Why and when did the GOP become so anti-worker? The Chamber of Commerce, which is GOP dominated and a few unknowing Democrats, has always been against workers having a living wage. At one time there were a few GOP elected presidents that were for wage slaves, healthcare, workers safety laws, environmental laws, and the right for workers to have unions.
This was when they, the corporate-run GOP, needed our workers and at that time they just wanted to keep unemployment at a 6 percent or higher unemployment. The reason for the 6 percent and higher was when unemployment reaches 5 percent or lower then the workers would be in a better position to fight for better working conditions, such as pay, pensions, healthcare, work place safety. But now with NAFTA, outsourcing jobs overseas, the corporations don’t care about the unemployment percentage.
The GOP politicians don’t care and have no intention to help working class people. Now the large U.S. corporations have traded away their loyalty from U.S. workers to overseas cheap wage slaves, and with this it also helps pollute the wage rates. Walmart sets the trend and is fanatically antiunion or a living wage, such as $15-$18 an hour.
I don’t think we will ever see again a GOP president elected who will ever support workers and their families. Hell, we’ll be lucky to get support for unions from Democrats elected president. I do think that President Obama, if he gets another four years, is our best hope to support unions by passing card check. We will have to hold his feet to the fire.
Let’s look at some of the GOP elected presidents who signed into law bills that helped the common worker:
President Grover Cleveland signed into Labor Day a national holiday – 09/01/1894
President Eisenhower signs legislation expanding Social Security by providing much wider coverage and including 10 million additional Americans, most of them self-employed farmers, with additional benefits -09/02/ 1954
President Nixon signed The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), which sets and enforces protective workplace safety and health standards in 1970
President Ford signed The Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), regulating and insuring pensions and other benefits, and increasing protections for workers – 09/02/1974 revised in 2008 by Bush & again in 2009 under Obama
President George H. W. Bush signed The Americans with Disabilities Act (P.L. 101-336), enacted into law on July 26, 1990, prohibits private sector employers who employ 15 or more individuals and all State and local government employers from discriminating against qualified individuals with disabilities in all aspects of employment.
Yes, they are coming for us. Workers need to have one another’s backs because no one else will. Neither the broader labor movement nor the Democratic party are prepared to meet the urgency of this moment. So it’s going to fall upon the rest of us to mount a real resistance against Trump’s authoritarian takeover. We’re going to have to get our hands dirty. I don’t care if you have a good, well-paying union job and you are in the middle class now—if you see a worker being dragged out of his workplace regardless of how skilled the job and potentially taken to another country, you should be ready to be there for that worker. When I.C.E. shows up, gather around and shame them into leaving. It has worked in other places. America is sleep walking into authoritarianism, and if there’s anyone out there who is a member of a labor union that is safe—at this point— and doesn’t think this applies to them. Understand that they just haven’t gotten to you yet. They’re coming for all of us. There are ...
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