Union Perspectives

Each blog I write from here on out could be my last. I don’t know if or when they will shut me down, but I will keep the blog going for as long as I can. I’m not engaging in hyperbole, not with what is coming at us in January. We need to protect and defend the National Labor Relations Board. When Trump was last in office, he systematically eliminated workers’ rights to join unions and negotiate collective bargaining with employers—this not only hurt employees, but their communities and the economy overall. Trump weakened worker protections and actively worked at eliminating rules that protected workers. We need to keep the NLRB for all workers, for organizing workers and nonunion workers and build a workers’ union that is much stronger than the MAGA or the old Tea Party. Our unions will fight and win. The benefits unions fight for eventually work their way down to nonunion workers. If MAGAs weren’t so hellbent on owning the Libs, they, too, would enjoy a four-day work-week with full p...

For the workers to fight and win their labor battles, they must understand what they are up against and the history of their enemy, such as the banking system and the world banking system, and numerous others. There is a good video that explains these systems in animation that a friend, Ian, told me about. The video is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mII9NZ8MMVM . I highly recommend people take the time to watch this simply explained video on a complex topic. It’s like the video, Who Moved My Cheese, https://www.google.com #q=who+moved+my+cheese+video . Both are very educational. One must also understand big pharma and health insurance companies and how they buy our politicians in both political parties, who then kill any attempt at single payer legislation. They now are buying politician to fight the marijuana laws so they can sell their synthetic marijuana pills, and to do that they will support laws that make marijuana illegal except for what they sell. This explains why U.S. At...

The world financial wealth is $95.5 trillion. This is the cash that keeps the capitalist system running now, what happens when there is 8 percent or $7.6 trillion missing? This is money, which is not circulating in the system, such as wages paid or being spent on durable goods that would need to replaced eventually, stoves, or washers and dryers. It is just a loss to all except the hoarders of the $7.6 trillion. To make matters worse, there is also $190 billion lost in taxes worldwide, $35 billion just in the U.S. and this is money that has to be made whole by the 47 percent. Once again, cash taken out of the capitalist system in ways like pay for our federal, state, county and city government workers, law enforcement, firefighters, infrastructure, schools, colleges, and renewable energy exploration. All would make for good jobs we need, but with no cash no jobs can be created. Our taxes are making up for what these thieves are hiding in other countries. Their excuse is that it’s not i...

Are the days of a two-party system coming to an end? At this time the GOP is split between the Tea Party and the old GOP people. The Democrats are splitting between the centrists/Blue Dogs and the new young people’s party, the Revolutionaries. The wages slaves of the world are demanding a fair share in their lives that they are not getting from their government’s representation. Just look at Spain’s election, which shows strong support for two new upstart parties challenging Spain’s traditional two-party system. Then there is Ukraine’s governing coalition that lost its majority in parliament. There are different reasons for each country, but there is one that crosses lines, which trust and dissatisfaction with their elected politicians. Here in the U.S., we have a broken system in the Democratic party, which can rig elections by using super delegates. Super delegates were established during the 1972 election cycle when George McGovern and Jimmy Carter squared off. Using the 712 super ...

Wage slaves need to understand that they will never be invited to the oligarchies’ country clubs unless it as lawn maintenance or to serve them food and wash their dishes while being paid minimum wage. So why is it that some union workers, who have pensions, steady-good-paying jobs and healthcare, they lean toward GOP candidates or Blue Dog Democrats? It never works out for them to vote for these types of candidates, just look at the postal workers. Some of these American Postal Workers Union employees voted GOP and donated money to Congressman Darrel Issa, who returned the favor by doing everything he can to shut down the postal service and privatize it—all to bust the union. Remember the air traffic controllers? They were once unionized and supported Ronald Reagan for president and we all know how that turned out. What proletarians have to remember is that the GOP and Blue Dogs Democrats are not our friends and never will be and they should never be trusted. This is a class war that...

Empire: No doubt one is a wretched plebian harassed by debts and military service, but to make up for it, one is a Roman citizen one has one’s share in the task of ruling other nations and dictating their laws, according to Sigmund Fraud in The Future of Illusion, 1927. This is the thinking of the GOP’s Tea Party people, who believe we are the best country in the world and all other countries should be like us. These people they are a part of an empire and think it will never end. This is again an illusion told to the uninformed GOP followers who blindly listen to the talking heads who are funded by the oligarchies. The GOP Tea Party members are not the only people with an illusion of an empire. Our union leaders also fall into this trap by not voicing their opinion on U.S. trade and foreign policy for it is usually so bad and explosive that is normally avoided in polite company within the union movement. Every action or failure to act has consequences and labor silence on questions o...

