Free Republic

October 9, 2008 Dear xxxxxx: Two significant events have occurred regarding elementary and secondary education funding this week. In order of importance, the Governor released his budget cuts at an 11 a.m. press conference. Kaine's press release began: Governor Timothy M. Kaine today announced the official revenue reforecast, and immediately announced an executive spending reduction plan to meet the fiscal year 2009 shortfall. The Governor's plan reduces government spending by making operations more efficient and reducing the scope of some government programs, while protecting K-12 education and other critical government functions, like public safety. Thankfully, P-12 funding was spared for...

About 50 off-duty police officers surrounded civilian flaggers directing traffic around a road project, heckling the workers as part of continued protests of the governor's new rules curbing paid police details at road projects. "I hope you sleep at night," shouted Stoneham Patrolman Joe Ponzo at the workers in neon vests and hardhats. "You should be ashamed of yourself -- you're union. This is a travesty." Off-duty officers from Arlington, Medford, Everett, and Woburn lined Lexington Street, a two-lane road where traffic backed up in both directions because of the protest. At one point, the workers for Mass. Highway had...

<p>In August by chance, I met the president of a large labor union of a major city who was on vacation where I live. After finding out he was the president of a union I steered the conservation to politics and the upcoming election, the conservation was alarming yet enlightening.</p>

The Employee Free Choice Act passed the U.S. House of Representatives in 2007, but Democratic backers couldn't end a Republican filibuster against it in the Senate. Democrat Mark Udall backs the act and Republican Bob Schaffer doesn't, making Colorado one of about eight states where dueling groups could spend a combined $40 million nationally to highlight issues raised in the legislation. Employees at private companies now can unionize by getting 30 percent of the work force to sign cards seeking union representation and then getting a majority of workers to back unionization in a secret-ballot election. The EFCA would allow...

At Issue: What Government Can Take Out Of Paychecks . "The government cannot take money from one group, funnel it, bundle it up and give it to another group that lobbies government back." said Amendment 49 supporter, Jon Caldara. "All this does is put a simple restriction on government. It says, 'Government, you will not be funneling money to lobbying organizations.' People want to give that to lobbyist, they should do that themselves."

TEACHERS should NOT be prosecuted for having sex with pupils over 16, claim union bosses. The NASUWT says it is UNFAIR to treat teachers who have affairs with students who are over 16 as sex offenders, insisting all they are guilty of is an “error of professional judgement”. In 2001 it became illegal for teachers to have any intimate or sexual affair with any pupil in their school under 18. If found guilty of doing so, the teacher would face instant dismissal, be made to sign the sex offenders register and possibly face jail. But NASUWT general secretary Chris Keates...

Amendment 47 would prohibit mandatory labor union dues. "This simply says that regardless if you have a union or not, if you do decide to get unionized or you're currently unionized, you cannot force someone to participate in a labor union against their will." Supporters of the so-called Colorado Right To Work Amendment said government employees already have this right. The measure would extend it to the private sector.

Angry police union members chased away MWRA workers in Everett and Revere today citing safety concerns in the first test of the state’s new rules on road details. In Everett, union members and reporters and cameramen surrounded a two-person crew from the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority that showed up to perform routine maintenance inside a manhole at 11:30 a.m. After several conversations with union members, the MWRA crew left without doing any work. (continued)

Colorado's ballot just got a lot shorter. Union leaders agreed to pull their four ballot initiatives Thursday, hours before the deadline, in exchange for help from businesses for defeating three other amendments, numbers 47, 49 and 54. The pact calls for businesses to raise $3 million to help unions defeat the initiatives. Unions already have raised $6.7 million, and the $3 million from businesses would give the campaign more money than either of Colorado's two main U.S. Senate candidates has raised so far. The deal also represents a truce in the union-business battle that has raged throughout most of Ritter's...

Yes, our public schools have become less about teaching our kids math, reading, writing, science, and history and more about subtle and nuanced liberal indoctrination and brainwashing. From Fox News: Virginia Republicans are in an uproar after the state teacher's union sent an e-mail to its members encouraging them to wear blue-colored shirts to school to show their support for Barack Obama. State Republicans are calling it an undisguised attempt to influence students' political views. The Virginia Education Association sponsored "Obama Blue Day" on Tuesday. In an e-mail sent last week, it urged teachers to participate by dressing in blue....

