Union Perspectives

Union members need to answer just one question. Who do they think is looking out for them and their families? This the same question non-union workers should be asking themselves. Even retired workers and those workers who can’t work should be asking themselves. Now, labor knows the GOP does not want unions, and their billionaire supporters want all unions gone because unions are the only army large enough to slow down the billionaire from taking over this country. Union and non-union workers members now must pick which side they are on and if it is unions then they need to do all they can, like vote for who supports them. And then work with all unions to win in the 2024 election. If we lose this election, we will lose the life we have now for unions will be one of the first protections to go, followed by voting rights. We will not be able to go to the streets to protest against laws that abridge our rights. The next six months will be the life or death of the working people and union...

In 1912, Eugene V. Debs said, “The workers can be emancipated only by their own collective will … and this collective will and conquering power can only be the result of education, enlightenment and self-imposed discipline.” The working class has to advance together or not at all for unionized labor has become but an island of well being in a sea of resentful low-wage-unseen aspirants due to income inequality within the working class. If labor is to make progress it should work with their community’s but not at the expense of the community. One example of at the community’s expense is the Cop City project in Georgia. At this time, Labor is on a roll, but this can stop with a wrong election or with a single stroke of a pen and all of collective bargaining could be wiped out. But the good news is, we have found some new labor leaders and they are winning, such as Shawn Fain with United Auto Workers, Sara Nelson with the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, and Sean O’Brien with Teamster...

Sitting at me desk, trying to think if something to write is very hard with all the purpose-driven chaos caused by our government and the lack of appropriate media coverage of the damage being done by this corrupt government. It’s hard to stay positive, but I keep reminding myself, “This too shall pass.” I am looking at my books by authors like Jack London (The Iron Heel), Eugene V. Debs (The Bending Cross), Peter Barnes (Liberty and Dividends for All), Thomas Paine (Common Sense Rights of Man), Samuel B. Griffith (edition of Suntzu’s The Art of War), Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince) and wonder how many people have read these great works, and had our educational system taught the truths within the covers of these books would our country be in the mess we are in now? We have a belligerent, insecure, devious, unintelligent, deadbeat conman in the White House bankrupting our country and throwing parades for himself like despots of other regimes, while our feckless executive branch of ...

Now is time for all unions, AFL-CIO, to step up and put their differences aside just like former president of the United Automobile Workers (UAW) and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) Walter Reuther dreamed of. It’s time for unions to do something bold, like Medicare for all and free education. Unions were the leaders in all these areas, consider child labor laws, free speech laws, pensions, and unemployment benefits when people were out of work; and the Social Security we have today. All of these things will go away if we do not come together and fight. At this time, it is workers’ unions against the corporations and the very, very rich, who would like to break our unions and even take away the minimum wage. We even know what their play book is on how the GOP is going to do this. The tax breaks Trump gave the rich has put us into debt is step one, step two is Trump and the GOP spends as much money as they can on the military complex, making many of the rich even richer...

The fight against “right to work” legislation goes back to 1968. In one of his speeches, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “That in our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, as right to work. It provides no rights, and no work. Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining. We demand this fraud be stopped.” It is has now been about 49 years, and the same playbook called, “Right to work” to destroy union is still being played. The GOP and corporate Democrats want to destroy unions by taking away the right to collect dues. People still fall for this self-destructive line without looking into what they are forfeiting in the process: healthcare and pensions. Fraud and who are to blame? It is the unions for not educating people, not just their workers? The attack and the fight against it has never stopped. In 1933, in his Statement on National Industrial Recovery Act, President Franklin D. Roosevelt sai...

To change the abundance of labor in the world is to put more money in the pockets of the laborer to buy the products their fellow workers are making. Otherwise, when there are more products than money, there is slump in the economy. Austerity policies, low wages and automation (robots) were also of concern in the 1950s when Henry Ford II, CEO of Ford, took Walter Reuther, head of the United Auto Workers Union, on a tour of a new engine plant. Ford gestured to a fleet of new machines and said, “Walter, how are you going to get these robots to pay union dues?” The union leader turned to Ford and said, “Henry, how are you going to get robots to buy your cars?” This type of change in the labor has created a new type of working class that swings from task to task in order to make ends meet while enduring the loss of labor rights and bargaining rights. They are called “precariat” workers, a group of workers who live on the verge of collapse due to the instability of the nature of their jobs...

