LaborPains.org

In what is being described by CNN as a landslide by women, Blanche Lincoln managed to hold off labor-backed Bill Halter in the hotly (and nastily) contested Democratic primary race in Arkansas. The AFL-CIO called the loss a “tremendous victory” for working families, and SEIU stood by their man as well. If this is what a “tremendous victory” looks like and feels like, I hope that labor unions get “tremendous victories” more often. Reminds me of how they called losing to Scott Brown a “victory”. I see a pattern.

Labor groups poured about $10 million dollars into the primary run off after the May primary results. They spent the last few weeks hemorrhaging cash. The Hill ran through cash and boots by numbers yesterday:

“The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) has spent more than $3 million on the race, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) records, while the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees has spent more than $1.5 million. Labor groups are also putting activists in the field for what is expected to be a close election. The AFL-CIO has sent staff from its Washington office to help Halter supporters get to the polls, as has Working America, its community affiliate.

Working America’s 41 paid organizers in Arkansas have made 315,000 phone calls and knocked on 120,000 doors, canvassing voters in 27 cities and 17 counties in the state, according to spokeswoman Alison Omens. The group has also spent more than $1.3 million on ads…”

Politico’s Ben Smith got the most damning quote of ‘em all from the Lincoln-backing White House:

“Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members’ money down the toilet on a pointless exercise,” the official said. “If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November.”

Sorry. No matter how many times these unions burn through their coffers, lose, and call it a “victory,” I don’t think that Lenin’s “A lie told often enough becomes the truth” applies. If I want to see some real victory, I think I’ll just watch the World Cup.

Tomorrow, a number of unions will find out if their blood, sweat, tears, and cash–lots of it– paid off in Arkansas when Blanche Lincoln faces off to labor backed Bill Halter. According to the New York Times, labor in Arkansas has “knocked on 170,000 doors, made 700,000 phone calls, sent 2.7 million pieces of mail and spent almost $6 million on television and radio advertising.”

If you are still not convinced of how serious they are, here’s a round up of quotes from some major unions:

Communication Workers of America in the New York Times:

“We’re sending a message here,” said Larry Cohen, president of the Communications Workers of America. “Our members have had it — not just in Arkansas, they have had it across this country.”

American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees president Gerald McEntee in the Wall Street Journal:

“We go out and work like hell” to elect Democrats in 2008, “and yet we’re getting screwed,” said Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Mr. McEntee said he was especially unhappy to see Mr. Clinton, who benefited from labor support in the past, attacking unions in the Lincoln ad. “To see him in full form in Arkansas bleeding us out, we felt was a disgrace,” Mr. McEntee said.

A state level A.F.L.-C.I.O worker says that the level of mobilization is extreme:

“This is pretty new for Arkansas,” said Justin Nickels, the communications director for the state A.F.L.-C.I.O. “It’s sort of like we’ve been thrown into the N.F.L.”

And the SEIU, who’s pumped millions into a state where they have a mere 1,000 members, is running ads that will make any voter who pays attention to the news…..blanch.

Here’s the first thing you need to know about Senator Casey’s event on March 22, 2010, introducing the Create Jobs and Save Benefits Act of 2010, is who was in attendance at the announcement:

“Senator Casey was joined at the event in Carlisle by representatives from YRC Transportation, ABF Freight Systems and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.”

Folks these days know that if you put the phrase “Create Jobs” at the beginning of a piece of legislation, its easier to yell at your opponents about how they opposed a “jobs bill.” There are about one hundred cliches, mores, and epithets that would work  right about now, but I think sticking with the old favorite “You can’t judge a book by it’s cover.”

Borrowing from the Wall Street Journal, the bill would better be entitled “The Union Pension Bailout.” Because that’s what it is. During the health care legislation reform debacle, part of the bill was section 164 that bailed out failing pension funds to the tune of $10 billion USD.  It passed in the final version of the bill relatively unnoticed, giving Jimmy Hoffa a taste of sweet, sweet success.

