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Because organizing means talking to one another | The Bellman
Shout out to zwichenzug, who is doing an amazing job of rounding up what is in the "blogosphere" regarding organized and unorganized labor. Go to the site for the link fest, but here is the content:
It hurts me to do this, but this week's featured post is from the odious Mickey Kaus. Why? Because Kaus managed something almost unheard of in the world of labor blogging. He started a conversation that other blogs took up.
Mickey Kaus wrote:
Isn't abolishing the notorious Davis-Bacon Act on Reed's wish list too? This obscure law, which essentially requires that all government construction projects pay "prevailing"--i.e. union--wages, offers the ur-case of a policy that benefits a powerful Democratic special interest (the Building & Construction Trades Department of the AFL-CIO) while undermining the general interest in affirmative government the Democratic party is supposed to be pursuing (by making virtually everything the government does--including building low-cost housing--unnecessarily expensive). |link|
* My vote for best rejoinder goes to Matthew Yglesias for pointing out the connection between a strong labor movement and the existence of political support the very projects which Kaus claims are undermind by laws like Davis-Bacon.
* Kaus's reply to Yglesias was predictably tendentious, relying mostly on the argument that the comparative success of Clinton as compared to Mondale shows that there's no reason for Democrats to pursue policies favored by their constituency.
* Nathan Newman countered some of the more ridiculous Kausisms by reminding us that the Clinton Administration was a pretty good friend to labor.
* Which, in turn, prompted Brad Plumer to write that the real lesson of Clintonism, "is that without a pervasively strong labor movement, any pro-worker rules or regulations or legislation that get passed by a liberal president or Congress can easily be repealed by the next conservative president."
There's more, but you get the idea.
Elsewhere:
* At Confined Space, Jordan Barab has the goods on the Bush Administration's latest move in their ongoing campaign to eviscerate OSHA.
* Complaints about SEIU's tactics in the ongoing nurses strike in San Francisco can be found at Rosenblog.com
* Josh Eidelson argues that pursuit of card check recognition is the right tactic for unions, since that's their best way to avoid the jurisdiction of Bush's NLRB.
* At The Blotter, Beth Hawkins makes the case that airlines have been turned Federal bankruptcy law into an all-purpose union busting tool.
* Chuckdawg makes some good points about the ways in which the individualistic ethic serves corporate interests.
* Jonathan Tasini has the latest rumors about who might be jumping from the AFL-CIO to the Change to Win Coalition, and also breaks the news that CTW will spend 75% of its budget on organizing.
* Future of the Union is the place to go for blogging about internal UAW politics.
* Last but not least, Citizen Chris is doing the dirty work. Read his first hand account of an evening at the phone bank. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Shout out to zwichenzug, who is doing an amazing job of rounding up what is in the "blogosphere" regarding organized and unorganized labor. Go to the site for the link fest, but here is the content:
It hurts me to do this, but this week's featured post is from the odious Mickey Kaus. Why? Because Kaus managed something almost unheard of in the world of labor blogging. He started a conversation that other blogs took up.
Mickey Kaus wrote:
Isn't abolishing the notorious Davis-Bacon Act on Reed's wish list too? This obscure law, which essentially requires that all government construction projects pay "prevailing"--i.e. union--wages, offers the ur-case of a policy that benefits a powerful Democratic special interest (the Building & Construction Trades Department of the AFL-CIO) while undermining the general interest in affirmative government the Democratic party is supposed to be pursuing (by making virtually everything the government does--including building low-cost housing--unnecessarily expensive). |link|
* My vote for best rejoinder goes to Matthew Yglesias for pointing out the connection between a strong labor movement and the existence of political support the very projects which Kaus claims are undermind by laws like Davis-Bacon.
* Kaus's reply to Yglesias was predictably tendentious, relying mostly on the argument that the comparative success of Clinton as compared to Mondale shows that there's no reason for Democrats to pursue policies favored by their constituency.
* Nathan Newman countered some of the more ridiculous Kausisms by reminding us that the Clinton Administration was a pretty good friend to labor.
* Which, in turn, prompted Brad Plumer to write that the real lesson of Clintonism, "is that without a pervasively strong labor movement, any pro-worker rules or regulations or legislation that get passed by a liberal president or Congress can easily be repealed by the next conservative president."
There's more, but you get the idea.
Elsewhere:
* At Confined Space, Jordan Barab has the goods on the Bush Administration's latest move in their ongoing campaign to eviscerate OSHA.
* Complaints about SEIU's tactics in the ongoing nurses strike in San Francisco can be found at Rosenblog.com
* Josh Eidelson argues that pursuit of card check recognition is the right tactic for unions, since that's their best way to avoid the jurisdiction of Bush's NLRB.
* At The Blotter, Beth Hawkins makes the case that airlines have been turned Federal bankruptcy law into an all-purpose union busting tool.
* Chuckdawg makes some good points about the ways in which the individualistic ethic serves corporate interests.
* Jonathan Tasini has the latest rumors about who might be jumping from the AFL-CIO to the Change to Win Coalition, and also breaks the news that CTW will spend 75% of its budget on organizing.
* Future of the Union is the place to go for blogging about internal UAW politics.
* Last but not least, Citizen Chris is doing the dirty work. Read his first hand account of an evening at the phone bank. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
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