EFCA and the secret ballot

The honest truth is that EFCA would NOT take the secret ballot away from workers. As the labor law stands right now, the employer has the right to choose whether to accept the outcome of a card-check process (some of them actually do) or force the workers to have a secret ballot election. If EFCA passes the workers will get to decide whether they accept the card-check or want to have a secret ballot election. The key difference here is that the choice is given to the workers rather than the employers.

Now, I can see the argument from the other side. “If you have to stand up in public and say you want a secret ballot election,” a right-winger might say, “you might as well give up your secrecy because everyone will assume you’re going to vote against the union.” Maybe, maybe not. But here’s what I have to say about that: I would rather have the choice, even if it means having to stand up and defend my beliefs, than let the boss choose for me. Sometimes democracy requires that you make an opinion and have the balls to stand up for it. If we lived under an absolute monarchy and let the King decide all the policies for us I would never have to debate politics again. I could close down this blog and spend the time I use to write these posts on something more enjoyable (like porn), and I wouldn’t have to deal with people sending me death threats or telling me “communism is teh sux you killed like 123945234 billion people”. I have to confess something to the blogosphere: I struggle with some serious anxiety issues and every time I get a comment notification in my email I cringe and can barely bring myself to open it. I’m that afraid that some stranger on the internet that I’ll never meet is going to say something mean to me. I’m quite possibly the biggest coward in the world. But you know what? Despite the sheer terror I have of being ran through the verbal ringer, I still stand up for what I believe in, even if it’s unpopular. I am glad I have the right to speak my mind, even if it will probably take 10 years off my lifespan.

And of course the following argument is, “if people have to advertise their opinions, they open themselves up to intimidation by union organizers, which is what a secret ballot is supposed to protect against in the first place.” That must be the argument of someone who hasn’t really had to work, at least not on the shop floor, a whole lot in their lives. Who are these mythical union organizers that are going around and intimidating people, trying to get them to sign up “or else”? Does anyone really believe that there’s a Jimmy Hoffa lurking around every job site? If only we were that lucky! Let me tell you something, from the viewpoint of someone who has had plenty of Joe-jobs (union and non-union). I have never once been approached by a union organizer about organizing a non-union job. Ever. In my life. Anywhere. If there are any sly, backhanded, shady-ass union organizers reading this, please come and pick on me. I would be more than willing to help you out in your endeavors to organize the world by any means necessary. Unfortunately I’m not entirely sure you exist because I’ve never seen you. You’ve certainly never intimidated or threatened me.

I’m pretty sure that no one has ever been fired for being anti-union.  No one is going to break your kneecaps or lynch you from a railroad trestle. These are, however, things that might happen to you if you take a pro-union stance. The idea that the employer needs to decide whether to honor card-check or force a secret ballot election to protect the workers is ridiculous. It’s set up that way so the employer can drag their feet and use the time they  buy to indoctrinate, intimidate, harass and fire pro-union employees in order to rig the election.

The smear campaign against EFCA that has been fueled by big business is so out of touch with reality, it turns the whole situation on its head. Right now, the employers hold all the cards, and they don’t want to give them up. Are you so afraid of having to make a decision that you’d rather not have the choice?

The left-wing view of Obama

Despite what the media tells you, Obama is not a leftist. At best I would call him “center-left”. He’s by no means a socialist or a communist. He’s not a revolutionary. He was the best chance we had to defeat the ultra-right during the last Presidential election and a hell of a lot better than McCain would have been. But he’s not going to lead us into a global communist revolution or something like that.

Everyone, except Glenn Beck maybe, realizes this. That’s not the question. The question concerns those of us who ARE socialists, leftists, or communists, and it’s this: now that we’ve got him in office, how far do we go in supporting him and criticising him? Where do we draw that line?

The Clinton years were wonderful for me, as a teen just becoming politically aware in a very conservative rural town. For the only time in my life I could talk about how lousy the President was and people agreed with me. Then came 8 years of Bush. Those were not easy times. I became more withdrawn about politics, a little more careful about who I spoke to about it. Sure, I wore a Fidel Castro tee shirt on a regular basis, but I waited for people to ask me about it and then gave them a watered-down response.