In the1920s, the corporations representing capital (money) mobilized for war of the extermination on all labor organizations in the United States, and they never stopped. They have just changed tactics and leaders overtime. Today, the one who is leading this charge is back by the Koch brothers is Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, who recently signed the right to work legislation into law. This means workers in a union do not have to pay union dues, but still get the same union benefits as dues paying workers. How the hell does this work? When they take away union funds it is like tying one hand behind your back, and then trying to fight a two-handed bully. The anti-union money people have never given up on breaking unions or breaking up the New Deal. The other tactic union busters use is the old divide and conquer—pitting working people against working people so they will tear down their neighbors, who are lucky enough to have union jobs—and this seems to be working. Labor was warned ...

There is a consensus in the U.S. and worldwide that the labor movement is dying, but to understand how to turn it around, we must understand why, when, who and what. Labor at one time had the momentum and was winning so why is labor at 7 percent today and with 24 states now right to work for less laws that sap union treasures by allowing workers to benefit from union contracts without paying dues. Why do union members belong to the GOP or vote GOP? One reason is that union head of families, fathers and mothers, have not taught their children the importance of unions. They had all the benefits of a union: healthcare, good pay, weekends and holidays off, and money for a good education, but was never taught how or where this all came from, not at home, not in the schools and not even at the union meetings. Who is to blame? It is the unions and the unions’ members not teaching it at home, and throw in apathy and anti-union laws, and some Blue Dog Democrats who did not support unions and w...

The right wing governments of the world are pushing the wage slaves from the ballot box to the streets because the oligarchies have bought the ballot box. This forces the toilers to go to the streets to protest the wrongs of the right wing governments, like in Belgium, Brussels, where 100,000 workers had to take to the streets to demonstrate against planned reforms against public transport, schools, post office and other services. The government wants to cut staffing, services along with companies across the country. This is worldwide and here in the USA workers will be even more under assault by the right wing GOP for they now control 27 states, which will finish devastating the unions, and the oligarchies own the ballot boxes here also and the courts. So all that is left is the streets, which will probably be closed soon by Sedition Laws being passed by cities, counties and states, such as what was done in Ferguson, Missouri, where protestors were not able to stop walking, standing ...

The vilification of the union name and labor movements started around World War I, when the U.S. government broke the back of the International Workers of the World (IWW). Some of IWW members were against the war despite that fact that many IWW members served honorably in military. The next onslaught against labor was brought on by the actions of Jimmy Hoffa for abuse of the Teamsters’ union members pensions. The McClellan Committee, led by Attorney General Robert Kennedy. When the McClellan investigation was over, Senator Barry Goldwater went after the Reuther brothers, mostly Walter, who was the United Auto Workers president. The AFL then supported the Vietnam War and fought in the streets against fellow union members, who were mostly Democrats protesting the U.S. invasion of Vietnam. This did not earn the AFL any points with the GOP; in fact, they viewed the AFL members as suckers. Walter Reuther was sickened by the news coverage of union workers beating up protesters. He said it ...

Labor fights that were lost or won have always been decided by public opinion, even though there was contributing events, such as the National Guard, law enforcement, and court orders. Public opinion is a largest factor for without public support the elected politicians will not support you whether it’s local government (cities and counties), states, or even federal, for their life is controlled by public opinion, and, of course, lobbyists money, but in the end it still is public opinion that matters. So when labor starts a campaign, it must first test the waters, then plan from there. At this time, the $15 to $16 per hour minimum wage is enjoying very good public opinion ratings, but it needs to be pushed to at least 70 percent of the favorable rankings and made to hold at that rate, which will take money to advertise the benefits and explain about the corporations, that are supporting or leaning in favor of this increase in the minimum wage for all wage slaves in the low-wage indust...

