Archive for February, 2010
Community, Labor Unite with IUE-CWA at Whirlpool Rally
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| CWA Vice President Seth Rosen (left) and IUE-CWA Division President Jim Clark joined union members and community supporters in solidarity with workers at Whirlpool. |
When more than 5,500 workers and community and religious activists from at least six states converged in front of the Whirlpool plant in Evansville, Ind., members of IUE-CWA led the way to deliver the message to “Keep It Made in America.”
Local 808 President Darrell Collins said:
We have had small rallies before and Whirlpool ignored us! They will not ignore us today! This is just the beginning of something big. We will carry this fight on till it changes. There is no limit to what we can accomplish as long as we work together.
One of the Whirlpool workers who stands to lose her job is Natalie Ford. A member of Local 808, Ford told the rally:
This doesn’t just affect us, it affects everyone in our families…This is the only life we’ve known–now it’s gone. The questions run through my mind: Am I going to lose everything I’ve worked my entire life for? I try to be strong for my family, but deep down I’m scared to death, not knowing what the future holds for us.
Thousands Tell Whirlpool: Keep It Made in America
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| AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka (far right) rallies with workers at the Whirlpool plant in Evansville, Ind. |
More than 5,000 workers, community and religious activists from at least six states converged in front of the Whirlpool plant in Evansville, Ind., to say with a unified and loud voice: “Keep It Made in America.” The massive crowd stretched nearly a mile along the road leading to the plant.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka along with 40 people, including children and grandchildren of workers, clergy and retirees, used a Whirlpool refrigerator to wheel petitions with 70,000 signatures to the plant’s locked front gate. At the same time, more than 40,000 signatures on petitions were delivered to the Whirlpool headquarters in Michigan. The petitions urged Whirlpool executives to reconsider their decision to shutter the Evansville plant, laying off 1,100 people and moving jobs to Mexico. Union members also made more than 1,700 phone calls today alone to Whirlpool headquarters in Benton Harbor, Mich., and the Evansville offices with the same message.
As the petitions were delivered, marchers chanted in unison “USA,” “USA.” The crowd extended down Evansville’s Hiway 41 five-to-deep as far as the eye could see. With tears in his eyes, a local business owner told of the hardship his company would experience with the plant closing.
IBEW Team Makes Super Bowl Work
Super Bowl XLIV was the most watched show in TV history. But before the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts took the field, a different kind of team was behind the scenes, making sure the game was seen around the world.
More than 500 broadcast technicians, all members of the Electrical Workers (IBEW), were in the stands, on the field, behind cameras and in the control room to make the Super Bowl work. In a new video (above), IBEW tells the story of this unseen but vital group that made watching the game possible.
There were 90 cameras alone. Neil McCaffrey, a member of IBEW Local 1212, has operated a camera at seven Super Bowls. He says:
Everyone wants to participate in it [Super Bowl] because it’s so big. So it’s a great sense of brotherhood.
NASA Workers Launch Effort to Save Jobs
Workers, small business owners, elected officials and community activists today launched a national campaign to save as many as 7,000 jobs at NASA and thousands more in central Florida.
The Obama administration, in an effort to balance the federal budget, has proposed outsourcing most of the program that includes lunar landers, moon bases, and the replacement for space shuttle to other governments and private companies.
Such a move would devastate central Florida, which already has been hit hard by the foreclosure crisis. Without a new commitment to extend the space program, central Florida stands to lose 7,000 jobs at NASA and another 16,000 public- and private-sector jobs could be jeopardized. Members of several unions work in the program, including Machinists (IAM), Transport Workers (TWU), Electrical Workers (IBEW) and others.
Speaking at a rally in Titusville, Fla., not far from Kennedy Space Center, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka told a crowd of nearly 2,000:
This is no time to tear out the foundation of this community. At a time when so many Florida breadwinners are out of work or working part time, when over half a million in Florida have lost their homes, does it really make sense to pile on more misery?
Writers Guild Honors the Best of the Year
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The Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) and Writers Guild of America, West earlier this month honored the year’s best writers for film, television, radio, news, promotional material and video games during simultaneous ceremonies in New York and Los Angeles.
Alan Zweibel received the WGAE Ian McLellan Hunter Award for lifetime achievement in writing. The award, named after a longtime WGAE member, is given in honor of a body of work as a writer in motion pictures or television.
One of the original writers on “Saturday Night Live,” Zweibel has won multiple Emmys and other awards for his work in television, including, “It’s Garry Shandling’s Show,” “Monk,” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” He co-wrote the screenplays for “Dragnet” and “The Story of Us.”
