Bosses exercising virtual veto over right to form a union

[impeach the gop]

In "The right to say no to unions," his Sept. 20 Counterpoint attacking my Aug.
31 Op Ex article ("Firms, consultants work to undermine union rights"), William
Bednarczyk fails to mention that he is part of the multimillion-dollar industry
dedicated to destroying workers' right to choose a union.

http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/4146062.html

[Aries]

1. Repeal the Taft-Hartley Act!

Every Democratic presidential candidate should be asked their position on repealing Taft-Hartley, which reduces U.S. labor rights below the level of all other industrialized companies (depending on whether you count China), and was the result of Cold War red scare politics that no longer are relevant.

From:

http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/T/TaftH1art.asp

Taft-Hartley Labor Act

"1947, passed by the U.S. Congress, officially known as the Labor-Management Relations Act. Sponsored by Senator Robert Alphonso Taft and Representative Fred Allan Hartley, the act qualified or amended much of the National Labor Relations (Wagner) Act of 1935, the federal law regulating labor relations of enterprises engaged in interstate commerce, and it nullified parts of the Federal Anti-Injunction (Norris-LaGuardia) Act of 1932. The act established control of labor disputes on a new basis by enlarging the National Labor Relations Board and providing that the union or the employer must, before terminating a collective-bargaining agreement, serve notice on the other party and on a government mediation service. The government was empowered to obtain an 80-day injunction against any strike that it deemed a peril to national health or safety. The act also prohibited jurisdictional strikes (dispute between two unions over which should act as the bargaining agent for the employees) and secondary boycotts (boycott against an already organized company doing business with another company that a union is trying to organize), declared that it did not extend protection to workers on wildcat strikes, outlawed the closed shop, and permitted the union shop only on a vote of a majority of the employees..."

[lancemurdoch]

3. Bush invoked this

Bush invoked this to try to hurt the dockworkers on the West Coast. When it was put in, it was under the idea that with the USSR in place, to prevent "communist-controlled unions" from striking or whatnot the government could take the extraordinary measure of forcing workers to work...I would ask what is more totalitarian, the fear of a strike, or the government forcing workers to work against their will...anyway, as you can imagine, now that Republicans have gotten power and that threat is gone, they're still using the power of what was called the slave labor bill when it was introduced.

[Mairead]

4. Dennis is for REPEAL

[alfredo]

2. Zappa the prophet

"The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theatre."
~ Frank Zappa, 1977

How many Americans still believe we are the land of the free? How many are willing to take the time to see what is happening to their freedoms? How many are willing to do something about it?