SEIU may be linked to ultimatum on withholding stimulus funds (Schwarzenegger vs Obama)

[Omaha Steve]

Source: LA Times

California officials say the union may have influenced a federal requirement that a pay cut be reversed for home healthcare workers.
By Evan Halper

Reporting from Sacramento -- Officials in the governor's office say a politically powerful union may have had inappropriate influence over the Obama administration's decision to withhold billions of dollars in federal stimulus money from California if the state does not reverse a scheduled wage cut for the labor group's workers.

The officials say they are particularly troubled that the Service Employees International Union, which lobbied the federal government to step in, was included in a conference call in which state and federal officials reviewed the wage cut and the terms of the stimulus package.

California Secretary of Health and Human Services Kim Belshe said she could not recall another instance in which the federal government invited a significant stakeholder group into such government-to-government negotiations.

"The involvement of a stakeholder in this kind of state-federal deliberative process is unusual at best," she said. "This was really atypical and outside any norm I am familiar with."

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-me-cal-healthcare11-2009may11,0,6166232.story

[county worker]

1. What, workers can't have a lobby too?

[Tempest]

2. The state of California is also a stakeholder

The state's position is hypocritical.

[WestSeattle2]

3. Well good on them....

about damn time. For the last 30 years we've had nothing but administrations who have been pro-business (Clinton) and/or pro-business and vehemently anti-labor (Reagan, Bush, Bush). The top tier has had a strangle-hold on labor, freezing our wages while gorging themselves at the pig trough, refusing to share even a penny unless they were forced to. Real wages have fallen for most Americans, many of whom have turned to credit cards to purchase a lifestyle they cannot afford. Now we have an administration who appears to be open to leveling the playing field, and ohhhhhhhh listen to the screaming and howling coming from the walnut-paneled boardrooms.

SEIU is the only union I know of that brings a gun to a gun fight. Most other unions bring knives to a gun fight with the commensurate results. When you're dealing with thieves and liars, you need a union like SEIU. And no, I'm not a member but would like to be.

[friendly_iconoclast]

5. "SEIU is the only union I know of that brings a gun to a gun fight"

Yepper, that's why I joined them!

Well said, WS2.

[bemildred]

4. "We make no apology . . . for expecting the Schwarzenegger administration to obey the law."

Or to put it another way: "elections have consequences". Find somebody else to screw Ahnuld.

[Egnever]

6. Thats my president!

I love this guy!

[No Elephants]

7. Remind me: What's improper about two sides to an issue participating in the same conference call?