Occupy The Unions

If the current trend continues, within the next 15 years, private sector unions will constitute only 1% of the workforce, if that. And this has everything to do with their support for the Occupy Wall St. protest that is currently going on throughout the United States.

Forty years ago private sector unions represented nearly 30% of the American workforce. Today that number has reduced to a little less than 7% and is trending down. There are a myriad of reasons for this development: the general decrease in manufacturing jobs, the unwillingness of a more educated workforce to delegate one’s economic obligations to less educated representatives, the inability of unions organizing new members by imposing economic sanctions upon reluctant employers due to the development of a more highly technological society, and finally the ability of employers to reduce the cost of production by exporting it to foreign locales.

Private sector unions therefore are so shattered that they feel compelled to join any successful movement willing to accept them in order to regain their once dominant place in America.

The Occupy Wall St. movement constitutes college educated upper middle class white youth and therefore its leaders recognize the movements vulnerability and the real possibility of its stealth socialist agenda being revealed to the somewhat sympathetic American public. It therefore sees unions, especially private sector unions, made up of ethnic and minority constituents, as a necessary ally in order to enhance its already waning popularity. The irony of course is that ultimately when Occupy Wall St. policies and programs are crafted by highly educated, white, socialist activists they will have little to do with the expansion of private sector union membership.

Christian Fundamentalism

Liberal/socialist dogma contends that Christian Fundamentalism is atavistic, a throwback to some pagan past, which our modern society must keenly resist.

It has now become fashionable in the climes of the Upper West Side in NYC or the summer vacation locals where liberal/socialists imbibe and graze such as the Hamptons on Long Island, Cape Cod or the Berkshires in Massachusetts to conflate the Tea Party movement with Christian Fundamentalism. This was hardly unanticipated since Christian Fundamentalists and a majority of Tea Party supporters are against unfettered abortion which is also for liberal/socialists one of the pillars of their dogma along with the anodyne of social justice, a diminished military and a powerful and all-consuming central government. So for liberal/socialists with the addition of the Tea Party movement Christian Fundamentalism takes on a far more sinister religious component and an expansion of its political base. When liberal/socialist pundits complain about the Tea Party movement what they are really concerned about is the enlargement of Christian Fundamentalism as a political force in America.

Isn’t ironic therefore that liberal/socialists correctly view Christian Fundamentalism as an impediment to performing their pagan rituals such as the killing of human fetuses, homo-sexual license along with the pagan celebrations such as the various seasonal bacchanalias all of which Judeo-Christian morality, a fundamental tenet of Christian Fundamentalism, is ignored.

Cheese Heads Have The Final Word

There is something exciting and enticingly different about our beloved country. And this is being demonstrated right now in Madison, Wisconsin.

In 1963 after nearly 100 years of organized labor’s efforts in the state of Wisconsin the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Workers for the first time in the country gained for its public employee members the right to collectively bargain with respect to their terms and conditions of employment. At the time there were those that expressed concern that it was analogous to putting the wolf in the hen house. Wisconsin voters however were undeterred in their belief that since private sector unions already had the right to collectively bargain with their employers since 1936 under the National Labor Relations Act the time was ripe to provide the same rights to public sector unions. Within a decade nearly 40% of all public sector employees throughout the country gained the right to collective bargaining.

Now we have come full circle. Yesterday, after nearly half a century of collective bargaining in the public sector, the state Senate in Wisconsin repealed this right by a vote of 18 to 1. There wasn’t a Democrat in the Senate chamber since they had fled Wisconsin and are currently ensconced in Illinois believing that this would deny the Senate a quorum prohibiting the Senate to vote on the bill to repeal. This legal technicality didn’t work and now these AWOL Democrats are claiming that democracy no longer exists in the State of Wisconsin. Union protesters have converged upon the capital angry and frustrated unwilling to accept the inevitable.

Those who expressed caution in 1963 have now been proved correct. The wolf has been eating the hens and the hen house is nearly empty. Today the bill goes to the Assembly and then to Governor Scott Walker for his signature.

So what does all this mean to the great American experiment? Unlike China or Russia which have autocratic governments, or even seemingly democratic countries such as France or Germany the American system of democracy has the American people providing the first word and the last word. Today, in Madison, Wisconsin, notwithstanding the anger and anguish of the public sector employee protesters, the American people will have the last word. Now what’s wrong with that?

