The lobbyist and spin doctors against the working American have launched all sorts of anti-union websites, one of their newest is using the "stop unions" phrase. So here's a nice little spot on Blogger where I can test some nice widgets for my own site Joe's Union Review
No, he didn't wear anything inappropriate, didn't summon up a demon nor did he sacrifice a student. In an attempt to get his students attention, he made a toothpick disappear. Now a fellow who would probably have been a really good teacher had his job go the way of the toothpick.
Land 'O Lakes, Florida -- The stories in the news about inappropriate relationships between teachers and students have been overwhelming. There was even a substitute teacher in New Port Richey who got in trouble after investigators say she had a relationship with an underage student.
Well, another Pasco County substitute teacher's job is on the line, but this time it's because of a magic trick.
The charge from the school district — Wizardry!
Substitute teacher Jim Piculas does a 30-second magic trick where a toothpick disappears then reappears.
But after performing it in front of a classroom at Rushe Middle School in Land 'O Lakes, Piculas said his job did a disappearing act of its own.
"I get a call the middle of the day from the supervisor of substitute teachers. He says, 'Jim, we have a huge issue. You can't take any more assignments. You need to come in right away,'" he said.
When Piculas went in, he learned his little magic trick cast a spell that went much farther than he'd hoped.
"I said, 'Well Pat, can you explain this to me?' 'You've been accused of wizardry,' [he said]. Wizardry?" he asked. (Read the entire story)
Wizardry, can you believe it? Now I know Florida is a tad on the backwards side, I can say that I have relatives there, but fucking wizardry?????
If the people running the schools down there are accusing teachers of wizardry I can only imagine what the students must turn out like.
Staff and students at several Catholic schools around the city are preparing for teachers to walk off the job Tuesday morning after talks with the Archdiocese broke down Monday afternoon.
Both sides failed to reach a compromise on wages, health care and pensions before the pope's scheduled arrival in the United States Tuesday afternoon.
The Lay Faculty Association, which represents 450 teachers at ten schools, including five in the city, says members will go on strike, just days before Pope Bendict XVI arrives in New York City after a visit to Washington, D.C.
The archdiocese says the strike won't interfere with the pope's visit in any way.
"This is not going to have any impact on the pope's visit," said archdiocese spokesman Joseph Zwilling. "The only thing it might do is cost the teacher a couple of days pay, for going on strike, and also, I think, embarrass the teachers union themselves for doing this."
A union spokesperson says during the strike, some schools will be closed, while others will stay open, but will then release students at 10 a.m. The spokesperson says its up to individual schools to decide how they intend to proceed.
The union has rejected the deal offered by the Archdiocese of New York's Association of Catholic Schools. The archdiocese says it has made a generous offer to the union and that the terms will not be improved if the teachers go on strike.
The archdiocese was able to reach an agreement with another group of lay teachers that went on strike for two days earlier this month. It came to terms on a four-year deal Friday with the Federation of Catholic Teachers.
So you can afford to send your kid to Catholic School for a better education.
In the New York City area, there is a good chance that with the smaller enrollment and smaller class sizes your child will have a much better means of actually learning without all the nonsense involved such as...
social promotion
overcrowding
plots to blow up the school and kill students and teachers alike
the whole you got better shoes than mine so I'm gonna steal them thing
In that, you pay a very high price for the benefit to send your child to school, but the cost almost always seems worth it. Which brings us to the point of the job action. These teachers, who all make well below the Public school teachers salary, have been working without a contract since August 2007.