Now it’s back to a Democrat in office and for the first time in a long time I could call my dad up and bitch and moan to him, and he would bitch and moan right with me. But I don’t want to. So far I have been very quiet about my reservations regarding the Obama Administration’s policies. Because he is NOT a socialist/communist/etc. and I am, there are obviously some things I disagree with him about. Quite a few of them.

But at the same time I’m not so sure it’s time to start publicly blasting him because I’m afraid if we drag him down too far, the Pig with Lipstick will be ready to turn our country into one big JesusLand in 2012. I guess I am not entirely confident in the political education of Joe Sixpack. I think most people don’t see out of the two-party box and if they don’t like the Democrat incumbent they’ll automatically vote for the Republican (or vice versa). I seriously can’t see a lot of people saying “well, the problem with Obama is that he is not left enough.” Which is exactly what I’d like them to say, because it’s true. But our political system has been trapped in this framework where John McCain is considered centrist and Obama is the farthest left we’ve had in decades, that I don’t see a lot of people thinking outside of that box.

Then again, if we — meaning the really left left –  just sit by silently, or even cheerlead Obama, don’t we stand to lose the few people who support us? If we appear too “centrist” don’t we risk alienating our support from the left and further fragmenting the movement that way?

So there has to be a line drawn somewhere. Where is it? I don’t know. That’s not a rhetorical question. I seriously want some input on how we approach the Obama adminsitration.

Here’s what I do know. Whatever policy we take, we need to be crystal clear on our intentions and present alternatives. We cannot criticise Obama only to throw fuel on the right-wing’s fire, and whenever we support him it has to be clearly stated that it is a tactical move, and why. That’s all I’ve got.

Was the World Baseball Classic rigged?

Was the World Baseball Classic rigged? I don’t mean to say that there was cheating on the field, bribery of officials, or anything like that. But a quick look at how the brackets panned out leaves one wondering if the pools weren’t set up to intentionally give Team USA an easy ride into the semifinals and force at least one superior team out of contention before they got there.

The semi-finals of the WBC back in 2006 featured four teams: Cuba, Japan, South Korea and the Dominican Republic. In this year’s classic, three of those teams — Cuba, Japan and South Korea — fed into the same quarterfinal pool. Cuba and Japan finished second and first respectively in the last classic and the Koreans won the gold in the Beijing Olympics. These are the three top teams on the international baseball scene, and they were all stacked up one side of the bracket.

On the other hand, the way the tournament was set up, the United States would only have to potentially face one of the semifinalists from 2006 — the Dominicans — on their way to the semifinals. In fact, the highly-touted Dominican Republic collapsed in the first round and Team USA didn’t even have to play them.

So the result was two quarterfinal pools, one which looked stacked, and the other just mediocre. Pool 1 featured Cuba, Japan, South Korea and Mexico. On the other hand, Pool 2 featured the United States, Venezuela, Puerto Rico and The Netherlands. Comparing the two side-by-side we see the same three baseball powerhouses mentioned earlier all lumped up in Pool 1, while Pool 2 featured some respectable squads but no one that was predicted to advance to the finals.

The conspiracy theorist in me, which I try unsuccessfully to repress, thinks that this was a setup. The United States, which has some kind of insecurity complex and gets all butthurt if anyone says it’s not the best at anything, didn’t even make it to the semifinals of the tournament it set up in 2006. By setting the bracket in such a way that they would have an easy schedule they guaranteed themselves, at worst, a fourth place finish (they ended up third).

They also guaranteed that one of the top three teams powerhouses in the game would not advance to the semifinals. By setting up one quarterfinal pool featuring all three top teams, from which only two can advance, obviously one of them had to go. No doubt there were many who were glad to see Cuba go. I know it pained a lot of people to see their gazillion dollar Dream Team bested by a bunch of semi-pros from a poor communist country year after year, which I’m sure was part of the appeal as putting them in the same pool as Japan and South Korea.