The Third Rail

If Social Security and Medicare are the third rail of domestic affairs, home grown militant Islam seems to be the third rail of foreign affairs.

This week the House Homeland Security Committee, chaired by Congressman Peter King will be looking into the radicalization of young followers by al-Qaeda right here in America. This will not be the first time that extremists have infiltrated the American homeland. In March 1936, the German American Bund, an organization which supported a radicalized Nazi Germany was established in Buffalo, New York. The Bund held rallies throughout the country with Nazi insignia and procedures such as the Hitler salute, and attacked the Roosevelt administration, Jewish influences, and alleged Moscow-directed trade unions. The FBI was all over this organization and at the beginning of the war with Germany in December 1941 the FBI knew enough about its various chapters throughout the country that within a very short time it arrested its leaders and shut them all down. Americans breathed a lot easier.

The Jewish Defense League or JDL is a Jewish nationalist organization founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane in New York City in 1968. JDL’s self-described purpose was to protect Jews from local manifestations of Anti-Semitism. The group has bombed Arab and Soviet properties in the United States. The FBI therefore characterized it as right-wing terrorist group holding it responsible for the killing of at least one American and a plot to kill Issa U.S. Congressman Darrell in 2001. Even today the JDL is alive and well.

And during the Civil War America had a crop of southern radicals, spies and downright assassins, John Wilkes Booth being the most famous.

My point is that America throughout its history has had an abundant share of very nasty, dangerous, ideological, radicalized, unrepentant murderers. If Congressman King wants to investigate Muslim communities and whether al-Qaeda, America being its sworn enemy, is attempting to radicalize young, vulnerable Muslims, Muslims should take no offense. In fact they should assist in the process for no other reason than for the protection of their own children. Instead of Congressman King’s investigation being a third rail for America, let it be third rail for al-Qaeda.

Bad Equation; Broken System & Common Sense

Let’s see if I got this straight. Public school teachers are out protesting throughout the country that state governments want to freeze wages, reduce benefits and limit their right to collective bargaining because the states are running out money. While at the same time our schools have been failing for decades.

The American people are catching on to the fact that the public school system overall is a failed system. Oh, there are pockets of success, especially in the rich white communities that surround our major cities. But generally speaking we are not educating our children. And truth be told we can’t blame our hard working dedicated teachers for this. Rather it’s the system which we, as Americans, have chosen. For example, why do we insist that where the student resides determines what particular public school he attends? Why do we spend incredible amounts of money to reduce class size when there is no objective evidence that a reduced class size improves a child’s ability to learn? Why do we insist on giving teachers an increase in wages for obtaining an advanced degree when it has been clearly shown that there is no relation between having an advanced degree and better teaching skills? And why are school systems saddled with a seniority system that limits them in their ability to lay off teachers based on merit? A seniority system may make some sense when dealing with labor which is fungible such as in manufacturing but it makes no sense in education when skill is the key ingredient to better learning not length of service. Oh, and one final question why do public sector teacher unions have anything to say about issues that affect children’s education, especially when they are legally bound to represent only the interest of their members, the teachers?

Now that resources are limited American parents are beginning to ask an even more important question about the delivery of education to their children: Why do we have a system of education that is failing our children and has government and public sector teacher unions collude in extracting more and more money from the American taxpayer to support it? By public school teachers protesting they have put a target on their own backs causing the American people to suspect that public sector teacher unions must be removed from the equation and replaced with common sense.

Public Sector Employees In Shocking Protest

This Saturday public sector union employees were protesting in most of the most of major cities throughout the country. And holy of holies, they were protesting against the American taxpayer!

This is Roger Madon and this is what I think.

There was a time in our country when there weren’t public sector union employees. In fact there was a time in our country when there weren’t many public sector employees at all. Teachers, police officers and firemen, for example, were paid by individuals or paid by the government to private sector companies which hired private sector employees to perform the agreed upon service. That was at a time when 90% of all employees were working as farmhands when our cities were small and there were few workers available. All of this changed after the Civil War. Our cities grew, they grew fast and they grew in both size and complexity. For a city the size of New York, for example, which has 16 million people to serve during a working day, to have a private company provide fire retardation service just doesn’t make much sense. The government now provides for our pedagogical, criminal justice and firefighting services along with other numerous services which at one time were provided by the private sector.

