Forum Post: Going Postal on Trade Union Labor ~ The Class War on the Labor Front
Posted 11 years ago on Feb. 7, 2013, 7:04 a.m. EST by WSmith
(2698)
from Cornelius, OR
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
Going postal, yea verily | Prairie2 News | Wednesday, February 6, 2013
SIGN THE PETITION: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/save-post-office/VjdYZTKl
The USPS has announced the end of Saturday mail delivery starting in August. It's not clear that they can legally do this, since Congress has oversight of the Constitutionally mandated service, and they haven't approved such a move. The Republicans are loving it, so you know this is bad national policy on its face. The simple fact is that the Republicans want to destroy the postal unions and privatize still more of the public infrastructure.
The financial problems the Postal Service have were entirely manufactured by the Republican lame duck Congress in 2006 when they mandated 75 years worth of pension and medical benefits to be paid in just 10 years. Workers that are yet to be born are having their retirements paid for, otherwise the semi-autonomous agency would have been averaging a more than 2 billion dollar annual surplus.
The big lie is that the PO is suffering from lack of volume, they are still moving more mail than 25 years ago when they were making money. People who study these things aren't predicting volume to decrease by any substantial amount from this point. Some things simply need to physically delivered, why do you think the Republicans want to privatize it? Do you think they intend to lose money? Do you know where the big commission is for a car salesman? It's not from selling you a new car, it's from 'stealing' your trade-in (that's what they call it at the dealership, 'stealing'). The Republicans are telling you how bad your 'used' Post Office is, but they'll take it off your hands. You'll soon be driving a shiny new lemon you can't afford to buy stamps for.
Another lie is that Postal Service has a high cost of operations, in fact postage in the US is far lower than the rest of the world. Postage rates are set by a commission, but the Congressional restrictions on increases are making it impossible for the rates to be set properly.
There is a long list of goods and services that Post Offices could sell that would be beneficial to the public and make money, but Congress restricts what they can do by law. Privatized mail delivery would eventually mean no delivery in rural areas or even in so-called urban areas. We've got to run it like a 'business', don't you know.
Laying off the carriers who do Saturday deliveries, who are mostly part-time employees, will in theory save $2 billion. It will also create a $2 billion hole in the economy for no good reason and make life more difficult for the average citizen. There is a reason they put the Postal Service in the Constitution. Originally the framers wanted to encourage newspaper delivery as well as commerce, but it's already to the point where a newspaper can take two days to arrive, and weekly 'news' magazines are more like historical journals by the time they get to your mailbox. Further cuts are simply going to make that worse and bring the system crashing down.
If the Republicans get their way we will return to a period before the Constitution when there was no Postal Service. But that would be consistent with their goal of making everything 'pre-Constitutional', and 'pre-Manga Carta' for that matter. Habeas Corpus? 'Nay, I thinketh not'. Those English Common Law concepts in our legal system need to go too, those are so 400 AD. - Leviticus though, that's a keeper. Stoning for everything and we mean everything. Except witchcraft, then only burning will do. We are Republicans, and we know with certainty that a witch is heavier than a wooden duck. Yea verily. http://www.prairie2.com/
Republicans Applaud The Slow Death Of The Postal Sevice; Post Master General Pat Donahoue Responds:
Video: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/45755822/ns/msnbc-the_ed_show/#50725523
Read more: http://www.randirhodes.com/pages/homework.html?feed=364336&article=10786209#ixzz2KHU04j6l
SIGN THE PETITION: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/save-post-office/VjdYZTKl
Look out. They are starting with the post office, but these loons would really like to privatize everything. So, unless you want to pay a toll to go down your street someday, you better start standing up against this crap. Governments exist for a reason, that reason is to govern and provide for the general welfare of the people, not to merely provide ways for capitalists to make profits.
Halleluiah!
Spread the word!!
They want to privatize everything! We have to pay just to live!!
The Class War has a profit motive!!
Why We Must Rescue the U.S. Postal Service From the Brink of Death
The post office can still be saved, but its grave has been dug
February 6, 2013 | AlterNet / By David Morris
“When the post office is closed, the flag comes down. When the human side of government closes its doors, we’re all in trouble” -- Jennings Randolph, senator from West Virginia 1958-'85
For the post office the end game is on. This year, the U.S. Postal Service will close half its processing centers. By late spring a first-class letter will take one to three days longer to arrive at its destination. By the end of this summer, Saturday delivery is scheduled to end. Over the next year the post office plans to close over 3,000 local post offices while slashing some 220,000 of its 650,000 employees.
Looking back, it is easy to distinguish three discrete stages in the 221-year life of the Postal Service.
