DeMint: ‘Unionization’ a threat to airport security

[TomCADem]

Source: Raw Story

Republican senator Jim DeMint used the attempted attack on a airplane bound for Detroit as an excuse to voice opposition to unions.

Absent any other television guests interested in countering Senator DeMint's assertions, Fox News provided him a national forum for a broad attack on labor. He warned, "The administration is intent on unionizing and submitting our airport security to union bosses' collective bargaining."

The senator from South Carolina told Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace that unionization is a threat to airport security because collective bargaining prevents flexibility.

"We have to out-think the terrorists and when we formed the airport security system, we realized we could not use collective bargaining and unionization because of that need to be flexible," DeMint said.


Read more: http://rawstory.com/2009/12/demint-unionization-a-threat-security/

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It is amazing that such a large segment of the country both votes Republican and watches Fox News. It must be like living in an entirely different reality.

[Cha]

1. Up with Unions..Down with idiots like jim demint.

[Hawkeye-X]

2. No, Dement, you're a THREAT to airport security

you and your Republican ilk.

Now turn yourselves in to the FBI so the process is easier for them.

Hawkeye-X

[baldguy]

17. +1

[bluestateguy]

3. I guess all of the NYC firemen and policemen were not unionized on 9/11

Oh wait, they were!

[BeyondGeography]

4. If his IQ gets any lower, we'll have to water him twice a day

(Molly Ivins, RIP.)

[Demit]

13. LOL!

I was going to compliment you on that line, then I saw you footnoted it as a Molly Ivins quote. Compliments on your taste, then!

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

5. Perfect Compromise: Abolish the TSA

No TSA = No TSA Union

Their little more than a permanent monument to the Bush administration in each and every airport. Belligerent, Incompetent and Criminal, throw them out,

[bluestateguy]

6. Uh, do you want the incompetent private security rent a cops back?

I don't.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

8. what the fuck do we have now?

The honor system would produce equal results without the screaming belligerent morons.

[SomeGuyInEagan]

26. +1

I am sure many joined the TSA after 9/11 with good intentions. But clearly there is a lack of training, lack of oversight, lack of motivation and a lack of consistency. The TSA is a boondoggle.

[Sherman A1]

12. Agreed

It would be the perfect solution.

[TomCADem]

31. The Flight Originated In The Netherlands - Why Blame American TSA Workers?

The attempted bomber boarded the plane in the Netherlands. I am not sure how American TSA workers are at fault. Also, how does privitizing airport security help security? Wasn't airport security largely unregulated prior to 9/11?

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

32. The latest fucktard "bomber" has nothing to do with this

The TSA needs to be abolished for its abuses of the traveling public, 9/11 didn't happen because of bad airport security - 9/11 happened because airline policy was to cooperate with hijackers, spend the night in Havana or wherever and get everyone home alive. The 767 Cruise Missile hijacking is a different animal.

More people are killed each year in shootings at suburban office parks, than are killed by terrorism in any form.

Maybe we need a SOPSA, Suburban Office Park Security Administration to inspect those entering office parks,

[TomCADem]

37. The TSA Staff At My Airport Are Pretty Polite

So, I don't know whether such blanket statements have merit.

[Frances]

7. Unfortunately, DeMint

speaks for most of the South and the South is gaining in population and thus influence in Congress. I grew up in the South and maybe that's why I realize how difficult it is to get Progressive legislation through Congress.

The Vietnam hero, Max Cleiland, was defeated for re-election as Senator from Georgia because he voted to allow airport personnel to unionize. The Georgia voters bought the idea that Cleiland was a traitor and replaced him with a man who got a medical deferment for something minor so he wouldn't have to go to Vietnam.

[Proletariatprincess]

9. Free Labor and collective bargaining have always been an anathema in the South.

It is why the Civil war never ended and why this Republic is doomed to failure. Unless those who work for a wage have a say in their government and the right to organize to raise the value of their labor and associate freely without coercion from government and law enforcement, there can be no democracy and no middle class.
But then, the Demints of the world don't want a middle class and secretly wish that slavery was still legal...but wage slavery is the next best thing and unions are just too uppity about such things.
This country has lost it's way when any politician can get away with blaming unions for terrorism. Our best days are long behind us and I have come to really dislike my own country when see how badly it treats it's most productive and hard working people.

[Enthusiast]

19. Propaganda has consequences.

People in the South hear it from the pulpit, they hear it on the radio and they hear it on their Fox News TV channel. "Unions are communist! Unions are anti-American!" They have been told this for their entire lives.

[Frances]

25. I agree that religion in the South

affects the region's attitude toward unionization.