So far, so good. But how did unions get involved in this? In the early part of the 20th century progressives, otherwise known as socialists, convinced the American people that public sector employees were an abused and discriminated group of workers and therefore should have the benefit of professionals who knew how to deal with those who hired, managed and fired these public sector employees. American voters however didn’t truly appreciate the fact that the managers who were assigned to negotiate the collective bargaining agreements with these public sector unions didn’t have their own skin in the game. The money with which they ultimately agreed to provide these public sector employees didn’t belong them. So it didn’t matter how much money the managers agreed through collective bargaining to pay these public sector employees they still went home with their own paychecks intact. The public FISC did not belong to the managers so there was no incentive for them to resist the unions’ demands. On top of this the politicians having received large contributions from these public sector unions encouraged the managers to shut up and agree to the unions’ demands. Now the American people have finally caught on to this corrupt practice and they are mad as hell and they want it stopped. Personally, I don’t think the Saturday protestors will have a chance on Monday.

This is Roger Madon and that’s what I think.

When Public Unions Vote For A Pay Decrease

The labor movement as we know it began with the passage in 1935 of the National Labor Relations Act and ended 75 years later with Congressional and state elections held on November 4, 2010. How in the world did that happen?

This is Roger Madon and this is what I think.

When I began practicing labor law in 1973 labor unions had organized nearly 25% of the private sector workforce. Therefore one out of every 4 employees in America were members of a union. Their wages were above average, they had job security and they had health and pension benefits. Getting a union job in America in 1973 meant you were set for life. In 1973 workers in the public sector had just been getting their right to organize and represented only a small fraction of public employees throughout the United States. Americans in 1973 didn’t quite understand that public sector unions were very different from private sector unions in that when a public sector union sits down with their members’ employer, to negotiate terms and conditions of employment, a board of education, the mayor’s office, a state agency, unlike their private sector union brothers and sisters, they were negotiating for a piece of the public fisc, in effect a piece of the tax base.

By November last year the world had changed. Private sector unions represented only 7% of the work force while public sector unions represented nearly 40% of all public sector employees. Moreover public sector unions gained a stranglehold on municipal and state treasuries throughout America. Americans were being told by their mayors and governors that their cities and states were going bankrupt and that the direct cause for this was the corrupt relationship between public sector unions money going into the pockets of their state and local politicians. Therefore when the American people went to the polls last year they were determined to stop this deal with devil and voted for the political representatives that promised to put an end to it.

The howling, the screaming, the yelling by public sector employees in state capitals throughout the Midwest and which the American people are viewing on their television screens is the result of 37 years of public sector unions, with the assistance of corrupt politicians, having grabbed large junks of taxpayer money with no concern for the consequences of the American people. What we are now observing is the American taxpayer in revolt the consequences of which will not fully be known for another decade. But what is certain the labor movement in America has changed forever.

This is Roger Madon and that’s what I think.

Who Will Control The Government?

For the first time in history the American people are learning something about our political system that frightens them. And if they don’t do something about it now it will change who we are as a nation and as a people forever.

This is Roger Madon and this is what I think.

During the Great Depression Congress passed the Railway Labor Act, which ultimately covered all railroad and airline employees and the National Labor Relations Act which covered all other private sector employees. During the 1960’s various states throughout the country passed laws which provided public sector employees, teachers, police officers, firemen, the same rights as those which the National Labor Relations Act provided private sector employees.

Today unions in the private sector represent only 7% of the entire American workforce. However public sector unions represent nearly 90% of all public sector employees throughout America. When public sector employees first gained the right to be represented their wages were substantially lower than those employees working in the private sector. The reason for this was that public sector employees traded lower pay for greater job security, namely, protection from being fired or being laid off. Today public sector employees have higher wages and far better health and pension benefits than the rest of the country. How did this happen? Well it’s quite simple. Wages and benefits of public sector employees are controlled by politicians, governors and state legislators, usually Socialist Democrats, while hundreds of millions of dollars are paid into their campaign coffers by public sector unions who get this money through union dues required to be deducted from their members paychecks. Imagine. Public sector unions negotiate in behalf of their members with the very employers which they are paying to support their political existence. Is there anything more corrupt than this? If this occurred in the private sector people would be going to jail.

