Because It Needs to Be Said, After All These Years

Was going to post this on it's own, but will say "sorry for my absence." Good Lord, this guy longs for the day when life is not pounding him flatter than hammered dog shit. It's been said by better monkeys than me, but pray for mojo.

Are we Hearing the Death Knell for Unions? « Wade Rathke: Chief Organizer Blog

Are we Hearing the Death Knell for Unions? « Wade Rathke, former ACORN dude

In the Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago a breathless story about a possible $100,000,000 organizing campaign being launched by SEIU in more than a dozen cities around the country was attributed to an anonymous SEIU board member and other sources. Whatever the merits and truth of those reports, SEIU and every other union need to pull all of their last dollars together and figure out how to survive and turn the tide and do it now, make it real, and make it very, very different, because the bell has rung on the old school and the old ideas, as Stern acknowledges, and we are running out of time and money with the tide coming in hard against us.

Wisconsin as a Good Thing | Democratic Strategist

Wisconsin as a Good Thing | Democratic Strategist

But the trade union movement's weak public relations outreach is puzzling. In this age of streaming video, where is Labor's television station, or even nation-wide radio programs? Where are the academy-award nominated documentaries about labor's pivotal contributions to American society? How about some public service ads educating people about union contributions to social and economic progress in America?

It's no longer enough have labor leaders do guest spots on news programs and talk shows. a much more aggressively pro-active p.r. and educational effort is needed. That commitment, coupled with an effort to modernize union recruitment and membership could help insure that sleazy politicians like Walker never get the chance to do their worst.

How Chris Christie Did His Homework - NYTimes.com

How Chris Christie Did His Homework - NYTimes.com

What makes Christie compelling to so many people isn’t simply plain talk or swagger, but also the fact that he has found the ideal adversary for this moment of economic vertigo. Ronald Reagan had his “welfare queens,” Rudy Giuliani had his criminals and “squeegee men,” and now Chris Christie has his sprawling and powerful public-sector unions — teachers, cops and firefighters who Christie says are driving up local taxes beyond what the citizenry can afford, while also demanding the kind of lifetime security that most private-sector workers have already lost. It may just be that Christie has stumbled onto the public-policy issue of our time,which is how to bring the exploding costs of the public workforce in line with reality.

Get hyperbolic much, NYT?

Labor Secretary Solis: "Elections do matter" – The 1600 Report - CNN.com Blogs

Labor Secretary Solis: "Elections do matter" – The 1600 Report - CNN.com Blogs

The political rallying cry came as some liberals and labor activists had questioned why President Obama hadn't visited protesters in Wisconsin, especially in light of a 2007 campaign line. Then-candidate Obama told a crowd in South Carolina "understand this, if American workers are being denied their right to organize and collectively bargain, when I'm in the White House, I'll put on a comfortable pair of shoes myself, I'll walk on that picket line with you as president of the United States of America."

On Thursday White House spokesman Jay Carney, asked about why he wasn't making such a trip, said, the President has "an ability to be heard when he speaks, and he spoke to the situation in Wisconsin and his views on it last week. And I'll leave it at that."