The teachers union has been handing out thousands of Barack Obama campaign buttons to its members, sparking a clampdown by education brass. The Department of Education - which has a long-standing policy barring teachers from wearing campaign buttons in schools - is set to send out an e-mail this week from Schools Chancellor Joel Klein laying down the law. "Schools are not a place for politics and not a place for staff to wear political buttons," said department spokeswoman Ann Forte. "We don't want a school or school staff advocating for any political position or candidate to students and we...

Teachers union e-mail touting Obama scorned Mike Drost Thursday, October 2, 2008 An e-mail distributed by a Virginia teachers union encouraged members to bring politics into the classroom by wearing blue in support of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama and simultaneously suggested that the union's voter registration efforts include those "you teach." The Virginia Education Association (VEA) e-mail drew strong criticism Wednesday from elected Republican officials and some residents after the state Republican Party obtained a copy. The author of the e-mail conceded Wednesday that the e-mail should have been worded differently. The VEA is an affiliate of the...

SOQUEL -- Teachers at Soquel High School have agreed not to wear "Educators for Obama" buttons in the classroom after a parent complained that educators were attempting to politically influence his daughter and other students. John Hadley, an importer of South African goods, called the school to complain Friday after his 16-year daughter Teegan returned home and reported that she had seen several teachers wearing the buttons.

Labor union trusts that provide a variety of benefits for workers must disclose detailed financial information under new federal rules designed to root out corruption, officials said Monday. In announcing the requirement, the U.S. Labor Department cited several cases in recent years of union officers stealing from trusts established for retirement funds, job training and disaster relief. It was not immediately clear how the rules might apply to a Service Employees International Union local in Los Angeles, whose spending practices are the subject of a criminal investigation. The United Long-Term Care Workers has a related health trust and worker-training charity...

The Service Employees International Union's headquarters has paid millions of dollars to consulting firms, political nonprofits and individuals with family ties and other personal connections to some of the labor organization's top officers, records show. One company partly owned by a union director also received more than $1 million in SEIU consulting fees. The nation's fastest-growing union, the SEIU bills itself a standard-setter in the drive to reform and modernize the labor movement. It has adopted a code of ethics that bars officers from directing business to their relatives, although a spokeswoman said no competitive bidding process is required when...

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- You just knew that when Joe O'Connell, former head of the local AFL-CIO, got on stage here with John McCain and Sarah Palin things were not going smoothly for the Obama campaign among union voters. "I am a lifelong Democrat, an intelligent Democrat, who is supporting John McCain," O'Connell said last week as a crowd of 7,000 waved "Another Democrat for John McCain" signs and roared its approval. O'Connell assured the energized crowd that "organized labor will have a seat at the table when John McCain becomes president." It's the kind of statement that Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President...

Union: Muslim Workers Reach Deal for Prayer Break Wednesday, September 17, 2008 10:58 PM OMAHA, Nebraska — A meatpacking plant has agreed to accommodate Muslim workers' request for prayer time during Ramadan, union officials said Wednesday. Earlier this week 300 Muslim JBS Swift & Co. workers, most of Somali background, walked off the job in protest of the prayer dispute. No one was fired after the protest. Dan Hoppes, president of the local United Food and Commercial Workers Union, said management at the plant has agreed to temporarily change the timing of the second-shift lunch break to accommodate workers wanting...

Thanks to John McCain’s selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, many people across the country are for the first time learning about how her state’s law authorizing union “exclusive” bargaining over public-safety and other government employees works in practice. And it’s not a pretty picture.Snip...But fair-minded people who find out a little about Wooten are bound to conclude that the real scandal is why he wasn’t fired well before Palin became governor.Snip...Union bosses who thought even a 10-day suspension was too severe a punishment for a trooper who had, over his mother’s loud protests, used a...

"Thanks to John McCain’s selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, many people across the country are for the first time learning about how her state’s law authorizing union “exclusive” bargaining over public-safety and other government employees works in practice."

VALLEJO, Calif. -- Mayor Osby Davis, who has lived in this waterfront city across San Pablo Bay from San Francisco for 60 of his 62 years, says: "If you have a can that's leaking two ounces a minute and you put an ounce a minute in it, it's going to get empty." He is describing his city's coffers. Joseph Tanner, who became city manager after this municipality of 120,000 souls was mismanaged to the brink of bankruptcy, stands at a white board to explain the simple arithmetic that has pushed Vallejo over the brink. Its crisis -- a cash flow...

