LaborPains.org

The AFL-CIO branch in Southern Florida has made its endorsements for this political cycle and there are few surprises. What is disturbing to learn is the group’s #1 selection criteria: the deceptively-named Employee Free Choice Act.

Deborah Dion, the union’s political director, said the endorsements are made on the basis of issues, not party affiliations. The No. 1 litmus test: The Employee Free Choice Act, a bill in Congress that would make it easier for workers to unionize.

The Southern Florida AFL-CIO hints at the intimidation tactics they might use if EFCA is passed into law:

“If Joe tells the shop steward he’s going to send in an absentee ballot, the shop steward can follow up by going back to Joe if he doesn’t turn it in,” Dion said.

When are Maine’s Democratic candidates going to get it? The secret was let out on this site that the average Mainer opposes corrupt tactics also known as a “card-check” as a fair way to unionize at work. Ninety-two percent believe it is a worker’s right to have a private vote. Apparently, Maine’s Democratic candidates still haven’t heard the news.

Maine Representative Thomas Allen (D-1) and his partner-in-deception Rep. Michael Michaud (D-2) are just two of the co-sponsors of the misleading Employee Free Choice Act. This act strips employees of the traditional government supervised, private ballot vote and allows a simple majority to publicly sign a contract in support of a union. What about the other 49%? Allen and Michaud could care less.

Allen is now taking his anti-worker platform to the entire state of Maine as he runs for the US Senate. In his place as the Democratic candidate for Congress in the first district, Chellie Pingree promises not to let down the union bosses who continue to pour money into the state races. According to UnionMaine.org, “If Pingree were in Congress today she would be an ally” and support the Employee Free Choice Act.

These three are quick to point out their support for democracy on a wide range of issues. But when 36% of your total campaign contributions come from union PACs, as in the case of Tom Allen (Federal Election Comission, May 22, 2008) the will of the people is side stepped for the will for power in Washington, DC.

Do Tom Allen, Michael Michaud and Chellie Pingree believe a private ballot is the best way to elect them? Or would they support the first 51% of people in their districts to publicly sign a contract in support of their opponent in November? Or just maybe they will see the light and represent the people of Maine.

In a previous post, I wrote about unions using litigation as a scare tactic against employers during union organization campaigns. Smithfield Foods, a North Carolina corporation currently engaged in litigation against the United Food and Commercial Workers union, is pushing back against the union’s (anti-)corporate campaign. A federal court has refused to dismiss Smithfield’s RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act claims against UFCW, saying that Smithfield had a property right (a RICO Act requirement) to recognize the union “without interference by or involvement from the union”:

“The very existence of the Corporate Campaign concept is founded on the recognition that the exercise of that right is of great import and of great consequence,” the court noted.
“Until the Unions prevail in a valid NLRB certified election,” it is this intangible, but no less valuable, property right that is capable of being extorted by the defendants through the use of corporate campaign tactics, the court concluded. As such, the company has stated a cognizable RICO claim.

The unions responded by arguing that their conduct was merely coercive and not extortion. Merely coercive…okay then.

Democrat Elwyn Tinklenberg, 6th District Congressional Candidate, has joined the Al Franken bandwagon. On EFCA, Tinklenberg is using the same “intimidation” fig leaf to cover up the same dirty little secret: They are doing the bidding of the Washington union special interests at the expense of Minnesota workers.

It’s not hard to figure out that, when 95% of Minnesotans support keeping their private ballot right, it takes a pretty powerful force to move politicians off of that issue. That powerful force in this case is the big money union campaign contributions and union political muscle being employed on behalf of Tinklenberg.

Like Al Franken, Elwyn Tinklenberg is also willing to smear thousands of honest, hard working 6th district business owners with his accusations of intimidation. His wild, unsubstantiated charges are hardly representative of a thoughtful, moderate legislator. They are fitting of the extremely liberal constituency groups that dominate today’s Democrat party.

King Banaian, Professor of Economics at St. Cloud State University and Minnesotans for Employee Freedom Steering Committee member, penned this terrrific piece on EFCA.  Dr. Banaian, as a trained economist, has particularly keen insights about the harmful effect of EFCA.

One non-economic point he made stood out:

Coercion in voting should offend us all; we watch Zimbabwe this week where an opposition party that won a plurality of the votes in a primary has chosen to withdraw rather than risk violence against its supporters by the Mugabe government. But we hear very, very little about the legitimate threats made to workers — not violence, but getting workers fired so that you could pass a unionization effort — in order to support the L of DFL. That’s what the city council in Minneapolis did to those workers at the Hotel Ivy. Do they care?

In case there was any doubt that stripping workers of their right to a private ballot on the job is a dangerously radical infringement on democratic rights, the chair of the Communist Party USA Political Action Committee has come out in support of the legislation. She cites AFL-CIO Executive VP Arlene Holt Baker as saying:

This election cannot be only about John McCain’s failings. It must be about working people’s vision — our vision of a new direction for our country. A vision that includes universal health care, the elimination of poverty, good jobs and the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act … [W]e are going to spark a movement of those who are ready to make their voices heard in shaping the new America we must build together — and we are going collect our debt this November.

It’s ironic that a political organization that allegedly dedicates itself to standing up for workers is advocating for legislation to strip workers of one of their most basic rights.

Though Democrat Elwyn Tinklenberg just won the endorsement of the political insiders of the Independence Party in his run for Congress, he sure hasn’t shown any independence when it comes to the real issues facing Minnesota’s 6^th Congressional district voters.

Take, for example, his position on the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). Under EFCA, the right to a private-ballot election is taken away in favor of allowing a union organizer to enter a worker’s home to “ask” her to sign a card instead.  Gone is the ability of Minnesota workers to vote their consciences free of pressure and intimidation, despite the fact that 95% of us want to keep that right.

Look at this page from Mr. Tinklenberg’s website and you’ll understand why he’s so enthusiastic about EFCA: A laundry list of endorsements from Big Unions.  That means big money campaign contributions and workers for his campaign pouring into Minnesota.

Where is the independence from this old-fashioned Democrat special interest and their very liberal agenda?  If Tinklenberg is caving in to special interests before he even gets to Congress, we shudder to think what he’ll do once he gets there.

That’s a strange definition of independence.

As if our court system isn’t backlogged enough, some union organizers are using litigation as a scare tactic against employers in union organizing campaigns. Even when the case against an employer has no merit, the damage to employers has been done:

In many cases, the union withdraws a lawsuit before any decision on the merits is reached because its organizing goals have been realized. Even when lawsuits have little or no merit, the legal actions may succeed in distracting the employer by forcing it to incur immense legal fees and expend large amounts of time defending the suit, and by damaging the company’s reputation and threatening its business.