Ten billion dollars is a drop in the bucket compared to how much money this legislation would cost. From the Wall Street Journal:

“Mr. Casey is claiming his multi-employer-bailout scheme will cost a mere $8 billion, but Moody’s estimated last year that multi-employer plans were $165 billion underfunded.”

“The tab is likely to be much higher given the moral hazard Mr. Casey would create. As Hudson Institute economist Diana Furchtgott-Roth notes, the bill creates “a vicious circle. Once PGBC took over some plans, other employers would want to declare bankruptcy, unload plans on the PGBC, and reorganize under another name. The incentives to do this would be enormous.” [...]

Union chiefs prefer the power that comes with managing huge pension investments—even if they’re failing. They are now counting on Mr. Casey to preserve their power by making taxpayers pick up the tab for years of pension mismanagement. With the union priority of “card check” stalled, word is that the Casey bailout is Big Labor’s consolation prize. Taxpayers should let Congress know they don’t want to pay.”

If Hoffa wins this one, perhaps it will be enough to fend off the attacks from within his own ranks. Vice President Fred Gegare is vying for the number one spot, according to reports, in the upcoming election in 2011. Interestingly enough, the reason Fred Gegare cites for breaking ranks with Hoffa is all about pension funds:

Gegare especially points to the decision to let UPS out of the Central States Pension Fund, saying that move has led to employers “lined up” to get out of the pension fund, with Central States losing two-thirds of its participants. Gegare is the union chair of the Central States Pension Fund. He also alleges that the union is experience financial difficulties because of some Hoffa decisions. “I cannot understand some of your decisions in the last four years regarding some of your expenditure that you were questioned about,” he writes.

From the Wall Street Journal:

The rise of the tea party makes Democrats even more dependent on organized labor. In this week’s Pennsylvania special election for the late Jack Murtha’s seat, the AFL-CIO alone sent out 80,000 mailers on behalf of Democrat Mark Critz, along with 100,000 robocalls.

In Arkansas, unions showed their clout by forcing Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln into a June runoff with labor-backed Lt. Gov. Bill Halter. Unions decided to make an example of her after she opposed the “card check” bill that limits the use of secret ballots in union elections. Unions, especially the Service Employees International Union, spent more than $3 million against her.

In contrast to the tea party, there has been far too little scrutiny of the SEIU, whose membership of government and health-care workers is the fastest-growing of any union in the country. Andy Stern, the just retired head of the SEIU, was found to be the most frequent guest at the Obama White House last year, stopping by 22 times between January and September, more than all congressional leaders and cabinet members.

The SEIU’s close ties to the discredited group Acorn have largely been ignored. The same is true for the violence perpetrated by some of its members.

Image courtesy of gerlos.

Um.

Sometimes things just don’t make sense. Racine County has grass in its road’s medians. The Teamsters can’t and won’t mow it, but that doesn’t stop them from asking the County not to let local inmates do it for free.

Teamsters leaders filed a grievance in 2009 after county officials began using volunteers from the Racine County Jail to cut the sprawling grass. For budget reasons, the state government had announced that it would only pay counties to mow the full length of the medians once during the year.

The policy is back for a second year, with state officials hoping to save $2.5 million by minimally mowing. That means the inmates will be back, too, unless the union gets its way. We would be more sympathetic to their beef if the Teamsters, filled with law-abiding members, were actually losing work to the prisoners. They’re not. County leaders have repeatedly said the government can’t afford to pay anyone to do the extra work. The only reason to choose the inmates – all nonviolent offenders – is their willingness to work for free. Well, other than little time off for good yardwork.

If they don’t do it, nobody will.

According to the editorial, the Teamsters say that the contract violations extend beyond the “grass” issue. Sorry Teamsters, there’s no middle of the road on this one.

Image courtesy of boodoo.

Here’s a life lesson. If you are going to ignore conventional protesting practices and take a page from the play book of some of the most egregious protesters in modern times, make sure you check who lives next door. There could be a journalist nearby–a journalist with a camera and a website. And check that your “target” is home, not his frightened son hiding in the bathroom.