The union, the Federation of Catholic Teachers, states that the Archdiocese of New York has been holding back information on the current costs of their health care package, which has been the major stipulation since the Archdiocese submitted their "Final offer" in November 2007
The "Final offer" included increased premiums which the union said was too high, so a few weeks later they began seeking a new health care plan from an outside group. They wound up finding a plan through Local 153 of the Office and Professional Employees International Union(OPEIU). One item needed to calculate the new plan, was the cost of running the plan they had in place in 2007. According to the NY Times (4/5/08):
That group agreed to do a feasibility study (new group for OPEIU plan), Ms. Perry said, but told the union it needed to provide information from its previous plan. While the archdiocese has provided a lot of information, Ms. Perry said, it has yet to turn over one of the most vital pieces: the actual cost of running the plan, known as the utilization cost, from 2007. The union has repeatedly asked for these figures since last December, Ms. Perry said, but the archdiocese has provided years-old information.
“The cost of health care makes it difficult for people to make ends meet,” Ms. Perry said. “This strike is an unfair labor practice strike in order to get the information.”
But Joseph Zwilling, a spokesman for the archdiocese, said the archdiocese was preparing those documents and had been planning on turning them over to the union within the next few days.
Last December?? The union has been asking since last December for some paperwork to avoid the strike and the Archdiocese, knowing the union wants to come to terms, has been stalling? Why on earth are they potentially putting the kids education at risk?
On April 1st., the union members had a strike vote, and announced they were going to start it during the Popes visit, according to NY1 (4/1/08) :
Catholic school teachers voted Tuesday night to go on strike over contract terms the week Pope Benedict XVI comes to New York.
About 300 city Catholic school teachers have been working without a contract since August and union officials say Edward Cardinal Egan has been unreceptive.
Of the more than 150 members of the Lay Faculty Association that joined in Yonkers to vote on whether to authorize the strike, only 20 members voted against it. When the union's head announced the vote, the crowd cheered.
The union wants to raise top teacher salaries from $53,000 a year to $60,000. Talks stalled in December over salary and benefits for the next three years.
Teacher Mary Anne Lamassa says that when she compares what the archdiocese brings in every year with what she takes home as a math teacher, the figures just don't add up.
"My salary is only $52,000 a year," she said. "I know at a public school I could make much more than that, but I like where I teach. I like serving the diocese and working with the students at Cardinal Spellman."
They said the timing of the strike would show the church they mean business.
"We need to get the message out to the Catholic community who will be here during that time, and it's important for everyone to understand that we are not protesting the pope's visit, but we need to get the message out to the Catholic community that we have a problem here in New York," said Anthony Cusimano of the teachers union.
"The pope will probably not even know we're here," said Henry Kielkucki, the union head. "The pope will probably not even know there is a strike. It's the Catholic community that's going to have to say 'why are your teachers going on strike during this very holy time?'" (continued) In a statement, a spokesman for the archdiocese said, "To use the visit of the Holy Father as a means of protest and division is an insult to the Holy Father and to the people of God at this diocese."
Ignoring the need for the information to get a more competitive health plan which could have avoided this entire mess is an insult to the teachers, the students and the hard working families who can afford to choose to send their kids to a Catholic School. It seems this could all have been settled almost a year ago when in May 2007 negotiations first begun.
Poughkeepsie Journal has a forum where this is being discussed, I'm waiting for my confirmation E-Mail, you can get E-Active and speak your mind too.
-TO BUILD MORE SCHOOLS -TO FUND FULL-DAY KINDERGARTEN -TO LOWER CLASS SIZE -TO IMPROVE MIDDLE SCHOOLS -TO EXPAND ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS PROGRAMS -TO KEEP AFTER-SCHOOL PROGRAMS AND TUTORING SERVICES
We may face uncertain economic times ahead, but this much is certain: We must keep the promises to our kids.
Show your support for theKEEP THE PROMISES COALITION
BRING YOUR UNION'S BANNER!
What: "Keep the Promises Coaliton Rally" Where: City Hall Park When: Wednesday,March 19th Time: 4:00PM
Click the picture below for leaflet, had to convert from PDF to JPG so it isn't very clear
‘Keep the Promises’ coalition forms to reverse city, state ed funding cuts
A diverse coalition of education advocacy groups, community organizations, clergy, labor unions and dozens of elected officials has launched a major campaign to fight state and city budget proposals that could cost New York City public schools $700 million.
