No more card check in EFCA

I’m a little slow to get to it, but it seems that the card check part of the Employee Free Choice Act will be dropped. It was always going to be a tough sell, because of the propaganda of businesses saying that unions would intimidate workers without a secret ballot.
The revised bill still has several good [...]

Andrew Ross Sorkin, unions, and corporate raiders

On a panel on Morning Joe on MSNBC, Andrew Ross Sorkin asked whether anyone on the panel could name a successful company that had a union (this was in the midst of union bashing). He sent an ‘apology‘ to TPM:
“Boy did I touch the third rail! My off-handed comment was admittedly flip. I apologize for that. It was [...]

But we need secret elections to stop intimidation

People who want to keep out unions, always say they’re against the Employee Free Choice Act because there needs to be a secret ballot so that the unions can’t intimidate workers. Let’s see what such a fair election is like:
An N.L.R.B. judge concluded that management had committed so many serious violations of the law — [...]

A couple older bits about unions and the CEOs that hate them

In the way of the web, I found a couple items that say something about something.
The first is from the Huffington Post in January detailing comments from conference calls last November (Marcus is a co-founder of Home Depot):
“This is the demise of a civilization,” said Marcus. “This is how a civilization disappears. I am sitting here as [...]

We Need a Law and Order Candidate

I don’t have a subscription to the New York Review of Books, so I can’t look at this article about The Big Squeeze by Steven Greenhouse. This means I will shamelessly steal bits from Hilzoy:
the story of a man named Drew Pooters, who served in the Air Force for 14 years, got out, and eventually ended [...]

Wal-Mart Against Obama

Here’s another reason to vote for Senator Obama, Wal-Mart is against him (via Kevin Drum, you might have to go through his site to see the article):
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is mobilizing its store managers and department supervisors around the country to warn that if Democrats win power in November, they’ll likely change federal law to make [...]

Zimbabwe and Burma

Things are getting a bit weird (yeah, I know, these countries have been weird for a long time) in Burma and Zimbabwe:

the ruling generals have built a new capitol for Burma:

The bamboo forests and sugar cane fields that once covered the gently sloping hills here have been replaced by hulking government buildings, roads so long [...]

Why Unions Still Matter

Lindsay at Majikthise has a story about Indian guest workers in New Orleans. Here is the worker’s statement:
New Orleans Workers’ Center for Racial Justice
 
Statement of Indian Workers’ Congress at Launch of Hunger Strike
May 14, 2008
We represent over 550 Indian guestworkers who were trafficked to the United States Gulf Coast in late 2006. Eighteen months after [...]

Support the Writers

Just a quick post to link to unitedhollywood, a blog writing about the writer’s strike. We should show our support for the union.
Update: I like most of their news, but this post at womensensenews  doesn’t get it:
But the pink-collar crowd lacks the solidarity of a union or a $12 million strike fund, as members of [...]

Win-win for who?

This article seems to have a weird conclusion:
Cerberus Capital Management LP sees Chrysler LLC’s new contract with United Auto Workers union as a “win-win” for both sides that would help restore the car company to profitability, Chairman John Snow said on Monday.
considering new workers will be paid much less and the union lost in terms [...]