SEARCH
Go for the Grinch
Bah, humbug. Forget the cute socks hanging by the fireplace and the stomach-churning eggnog. ‘Tis the season to go after the Grinch.
This year, there are many options.
First up: “The Mitch Who Stole Christmas.” The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) is running a great action featuring one of this year’s worst anti-worker lawmakers, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
Most recently, McConnell killed an emergency loan bill to keep afloat the nation’s automakers, along with 3 million to 5 million U.S. jobs. Jane, Emptywheel and others have amply documented his role in quashing the bailout, a blatant attack on unions and the middle class.
CNA/NNOC Co-President Geri Jenkins, RN, says McConnell may have been after UAW members and their union this time,
but tomorrow it will be other working people’s wages and benefits.
The campaign (click here) invites people to send a message to McConnell and sign up for public protests and other actions to protect America’s working families.
Next, there’s the annual Jobs for Justice Grinch of the Year contest. Anti-worker nominees predominate. Among them: notorious PR sleaze lobbyist Richard Berman, a hired gun for the alcohol, tobacco and fast-food industries. Jane gives some of his ugly details here. Berman has mounted campaigns to gut drunken driving laws, downplay the public health impact of obesity and indoor tanning and prevent an increase in the minimum wage.
But he’s reserved his greatest venom for attacks on unions and working people. He is spending millions in corporate cash on a deceptive and outright false ad campaign to defeat the Employee Free Choice Act. Berman has multiple front groups that channel corporate cash and millions of dollars from the likes of the Chamber of Commerce, the National Restaurant Association and the National Association of Manufacturers.
The other nominee for the Grinch award is “Wall Street executives.” No need for further description of why they belong on the Grinch list.
You can cast your vote for these deserving nominees here.
The only items the Grinch stole from the good folks of Whoville were some jingtinglers, trumtookas and gardookas, along with their roast beast. But this year’s Grinch nominees who tried to steal Christmas from workers are after a lot more serious loot—like health care, wages and their union cards.
Each of these Grinch nominees deserves a lot worse than recognition, of course, because each all will remain, in the immortal words of Dr. Seuss: a three-decker sauerkraut and toadstool sandwich, with arsenic sauce.
 |
Become a Fan on Facebook |  |
Follow Us on Twitter |  |
Subscribe to YouTube |  |
Subscribe to Blog RSS | ||||
4 Comments
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
yes mcconnel and other republican senators are attacking thi loan as welfare to union workers. but many of these same senators and congressman gave corporate welfare to the foriegn based auto companies that now are in their states. what i want to know is why mr. sweeney and the rest of the leaders of the afl. are not screaming about these issues in every way possible. please someone tell me WHY!!!.
The strength of our labor movement wasn’t built on crumbs from Congress. The impetus for enacting pro-worker legislation over the years came from a labor movement that was willing to take economic action in order to secure justice.
Alas, our movement has grown much too sedate. Where has our militancy gone?
The labor movement of yore was characterized by a social conscience pledged to defend any worker in distress.
Since the late 50’s working class Americans have allowed themselves to be distracted by conservative, cold-warrior apologists. And the result? Labor’s numbers have fallen from over 35% of the working class in the 50’s and 60’s, down to today’s 12% (7% in the private sector).
It does not take a genius to understand that what once worked will work again. In order for that to happen, however, rank and file union members need to be willing to fight for justice just like our forbearers did.
A mindset of go-along-to-get-along collaboration is what got us in our current predicament. Adherents to that failed strategy need to be moved aside. Only the rank and file can do that.
We can lament and moan all we want, but while we’re crying in our beer we’ll continue to see the likes of McConnell have their ways. (There are culprits on both sides of the aisle. One side has an evil agenda, and the other is spineless.)
Here is what old Mitch couldn’t do a damn thing about…except to retreat: If several million union workers from key industries took economic action until justice was won, McConnell et al would wave their white flags.
The government of we the people has continuously double-crossed America’s working class. We’ll get more of the same unless we are willing to return to our heritage that is rooted in social activism.
Don’t let anybody tell you any differently! Those who will try to dissuade you have no solution! The past 50 years provides ample proof of that statement Unfortunately, the status quo that some labor-fakers want to defend is their own status quo, irregardless of the consequences to their memberships.
In Europe and elsewhere millions of workers take to the streets to win justice.
Here in the U.S. we are conditioned to accept the notion that we’ll “eat, bye and bye, in that glorious land above the sky; work and pray, live on hay, you’ll get pie in the sky when you die”.
Well, those of us who are concerned with the here and now need to heed some words from “Solidarity Forever”:
“In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold;
Greater than the might of armies, magnified a thousand-fold.
We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old.
For the Union makes us strong.”
The newsletter “Too Much” has named their top ten grinches in the CEO department. It’s online at http://www.toomuchonline.org/tmweekly.html
If you work for any of the mentioned companies, you’ll know why your benefits are being cut back or disappearing. Someone has got to pay for those excessive salaries and benefits!
Rich A. is dead on! The real levers of power in a society dominated by corporations is the shop floor, the sales office, the sales floor. Political pressure and power are necessary but will not do it alone. The money coming from business will always win out in the halls of Congress. If we want to challenge corporate power, you do it at the workplace, not Washington DC.