June 25, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

CHENEY THE TORTURER

As we learn more and more about the nefarious Dick Cheney, you have to wonder how the United States allowed monsters like George W. Bush and Dick Cheney to acquire so much power. We allowed them to steal a presidential election in 2000. Congress rolled over like a puppy dog and let them whatever do they wanted after the attacks on 9/11. Suddenly, all that the United States had ever stood for wasn't applicable anymore. We didn't have to observe international treaties. We could "preemptively" attack countries. We could kidnap people who were suspected terrorists, no matter where they were in the world. And we could torture. The Geneva Conventions and habeas corpus were so quaint. This article by Barton Gellman and Jo Becker is at www.washingtonpost.com:

Cheney and his allies, according to more than two dozen current and former officials, pioneered a novel distinction between forbidden "torture" and permitted use of "cruel, inhuman or degrading" methods of questioning. They did not originate every idea to rewrite or reinterpret the law, but fresh accounts from participants show that they translated muscular theories, from Yoo and others, into the operational language of government.

A backlash beginning in 2004, after reports of abuse leaked out of Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and Guantanamo Bay, brought what appeared to be sharp reversals in courts and Congress -- for Cheney's claims of executive supremacy and for his unyielding defense of what he called "robust interrogation."

But a more careful look at the results suggests that Cheney won far more than he lost. Many of the harsh measures he championed, and some of the broadest principles undergirding them, have survived intact but out of public view.

REPUBLICANS' CROCODILE TEARS FOR WORKERS

When there has been talk of raising the minimum wage Republicans suddenly find themselves concerned about workers and small business. "It will cost jobs!" they'll claim, even though the historical evidence doesn't support that claim. Republicans opposed even non-paid leave for employees to deal with family emergencies. And Republicans love to demonize unions. Unions, to hear them tell it, are the root of all evil. Unions, in fact, are largely responsible for many of the benefits American working people have earned, everything from the eight hour day, to time and half for overtime, to paid vacations, sick days, and pension plans. Now the Republicans in Congress are using the same old malarkey to try to scuttle the Employee Free Choice Act, which would give workers greater freedom in forming unions. It's time to send a resounding "No!" to Republicans and their make-the-fat-cats-fatter economics. This article by Bob Geiger is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The bill would make it easier for workers to get a living wage and decent benefits and, hey, this is America and everything, so who in the world would have a problem with that?

You guessed it -- the same crew that worked like crazy to keep the minimum wage at $5.15 an hour for the rest of our lives or until a Democratic Congress came to town and got a raise passed.

But what's interesting -- or not, if you're accustomed to watching the Republican party's fear-and-smear approach -- is how much concern GOP Senators suddenly seem to have for workers and how afraid they are that employees will lose their right to unionize via secret ballots. And of course, Republicans love to raise the possibility that these poor workers will also be subject to intimidation by big bad union bosses, hell-bent on forcing them into higher wages and better benefits.

The usual GOP suspects came out strong on Friday in debate about the legislation. Here's Mike Enzi (R-WY), who's voted against working families on the minimum wage more times than Mitt Romney changes his political views:

June 22, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

A STEP TOWARD ECONOMIC SECURITY

Congress is debating the Employee Free Choice Act, which would allow employees more freedom to unionize. It's desperately needed legislation. We hear the pundits talk about market "corrections" when there is a downturn in the stock market. We need a correction in the imbalance that exists between salaries and the perks and bonuses that go to high rollers. While CEO salaries have exploded, the wages of average workers have flatlined. Unionization gives working people more power to get economic security for themselves and their families. As this author points out, this is a far better approach than blaming illegal immigrants and building a wall between the United States and Mexico. The article by Harold Meyerson is at www.prospect.org:

This week, just before it turns again to immigration, the Senate takes up the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would restore to America's workers the right to join unions. Depending on how you look at it, the Senate's timing -- moving to bolster middle- and working-class incomes before it alters our immigration policy -- is either impeccable or 30 years too late.

For those adamantly against the efforts to legalize the 12 million or so undocumented immigrants among us, opposition has become the vehicle to express a range of anxieties that go far beyond the question at hand. Some of those anxieties are racial and cultural. Others are economic -- the fear that immigrants take jobs from native-born Americans, the fear that they drag wages down.

