Vote for the Worst of the Worst of the 1%
You might call it an “unpopularity contest.” Brave New Foundation (BNF) wants to know who you think are the worst of the worst of the 1 percent who are doing the most to damage the economy and destroy democracy.
They’ve put together a rouges gallery of 30 bankers, politicians, corporate big wigs, hateful pundits and other assorted characters who are using their wealth and power to exploit the 99 percent.
There is no shortage of bad men on the list (and yes, they are all men). There’s Hugh Grant, for instance — not the actor, but the CEO of Monsanto, a Read the rest of this entry »
Right-Wing Noise Machine Aims at Public Employees
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New Republican governors, old right-wing radio windbags, Fox News and extremist hacks continue to stoke the noise machine that’s belching blather about public employees.
As Dave Johnson at the Campaign for America’s Future writes:
The right’s propaganda machine begins with a simple narrative, repeats it endlessly, and then ties current events to the narrative to drive the point home. The corporate/conservative right are currently working a narrative that public employees and their unions are the reason for state and local budget problems. This is repeated endlessly, and every current event that hits the news is then used to support the claim. This is how an untruth becomes “conventional wisdom.”
AFSCME Counters Right Wing Attack on Workers with ‘Stop the Lies’ Campaign
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AFSCME is launching an aggressive new “Stop the Lies” campaign to fight back against lies about public workers by radical talking heads like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, John Stossel and right wing politicians.
The campaign will use social media, videos, paid advertising and ground events across the country to get the truth heard amidst the din from Fox News, loudmouthed television and radio talkers and their orchestrated attacks blaming public employees for the financial crises cities and states are facing. http://www.afscme.org/index.cfmSays AFSCME President Gerald McEntee:
Public service workers have become the scapegoats for the far right. We’re not going to sit around and let corporate CEOs define the debate. After all, it was their greed and incompetence that drove this country’s economy into the ditch. Read the rest of this entry »
Extremist Media Steps Up Attacks on Workers, Unions
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In their attack on the union movement, extremist reactionary media outlets increasingly are depicting unions and workers as thugs, Communists and destroyers of free enterprise. Media Matters has compiled these recent attacks and we’re cross-posting some of the watchdog group’s findings here. We urge all unionists to take a minute from pinko thuggery to check it out.
The Blame Game: Conservative Media Try to Pin Problems on Unions
Beck says unions have “raped” police and firefighters. On the August 4 edition of his radio program, Glenn Beck said of unions: “Look what they’ve done to the police and firemen. They’ve raped these guys. Along with politicians. Along with politicians—raped them. The bravest among us.” Beck went on to ask, “What, do you think the politicians are not in bed with the unions?”
Limbaugh Lies About Big Branch Mine: No, Rush, It Wasn’t Union
It was Sen. Al Franken (D- Minn.) in his previous incarnation as an author and comedian who called Rush Limbaugh “A big fat liar.” Well, others can address the first part, but Limbaugh himself has again offered solid evidence about the liar part.
Last week, Limbaugh lambasted the Mine Workers (UMWA) for not protecting their members who, he claimed worked at the Upper Big Branch mine in Raleigh County, W.Va., where 29 coal miners were killed when the Massey Energy Co. mine exploded.
Of course as we all know, and has been widely reported in mainstream media–and even on Fox News–Upper Big Branch was non-union coal mine. While he never acknowledged his mistake, at least he piped down for a few days.
But yesterday, with a full bag of gas at the ready, Rush claimed he had irrefutable facts to back him up, that UMWA did certainly represent the miners at Upper Big Branch. He said the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) had ordered Massey to hire union coal miners. Read the rest of this entry »
The Tea Party Isn’t Union Friendly
Here’s what a commenter posted recently at the AFL-CIO Now blog:
I am a progressive democrat, former member of three unions and my run was heavily funded by unions. I was beaten by a right-wing Republican because rank-and-file union members voted for my opponent.
And:
Until union members stop drooling over Glenn Beck and his ilk, unions will continue to be rendered impotent.
What was it the immortal Pogo said? “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
Health Care Kumbaya
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| Protest against health insurers need to have both a union and community face—like this march both against foreclosures and for the Employee Free Choice Act earlier in March in Lynn, Mass. |
The peasants are filing their pitchforks to a fine point in anticipation of an attack on the palace—and the target of their ire is not what we might have intended. At this critical moment in the health care debate, more than a few working folk are taking a suspicious look at the health care reform efforts of Senate Democrats, President Obama—and their own unions. A headline in my local newspaper, the Lynn Item, helped stir the tempest: “Obama Open to Taxing Benefits to Fund Reform.”
Vincent Panvani of the Sheet Metal Workers (SMWIA) warns:
If any of these Democratic Senators vote for this, they’ll be out in 2010, and it will be used against Obama….[Y]ou’re taxing the middle class.
Teamsters President James Hoffa calls taxing health care benefits “the poison pill that will kill reform.” The Laborers have attack ads at the ready. And Donna Smith, an organizer and legislative representative for the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) notes that insurance companies continue discriminatory rates for older workers and ongoing rescissions of benefits—that is, targeting people with more than 1,400 medical conditions for “opposition research” investigations so their benefits can be cut off. “Ugly stuff,” she puts it. (At a health care forum in Lynn, Mass., last week, Rep. John Tierney reported that in congressional hearings he asked every insurance company if they would stop these viscous targeted rescissions—each one said “No.”)
The First 100 Days: Media Attacks on Employee Free Choice
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The folks at the watchdog group Media Matters have been taking a close look at media attacks on President Obama and his policy proposals in the opening months of his administration, and they’ve found many examples of media fear-mongering, disinformation and just plain weirdness in the first 100 days.
One of the worst is this piece of rot from Rush Limbaugh, who attacks Obama for his support of the Employee Free Choice Act. Apparently, Limbaugh gets his information about how union formation works not from workers who’ve tried to form unions, but from fictional TV shows. He thinks that bus drivers like Theresa Gares, nurses like Kelly Beringer or casino dealers like Aneil Patel are lead-pipe-toting cartoon mobsters. Limbaugh will say anything to keep workers from having a voice on the job.
The team at Media Matters has picked a dozen of the most outlandish moments of unfair attacks and unhinged rhetoric, and they’re holding a contest to determine which is the “Worst Media Moment” of Obama’s first 100 days. Limbaugh’s attack on workers’ freedom to form unions is our choice for the worse.