Members of more than 60 community groups, parent organizations and unions, as well as some 40 state and city elected officials, gathered on the steps of City Hall on Feb. 10 to announce the formation of the “Keep the Promises” coalition in response to budget reductions and proposed cuts in education for city schools. The list of cuts includes the following:
The city has imposed an immediate 1.75 percent cut to schools — a $100 million, midyear cut that will disrupt schools’ programs, schedules and staffing.
The mayor’s 2009 budget proposal cuts New York City education by $324 million.
The state budget proposes to give city schools nearly $200 million less than was expected in the Contract for Excellence, stalling progress in class size reduction, full-day pre-kindergarten expansion, improving middle schools and other programs and services.
The state is also proposing to cap building aid, which will slow school construction.
“When government promises to safeguard the quality education of our children, parents and the public have a right to expect those promises to be honored,” UFT President Randi Weingarten said to reporters as she stood on the City Hall steps flanked by dozens of her coalition colleagues.
She said that “in the absence of an independent Board of Education and an independent schools chancellor, public school children need champions to intervene and protect them. That’s why we are part of this coalition launching this campaign.” Weingarten said the coalition would fight to have the funds restored because the city’s children deserve the quality education they’ve been promised.
“Make no mistake,” Weingarten added. “School-based educators would never dream of saying, ‘Now that we have less we will do less.’ Instead we will fight the school cuts.”
Geri D. Palast — executive director of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, which took the state to court to win increased funding for New York City schools — noted that after 13 years of litigation, New York State “legislated a promise” to add $2.35 billion in classroom operating aid for New York City over four years. At the same time, Mayor Bloomberg said the city would add $2.2 billion. The state also said it would provide $11.2 billion to subsidize the city’s $13.1 billion school construction plan to “finally fund the constitutional right to a sound, basic education,” Palast said.
However, she added, both the state and the city are proposing $700 million in cuts in these commitments. “Long overdue funding of these promises tied to accountability for this catch-up plan must be immunized from short-term economic fluctuations,” Palast said. “A generation of kids has already paid the price for delayed funding with their futures.” (Click for: Full Story)
Main Stream Media, are they lazy, or is it in their best interest not to report factual information.
In November 2007, I wrote a story entitled "Slavery Alive and Well In New York and the rest of the US" at Union Review , in which i run through the various ways in which is not only tolerated and unregulated but the facts are so underground the real tallies on these human rights infractions are almost impossible to figure. From the Long Island, NY perfume barons who had actual slaves living in their house, the slave like conditions in which undocumented workers in the construction industry must endure, to the prostitution industry that uses indentured servitude to pay their way to the states which the NY Times reported on way back in 1994. Before that story, back in 7-08, I wrote about the H1B Visa abuse, mostly in the tech sector, that a law firm actually had the audacity to produce a video training seminar where they boast on how to use this procedure. That story, "Corp Objective: Disqualify Qualified American Workers, Get H-1b Visa's For Non-Citizens." and it's follow-up, "Offshoring and H1B Visa abuse, the 1-2 punch to knockout US tech workers" are among my two most read entries since I have been writing about the labor movement. Which brings us to the newest in the trend of slavery and Visa abuse that is alive and well in these United States.
From:ABC News 3-07-08
Revolt in Mississippi: Indian Workers Claim 'Slave Treatment' Workers Call for Signal International to Be Prosecuted on Alleged Human Trafficking Charges
Rebelling against alleged "slave treatment," some 100 workers recruited from India staged a dramatic protest at a Mississippi shipyard Thursday, claiming they had been tricked into coming to the United States.
The workers, brought from India to work as welders and pipe-fitters at Signal International shipyard in Pascagoula, hurled their hard hats at company gates and demanded a federal investigation.
