Labor Rights

The Republican Urge To Provoke Violence And Bloodshed

Ronald Leave a comment

The Republican Party, instead of promoting harmony and a sense of common purpose among the population of the United States, instead, for some odd reason, hard to fathom, does just the opposite! Everything it advocates instead provokes violence and bloodshed, without any rhyme or reason!

Examples of this abound!

1. Wisconsin, Ohio and other states take away labor’s right to collective bargaining, provoking massive demonstrations and outrage.

2. Florida cuts unemployment compensation to the lowest number of weeks of any state, 20 weeks, in the midst of an all time high unemployment rate of 12 percent, one of the highest in the nation, bringing desperate people to the brink of violence.

3. Florida also decides to make it more difficult for former felons to regain their voting rights, making it five years after completion of sentence and probation before one can even request restoration of voting rights, angering many who will feel discrimination.

4. New Hampshire and other states are working to make it more difficult for college students to vote in their college towns, as well as states which want to require state mandated IDs which intimidate poor people and minorities from registering to vote.

5. Arizona and other states are promoting profiling, giving police the right to stop anyone who they believe to be an illegal immigrant, and in the process advocating nativism.

6. Arizona and other states are cutting benefits for poor people who need transplant surgery, angering family members of those patients.

7. States are laying off teachers, police officers, firefighters and other public servants, and by increasing the unemployment rate, are fueling resentment among many of the newly unemployed. Also, the crime rate is bound to go up as we have fewer police officers.

8. States moving to criminalize abortion are provoking pro life extremists to the potential for bloodshed and violence.

9. States promoting guns on campus and in bars and other public places tends toward violence and bloodshed potential in the future.

10. The promotion of opposition to gay rights helps incite threats and violence against those by religious extremists who see homosexuality as a threat to American society.

11. The promotion of the “Birther” conspiracy theories about President Barack Obama by Republican leaders and conservatives fuels threats against our President by those who think he is a Muslim.

12. Congressman Peter King, by holding hearings on Islamic terrorism, promotes the image that we cannot trust the Muslim population within our midst.

This is a dangerous set of circumstances which makes one wonder what the future of the nation is, with the tendency of the Republican Party to be oblivious to what is occurring, or is it oblivious, or in fact purposely promoting these circumstances? One has to wonder!

Public Employees And Collective Bargaining Rights: Going Into Reverse! :(

Ronald Leave a comment

With the Wisconsin controversy fresh in our thoughts, it is very revealing to see a map of the United States and see the state of collective bargaining rights for public employees in the 50 states of the Union.

34 states guarantee collective bargaining, including all of the Northeast, New England, the Midwest, the Paciific Coast, some of the Mountain West, plus Tennessee and Florida, and also Alaska and Hawaii.

11 states have collective bargaining as “permissable” including West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona.

5 states have collective bargaining as explicitly illegal, all in the South, including Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Texas.

What a state of affairs that in 2011, after a century of labor struggles to be able to negotiate their working conditions, we are seeing movement in states such as Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee, Maine, New Jersey, and Florida against such labor rights!

We are progressing backwards into the 19th century! 🙁

The Long Range Significance Of Wisconsin! Survival Of The Middle Class, Public Education, And Democracy!

Ronald Leave a comment

The Wisconsin labor struggle is a battle against corporate interests who wish to destroy the working middle class’s right to collective bargaining and labor representation. It is a calculated attempt of conservatives, Tea Party Movement, and Republicans (who have always hated and opposed labor rights) to diminish the middle class and destroy public education, the only way for upward social mobility in this society!

The labor movement helped to create the middle class, but it had to face entrenched business and conservative interests in the 19th century and in the 20th century. Now, in the 21st century, it faces new attempts to take away the hard earned rights and benefits that generations of workers struggled for, earned by the sweat of their brow, and deserve respect and dignity for their commitment to their work.

Every social movement in this country has required marches, demonstrations, lawsuits, and civil disobedience to win support–including the anti slavery movement, the women suffrage struggle, the recognition of labor rights, the civil rights movement, the women’s rights movement, and the gay rights battle!

