TOMMORROW WE BEGIN!

[TWU informer]

Supreme Court: Campaign-finance limits violate free speech



January 21, 2010
The Supreme Court campaign finance ruling on Thursday means corporations can spend freely on political ads leading up to elections. The Thursday decision invalidates a part of 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform law that sought to limit corporate influence.

As long as money is considered FREE SPEECH, then we will continue to have a Government, BY THE MONEY, and FOR THE MONEY.

Organized Labor should shutter the AFL-CIO Political Contributions and invovlement as it pertains to money. The organization should convert to a purely action and protest group taking our compaints to the street is the only FAIR method of involvement. Organized Labor continuation of a game of who has the most money is stupid and a predictable failure on all fronts.

It’s not every day the AFL-CIO encourages workers to dismantle their labor union and abandon collective bargaining, but in the case of the NFL Players Association’s battle with team owners, Big Labor is cheering it on.

If the AFL-CIO would take a page from their own cheering on during the NFL battle, and dismantle the political funding machine of organized labor and resort to purely action and protesting, we might actually stand a chance.

But the false rich and powerful leaders will never take this required action because that have plenty of cash, still live lavishly, and are not suffering like the AFL-CIO membership. This complete disconnect between the Union Leader and the Union Worker will be the down fall of organized labor in this country.

 

[TWU informer]

Interesting Document from the Fire Fighters Union related to the failure and needed changes of the AFL-CIO

http://www.workinglife.org/filebin/fol/Firefighters.pdf


Do you think the AFL-CIO Leadership Listened? Hell NO!

 

[TWU informer]

Unions should stop wasting workers' hard-earned money on candidates

By Jonathan Tasini
Jonathan Tasini, president emeritus of the National Writers Union, is president of the Economic Future Group.
February 20, 2005

Over the last 20 years, the labor movement has poured billions of our members' hard-earned dollars into electoral politics — and we've gotten very little to show for it except a weaker labor movement, too many election day whuppings and too many politicians who, when they do win, promptly turn their backs on working men and women. It's time we turned off the spigot and put the money to better use.

The Center for Responsive Politics reports that between 1979 and 2004, unions gave about $500 million in direct contributions to candidates for federal office. From 1998 to 2004, unions lavished about $600 million on political parties. And unions paid $100 million to 527s (independent political action committees) in 2004. That's $1.2 billion in cash — not counting money spent on the parties from 1980 to 1998 and labor's own effort to get its members out to vote. A few union political experts tell me unions spend seven to 10 times what they give candidates and parties on internal political mobilization. So we're talking $8 billion to as much as $12 billion on federal elections alone.

What have we gotten for that? For the last 25 years, employers have broken labor laws with impunity and fired tens of thousands of workers trying to organize. By every measure, life for most workers has become more difficult. Few politicians challenge the right of corporations to run the workplace like a dictatorship. We've lived almost entirely under Republican presidents — the exception being Bill Clinton's eight years. Even those years hurt us, as Clinton aggressively lobbied for the North American Free Trade Agreement and enthusiastically embraced its dubious premise — an unmitigated disaster for American and foreign workers. His secretary of Labor was pro-NAFTA, did virtually nothing to push for the real right to organize a union and, instead, advocated a now-discredited liberal, elitist view that we should not worry about the global economy as long as dumb workers retrained themselves.

During the Clinton years, labor could not get a bill passed that would have prevented strikers from being permanently replaced. The reason? The two Democratic senators from Arkansas, Dale Bumpers and David Pryor, refused to provide the two votes that would have ended a Republican filibuster. We got exactly what we should have expected — a few crumbs.

Don't get me wrong. I admire the fire and dedication of the labor people who pour their souls into campaigns. But we've been acting on the belief that the political arena could make up for our declining numbers and weakness in the workplace. Our money and troops have squeezed out a few victories for Democrats. But we've remained passengers, not drivers of the political vehicle. Politicians ignore us because we can't turn out enough voters to end their careers. We couldn't even muster a meaningful spanking for those NAFTA-backing Democrats.

