw the shady groups connected with ACORN but not named ACORN just last year during the Doug Hoffman, New York 23 arc. There an ACORN affiliate had created a fake political party in order to funnel cash to the Democrat running in that race. One of the organizations hip-deep in that election was a political group called the Working Families Party. Of course, the WFP is more-or-less a front for ACORN in New York and no political party at all.
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ACORN’s Tangled Branches”