Don’t get me wrong. I was rooting for Team USA last night all the way. But I don’t think they deserved to make the semifinals while Cuba went home. USA’s record this WBC has hardly been impressive: they beat the Netherlands soundly but just eeked out a win against Canada and split vs. Puerto Rico and Venezuela. I don’t mean to be condescending but, aside from maybe Venezuela, none of those teams are really top-tier squads. Cuba, on the other hand, had to face Japan twice in the quarterfinals, which is what did them in.

What if the pools were set up as they were in 2006? The quarterfinals could have featured a matchup of USA vs. Cuba. That could have been embarassing and threatened the chances of USA advancing. So better to throw Cuba into the “random countries” pool B.

Montana: Mobilize for EFCA!

On March 11th, the Employee Free Choice Act was re-introduced to Congress. It is currently in both houses as Senate bill S. 560 and House bill H.R. 1409. It’s time for Montanans to organize and put the heat on our representatives in Congress to pass this historic piece of legislation. Here’s how you can help:

1. Get educated. Not sure about the Employee Free Choice Act? Read up on how these bills would help workers and the American economy. Check out this fine article from the People’s Weekly World: America’s Choice: Union Yes!
2. Contact your Senators and Congressmen. The Missoula Area Central Labor Council is trying to get as many people to write letters to their representatives as possible. As of this writing, none of our people in Washington have sponsored either bill. Tell them that it’s important for them to get behind it TODAY!
   • Senator John Tester (D): You can e-mail Sen. Tester here. You can also contact one of his offices or write him. The information is available here.
   • Senator Max Baucus (D): E-mail Sen. Baucus here, or contact/write one of his offices (information available here).
   • Congressman Denny Rehberg (R): You can use the House’s e-mail search to find Congressman Rehberg’s e-mail here. Or, you can write/locate his office with the information given here.
   • If you live in another state (or are registered to vote there), you can find out if your Senators & Congresspeople are co-sponsors of these bills at the Library of Congress’ Thomas Database. If they are, write/call/fax them and thank them. If not, write them and tell them that you support workers’ right to organize and the Employee Free Choice Act.
   • If you are new at this or aren’t sure what to say, use one of the sample letters that the Missoula Central Labor Council sent me. If you want to write something more personal, great, but just remember to keep it short and sweet. It’s better if we get many people to send concise letters than a few people to send lengthy ones.
3. Get your friends, family, comrades, whoever to do the same! Big business and the ultra-right is trying to twist the truth to make EFCA sound like an assault on workers. This is an outright lie! Let’s get as many working-class people and allies to stand up and say that we want our right to organize protected.

Thanks for taking the time to get behind this. I feel like we’re on the verge of getting it through this time, but so far there have been only one Republican co-sponsors so it might be a harder fight than expected. We can’t afford to take it for granted that these bills will pass into law. Let’s get out there and mobilize for EFCA!

More unrest in Tibet

For those of you who are interested in the Tibetan Nationalist movement and it’s goings on, here’s an interesting AP article for you (full version here):

BEIJING – Hundreds of Tibetans attacked a police station and government officials in northwestern China despite heightened security, prompting the arrests Sunday of nearly 100 monks, state media reported.

…

The violence is the latest known incidence of unrest following a bomb explosion Monday in an unoccupied police station in predominantly Tibetan Ganzi prefecture in Sichuan province.

…

A former resident of the area who now lives in Dharmsala, India, said the protesters were angry because they believed the man, a 28-year-old monk named Tashi Sangpo, jumped in the river to commit suicide after fleeing.

“When Tashi was being interrogated by the officials, he asked their permission to go to the toilet. He then went out and jumped into the Yellow River,” the source said on condition of anonymity, citing fear of reprisals against his family still living in China. “The dead body is yet to be found.”

So here’s the chain of events as I understand it:

1) Tibetan nationalists plant a BOMB in a police station.

2) Chinese authorities take a nationalist into custody for questioning.

3) The suspect is allowed to use the bathroom and apparently runs off when no one is looking, jumps in the river, and (allegedly) commits suicide.