In all wars the battles decide who wins so you must win the most battles and the most important ones and the battle to unite the working class against the divide and rule strategies of the capitalist class upon which their domination rest. It is a battle the wage slaves must win. If you don’t fight, you don’t win—period. If someone you know doesn’t understand why the minimum wage needs to raise, wait until the end of the month and then ask again. The cost of everything is going up; some of the costs are understandable, but some are not and corporations are using any excuse to raise prices, but not workers’ wages. How the hell are we supposed to survive> The employers try to turn workers who are black, female, gay, Mexican, or immigrant into scapegoats as distraction for the lack of good jobs creation along with the strategies the oligarchies blame Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act and the minimum wage, but the minimum wage raises are coming and the spending power of the toilers w...

It is time for the 1 percent oligarchies to start paying back for the use of “our” commons. They are getting a free ride. They exploit our national resources, our clean air and water, they use our roads, airspace, radios, television, and our armed forces protect their interests abroad. Our commons belong to all 100 percent of us, but the 1 percent uses it the most and the 99 percent have to pay for the upkeep through our taxes, which the 1 percent has loop holes to avoid paying their fair share. There needs to be a tax on the use of our commons that is fair. At this time the oligarchies get a free ride. We give them young, healthy, educated workers, who are the 99 percent have paid to educate and healthcare to keep them healthy and they try to pay them the lowest wages with no benefits possible. A recent job advertisement listed a master’s degree was required, but the starting pay was only $34,000 a year, not enough to live on and pay back student loans. This means we are subsidizing ...

What is the commonality between the old Nazi Brown Shirts of Germany, the Greek Golden Dawn Party and the USA Tea Party? One is they were funded by the oligarchies; two is they all started out as laughable, but soon became more powerful, more racist and more fascist than anyone thought possible. They are antiunion, against immigrants and will crucify anyone not willing to go along with their agenda. The Greek Golden Dawn traces their roots back to the Metaxas dictatorship in the late 1930s to the Nazi collaboration during the occupation in WWII. Now, it looks like the USA’s Tea Party is starting to use the Brown Shirts and Golden Dawn playbook and even the conservative party of England is getting on the bandwagon. It is the whole oligarchies against the proletarian class. It’s warfare: the money against the workers. The stupid people who think they belong with the rich are just bought and brainwashed. This is where the oligarchies find their troops. If these wannabe rich people woul...

The fight to keep the prevailing wage in a little city has been ongoing for three years. The fight is between a supposed nonprofit corporation and the City of Redding against the unions in northern California. The so-called nonprofit, Turtle Bay Museum, wants to build a 5-star Sheraton hotel as a funding source for its enterprises. The case went to the courts and labor won. Now the Turtle Bay wants to go back to court, but this time labor is in for the long hall. This win for labor or loss will affect all of California, and could even set a precedent for the rest of the nation. For this reason alone labor must win, and in this case Turtle Bay needs the hotel more than the labor needs the jobs for labor will not miss out on a thing if this hotel is not build. They have nothing now so if the hotel isn’t built they won’t be out of work, but if the prevailing wage is overturned, unions will lose a lot more than this one job. We can kiss the prevailing wage jobs goodbye, and construction j...

American Legislative Exchange Council is pushing the union busting resolutions to make states “right to work” states. Dr. Martin Luther King had said was one of the greatest frauds ever perpetuated on workers. What ‘right to work’ would do is let workers, who are in a union pay dues or opt not to pay. If they opt out they still get the benefits from the union as the dues-paying workers. Some pay, while others get a free ride. I always thought Republicans and the Tea Party members were against free rides – something for nothing. What the ‘right to work’ does is weaken the unions by sharing the benefits in an open shop whereas in a closed shop everyone pays their fair share. Weakening the unions is what ‘right to work’ and ‘pay check protection’ is all about and ALEC and the GOP won’t give up until they succeed in destroying all the protections in place for workers. This is what this is all about. There are currently 23 states with ‘right to work’ legislation; and Arizona is currently...

In a previous post I wrote about the GOP’s strategy to go the birth place of union activities and begin dismantling workers’ rights and protections. There is a war going on but unions and progressives aren't paying attention. We’ve seen how the GOP in Wisconsin dismantled public employees’ bargaining rights. Now the GOP is going into Maine, the birthplace of the oldest child labor laws, and seeking to weaken the law that protect children form exploitation. Maine’s governor, Paul LePage, wants all workers younger than 20 years of age to make less than minimum wage. He wants to increase the work week for teens from 20 hours to 24 a week and increase the work hours on a school night from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. The pay would be whatever the employer determined for the first 180 days of employment. After 180 days, the employer could conceivably fire the teen and hire new teens for 180 days again. The common thread is that these two states are birthplaces of the labor laws: public employ...