Right to Work Blog

The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reports on organized labor’s new effort to slip in unionization for airport screeners:

Democrats figure they owe Big Labor for helping them take Congress, and now comes the payback. Tucked away in House and Senate bills that purport to implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission is a provision that the Commission most assuredly did not recommend: collective (sic) bargaining rights for the Transportation Safety Administration’s 43,000 airport screeners.

Congress created TSA in 2001 without union rights on common sense grounds that the agency overseeing airport security was more like the Defense Department than, say, Agriculture. Unionization, with its myriad work rules, would make it harder for the executive branch to hire, fire, train and reassign workers to best meet changing terrorist threats.

Democrats haven’t stopped trying to overturn that decision, and in 2002 they forced a showdown with President Bush over union rights as part of creating the Department of Homeland Security. Mr. Bush opposed the effort by Senate Democrats who were then in the majority, and the dispute helped the GOP gain Senate seats that November. This may explain why Democrats are now trying to unionize TSA sotto voce, under the cover of 9/11 Commission “reforms,” and so far the press corps has barely noticed.

Big labor activists are pressuring Rep. Shelly Moore Capito to support the card-check bill. The Charleston Gazette reports that Capito has “not yet pledged her support to the legislation.”

West Virginia readers and any other American who cares about workers’ rights should let Capito know the importance of protecting workplace democracy and voting AGAINST H.R. 800, the Card Check Forced-Unionism Bill. You can contact her office at (202) 225-2711.

For more information about this dangerous legislation click here.

Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple Computer, likes to speak his mind and at a recent conference on education reform in Austin, Texas, he let the teachers unions have a piece of it.

PC World reports that,

[d]uring a joint appearance with Michael Dell that was sponsored by the Texas Public Education Reform Foundation, Jobs took on the [teacher] unions by first comparing schools to small businesses, and school principals to CEOs. He then asked rhetorically: “What kind of person could you get to run a small business if you told them that when they came in, they couldn’t get rid of people that they thought weren’t any good? Not really great ones, because if you’re really smart, you go, ‘I can’t win.’”

He went on to say that “what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way. This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the-charts crazy.”

Once again Iowa political reporter David Yepsen has issued a warning to Democrats: Mess around with Iowa’s Right to Work Law at your own peril.

Yepsen points out that the anti-Republican sentiment that was prevalent last election could quickly turn into an anti-Democrat mood should Right to Work be sacrificed by the new Democrat majority in the state. “Something similar could happen in some Iowa legislative districts next year. It’ll be over this idea of gutting Iowa’s right-to-work law to legalize “fair share” fees. Unions want to change the law, which says you don’t have to join a union to get or keep a job. They want to allow contracts that require nonunion employees in union shops to pay a fee to the union . . . .

“Yet polls show most Iowans oppose such a violation of worker freedom. About a dozen Democratic members of the Iowa House from toss-up districts could be vulnerable on the question because their mere presence in the Legislature gives Democrats the majority — and union leaders the ability to push the matter.

“Even if Democratic leaders announce they are dropping the idea because they don’t have the votes to pass it, the fact they gave it serious consideration has spooked and energized the state’s business community. It has given Republicans a desperately needed club they can use against Democrats from marginal districts in 2008.”

Right to Work supporters in Iowa are making their voices heard in the halls of the state capitol. Postcards and phone calls are pouring into Des Moines from every corner of the state in opposition to this Big Labor power grab. Keep up the pressure!

Government unions have become a powerful force driving up costs for taxpayers. According to the USA Today, their power and influence has created a “pension and benefits gap” between the private sector and government jobs. In fact, the paper found that for retirees it pays to have worked for the government instead of the private sector, and taxpayers are being squeezed.

“Governments’ generosity could have serious consequences for taxpayers and pensioners. Some states — including Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio and West Virginia — have troubled retirement systems that may require huge tax increases, spending cuts or even defaulting on promised benefits. The U.S. government has a bigger unfunded liability for military and civil servant retirement benefits ($4.7 trillion) than it does for Social Security ($4.6 trillion).”

And who is to blame?

Big Labor.

“‘Pension benefits are like a lobster trap. You can get in, but you can’t get out,’” says John Moorlach, an Orange County supervisor who has tried to reduce retirement benefits for government workers.

“He blames elected officials for awarding unsustainable retirement benefits to win support from employee unions. ‘Elected officials love to give generous retirement benefits because they don’t cost anything today and they’ll be out of office when the payments come due,’” Moorlach says. “And the public? Eyes droop with boredom when you bring up the topic.”

The Mount Pleasant Area Chamber of Commerce joined the growing chorus of calls condemning the “[un]Fair Share” proposal that would destroy Iowa’s Right to Work Law. The resolutions passed by the Chamber “urges state legislators to vote against any legislation which would gut Iowa’s right-to-work law,” according to Golden Triangle Newspapers.

“The resolution passed by the Mount Pleasant Area Chamber of Commerce states, ‘Passage of S.S.B. 1120 would bring forced unionism to Iowa, forcing tens of thousands of hardworking Iowans to pay a union boss just to get or keep a job.’”

Other Chambers or groups looking for a way to get involved can contact the Iowans for Right to Work Committee at (515) 473-8733.

“Missouri should become a ‘right to work’ state and end rules that require some people to join unions, or pay union dues, as a condition of their jobs, some lawmakers and state business groups said Wednesday,” quotes a recent article in the Jefferson City News Tribune.

And Rep. Steve Hunter, R-Joplin, has introduced a short, two-page bill to do just that.

For more of this story, click on or type the URL below:

http://www.newstribune.com/articles/2007/
02/01/news_state/333state10work.txt

Big Labor is already spending millions in workers’ dues money to push a legislative agenda chock full of new privileges for union officials. Now, Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Democrat Steering and Outreach Committee, is saying thank you. She has met with union bosses underscoring “the party’s determination to work hand-in-hand with outside advocacy groups to raise public support for bills on the Democratic agenda,” according to The Hill newspaper.

The bosses of Big Labor met with Stabenow and other steering committee members such as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Democrat Policy Committee Chairman Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) — the first such formal encounter since Democrats took control in January.

“Labor’s (sic) been a huge partner with Democrats during a lot of dark years when their agenda was not on the table,” said a Democrat aide. “There will be a lot of agreement in that room . . . .”

Big Labor – Big Hurry
Fast Tracking Card Check Bill

The inaptly but officially labeled “Employee Free Choice Act” (H.R. 800) was introduced in the 110th Congress by Rep. George Miller (CA-7) on February 5, 2007.

House Democrats, fearing growing opposition to the bill, have scheduled a vote on the measure the week of February 26. The bill, more accurately named “Card Check Forced-Unionism Bill,” will grant union officials expansive new tools to force workers to pay union dues as a condition of getting or keeping a job.

The fact that the legislation already has majority support in the House makes the outcome pre-determined, but we have always said the Senate is the real battlefield.

The whole Right to Work movement shed a collective tear when they heard the news that Rep. Charlie Norwood (R-GA) had passed. Norwood was a champion of freedom and workers’ rights. He was a stalwart defender of Right to Work and was willing to take on any and all to support America’s working men and women. We will miss him greatly.