Stage 1: Post Office Has a Broad Public Mandate
The first stage began in 1792 when President George Washington signed legislation making the United States Post Office a cabinet-level department. It was a public institution with a clear mandate: to enable universal low-cost access to information. In its early years this led it to initiate free and low-cost delivery of newspapers, and eventually, to offer a special rate for periodicals and books.
The post office helped tie the country together physically as well as intellectually. Post roads were essential to the early development of the country. Rural free delivery established in the late 19th century, spurred improvements in roads and bridges since the post office would not offer service where roads were bad. In the 20th century, mail contracts underwrote the embryonic aviation industry.
In the 1820s, when private companies began charging a handsome fee to deliver information faster, enabling cotton speculators to make a killing on the difference in prices at the docks of New York and the plantations of Alabama, the post office responded by establishing its own express mail service. The private sector complained. A congressional investigation concluded “(T)he Government should not hesitate to adopt means…to place the community generally in possession of the same intelligence at as early a period as practicable.”
In the 1840s, when the private sector began siphoning off the most profitable mail routes, leaving to the post office only money-losing routes, Congress gave the post office a monopoly, enabling it to dramatically reduce the price of postage and initiate free door-to-door delivery in cities. In 1858, the first mailboxes appeared on street corners.
At the end of the 19th century, when private parcel companies began treating their customers badly, the post office introduced parcel post. The competition resulted in reduced prices and improved customer service.
In the 1890s and early 1900s, financial panics and the closures of hundreds of banks led the post office to introduce postal savings banks. At its peak after World War II postal banks had over 4 million accounts and deposits exceeding $3.3 billion.
Stage 2: Post Office Becomes a Public-Private Institution
But after World War II, the post office’s inability to borrow money and invest long-term coupled with the dramatic increase in the volume of mail put an increasing strain on its system. In 1966 the mail system in Chicago literally collapsed under an avalanche of mail, leading LBJ to appoint a commission to study the future of the post office. The commission’s chairman, retired CEO Frederick R. Kappel, envisioned a more corporatized post office. Indeed, in testimony before Congress Kappel revealed his ultimate goal: “If I could, I’d make (the post office) a private enterprise…and the country would be better off financially. But I can’t get from here to there.”
In the l950s, low-paid postal workers often moonlighted to make ends meet. It took 21 years for an entry-level worker to reach the maximum wage level. Strikes were illegal. Workers demonstrated, lobbied and even held prayer services to publicize their plight.
In 1970, Congress voted itself a pay raise while stalling postal wage increases, sparking a wildcat strike by letter carriers in New York City. Other postal workers honored the picket lines and the strike spread throughout the nation. President Nixon sent in 25,000 National Guard and Army troops to attempt, unsuccessfully for the most part, to sort and deliver the mail.
The Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 was a compromise between management and labor. Unions were given the right to collectively bargain over wages and hours and working conditions for the first time. Wages increased significantly. For the first time, postal work became a middle-class job for hundreds of thousands, many of them minorities.
For management the Act gave the new quasi-public corporation now called the United States Postal Service (USPS) the right to borrow money and make long-term investments. In return Congress eliminated taxpayer subsidies, which amounted to 25 percent of the budget in 1971 (about $18 billion in current dollars) and demanded the USPS act more like a business.
Largely as a result of huge capital improvements, productivity soared. In 1966 Fortune magazine credited USPS with improving its service more than any other company or agency in America. In 1997, audits by Price Waterhouse found on-time delivery at 92%. The U.S. Postal Service was by far the most popular public agency. And between 1995 and 1997, postal operations produced a surplus of $4.6 billion.
But the tension between the public mission of the post office and the demand that it act more like a business, continued to grow. Management tried to close post offices and raised the possibility of ending Saturday service as early as the 1980s, leading Congress to pass laws forbidding the latter and significantly restricting the former. Under President Clinton, the Postal Service began contracting out services. Today, contracts comprise about 20 percent of its operating budget or $12 billion.
In 2000, the USPS began a formal partnership with FedEx and later UPS. Fed Ex provides air service for USPS parcels domestically as well as providing international logistics. In 2011, Alan Robinson, executive director of the Center for the Study of the Postal Market, determined that USPS delivers 30.4 percent of FedEx ground shipments. The USPS Fed Ex partnership is known as SmartPost. The USPS-UPS partnership is known as UPS Basic or UPS Mail innovations, and may be the fastest growing parts of their businesses.
Stage 3: The Dismantling of the Post Office
The third and current part of the life of the post office began in 2006 with the passage of the misleadingly titled Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act.