There is, as those of us who support the legalization of the undocumented must admit, some -- though by no means universal -- validity to these fears. Immigrants are not employed solely as farmworkers, gardeners, and nannies. One look at construction crews or the women who clean hotel rooms makes clear that there has been, in many regions, a vast shift in the composition of sectoral workforces. During the Depression, the government shipped Mexican migrant workers -- and American citizens of Mexican descent -- back to Mexico. Conversely, when Congress acted in 1965 to allow considerably more immigrants into the United States, it was a time of widely shared prosperity and mass job security of the sort that has vanished from America today.

April 01, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

TIME FOR NEW UNION MOVEMENT

53% of Americans would join a union if they could, according to new polling data. But business, in cahoots with the federal government, has been able to assault the union movement for decades. Despicable companies like Wal-Mart will even close stores rather than recognize unions. That should be illegal under the Wagner Act, but hey what's a little thing like the law these days? A resurgent union movement would be good for all working people, not just for union members. Things we used to take for granted like the eight-hour day, forty hour week, overtime pay, sick leave, and paid vacations were won because of unions. This article by Robert Kuttner is at www.boston.com:

In truth, academic studies going back to the work of Richard Freeman and James Medoff document the principal al reason unions have declined, from more than 30 percent after World War II to fewer than 8 percent of private sector workers today. It is mainly the result of business making clear that workers who support union drives risk losing their jobs.

Wal-Mart and other anti union companies take a more direct approach. In the rare case when local employees manage to organize a union, Wal-Mart simply closes the store. Fully 49 percent of employers threaten to move or close the worksite during the course of a union organizing campaign, according to a study by Chirag Mehta and Nik Theodore of the University of Illinois.

Punishing workers who opt for unions is illegal under the 1935 Wagner Act. But the federal government has stopped meaningfully enforcing the Wagner Act's guarantee that employees may form unions free from harassment or retaliation. Generally, fired workers who do win reinstatement orders have to wait for years, and punishments against offending companies are minor slaps on the wrist.

MY COUNTRY, RIGHT OR WRONG

Today's Fresno Bee has a letter from a fairly consistent right-wing correspondent to The Bee chanting the old "my country, right or wrong" mantra. That seems very similar to what Nazis said in their allegiance to Hitler. When my country is right I will support it to the hilt. When it is wrong I will criticize it and seek to change its course. I'm reminded of what Nobel laureate Albert Camus said about wanting to love his country and also wanting to do what is right. Despite what Mr. Right-Winger said, our first allegiance isn't to country and flag; our first allegiance is to conscience.

March 06, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

MAKE IT EASIER TO FORM UNIONS

In the business world there is a lot of anti-union propaganda. When I worked for one company a few years ago the warehouse workers were talking about unionizing. The company president called us into the conference room and talked about the horrors of a union, including the fact the union president made more money than he did. The company installed a security fence around the parking lot, implying that union organizers might get violent. I saw a guy wearing an anti-union tee shirt. The attempt to unionize failed. Everyone who works for wages should look at the history of unions and be grateful for all the benefits unions got us. Paid holidays, paid vacations, sick leave, the eight-hour day, and other benefits came about largely because of unions. When the middle class was strong and growing the union movement was also strong. I like the proposal currently being advocated to make it easier for employees to form unions. This article by Jonathan Chait is at www.latimes.com:

Every argument I've seen against card-check unfailingly mentions the long decline in union membership. Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), who sits on the House Education and Labor Committee, noted in an anti-card-check screed that union membership is "down to 12% nationwide." Yes, it's true, union membership in the U.S. has hemorrhaged. What I don't see is why that is a point against card-check. To me, it suggests just the opposite: Unions are so weak that we have little to fear from a small uptick in membership. Suppose union membership was exploding and there was some danger the American economy was going the direction of France, where it's impossible to fire anybody. That might be a good reason to oppose the spread of unionism.

But the real problem in the American economy is not that workers have too much bargaining power. It's that they have too little. Corporate profits have exploded in recent years, while wages for average workers have barely budged. It's obviously great that business is doing so well. What we need are a few measures to help divvy up the pie just a bit more evenly. Anything that helps to slow down the massive erosion of unions is one of those sensible, small steps.