So my proposal is simple: During the coming two-year election cycle, labor should not write a single check to a federal candidate or a political party. Let's take the money — and, more important, our focus and energy — and pour it into organizing new workers, kicking the stuffing out of the Wal-Mart family, pushing a national campaign for healthcare for all and advancing the labor-environment-sponsored Apollo Alliance, a brilliant idea to pour billions of dollars into good-paying jobs through new sustainable-energy projects. Faced with the specter of a rapacious global economy, people are ready for someone who'll champion broader, enforceable rights at work.

I can hear the chorus now: We have to support our political "friends" and defeat the Republicans. Get real. Given that virtually every incumbent is reelected in Congress, there is no chance the Democrats will be in a position to retake either the House or Senate in the next cycle — nor will Democratic incumbents lose. And, if by some miracle the Democrats recapture Congress, the chances are less than zero that they would attain a filibuster-proof margin in the Senate. Serious labor law reform is a pipe dream for a long time to come — even if we could get full Democratic Party support, which is doubtful.

So, for two years, let's do something radical: find out which politicians fight for working people without needing to be slipped a check. If we have to start trying to buy votes again, there will be plenty of takers. On the other hand, abstinence might earn us something — like more members and more respect, which, in the end, is what we need to have real power to shape the political agenda.

 

[CMH_GSE]

Campaign money paid off bigtime for GM and Chrystler workers.
Too bad we didn't file for BK in early 09 just ahead of the GM bailout.
No Obama left for us.

 

[Mr Red]

They kept their jobs at reduced pay and benefits,so I guess that statement was a joke right.

 

[TWU informer]

Campaign money paid off bigtime for GM and Chrystler workers.
Too bad we didn't file for BK in early 09 just ahead of the GM bailout.
No Obama left for us.

That was a bailout for the Corporations, the workers were just collateral recipients.
And the workers have not filed BK yet, the AMR Corporation did.
Fool

 

[CMH_GSE]

That was a bailout for the Corporations, the workers were just collateral recipients.
And the workers have not filed BK yet, the AMR Corporation did.
Fool

I guess I have to make every posting a long one with explanations so you can keep up.
My comment was made tongue in cheek and I in no way am in favor of what Obama did for GM.
Here is a story that tells you all you need to know about the GM bailout and how wrong it was.

http://gaanderson.hu...-Untold-Details

The government gave GM $49 Billion, only $30 Billion of it can not be repaid, it can only be recovered by the sale of government interest in GM ownership.

And the part that really raised eyebrows was this excerpt:
**It should be noted that established contract law required secured creditors be paid first, but Obama's administration simply ignored this legal requirement and gave the unsecured union creditors first position - leaving whatever might be left for the secured investors.

 

[JABORD]

All you fart smellers,I mean smart fellers! So knowledgeable on so many varied subjects. 'Tomorrow We Begin' means to me the chance to take some ideas from everybody here and try to apply them toward advancing from our current situation. Instead you genius' have to crud up the topic with all the political BS rhetoric.

 

[TWU informer]

My apologies, I do not usually turn the thread off topic I just join in the unrelenting debate after someone else cannot stay on topic.

Nearly every thread on this forum gets moved in a direction that is off topic.


And it seems to be the same users that are unable to remain on topic.
Some like to post simple 6 word questions on regular basis that gets the thread moving off topic.
They have nothing to contribute, just a simple 6-8 word question that is off topic.

Nothing I can do about that.

You could try using the "report post" function and try to get some moderation, but I think this forum has just become a free for all.

 

[CMH_GSE]

We can talk till the cows come home about changing unions, but for time being, TWU will be doing our bidding, like it or not.

If enough voices are loud enough together, you may be able to have the TWU change course, but from my observations, there doesn't seem to be a solid majority of voices for one particular direction, remember that over 2000 members did not vote on the last proposal.

When there is that much apathy, it's hard to elicit change.

 

[TWU informer]

We can talk till the cows come home about changing unions, but for time being, TWU will be doing our bidding, like it or not.