A bit of background is necessary to understand this historic piece of legislation. In 2001 the GAO placed the Postal Service on its high-risk list because of concerns about its economic future given the poor management and labor relations and increased competition from electronic mail. At the request of Congress and GAO, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) conducted a review of the Postal Service’s liability to the Civil Service Retirement System. Almost everyone expected OPM to discover huge liabilities. Instead, it concluded that USPS had overfunded its pension plan by more than $70 billion. In 2003, GAO raised the estimated overfunding to more than $100 billion.
In a sane world, USPS would have been able to use these funds to expand services, pay down existing debt and invest in new technology. But Washington is anything but sane. The USPS is considered part of the unified budget used for scoring purposes to estimate any legislation’s impact on the deficit. If USPS were to tap into its surplus funds it would increase the overall federal deficit.
For three years Congress debated what to do. Finally, in 2006 it passed a law that requires the Postal Service to pre-pay its health insurance fund by depositing an additional $5 billion a year for the next 10 years into the insurance fund to offset for the phantom accounting deficit under the unified budget. No other public or private agency is required to do anything remotely comparable.
In 2007, unsurprisingly, USPS suffered a $5 billion deficit. Today that deficit is over $20 billion and is used to justify the death of the post office by amputation of its work force, its processing centers and its local offices. The 2006 law also specifically prohibited USPS from offering new products that would create “an unfair or otherwise inappropriate competitive advantage for the Postal Service….”
Elaine C. Kamarck of Harvard Kennedy School of Government has observed the essential contradiction in Congress’ attitude toward the post office from the very beginning of its new life as a corporation. “Congress wants it to be self-sufficient but doesn’t want it to make money.” Kamarck continues:
CONTINUED: http://www.alternet.org/economy/why-we-must-rescue-us-postal-service-brink-death?paging=off
SIGN THE PETITION: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/save-post-office/VjdYZTKl
Thanks, signed.
Would it surprise you to find ALEC involved?
http://becauseican-2old2care.blogspot.com/2011/09/is-congress-killing-post-office-for.html
http://www.vltp.net/aleckoch-cabal-pursuing-privatization-postal-service-ups-fedex/
Really good stuff!
Funnily enough, not one article I read mentioned the Bush admin, FORCING the USPS to pay all that money 75 years in advance.
It was just him kicking the family dog on the way out the door.
Welcome to the Koch induced memory hole.
I hope that dog gets a chance to bite back.
I hope so too, but it's a deep, deep memory hole and there are few people even today that even know about that 75 years in advance requirement Bush FORCED on them.
Say it loud and say it proud...
And Tweet the shit out of it!!!
Ed Shultz and Rachel Maddow did shows on the subject.
And the whole email hacking thing revealed some dirty dirt!
Also signed. Save the postal workers jobs!!
This is obvious and yet widely misunderstood sabotage, our entire employment sector is under the same anti-union anti-labor attack.
Repubs changed the law regarding the postal worker pension so that they would be unable to afford the cost and come up short in the budget.
AKA GOP Sabotage!!
Support postal workers
Exactly! Anti worker sabotage.
And we should also work to expand Organized Labor to all work places!
One of the reasons we are having such a hard time now is that when we had more and stronger unions we didn't push to expand. We were short sighted and a little selfish. Let's learn from those mistakes.
I can't with our failure to expand. I would submit though that there has been a concerted effort by corp 1% plutocrats to destroy unions through outsourcing, and other means in collusion with republicans for 40 years.
The current effort is state level public worker union busting like Wi, and Oh by repubs, as well as postal unions by repubs in congress.
Growing union membership is critical. That must be a high priority ifwe want to correct the economic inequity.
ALEC's at it again.
ALEC's always at it.
ALEC and it's supporters are unafraid to lie through their teeth.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/101655097
The Post Office is not broke--and it hasn't taken any of our tax money since 1971
Consider $.50. What does that buy these days? Not a cuppa joe--that'll cost you two bucks at Starbucks, and even McDonald's wants a dollar for a small. Nor will it get you a newspaper, a pack of gum, a shoeshine, or a bus token. And Walmart, which promotes itself as the palace of cheap, sells practically nothing for a half-buck.
There's one place, though, where you can get a steal of a deal for a fifty-cent piece: your local post office. Put down two quarters or five dimes there, and you'll get a first-class stamp in return... and you'll even get a nickel in change. Slap that 45-cent stamp on a letter, drop it in the mailbox, and our nation's postal workers will move your missive across town or clear across country--hand delivering it to any address in America within three days (42 percent arrive the very next day, and 27 percent more get where we want them to go within two days).
