Union Perspectives

Why do the American people let our policies be determined by think tanks, instead of the people who we elect and pay to make our policies? Just who are the people in the think tanks and who do they represent? Most are conservative who represent the largest defense companies and are now pushing our nuclear weapons and U.S. security policies of strategy. This was being pushed by Michaela Dodge, who works for the Heritage Foundation think tank, but just who in the hell is she? Who is she to be deciding that the U.S. needs more nuclear weapons and to modernize the nukes that we have, and yet we and our elected officials look at the ideology of the think tanks as gospel. Most of the time the think tank participants are just carrying the water for the large corporations that fund the think tanks, which is in the multimillions of dollars. So, do you think we get unbiased and information in which to support or not support their findings? Think tanks should be looked at as no more than a ...

Labor councils, which is already well established, can be used to counter the GOP and anti-union corporations think tanks and other anti-worker organizations, such American Legislative Exchange Council, State Policy Network (SPN), Americans for Prosperity (their prosperity, not yours, and funded by the Koch brothers), MacIver Institutes and many others. They all are well-funded, but labor has its councils, which are well established, but we just need to expand and update our effort to counter our enemies. One thing that the GOP think tanks are doing is hiring media reporters and setting up a syndication service providing right-leaning wire service, which tends to sway public opinion. We, the labor councils, could very easily do this with very little expense. Every labor council should have their own think tank. In these think tanks there should be politicians, labor, business, academia and work on the messages for the media. It is the only way to tell our story and get support. I have ...

Why don’t we, labor wage slaves, have organizations, other than labor unions, fighting for our workers? The right wing has not only anti-labor think tanks, but also many undercover organizations, such as American Legislative Exchange Council; the right wing group the Lincoln Club of Orange County, California; Manufacturers Association; and the local, national and international Chamber of Commerce. These are just a few of the organizations that have come out from under their rocks and are getting laws or propositions on the ballot before we wage slaves even know what’s happened. This always puts us on the defense, which we must stop in order to counter their actions. They have the money, but we have the people. Whether or not they lose they will have depleted our treasury and worn our people out. What we need to do is take the fight to them, which will remove what they are doing to us. We could do this by using our labor councils and spin off organizations to work on propositions and ...