4) Protesters violently attack a police station in response to the alleged suicide.

So here’s my thoughts. First of all, this guy’s daring escape plan was pretty elaborate: ask to use the bathroom and instead run away. Obviously the notoriously brutal Chinese police were coming down pretty hard on him if he had to resort to such a daring plan as that, right? Yeah. Sure. Oh, by the way, that was sarcasm.

Second, they never recovered a body from the river so as far as any of us know he could still be alive and hiding somewhere. If I’d escaped from jail I probably wouldn’t let anyone find me. Granted, if he did commit suicide, his body is probably at the bottom of the river so it wouldn’t be a surprise that no one would find it. But still, who knows if there is any truth to the claim of his suicide?

Now, finally, the main point. We’re talking about people here who would PLANT A BOMB in a police station, and attack another. Last time I checked, blowing shit up is called terrorism. All the “Peace & Love” people with “Free Tibet” bumper stickers should probably know that they are supporting terrorists who are far from peaceful.

Let me state my position clearly. I am all in favor of national minorities demonstrating for their rights and the preservation of their culture. But there is a section of Tibetans who are very radical. They are pro-theocracy, racist nationalists who will resort to terrorism to ethnically cleanse their homeland of ethnic Chinese. I don’t hate Tibetans and I don’t want to repress or destroy their culture. I also realize that the Chinese police are not some ideally benevolent hug-fest people who can do no wrong. But the people behind the “Free Tibet” movement are not proponents of some progressive cause that we should support; their ideology and tactics are quite similar to that of the American Ku Klux Klan and it makes me sick to see people cheerleading for them.

Why Missile Defense is Destablizing

One project that got a lot of press a while ago, but has recently fallen out of the spotlight, was the United States’ Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system (commonly called just “missile defense”), the system which would shoot incoming nuclear ICBM’s out of the sky using interceptor missiles launched from Alaska. The system is now partially operational, but when it was first getting on its feet it received a lot of attention.

Most notable was the resistance of other countries to the establishment of this system, specifically Russia. Seen through the prism of the media and the obvious self-bias of most Americans, myself included, it initially seemed ridiculous that they would object. After all, these missiles are purely defensive and don’t we have the right to defend ourselves?

But the truth is that this missile defense system is dangerously destabilizing because it drastically changes the rules of nuclear warfare.

The one thing that has kept the world from nuking itself into oblivion over the past 5+ decades has been the thread of “mutually assured destruction” — any country that launches nuclear weapons against its adversaries can count on a retaliation equally as devastating. Launching nuclear weapons against another country would be suicidal. Ironically as it may seem, the proliferation of nuclear weapons to more and more countries is precisely what has kept anyone from ever using them.

The GMD missile defense system is not a direct threat to other countries, but rather, it removes some of the consequences that keeps the United States from attacking them. If this system were to ever become significant enough to intercept a large number of incoming ICBMs, the United States could nuke any country on earth without fear of retaliation. The only thing that would stop this from happening is the ethics of those involved, which are questionable. We must remember that for 8 years during the previous administration the White House was filled to the brim with evangelical Christians eager to see the impending apocalypse and probably speed the process along if possible. But for decades there have been people in Washington pushing for nuclear war, such as the genius who thought it would be a good idea to nuke the China-Korea border during the Korean war to keep the Chinese from aiding the North Koreans.

I can certainly understand why other countries fear the GMD system, and not because they’re just waiting to nuke us, but because they want us to know that they have the ability to retaliate. If we’re going to maintain a nuclear arsenal and point ICBM’s at other countries, we deserve to have them pointed back at us. On the other hand, if we are to continue to develop a sophisticated anti-missile defense system, it’s only logical that it should be accompanied by an inversely proportional reduction in our own ICBM arsenal.

Sam Webb vs. Glenn Beck

I watched Glenn Beck yesterday. I haven’t had the displeasure of watching this man for several months since I visited my Fox News loving father this past summer, and usually their was enough going on that I could zone it out. But yesterday was different because his featured guest was none other than comrade Sam Webb, National Chair of the Communist Party USA. So, for the first time ever, I sat down and actually watched Glenn Beck.