If enough voices are loud enough together, you may be able to have the TWU change course, but from my observations, there doesn't seem to be a solid majority of voices for one particular direction, remember that over 2000 members did not vote on the last proposal.

When there is that much apathy, it's hard to elicit change.

That wasn't apathy that was FEAR generated by Local 514. I spoke with several members who couldn't vote yes or not because they did not want to feel responsible for the outcome. Members being forced to vote on a choice of concessions for jobs, or concessions for no jobs, should be a crime in any Union Hand Book.

And the glass isn't really half empty as you like to view everything. 80% plus did cast a vote. How could you possibly know anything close to what the majority thinks if you really are in a little station and about to get laid-off?

None of this changes the fact that you and everyone else should attempt to respect the topic of discussion.
If you do not like the topic, start your own. Problem seems to be that nobody really wants to talk about worthless issues, so someone has to hijack a popular thread to get their desires discussed.

 

[CMH_GSE]

If you knew me, you would know I am always a glass half full guy.
I also like to live in Realville and not Oz.
Everything I have gathered seems to have our prospects in these proceedings not in good stead.
We are all looking for the best outcome we can get and most forecasts have that outcome a bad one for the rank and file.
This is doubly disturbing after we waited for 4 years for a better contract so I think everyone is equally frustrated with the screwing coming our way.

This still doesn't mean one choice isn't any better than another.

 

[JABORD]

In my opinion, the perverse 'success' of the TWBoo has been the ability over the years to 'dummy up' our craft! I have a hard time believing that they were smart enough to have created a planned strategy of this but it surely is deep rooted enough to say it goes back to Sonny Hall era and that generation of mechanic. It seems the lack of or managed information provided to us makes it easy for some to disengage and cross fingers in hopes that everything will be righted.
SWAMT has expressed that the democratic system that AMFA provides them is almost too burdensome due to all the votes the members are asked to participate in. I would welcome that problem.
We need a way to get most everyone to get involved. Aircraft Mechanic pride needs to be promoted Maybe a start would be if anyone knows of a book that features some memorable stories as to mechanic heros or something similar like all the pilot stories we know so well.(Wiley Post,Doolittle,etc) Any ideas out there?

 

[TWU informer]

In my opinion, the perverse 'success' of the TWBoo has been the ability over the years to 'dummy up' our craft! I have a hard time believing that they were smart enough to have created a planned strategy of this but it surely is deep rooted enough to say it goes back to Sonny Hall era and that generation of mechanic. It seems the lack of or managed information provided to us makes it easy for some to disengage and cross fingers in hopes that everything will be righted.
SWAMT has expressed that the democratic system that AMFA provides them is almost too burdensome due to all the votes the members are asked to participate in. I would welcome that problem.
We need a way to get most everyone to get involved. Aircraft Mechanic pride needs to be promoted Maybe a start would be if anyone knows of a book that features some memorable stories as to mechanic heros or something similar like all the pilot stories we know so well.(Wiley Post,Doolittle,etc) Any ideas out there?

The best Mechanic Pride information I have ever seen or heard was the testimony given by Brian Finnegan of PAMA (Professional Aviation Maintenance Association), during the AMFA vs NWA Presidential Emergency Board Hearing in Philadelphia.

Call 303-752-2632 and ask AMFA National for the trasncripts from the hearing, reproduce and distribute the testimony given by Mr. Finnegan.
It was the best I have ever heard!!! This testimony still to this day is the best explaination of the AMT profession and it's plight I have knowledge of existence.


Board Number 235
Northwest Airlines, Inc.
A10
AMFA
Mechanics & Related
03-12-01
05-10-01
Settlement prior to scheduled Report date of 5-14-01

http://kas.cuadra.co.../nmb/PEB235.pdf

Lee Seham might also have copies of the transcripts desired.

Note: I sent an e-mail to AMFA National requesting these files. If an when I receive them I will try to get them uploaded or linked for availability.

 

[Desert Snake]

I'm not at all impressed with IAM, i would rather give AMFA a shot.