University of Minnesota staff were key coordinators of the recent violent protests at the Republican National Convention (RNC). The university employees are also members of the local clerical union of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees. The AFSCME is part of the AFL-CIO union. Protests turned violent at the 2008 RNC located in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Police have arrested hundreds of demonstrators for violent attacks on police officers and bystanders and other more nuisance crimes. The Saint Paul Police have identified an anarchist group called the RNC Welcoming Committee as being at the center of the violence....

Many of you probably watched Sarah Palin accept the Republican Party's Vice Presidential nomination last night. Ironically, her husband - a member of the United Steelworkers (USW) union - is actually funding efforts to smear and defeat her.

The Service Employees International Union's top California officer has taken a leave of absence, and her former boyfriend has been ordered to return tens of thousands of dollars he received from the state council and Los Angeles local that she heads. Annelle Grajeda is the third major SEIU leader to step aside following reports in The Times about the union's financial practices. The SEIU acknowledged Saturday that Grajeda was on leave as president of the L.A. local and the union's state council, and as an executive vice president of the national organization, because of allegations that she was improperly involved...

This just gets better and better. You'll recall our recent focus on the abuse of funds and influence peddling by California Service Employee International Union (SEIU) head Tyrone Freeman being investigated in depth by the L.A.Times and how Mr. Freeman has been funneling union contracts to his family members. Now a related investigation in Michigan has revealed that one of Freeman's former associates has had to step down from a Michigan SEIU post because of similar financial misdeeds there. Once again the L.A. Times is the source for this sad tale of union bosses abusing the power so blindly handed...

California's largest union local and a related charity have paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to firms owned by the wife and mother-in-law of the labor organization's president, documents and interviews show. The Los Angeles-based union, which represents low-wage caregivers, also spent nearly $300,000 last year on a Four Seasons Resorts golf tournament, a Beverly Hills cigar club, restaurants such as Morton's steakhouse and a consulting contract with the William Morris Agency, the Hollywood talent shop, records show. In addition, the union paid six figures to a video firm whose principals include a former union employee. And a now-defunct minor...

Legislation that would make it more difficult for workers to hold a private ballot vote in unionization drives, which critics say would lead to harassment and intimidation, has spurred a pitched battle between powerful labor unions supportive of Sen. Barack Obama and big business in the presidential campaign. Seen by the AFL-CIO as a way to boost union rolls by hundreds of thousands of new members, the hotly-contested bill has become this year's No. 1 election issue for organized labor. Mr. Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has promised union bosses that the Employee Free Choice Act will become law in...

House Vote on Card-Check.

Right now, workers in business, like voters, get to choose by secret ballot on whether they will be unionized. If the Democrats pass their “Employee Free Choice Act,” what opponents rightly call “card check,” any employee will be placed at the hands of a less than merciful union representative who knows precisely whether or not the employee is supportive of unions. Under card check, instead of employees voting to unionize by secret ballot, employees will submit cards with their choice. There will be no anonymity with their choice. Because the Republican Party has enough members present right now to filibuster...

Union bosses are well aware that their days were numbered until Obama came along. And they are sparing no expense in getting him elected. The AFL-CIO and its affiliates have raised an unprecedented $250 million to put 200,000 union workers on the street campaigning for Obama in the crucial final weeks. The National Education Association has budgeted up to $50 million. The Service Employees International Union has added $100 million to pay 2,000 union members to leave their jobs and go work on Democratic campaigns. All totaled, unions are expected to spend more than $1 billion of their members’ money...

Our economic system — the market economy or capitalism — is a system of consumers' supremacy. The customer is sovereign; he is, says a popular slogan, "always right." Businessmen are under the necessity of turning out what the consumers ask for and they must sell their wares at prices which the consumers can afford and are prepared to pay. A business operation is a manifest failure if the proceeds from the sales do not reimburse the businessman for all he has expended in producing the article. Thus the consumers in buying at a definite price determine also the height of...