The workers claim they were defrauded by a Signal International recruiter in India who promised them green cards and permanent residency in the U.S. in exchange for a $20,000 fee. The workers allege that they instead received 10-month work visas, which was only enough time for them to pay off their recruitment fees.
The workers also claim that Signal forced them to live in substandard housing, with 24 men crammed into a small room. The men say Signal charged them more than $1,000 a month to live in company housing.
"For more than one year, hundreds of Indian workers at Signal International have been living like slaves," said former Signal worker Sabulal Vijayan. "Today the workers are coming out to declare their freedom. This trafficking needs to end."
The workers have reported their situation to the U.S. Department of Justice and are calling for Signal International to be prosecuted on human trafficking charges.
Signal International strongly denied the workers' allegations. The company released a statement saying, "Unfortunately, a few of the workers whom Signal had sponsored for H2B visas and recruited have made baseless and unfounded allegations against Signal concerning their employment and living conditions." According to the statement, "The vast majority of the workers whom Signal recruited has been satisfied with the employment and living conditions at Signal."
Signal called its housing complex "state of the art" and said government inspections have "found that Signal's practices and facilities are fully compliant with the law."
The Mississippi Gulf Coast has faced a severe labor shortage in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and many companies have replenished their workforce with overseas labor brought in under a guest worker plan. Human rights groups, however, charge that many foreign workers have been exploited by their employers.
"The U.S. State Department calls it 'a repulsive crime' when recruiters and employers in other parts of the world bind guest workers with crushing debts and threats of deportation," said Saket Soni of the New Orleans Workers' Center for Racial Justice. "This is precisely what is happening on the Gulf Coast."
How is it that we have temporary Visa's for Foreign workers when we have vast unemployment here in the United States? It's amazing how they are getting away with this, under the cloak of labor shortages, I fucking know plenty of welders who are quite capable of doing the job for an honest days pay. Never mind the fact that big business wants more Visa's. People's Weekly World has a more in depth article, from way back in March 2007:
Guest workers fired after protesting ‘slave’ conditions
Strike line formed when more than 200 workers walked off of the job at Signal, March 9, in solidarity with at 3 employees that they believe were wrongfully terminated and illegally imprisoned by management on Signal’s property. MIRA photo.
Hundreds of guest workers from India are protesting conditions in a Pascagoula, Miss., shipyard that immigrant rights activists compare to slavery.
Many of the workers gathered in a church on March 11 in this Gulf Coast port, after their employer, Signal International, threatened to send some of them home. Signal is a large corporation that repairs and services oil drilling platforms around the world.
According to Bill Chandler, executive director of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, “they were hired in India by a labor recruiter sent by Signal. They had to pay exorbitant amounts to the company, to the recruiter and to the attorney who did the labor certification for them.”
Labor traffickers globalized Signal brought about 300 workers from India in December to work in its Mississippi yard, and another 300 to work in two yards in Texas. The workers are part of the H2B visa program, in which the U.S. government allows companies to recruit workers outside the country and bring them here under contract. The visas are good for 10 months, but the company can renew them for those it wants to keep longer. The workers must remain employed, and if they lose their jobs, they must go home.
Signal H2B worker Joseph Jacobs talking to WLOX reporter March 9, about the general despair of mistreated Indian H2B workers at the Signal International, LLC, plant in Pascagoula, MS, including a young man who attempted suicide when he learned that he might have to return to his country without the opportunity to earn the money he had borrowed to come to the United States. MIRA photo.
Workers say they were promised jobs as welders and fitters, and had to pay as much as $20,000 each to the recruiting contractor, Global Industry. Workers also say they were promised that Signal would refund the money.
“I had to pay $14,000,” says one of those workers, Joseph Jacob. “I worked for years in Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia, and I spent all the money I had to get the visa, which the recruiter promised would be a permanent residence visa. But that visa never came, and finally he said they could get us a H2B visa. That would give us 10 months of work, and if the company renewed it, we might get as much as 30 months. I thought that was the only way I’d ever be able to get back the money they’d taken.”