The SEIU probably couldn’t have planned it worse when they decided to protest at the house Greg Baer, the deputy general counsel for corporate law at Bank of America.  Despite their own desire to minimize the coverage of the protest, by just bringing a sympathetic HuffPo reporter, Baer’s neighbor was none other than Nina Easton, the Washington Bureau Chief of Fortune Magazine. I’ll let her take it from here:

“Last Sunday, on a peaceful, sun-crisp afternoon, our toddler finally napping upstairs, my front yard exploded with 500 screaming, placard-waving strangers on a mission to intimidate my neighbor, Greg Baer. Baer is deputy general counsel for corporate law at Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500), a senior executive based in Washington, D.C. And that — in the minds of the organizers at the politically influential Service Employees International Union and a Chicago outfit called National Political Action — makes his family fair game.”

“Waving signs denouncing bank “greed,” hordes of invaders poured out of 14 school buses, up Baer’s steps, and onto his front porch. As bullhorns rattled with stories of debtor calls and foreclosed homes, Baer’s teenage son Jack — alone in the house — locked himself in the bathroom. “When are they going to leave?” Jack pleaded when I called to check on him. Baer, on his way home from a Little League game, parked his car around the corner, called the police, and made a quick calculation to leave his younger son behind while he tried to rescue his increasingly distressed teen. He made his way through a din of barked demands and insults from the activists who proudly “outed” him, and slipped through his front door.”

“Excuse me,” Baer told his accusers, “I need to get into the house. I have a child who is alone in there and frightened.”

Those of us who watch SEIU protests know sort of what we should expect. This was outside of that. As Easton put it:

Targeting homes and families seems to put SEIU in the ranks of (now jailed) radical animal-rights activists and the Kansas anti-gay fundamentalists harassing the grieving parents of a dead 20-year-old soldier at his funeral (the Supreme Court has agreed to weigh in on the latter). But that’s not a conversation that SEIU officials want to have.

I should add that there were no arrests, because the three officers on hand feared inciting the rabble-rousers.

Image courtesy of Nina Easton. I hope she doesn’t mind.

You know it’s not going to be nice article when the headline is “Andrew Stern departs the SEIU now weakened by infighting and expenses.” You know its going to be uncomfortable when the article is the Washington Post.

Worth your time, the article by Alec MacGillis offers a refreshing realistic to the legacy of Andy Stern, the man no longer the king in the Purple Palace. From the Washington Post:

“In celebrating her election last weekend to the head of the Service Employees International Union — the fastest-growing and most politically active union — Mary Kay Henry vowed to “build on the success” of Andrew L. Stern, the charismatic and ambitious labor leader who is taking his influence to new arenas, such as President Obama’s deficit commission. But the state of the union Stern is leaving behind is more mixed than Henry let on.”

“Even as Stern turns his attention to the nation’s spending problem, his own union’s spending — notably the multimillion-dollar tab from internal battles he has waged — is drawing sharp criticism from within the labor movement. Stern has expanded his union, but his decisions have left it, and the labor movement as a whole, financially strapped, according to disclosure reports that have received little scrutiny.”

Read more at washingtonpost.com.

Gov. Paterson may have gotten mad in January, but he’s finally laying down the law against labor unions in the state. According to the Wall Street Journal, Governor Paterson is considering going all Schwarzenegger on the State of New York:

“In his most aggressive move yet to slash state labor costs, Gov. David A. Paterson on Tuesday presented lawmakers with a choice of either freezing government operations or imposing a one-day furlough without pay for 100,000 unionized state employees. [...]

For months, the administration has tried to extract about $250 million in labor-reduction costs from the largest public employees unions, the Civil Service Employees Association and the Public Employees Federation. Union leaders have refused to relinquish a scheduled 4% raise that went into effect last month.

The governor said the unions “have given us nothing. Everyone is sacrificing. They are basically telling us they shouldn’t take a cut at all.” The governor said the furlough measure would save the state about $30 million, marking the first time the administration has cut costs this fiscal year, as opposed to deferring them.”

As an FYI for Paterson, the unions haven’t made it easy for Gov. Schwarzenegger. At all. But if the Mayor of San Francisco’s victory isn’t proof that standing your ground “works,” I don’t know what is.

Image courtesy of M. Bob in Tokyo.