Recent strikes in Germany prove what many experts have long been warning: Labor unions in the country are fragmenting. Mini-organizations representing specialized employees are making strikes more frequent and more complex than ever. Revolution is in the air at Lufthansa: Last week's five-day strike by ground staff had hardly ended before 5,000 pilots, organized in the union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC), began planning the next work stoppage. They want to see pilots working for Lufthansa affiliates receive pay hikes and are also fighting to create their own works council. A warning strike is planned for sometime in the next few days...

A few days ago I posted a story on a recent article in the New York Sun by Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Senior Fellow at The Hudson Institute, that focused on how the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) had not fully funded the pension plan of their rank and file members while they had over funded the pension plan of the Union's chief officers. Well, today at noon (CT) I was included as part of a conference call on the pending release of the full study upon which that earlier article in the Sun was based, written by by Diana Furchtgott-Roth. This...

Taxpayers in Contra Costa (and around the world) are closely watching the implosion of the City of Vallejo into bankruptcy and wonder at potential outcomes. This week Vallejo asked judges to void four contracts with unionized public employees. A hearing is set for July 23. The city faces its first major bankruptcy milestone, tomorrow, Friday June 27, when city and union officials present their initial arguments to the court. With an eye toward similar potential disaster in Contra Costa County, some wonder if it’s even possible to void such contracts. One observer opined that pro-union Democrat legislators have helped install...

The director of volunteers for the Democratic National Convention in Denver has resigned, saying she wasn’t “empowered” to do her job. Sondra Williams ...declined to elaborate on her reasons, saying she doesn’t want to criticize the host committee. The committee is coping with fundraising problems. It reported this week it is $11.6 short its $40.6 million goal.

<p>A dissident Iranian labour leader who is serving a five-year jail sentence has been hospitalised with a heart problem, a source close to him said yesterday. Mansoor Osanloo, leader of a union grouping bus drivers, was detained in July last year for "distributing statements against the system" and a judiciary official was in October quoted as saying he had been sentenced to jail.</p>

WASHINGTON, June 18 (UPI) -- A new television ad blasting likely Republican presidential nominee John McCain is only the beginning of liberal "independent group" ads, union officials say. The spot, produced independently of Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign, financed by the liberal activist group MoveOn.org and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, features a young mother with a baby criticizing McCain's determination to keep troops in Iraq. It began airing Tuesday in Ohio, Wisconsin and Michigan, USA Today reported. Pro-Democrat labor union leaders told the newspaper they have assembled millions of dollars for so-called independent...

More than 50 percent of Irish voters rejected the European Union Treaty meant to streamline decision-making for the 27-member union. Tendai Maphosa has this report from London. Results of Thursday's referendum trickled in throughout the day Friday and it was not looking good for supporters of the EU treaty. The official announcement was met with jubilation by opponents of the document. OFFICIAL: "Votes in favor of the proposal 752,451, votes against the proposal 862,415." Ireland was the only EU member that required a popular vote on the treaty, because it would have needed to make constitutional changes before it could...

Dear Rush, Over the last few months I've tried to call you countless times, but for some reason your line always seems busy. So please understand my use of this format, as I am obligated to reach out and answer the question you have asked your students at the Limbaugh Institute of Higher Education. Time and again you have asked "Who will speak for the Conservatives?"...

Dear Rush, Over the last few months I've tried to call you countless times, but for some reason your line always seems busy. So please understand my use of this format, as I am obligated to reach out and answer the question you have asked your students at the Limbaugh Institute of Higher Education. Time and again you have asked "Who will speak for the Conservatives?"....

Unsigned fliers in city schools urge 'job actions' . Not a single classroom teacher showed up for work at a northwest Denver school on Tuesday, an apparent "sickout" staged by teachers upset over stalled contract talks. All 16 classroom teachers plus the music teacher and a librarian called in sick... "I didn't have any warning," Kraft said. "I don't know what the goal is, so I can't really speak to whether or not that accomplished their goal. . . . (But) I'm not sure if leaving your students without a teacher is a way to address contract negotiations." DPS Superintendent...

A labor-union campaign in Colorado to tighten restrictions on layoffs and ... could put Democrats in an awkward position as they gather here in August for their presidential convention. Unions are pushing to get a total of six measures on the fall ballot, all of them opposed by small-business owners and corporate interests. "If they pass, it would be like putting a big 'Do Not Locate Your Business Here' sign on Colorado," ... Big labor groups said they will pump as much as $35 million into Colorado to pass their own measures and defeat a rival initiative promoted by business...