Signal put the Indian guest workers to work in the yard alongside U.S. workers doing the same job — welding and fitting. The company claims it pays workers from India the same wages as domestic employees. The guest workers say they were promised $18 an hour, but many were paid only half that after the company said they were unqualified. Chandler says the company recruiter in India determined the workers knew their jobs during the process of hiring them.
The new ‘company town’ Out of their wages, workers pay an additional $35 per day to stay in a labor camp Signal set up inside the yard. “The conditions are very bad here for the H2B workers,” Joseph says bitterly. “Twenty-four of us live in a room in a barracks that measures 12 feet by 18 feet, sleeping on bunk beds. There are two toilets for all of us and only four sinks. We have to get up at 3:30 in the morning, just so all of us have time to use the bathroom before going to work.”
Fired for meeting
Indian H2B workers from Signal International, LLC, marine fabrication company meet at a Pascagoula hall to strategize how to present their demands against substandard living and working conditions, March 4. MIRA photo.
A month ago, the Indian guest workers began meeting in a local church to discuss how they might get the company to refund the huge sums they paid to come to the U.S., and to protest the bad conditions. They organized a group, Signal H2B Workers United. It was after the company found out, they say, that it accused workers of being unqualified for their jobs and cut their pay. Eight were told they were completely incapable, and Signal announced it was sending them back to India immediately. Joseph was fired. “I am now terminated because I attended the meeting,” he says. “That’s what the company vice-president told me.”
Signal International President Dick Marler told the Mississippi Press that although workers had been employed since December, the company only discovered recently that they had no skills. Federal law required the company to fire them, he asserted.
Signal did not return calls for this story, but a statement on the company web site says the workers “receive the same pay and are taxed the same as all other Signal craft personnel. Workers from India have a reputation for being pleasant and hard-working.” It quotes Marler, who says, “We are fortunate the U.S. government has such a program that allows us to supplement our workforce during a time of emergency created by hurricanes.”
Deportations, company lock-up When the company announced the terminations, one worker disappeared. Another, Sabu Lal, slashed his wrists and was taken to the Singing River Hospital in Pascagoula. He told the Mississippi Press that dying would be better than being sent home.
“Lal and I are from the same place in India,” Joseph explains. “I knew he had sold his home, and had no place to return to. He was only able to make back a small part of the thousands of dollars he paid to the recruiter, and he said he couldn’t go home like that.”
Company security guards locked the fired workers in what they call the TV room, and wouldn’t let them leave.
Their co-workers contacted the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, which went to the Pascagoula Police Department. The police went out to the yard and eventually freed the imprisoned workers. Outside the yard, dozens of workers and activists denounced the firings and mistreatment.
DANGER: Guest worker programs
Signal International plant in Pascagoula, MS. MIRA photo.
“We’ve learned about case after case of workers in Mississippi, Louisiana and all along the gulf in these conditions,” Chandler says. “There are thousands of guest workers who have been brought in since Katrina and subjected to this same treatment. Mexican guest workers in Amelia, La., were held in the same way. They also got organized, and came to Pascagoula to support the workers here when they heard what happened.”
According to Chandler, Signal imported hundreds of workers from Peru a year ago, and after sending them home, brought the present group of guest workers from India to replace them. He says the experience of these workers highlights the problems inherent in proposals introduced into Congress over the last two years, which would set up similar schemes for the importation of as many as 400,000 guest workers per year.
“Organizations that are fighting for the rights of workers and advocating on behalf of workers should be totally opposed to these kind of programs,” he says. “The conditions that people work in here are so exploitative they’re worse than the conditions for even undocumented workers.”
The Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance and the Southern Poverty Law Center plan to go to court to stop the deportations. Meanwhile, workers say they are determined to continue challenging the company until the money they paid the contractor is returned to them.
