Obama Bureaucrat Tells Boeing Where to Expand

Obama Bureaucrat Tells Boeing Where to Expand

Company Prodded to Abandon New Aircraft Plant in Right Work State (Source: May 2011 NRTWC Newsletter) To a rational observer, it's obvious that the antics of the strike-happy union bosses at Boeing's West Coast facilities over the past few decades have been detrimental to the interests of the aerospace company's rank-and-file domestic employees as well as its shareholders. Since 1975, International Association of Machinists (IAM/AFL-CIO) union bosses have ordered employees at Boeing's Washington State and Oregon facilities out on strike five times. The most recent strike, in 2008, lasted 58 days and cost the company $1.8 billion. In a highly competitive, globalized industry like aircraft production, such costly labor stoppages put Boeing jobs at risk. The potential harm to workers is far greater than any economic gain they could possibly reap from a strike. Obama NLRB's Top Lawyer: Sensible Business Decision Driven by 'Anti-Union Animus'
Obama Labor Department: A School For Scandal

Obama Labor Department: A School For Scandal

Union Consultant Charged With Overseeing Union Financial Reports (Source: May 2011 NRTWC Newsletter) On his first full day as U.S. President, Barack Obama issued Executive Order 13490, otherwise known as the Ethics Executive Order. Under E.O.13490, presidential appointees are required to sign a pledge affirming that, for two years after the day they are appointed, they will not "participate in any particular matter involving a specific party that includes a former employer or former client." "Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency," Mr. Obama vowed. Unfortunately, almost from the day E.O.13490 was first issued, the Obama Administration has repeatedly ignored its letter as well as its spirit when it comes to appointees whose job is to oversee and regulate labor unions. Thousands of Union Bosses to Be Exempted From Disclosing Any Conflicts of Interest Last month, the National Right to Work Committee issued a report on one of the most egregious examples of an Obama appointee making policies that clearly benefit his former union-boss clients: John Lund, now the director of the U.S. Labor Department's Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS). Mr. Lund is a former employee of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE/AFL-CIO). And he is currently on unpaid leave from the Madison-based University of Wisconsin School for Workers, of which the AFL-CIO and many other unions, as well as many union benefit funds, are clients. But now Mr. Lund is responsible for overseeing federally-mandated union financial disclosures and criminal investigations regarding union financial irregularities and embezzlement!
Trumka's Tirade

Trumka's Tirade

AFL-CIO boss Dick Trumka speech where he issued the hollow threat to the Democrat Party to take his fidelity elsewhere, is being called Trumka's Tirade by the Pittsburgh Tribune: Big Labor boss Richard Trumka has issued an ultimatum to unions' lackeys in Congress: Meet our unrelenting demands or find another sugar daddy to fund your campaigns next year. "We will spend the summer holding elected leaders in Congress as well as the states accountable on one measure: Are they improving or degrading life for working families (of union members)?" says the AFL-CIO's Mr. Trumka. And Trumka says Democrats may be "controlling the wrecking ball" that's hurting unions. How's that for gratitude? Whereas unions, given their substantial contributions to Democrats in the last presidential election, didn't get everything on their quite lengthy wish list, they've made substantial inroads with Team Obama at the federal level. Those inroads lead to the National Labor Relations Board.
Trumka's Tirade

Trumka's Tirade

AFL-CIO boss Dick Trumka speech where he issued the hollow threat to the Democrat Party to take his fidelity elsewhere, is being called Trumka's Tirade by the Pittsburgh Tribune: Big Labor boss Richard Trumka has issued an ultimatum to unions' lackeys in Congress: Meet our unrelenting demands or find another sugar daddy to fund your campaigns next year. "We will spend the summer holding elected leaders in Congress as well as the states accountable on one measure: Are they improving or degrading life for working families (of union members)?" says the AFL-CIO's Mr. Trumka. And Trumka says Democrats may be "controlling the wrecking ball" that's hurting unions. How's that for gratitude? Whereas unions, given their substantial contributions to Democrats in the last presidential election, didn't get everything on their quite lengthy wish list, they've made substantial inroads with Team Obama at the federal level. Those inroads lead to the National Labor Relations Board.

Right to Work in New England

Once again, the Wall Street Journal makes an eloquent case in support of the Right to Work -- this time imploring legislators in New Hampshire to override a veto to become the first Right to Work state in New England: Twenty-two states have right-to-work laws, most of them in the faster-growing South and West. The big news is that New Hampshire is edging closer to becoming the 23rd, which would make it the first new right-to-work state since Oklahoma in 2001 and could lead to a regional revolution. The state House and Senate in Concord have passed a right-to-work statute, but Governor John Lynch, a Democrat, vetoed the bill. On May 25 the legislature will attempt to override that veto, and House Speaker Bill O'Brien says he is "cautiously optimistic" that he can gain the two-thirds majority to do so. This would be a landmark victory for the right-to-work movement. All other Northeastern states operate under forced-union rules, so the Granite State would gain a decisive competitive advantage over its neighbors in attracting investment and jobs. "Passing right to work on top of not having an income tax could make us the Hong Kong of the region," Mr. O'Brien says. The precedent would put enormous pressure on Maine and Massachusetts to follow. We assume Vermont is hopeless and prefers to be a tourist and natural history museum. Right-to-work laws don't outlaw unions. They simply allow each individual worker to decide whether or not to join the union. In compulsory-union states, workers employed in unionized workplaces are required to have union dues withheld from their paychecks as a condition of employment, so there's big money at stake here for unions.