It is past time for all unions and want-to-be unions to quit shooting each other in the foot. All we have to do is look back in history and see what we did wrong and what our leaders at that time did some of which still haunt us to this day. For example, one of the leaders was George Meany, head of the AFL/CIO at the time, gained control over the unions. Looking back we should have embraced Walter Reuther of the UAW. Reuther saw that we had to bring all wage slaves up to a living standard whether or not they were unionized, and we workers had a good chance with Eugene McCarthy when he ran for president. McCarthy was pro union, more than any other candidate except for maybe Roosevelt. But the unions decided to support the GOP. How did this work out for us? Hell, we even had labor unions vote for Ronald Reagan and then Reagan busted the Air Traffic Controllers Union's contract even after they voted and spent money on his election. Still the unions have not learned for the postal work...

The gap between the 1% oligarchies and the wage slaves gets wider by the day. The Stock Market just hit 1,500. It has never been this high and the corporations are making record profits than ever and yet the workers are paying for this as the wage gap just keeps widening so what are we to do? The elected politicians won’t help. They are in the pockets of the money people, but some of the world leaders are starting to get nervous about the level of anxiety of the poor 99%. There is no jobs and what there is pays very little and no health or pensions. When people have no hope, the masses can be very dangerous. All that is missing is a leader or leaders, such as Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., Walter Reuther, John F. and Bobby Kennedy, Malcolm X or Gandhi. When the leaders do appear we had better hope they are good ones and if they are we had better protect them from being killed like our old friends “Abraham, Martin and John.” Now will the new leader or leaders be something l...

When does the labor start looking at building the party of labor to represent all wage slaves who want to join? We start with the assets we have on hand our dues paying members then when we have the members and money we started electing people who will defend labor wage slaves and see if the Democrats want to join us if so then we would build a 50/50 partnership with one side having 51 percent one year or two and then the other side having the 51 percent for an equal amount of time if they want. If we win this November we need for the Democrats to show us what they can and are willing to do to educate and grow our labor movement. If they, the Democratic Party, do not back the wage slaves and 99 percent, then we need to promote our unions and tell the wage slaves what we have done and what we can and will do for our fellow working families. If we have to start a new party so be it, but if the Democratic Party wants to partner with us then good. But, either way labor has to start rebuil...

Our union messages have already been written. All we need to do is put them on the television, radio and in print. One message we need for California union workers was written by UAW past president Walter Reuther: There’s a direct relationship between the breadbox and the ballot box and what the union fights for and wins at the bargaining table can be taken away in the legislative halls and our members need to understand this or we will lose this in the fall election. The second union message was written by a union leader past president of the AFL, Samuel Gompers, was titled “What Does Labor Want?” "We want more schools, houses, and less jails, more books and less arsenals, more learning and less greed, more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures, to make manhood more noble, womanhood more beautiful, and childhood more happy and bright." The third message comes from President Franklin Roosevelt on wages. He wrote in 1933 ...

Why are the unions finding themselves alone in the fight for survival, and hated by both the oligarchies and the lower class? The reason is that the unions are the only organization standing in the way of total domination of the wage slaves by the 1%. Once unions are completely eliminated, the 1% will own the courts and government for years to come. The low wage workers were left behind in the earning power and resent those of us who have benefitted from union representation. Where is the help for the unions? For sure not the 1%, so what is left? The nonunion workers, who are not usually friendly toward union workers, perceive union workers as part of the 1% because, in their eyes, we union workers receive good wages, pensions, healthcare and paid vacations. We unions must fight for them, the low wage, nonunion slaves, and help float the ship up for all proletarian workers. They, the nonunion low-wage slaves, are the only resource left for the unions. Auto union president Walter Reu...

Wisconsin will be the turning point in which workers will either prosper or decline on the issues of pay, pensions, healthcare, vacations and all the other worker gains over the last 100 years. The GOP and wage slaves are at a crossroads and if the GOP wins then the dominoes will start falling state by state, which will put the workers in the position, the only option, of having to fight in the streets. We have already lost the U.S. Supreme Court, which is where all appealed cases end up, and they will and have already ruled against the workers. The only thing left will be the streets, which will not be good because the GOP/oligarchies will be able to identify the leaders and jail or, like in the 1800s-1930s, just kill them by trumped-up charges or by mob violence. Some of our labor leaders who were eliminated this way were Joe Hill, Big Bill Haywood, Walter Reuther, Eugene Debbs and Martin Luther King Jr., just to name a few. This is the old anti-union playbook and this worked time...