It is appropriate that Wisconsin, the birthplace of the Republican Party in 1854 at Ripon, and which had a platform of opposition to the expansion of slavery and included abolitionists in its midst; and also the birthplace of the progressive movement in Madison with the election of Governor Robert LaFollette, Sr in 1900–is the “ground zero” location of the new fight for labor rights and the survival of the middle class and public education!

Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin might be intransigent, but those opposed to his use of fear and hysteria–just as the GOP has always been good at utilizing, as in the Red Scare led by Senator Joseph McCarthy, and the manipulation of September 11 to promote the Iraq War–must not give in, and must continue the struggle, and it must be fought in Florida, Ohio, New Jersey and elsewhere with no surrender, as it will determine the future of the American middle class and the survival of a society that can still be termed a democracy!

The Assault On Organized Labor And The Working Class

Ronald 1 Comment

The year 2011 is seeing a frontal assault on the hard earned rights of organized labor and the working class, gained over the past century with the aid of Presidents Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon, George H W Bush, and Bill Clinton.

Collective bargaining is about to disappear in many states controlled by Republican Governors, and the Supreme Court has been actively restricting labor rights and promoting the rights and privileges of corporations.

We are rapidly descending back into the Gilded Age and 1920s mentality, including the possibility of National Guard actions against workers in Wisconsin, and who know where else eventually! 🙁

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate threatens to create a permanent underclass, and employers are making things only worse.

The white population has an unemployment rate of about 8 percent; the African American population rate is 16 percent; the Hispanic rate is 12 percent; and the Asian American rate is about 7 percent. Add to this the growing number of disabled and handicapped workers as well, and then add to the mix the news that employers more than ever are refusing to consider anyone for employment who is at this point without a job.

If this strategy continues, which would seem to be against the civil rights laws on race, ethnicity and the disabled and handicapped, then we are on the way to a permanent underclass of people who will be unable to find work, and will be denied or thrown off unemployment compensation (which is only temporary in any case)!

This sets up a situation of social dynamite, which could lead to bloodshed and violence, including use of the National Guard against the American population, by bully governors who decide to use force against people marching and demonstrating and demanding a change in attitude and policy to give this underclass hope and confidence that there is a future for them.

This whole evolving situation is extremely scary and troubling! 🙁

Threats Of National Guard Use Against State Workers Unions In Wisconsin: Deplorable! :(

Ronald Leave a comment

As written about by this author a few days ago, Republican Governors and state legislatures are declaring war on government workers–teachers, prison guards, police officers, firefighters, nurses, paramedics, social workers, sanitation workers, librarians and office workers–and setting out to destroy the rights of dedicated workers to have union representation and collective bargaining rights! 🙁

The imposition of pension and health care payments in large amounts on all these workers, plus cutting or freezing of wages, will throw many of these public servants out of the middle class, and in Wisconsin, Governor Scott Walker has threatened to call out the National Guard to use force against protesting workers and their demonstrations! 🙁

Is this threat of use of force against state workers to be seen as anything less than imposing dictatorial control over the labor force, and setting out to destroy all labor rights won over the past century in Wisconsin and nationwide? 🙁

Wisconsin, the center of progressivism, the home of Governor Robert LaFollette, Sr, one of the great leaders of the progressive reform movement, now is faced with a leader who is nothing less than a fascist in his approach to labor rights, by threatening violence against the right of assembly! 🙁

Wisconsin is only one of many states with Governors who are “bullies” against labor rights and freedom of expression, including Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey, Governor Rick Scott of Florida, and Governor John Kasich of Ohio, all of whom are threatening and imposing similar crackdowns on labor, although none yet have threatened the National Guard use that Scott Walker has suggested in Wisconsin.

Recall elections are allowed in Wisconsin and New Jersey, and action should be taken immediately to implement such an election.

Altogether, 18 states allow recall of state government officials, but sadly, not Florida and Ohio. 🙁

This is a sad, tragic situation that will only have the effect of undermining loyalty and commitment of state workers all around the country, and the American people will see the deleterious effect over time of what the Republican Governors are doing all over the country! 🙁