(Oh, and if you don’t set your DVR to Glenn’s show and want to watch it, you can view the clip on the Party’s website.)

The first thing that struck me, other than his propensity for hyperbole, was the ridiculous faces he makes. I guess he wants to appear animated and enthusiastic but to me he looks more like he’s trying to force a dump while constipated. But hey, people who tune in to Fox News are looking for entertainment rather than information and thoughtful commentary, so cartoonish facial expression are about par for the course I guess.

Anyway, I give Sam all the credit in the world for having the guts to go on the show even though he had to know that Glenn Beck only invited him there to try and make him look like an ass. The fact that his whole strategy for debate is to ask loaded questions that can’t be answered directly, and then cut the guest off mid-sentence with a shouting match should they find a way to explain, is evidence enough that he has no interest in a thoughtful debate and is only there to entertain his cheerleaders at home. For the record, I thought that Sam did a good job under these circumstances. He held his own in the discussion even though Glenn wouldn’t let him finish a statement. I understand that 99% of the people who watch Glenn Beck regularly were probably laughing and cheering for Glenn to verbally kick ass or something, but if the other 1% said “you know, I’m interested to hear what this guy had to say, I wish Glenn Beck wasn’t such a douchebag. Maybe I’ll go read what this Sam Webb guy has to say” I think it was a successful engagement.

The height of Beck’s stupidity became apparent when he tried to pin communists for Hitler (even though we Communists were the ones who defeated the Nazis, not to mention organize the International Brigades in the first fight against Fascism). Sam pointed out that Glenn wouldn’t let him answer a question, and that every time he had a response the conversation got diverted to Stalin or something else all together. He then stated that he didn’t hold Glenn responsible for Hitler, who arose out of capitalism. To which Beck responded that the Nazi’s were actually leftists because their name was derived from “National Socialism“, and when Sam argued against that point, Glenn told him to look it up in a dictionary.

Hey, Glenn: I can change my name to Santa Claus but I’m sure as hell not going to drop any presents down your chimney on Christmas Eve. Or a lump of coal in your stocking, even though you probably deserve one.

As an interesting aside, when Beck brought up Marx, first, and then later Stalin, a big image of each person would pop up on the screen with a caption next to it reading “Marx” or “Stalin”. Why? What did this contribute to the discussion? Were they worried that their viewers wouldn’t know who Marx and Stalin were so they should at least show them what they looked like? My guess is that the average Glenn Beck fan doesn’t have the attention span to watch two men have a conversation for ten minutes without some kind of fancy graphic to draw their attention back.

At one point Glenn asked Sam how much he donated to charity, and how much he made. Sam replied that he didn’t give to charity, he gave $500 to the People’s Weekly World, and that his salary is $26,000 a year. He turned the question around on Glenn who purposely avoided revealing his salary, despite being asked repeatedly, only answering that he gave “25%” to unnamed charities. 25% of what?

This led Sam to make one of his greatest statements of the evening (or, I should say, start to make the statement before Beck started shouting at him): that the problems of this financial crisis and capitalism in general aren’t going to be solved by philanthropy. Working people don’t want charity from rich people. Most working class people would be happy if they had the opportunity to put in an honest day’s work and get an honest day’s pay in return…an opportunity that is getting harder and harder to find. Working class people don’t want to live off the crumbs that the wealthy spit out. What we need is worker’s power in government. I think that giving $500 a year to the People’s Weekly World has the potential to do more for working class people than Glenn’s mysterious 25% donation. Glenn Beck, if your handouts make you feel better about being a stuck up corporate stooge, that’s fine. But as far as I’m concerned you can keep your charity.

Anyway, it was good to see “the boss” on TV for once. Obviously I’m not hoping for a massive amount of new recruits given the arena of debate but who knows? I thought it was great to get an opportunity for a sharp comrade like Sam Webb to cram a few words of sense in edgewise on a major media outlet like Fox News.