Now you understand what is going on in Wisconsin. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker wants to pass a law which will pull the plug on this corrupt relationship between public sector unions and the Socialist Democratic Party by limiting public sector negotiations to wages only and make the payment of union dues voluntary. Public sector unions and even President Obama himself want the American people to believe that this has to do with an “assault on unions.” By arguing this their purpose is to obscure the real issue: Who will control government, the American taxpayer or public sector unions?

This is Roger Madon and that’s what I think.

Progressive Socialist Barack Obama

“Sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never hurt me.” That was true when I was a kid growing up in Ozone Park but that’s not going to be true for President Barak Obama when he runs for re-election in 2012.

This is Roger Madon and this is what I think.

When it comes to politics names can be very important. For example, try running for public office on the Upper Westside in Manhattan with a sign that identifies you as a Republican. You just might get home alive. Voters on the Upper Westside identify themselves as progressives. This was the name Henry Wallace, an undeconstructed Socialist, gave to his party when he ran for President in 1948 against Harry Truman. I want you to appreciate that even though there were a lot of Socialist sympathizers in America at that time, especially on the Upper Westside, there was no way Wallace could even get enough petitions to get on the ballot if he called himself what he really was, a Socialist. And I’m being kind.

Or take George McGovern, he received the nomination from the Democratic Party in 1972 when he ran against Richard Nixon. McGovern was a delegate to Wallace’s Socialist Party, oops, I forgot, Progressive Party in 1948. However by 1972 no one running for public office wanted to be called a progressive, including McGovern, since that would mean you’re a Socialist. Oh yes, names are very important.

Now in the 2008 presidential campaign Barak Obama wiggled and waggled. He too gave himself the name of Progressive along with Hillary Clinton. Now the voters who lived on the Upper Westside knew exactly what that meant. But the rest of the electorate was clueless, especially the starry-eyed, twitterers below the age of 30. To them the name Henry Wallace could be a companion beer to Sam Adams for all they knew.

So where does all take us? Well it takes us to the subject of who or what Barack Obama really is. And those chumps who get their underwear in a twist about whether he was born in the United States are really being distracted from the important fact: President Barak Obama is exactly what he names himself, a progressive or what the Upper Westsiders know him to be, a Henry Wallace Socialist.

This is Roger Madon and that’s what I think.

Stealth Socialism With Barack Obama At The Helm

Today in the Wall Street Journal President Barack Obama wrote what can only be considered an announcement entitled “Toward a 21st – Century Regulatory System.” Today the Socialist-in-Chief has finally come clean.

This is Roger Madon and this is what I think.

Socialists in America know that the vast majority of the American people have rejected policies when they were clearly identified as socialist. Socialists have therefore done everything in their power, including changing their name to Progressives, to mask their structured policies and programs in such a way as to obscure their true intention, namely for government to direct and control capital, income and benefits.

The most useful stealth apparatus that Socialists have used over the last 40 years has been community organizing. Socialists knowing that even the most vulnerable in our society would reject socialist programs organize and infiltrate neighborhood groups whose civic needs are great. And when they aren’t, Socialists manufacture them. Before entering into politics, by his own admission, Barack Obama received extensive training in community organizing by various Socialist institutions. While living in Chicago he associated with numerous well known Socialists such as the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers. All this is admitted and well documented.

Now President Obama in his Wall Street Journal article today argues that the American people have not been served well by the cacophony of Federal agencies which Congress has created over these last 100 years. He argues that the rules they have established, without Congressional approval mind you, are burdensome and in many cases do not do that for which they were promulgated. So, in his article, he announces the signing of an executive order which, he claims will remedy this problem by providing these unelected bureaucrats with even more power while narrowing the constitutional powers of our elected officials in Congress with respect to oversight and control. President Obama, by signing this executive order, has provided the American people Sarah Palin’s “Death panels” on steroids. And all this is presented within the context of a seeming benign Wall Street Journal article. You have before you America Exhibit A in stealth socialism.

This is Roger Madon and that’s what I think.

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