Suppression of News that matters
Whatever your thinking, know this as a fact, this information was out there a full year ago and the suppressive corporate media didn't acknowledge it.
It is us against them, at so many levels. Turn off the damn TV and get to learning.
We knew about the abuses in New Orleans, the facts are never reported on, just take a look at the article at Union review published by Chuck Lazette in Sept 0f 2007, entitled "In the Lawless Post-Katrina Cleanup, Construction Companies Are Preying on Workers", and its further backed by a comment I found on the upcoming attack on the guest commentary found in the NaplesNews that was published on Labor Day in 2007 about unionized teachers entitled "Labor Day ’07: Union bosses’ agenda scary", by corporate lobbyist, and the mind behind "The Center For Union Facts" and other disillusioning bullshit against the people of America, Rick Berman. Here is the counter "attack" and I use the terms loosely, because Mr.Charlie Ward uses FACTS in his comment.
More for Rick Berman: Why didn't the Right to Work Committee defend the rights of the American workers in Louisianna(which is, after all, a right to work state? Recently, the State of Arizona (which is also a right to work state), passed legislation stating that businesses can not hire illegal workers, and illegals can not own businesses. These illegals are leaving Arizona by hundreds a day, selling their houses, leaving for other states or heading back to their homeland. The U.S. workers of Arizona have had enough of their wages being undermined and demanded change--and they got it. Guess who is challenging this new law? The United States Chamber of Commerce. Where is the outrage by you and the Right To Work Committee? Union membership in Arizona has grown by 30% in the past two years. One wonders why. With respect to The Employee Free Choice Act,tell the truth. The glitch in the bill that you and the Right to Work Committee object to is not the way a union is voted in.(card vs. secret vote--they are both legal and valid, and it is diversionary to assert that this is the issue. The issue really is that this bill would stop management from stalling for time and finding bogus reasons not to sit down and negotiate--just as you and the Right to Work Committee assert that unions use this tactic to slow down a decertification process. What is really not wanted is the clause that would require a federal mediator to step in if management and the union representation can not come together, and any employer who commits unfair labor practices shall be fined $20,000.00 for each violation. Thus far it has been passed by the House and it is up to the Senate. They are being lobbied strongly against this bill---by you know who. You are correct, unions do lobby and donate to politicians that they perceive will help them with their issues. As you know,all union members have the right to use the Beck Right Law, which states that they can request that none of their dues be used for political interests to which they do not subscribe. It's a law. Conversely, anti- union organizations and businesses also lobby strongly and donate heavily for support of their interests. So, where's the beef? It's politics. Right now, the NLRB is stacked with anti-union people, mostly Republicans. And yes, you are right, if the Democrats win, the pendulum will swing the other way. That, too, is politics as usual. The only thing The Right to Work Committee has done has been to assure that an individual does not have to join a union or pay dues, even if there is a union in their workplace. But they have done their best to undermine labor laws for all workers: i.e. minimun wage, overtime laws, OSHA and reduced workmans comp entitlements , which have been reduced as much as 50% in some right to work states already, and other laws which protect the rights of workers both union and non-union. In closing, Mr. Berman, I would like to say that with all the faults unions have, they have done more for humanity than any other organization of men that ever existed. They have done more for decency, education, betterment of all races, and for the developing of character in man than any other association of men. Clarence Darrow
Remember, before there is profit, there is labor. Abraham Lincoln (Republican President) Happy Labor Day. Charlie
One more note about Labor Day, according to WIN, Workers Independent News Radio on 3-14-08 "The Department of Transportation came under fire by Senator Byron Dorgan on Tuesday over a controversial “pilot program” that allows Mexican trucks to operate on US roads.", that program, which is Illegally being funded by Mary Peters DOT, was being pushed into operation directly by President Bush to have had a start date of Labor Day 2007.