WGAE President Michael Winship said:
[Alan Zweibel's] eclectic career and comic grasp of life have delighted audiences for more than three decades. We’re all delighted that his talent is being honored by his fellow Guild members.
Without Manufacturing Base, Nation’s Future Threatened
United Steelworkers (USW) President Leo W. Gerard recently sat down for a Q&A session with Richard McCormack, editor and publisher of Manufacturing & Technology News. McCormack, an expert in economic competitiveness and globalization, is editor of the new book, Manufacturing A Better Future for America, for which he wrote the first chapter, “The Plight of American Manufacturing.”
Gerard: How do we make politicians understand how vital manufacturing is?
McCormack: Politicians need to be hit over their heads with a baseball bat as forcefully as is possible, with Americans insisting that they at least acknowledge that a country that doesn’t make what is consumes is going to fail. It is a simple concept. There are many historical precedents of countries and empires failing after having lost their productive capacity. It is an ancient concept: a country that does not have industry cannot support an army.
Holt Baker: ‘We Have to Be Bold to Turn Economy Around’
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Steve Stallone is president of International Labor Communications Association and secretary/editor of the California Media Workers Guild, TNG-CWA Local 39521. Evelina Alarcon is chair of the Cesar Chavez National Holiday campaign. They are reporting from the 10-year commemoration of the free the Charleston Five campaign.
Even in this tough economy with its high unemployment, “Now is not the time to retreat,” AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker told a town hall meeting in Charleston, S.C., yesterday. She urged unionists and activists “not to back down” on workers’ major goals: a good jobs program, the Employee Free Choice Act and health care reform.
The town hall meeting was part of a larger 10-year anniversary commemoration of the victory to free the Charleston Five, members of the Longshoremen (ILA), who were arrested and charged with conspiracy to riot after state police attacked their picket line. A global movement to free them eventually led to the charges being dropped.
Holt Baker said:
We have to be as bold as the Charleston Five to turn the economy around. We have to go to the streets. We have to be ready to go to jail.
Bunning to Jobless Workers: ‘Tough Sh*t’
Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) has a message for the 1.2 million jobless workers who will lose their unemployment insurance (UI) benefits and COBRA health coverage in March when the two programs expire Feb. 28.
“Tough sh*t”
Bunning has single-handily blocked a vote on a 30-day extension by being the only senator to oppose a unanimous consent motion to vote on the bill which was passed earlier by the House.
For hours last night, Bunning refused to budge and according to Politico, when Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) urged Bunning to relent, his response was, “Tough sh*t.”
California Investigating 7 Health Insurers for Denying Claims, Hiking Rates
California has launched an investigation into possible illegal premium increases and denial of claims by the state’s seven largest health insurance companies.
Yesterday, state Attorney General Jerry Brown issued subpoenas for detailed financial records and other information records to Aetna Health, Anthem Blue Cross, CIGNA, Health Net, Blue Shield of California, Kaiser Permanente and PacifiCare.
Earlier this month Anthem Blue Cross announced it was raising premiums in California by as much as 39 percent for its 800,000 customers, despite a $4.7 billion 2009 profit by its parent firm WellPoint. The insurer is now facing a congressional hearing and Obama administration scrutiny over its rate hikes.
In September, California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) released a report that which states that since 2002 the state’s largest health insurers rejected more than one in five medical claims. Data from the last half of 2009 shows the rejection rate has jumped to more than one in four (26 percent), with PacificCare leading the way, rejecting 41.7 percent of claims, according to the CNA/NNOC report.
Ohio Workers Demand Good Jobs Now
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More than 100 working people marched from to the state capitol in Columbus, Ohio, yesterday to call on lawmakers to focus on creating jobs and making Wall Street pay for the economic crisis it created. They sent the message that it is time to help working people and put Main Street back to work.
Ohio’s jobless rate is 10.9 percent. The state has lost millions of jobs due to the decline in manufacturing.
Marchers chanted “Good jobs now, make Wall Street pay,” and carried signs saying, “Dear Wall Street: you destroyed millions of jobs. Fix your mess.” Some dressed as Wall Street executives to highlight the role of greedy executives in creating the economic crisis.
At the rally, sponsored by the AFL-CIO’s community affiliate Working America, speakers said Congress and the White House must take serious and immediate action to invest in jobs
Ohio AFL-CIO President Joe Rugola said corporations and Wall Street executives have destroyed working people’s jobs. He said it is up to working people to hold our elected officials accountable to create a new economy that works for working families.
Working America’s Regional Director Dan Heck said:
Ohio working people have been slaughtered by a bad economy, bad decisions made by the last administration and Wall Street greed. Working people are saying ‘no more’ and marched today to call attention to how bad things are for Main Street.