The churches are very authoritarian and believe that people should obey God without question. That philosophy says that women should obey men and men should obey their "betters," who, in the old days were the plantation owners and now are the heads of the companies where they work. Questioning the company bosses is like questioning God in the minds of many.

[Enthusiast]

35. So the Neo-Con

objective was to deindustrialize the North so we could have more 'God n' Country' in the manner of the old days. Maybe that's a stretch.

[mister1979]

10. What would Jim Demint know.....

.....about unions coming from SC?

[Sherman A1]

11. Precisely

and welcome to DU:hi:

[Enthusiast]

20. Good point.

At best he would hear how unions are communism. Funny how S.C. could not save their textile industry even though they resisted all attempts to unionize.

[No Elephants]

14. As opposed to the crack personnel that allow wannabe bombers on planes?

[daleo]

15. This is too stupid for words. n/t

[Hekate]

16. Unionized agents and/or civil servants would be MUCH better than the low-wage souls we have now

Let's see: higher minimum standards for hiring, better training, better motivation due to benefits and salary, more pride, protections for workers...

DeMint can go fly a kite.

Hekate

[Vinca]

18. God forbid the person screening an airliner full of passengers

should be paid a living wage. Republicans seem happy as clams to shell out piles of money to their cronies, but let the average person try to get ahead and they can't block it fast enough.

[Union Yes]

21. PROFIT is a threat to airport security.

[defendandprotect]

22. De Mint is a threat to people's government and democracy -- !!!

And sanity --

[dgibby]

23. DeMint is getting ready to make a run at the WH in 2012,

imo. I live in SC, and until Sanford self-destructed, we rarely heard from DeMint. Now he's the Mouth Of the South. He's also the darling of the radical right and the tea baggers, and is actively courting them.

[dugaresa]

24. Because nothing will make us more secure than underpaid workers with no benefits!

:sarcasm:

[Doctor_J]

27. Once again the airwaves and DU flooded with right wing talking points

thanks :thumbsup:

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

29. i'm more alarmed DU is full of passionate defenders of one of the worst creations of the bush admin

[Vidar]

28. K&R.

[Bozita]

30. Thom Hartmann blistered DeMint in his daily email today

Here:

Thom's Blog
Limousine Conservatives at it Again...

Republican Sen. Jim DeMint has used the attempted attack on a airplane bound for Detroit to go after working-class Americans. He told Fox News' Chris Wallace on Sunday, "We have to outthink the terrorists and when we formed the airport security system, we realized we could not use collective bargaining and unionization because of that need to be flexible. Yet, that appears to be the top priority now of the administration." In other words, Limousine Conservative and multi-millionaire Senator DeMint is telling us that working class Americans can't be trusted to keep our nation safe, particularly if they have the right and power to bargain for better wages and working conditions. And the Republican Party wonders why Americans don't trust them.

- Thom

[NeoConsSuck]

33. The senator from South Carolina

That says it all. When the eff is this state going to secede? It couldn't come soon enough.

[No Elephants]

34. Oops. Turns out, DeMint is the one holding up appointment of a head of the TSA.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4201862

No doubt, functioning without an agency head improves airport security.

:sarcasm:

Way to try to deflect blame from yourself to the American worker, Senator.


I hope unions all over the country will quote you and expose your tactics.

[fascisthunter]

36. The GOP has no toleration for common people uniting

to protect themselves from the elite they represent...

Their agenda is selfish and extremely discriminatory, and worst of all undemocratic. The irony is that without a democracy, the GOP wouldn't even exist, yet they atack what created them and allowed them to survive... suicidal.

The GOP is a neo-fascist political entity. A bunch of priveledged fruitcakes in stuffy white collars afraid to work and live like the rest of the World, because in their sick minds they see themselves as special, the "elite".

[Bombero1956]

38. 2 words, recess appointment

If Demint insists on holding up the confirmation of Erroll Southers on trumped up reasons then Obama should exercise his power to appoint him during Congress's next recess.

[mstinamotorcity]

39. Senator DeMint

is not an asshole this split lobe is the whole ass.What the f--k do terrorist and unions have in common. Nothing except they want to organize against wrong doing.Most terrorist from articles that i have read have a fundamental belief that they are correcting a wrong with their behavior of violence as a fear tactic. Unions organize to gain fair wages and decent benefits for the labor that they do. Senator DeMint is as i say demented and should not be in office. I keep saying we need healthcare reform with a public option with mental health benefits.Add DeMint to the list with Michele Bachmann,Virginia Foxx,Glen Beck and the rest who could benefit from the mental health benefit of the healthcare bill.