That $13.2 million grant Washington state won last year to enhance the teaching of Advanced Placement courses in math and science is history. It’s lost because of the financial incentives it would have provided for teachers who improve test scores. The Washington Education Association didn’t much like the idea of tying teacher pay to student performance on exams. Neither did the teachers union like the involvement of an outside party, the grant provider, in teacher-pay decisions.

May 1, 2008 Dear xxxxxx, The 2008 Legislative Session officially ended on April 23rd. A special session on transportation will follow. We will need to work in that session to protect the General Fund and make sure that dollars that should go to schools don't go to roads But, we can reflect and hopefully learn from the most difficult 2008 session. VEA bills fared poorly; in many cases because there was no money. There is new money for education, on a per-pupil basis 7.4% in 2008-09 and 1.5% in 2009-10. Considering the budget constraints, this is remarkable and reflective of...

LOS ANGELES -- An arbitrator has ordered the union that represents dockworkers at West Coast ports to tell members they must report to work Thursday and not take the day off to protest U.S. military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. A wide enough walkout could cause a slowdown at West Coast ports -- the nation's major gateway for cargo from the Far East. Arbitrator John Kagel issued his decision today after holding a hearing by phone with the employers' group, Pacific Maritime Association, and International Longshore and Warehouse Union, according to a document outlining the ruling. The union previously asked...

PORTAGE, IN - Hillary Clinton's campaign has worked hard of late to portray her as the fighter in the race, someone with the determination to see her plans through no matter what the obstacles. In North Carolina yesterday, Gov. Mike Easley raised some eyebrows when he said Clinton was so determined she made "Rocky Balboa look like a pansy." Well, this afternoon, a local labor leader introducing Clinton pushed the envelope further, saying the nation needed a leader "that has testicular fortitude." While defending Bill Clinton's role in the passage of NAFTA, Paul Gipson, president of a steelworkers local, said...

The California Public Employees Retirement System Chief Executive Officer may leave by the end of the year amid tensions with the board, marking the third top level executive at the $244 billion retirement fund to depart in 2008... Calpers is in the middle of an internal debate over whether to require infrastructure projects that receive Calpers investments to use union employees... In February, Christianna Wood, senior investment officer, stepped down ...

LONDON (Reuters) - A pipeline carrying nearly half of Britain's oil was closed on Sunday as a strike over pensions began at the neighboring Grangemouth refinery in Scotland, operator BP said. The refinery, owned by international chemical company Ineos, produces a tenth of Britain's petrol and diesel but also supplies vital steam to BP's Kinneil plant that starts to process the crude oil coming ashore from 70 North Sea fields. Unions have rejected pleas to operate the steam plant at the level necessary to keep Kinneil functioning during the two-day stoppage which began at 6 a.m. (1 a.m. EDT)....

U.S. Rep. Steve Chabot, R-OH, blamed labor unions and partisan politics for a U.S. House vote this week rejecting an amendment that could have kept the Delta Queen riverboat from having to phase out its overnight cruise packages. The historic riverboat has been operating with a special Congressional exemption from the federal Safety at Sea Act since 1968, an exemption that has been renewed eight times. The safety act bans the use of wooden vessels for overnight cruises. Backers of the exemption claim the Delta Queen deserves special treatment because of its historical significance and recently upgraded fire-safety systems. With...

Members of the International Longshore & Warehouse Union are proceeding with plans for a work stoppage at 29 West Coast ports on May 1 to protest the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite the fact that union leadership has withdrawn its request to waterfront employers that they accommodate closure of the ports. Planning for the protest began in February when the Longshore Caucus, the highest decision-making body for the 25,000 members of the longshore division within the ILWU, overwhelmingly approved a resolution in support of a day of protest. According to its contract, the ILWU is entitled to schedule a...

If the Democratic National Convention failed to produce a bounce for John Kerry, the same cannot be said of Illinois State Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic Party’s candidate for United States Senator from Illinois. While this rising star in the Democratic Party spouted some conservative themes during his speech, the rhetoric may be deceptive. While Obama spoke of individual responsibility – such as stating that the government cannot teach kids to read, parents must – his ideology and voting record is quite different. Obama is very liberal. Among his campaign contributors are George Soros, People for the American Way, pro-abortion...