There is a war against the workers here in the United States and using Labor Day to push our faces in it is showing you just how brazen they are. I don't think if you add all the facts you could come to any other conclusion. Rick Berman, who this site got it's name from, has now launched a new agenda, to find the worst unionized teacher, in the same week here in New York the United Federation of Teachers is fighting for the city to keep its funding for students. Yeah those bad teachers fighting for kids. What a bunch of bullies.
While I dislike all the candidates which the Main Stream Media picked for us, I certainly wouldn't vote for this vehemently anti-labor turd.
Came across this at Broadcast Union News, who made a quick breakdown from the AFL-CIO's recently launched McCain Revealed page, of the important reasons why John McCain is not a choice for any worker.
Sen. John McCain is clearly not a fan of workers’ freedom to form unions and bargain for better wages and benefits. He has spoken out against unions and consistently voted against collective bargaining rights for workers. Union members know the right to bargain is essential to preserving good jobs with good wages and benefits.
McCAIN DOESN’T LIKE UNIONS
McCain: Unions Have Played ‘Important Role’ But Have ‘Serious Excesses.’ When asked if unions are good for America, McCain responded, “I think the unions have played a very important role in the history of this country to improve the plight and conditions of laboring Americans. I think that like many other monopolies, in some cases they have then serious excesses.” [GOP Dearborn Debate, MSNBC, 10/9/07]
McCain: Teachers’ Unions Serve Unions’ Interest, NOT Children’s Interest. McCain has repeatedly attacked teachers’ unions. “It’s time to break the grip of the education monopoly that serves the union bosses at the expense of our children,” he said. [The New York Times, 2/11/00]
McCain Says Government Workers Are ‘Crippled’ by Union Contracts. In his speech to the Oklahoma State Legislature, McCain said, “We must streamline our workforce, demand high standards of behavior, promote excellence at every level based on merit and accountability, and not let good workers be crippled by the fine print of the latest union contract…. The civil service has strayed from its reformist roots and has mutated into a no-accountability zone, where employment is treated as an entitlement, good performance as an option, and accountability as someone else’s problem.” [Address to the Oklahoma State Legislature, 5/21/07]
McCAIN OPPOSES OUR FREEDOM TO FORM UNIONS
McCain Voted for a National Right-to-Work for Less Law.
McCain voted against the Employee Free Choice Act, which would level the playing field for workers trying to form unions. He voted for a National Right-to-Work for Less law that would attempt to eliminate unions altogether. [H.R. 800, Vote #227, 6/26/07; S. 1788 Vote #188, 7/10/96]
McCain Crossed a Writers Guild Picket Line to Appear on ‘The Tonight Show.’
McCain crossed the picket line of the Writers Guild of America to appear on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” [Think Progress, accessed 2/27/08]
McCain Voted to Allow Employers to Hire Permanent Replacements During a Strike. McCain voted against ending debate on a bill that would bar employers from hiring permanent replacements for striking workers. [S. 55,Vote #189, 7/13/94]
McCain Voted Against Collective Bargaining Rights for State and Local Police and Firefighters. [H.R. 3061, Vote #323, 11/6/01]
McCain Did NOT Co-Sponsor the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act. McCain did not co-sponsor S. 2123, the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act, legislation to grant fire fighters and police officers minimum collective bargaining rights. [S. 2123, 10/1/07; IAFF]
McCain Voted Against Collective Bargaining Rights for TSA Screeners. McCain voted against a measure to grant Transportation Security Administration (TSA) airport screeners limited collective bargaining rights. The measure would not have allowed them to strike or negotiate for higher pay. [S. 4, Vote #64, 3/7/07]
When school started this year, bus drivers in one of our local unions in Louisiana, the Caddo Federation of Teachers and Support Personnel, collected data on the temperatures in their buses. They found cases where the thermometer hit more than 110 degrees. The union took this information to the school board in an effort to get some relief, for both the drivers and the children.