Each day, six days a week, letter carriers traverse four million miles toting an average of 563 million pieces of mail, reaching the very doorsteps of our individual homes and workplaces in every single community in America. They ride snowmobiles to reach iced-in villages, for example, fly bush planes into outback wilderness areas that have no roads, run Mail Boats out to remote islands in places like Maine and Washington state, and even use mules on an eight-mile trail to bring mail to the 500 members of the Havasupai tribe of Native Americans living on the floor of the Grand Canyon.
From the gated enclaves and penthouses of the ueber-wealthy to the inner-city ghettos and rural colonias of America's poorest families, the US Postal Service literally delivers. All that for 45 cents. And if you've written the wrong address or your recipient can't be found, you'll get your letter or package back for no charge. The USPS is an unmatched bargain, a civic treasure, a genuine public good that links all people and commu-nities into one nation.
Answering the lies that privatization zealots and FedEx are peddling
Read more: http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/node/2927#.URST55bK0mQ
Don't you know?
The plan is to leave the USPS with all that unprofitable door to door delivery, after it's been stripped of all the efficiencies it has elsewhere..
I think they will delay until that pension is as full of money as it can get and take it via private take over. You want door to door, pay for it!! $5 first class stamps!!!
That's a possibility too, but after they've raided that FAT pension fund.
Keep in mind, it's almost half full now.
It's what they do.
They are totally doing it and we are watching!! Where are the torches and pitch forks!!!
Join the march to support the post office.
http://nysaflcio.org/usaforsixday/
(bumped up to remind the forum)
lets be honest the postal service has problems outside of the pensions and all that. however, the republicans just wanna kill it. not fix it.
No, if RepubliCons in Congress weren't restricting, handicapping and sabotaging the Postal Service it would be thriving while it gave some of the best and efficient services in the business world. Cons want to privatize it and kill the Union. This is part of the Class War we are losing.
Do We Really Want to Live Without the Post Office?
By Jesse Lichtenstein | Esquire, Published in the February 2013 issue
The postal service is not a federal agency. It does not cost taxpayers a dollar. It loses money only because Congress mandates that it do so. What it is is a miracle of high technology and human touch. It's what binds us together as a country.
PLUS: The Petition to Save the Post Office Now
AND: The American Post Office's Painted History
The letter is mailed from Gold Hill, Oregon.
The eleven hundred residents of this lingering gold-rush town, mostly mechanics and carpenters and retail clerks in other places, wake with the sun and end their day with a walk to the aluminum mailbox bolted to a post at the edge of their yard. In between, Carrie Grabenhorst heads out of town on highway 99, follows the Rogue River, and turns right on Sardine Creek Road. She turns left at a large madrone tree and heads up a quarter mile of dirt road, takes the right fork, goes past the sagging red barn to a white clapboard house with green trim, where she takes a dog biscuit from her pocket and offers it to the large golden retriever. It's a Monday, about 2:00 p.m. The dog stops barking. This is the usual peace, negotiated after thousands of visits over eighteen years.
CONTINUED:
Read more: Post Office Business Trouble - Why We Should Save the Post Office - Esquire http://www.esquire.com/features/post-office-business-trouble-0213#ixzz2KJjGcpG7
i didn't say to privatize it. i said it has some problems that need to be addressed.
Yes, RepubliCons in Congress!!
Postal support
UPD FYI
http://www.woai.com/news/local/story/Why-did-Congress-stop-the-US-Postal-Service-cost/rVOtDTWBDUOM5WOhm6ZMCQ.cspx
And a petition
http://act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=7636#
Now private unions targeted.
Support decent hard working Americans.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/14686-on-the-news-with-thom-hartmann-wisconsins-private-sector-unions-are-under-attack-and-more
Support decent hard working Americans.
Join the march to save the post office.
http://nysaflcio.org/usaforsixday/
I doubt congress will allow it. Probably more a stunt to get congress to provide financial support. More likely a continued increase cost in postage
The Post Office gets tough with Congress
By Felix Salmon | February 6, 2013
politics | post office
The fight between the Post Office and Congress is a very peculiar one. Normally, when the government owns some incredibly profligate business, it’s Congress which tries to impose efficiency gains and fiscal discipline, while the business insists that all of its spending is absolutely necessary and that it has already cut to the bone. In this case, however, the roles are reversed: the Post Office wants to change, and it’s Congress which is stopping it from doing so.
The latest move from the Post Office is a bold one: to abolish Saturday delivery unilaterally, starting August 1. This is a bit like Citicorp announcing that it was merging with Travelers: it’s illegal, but that’s not going to stop them, and the clear expectation is that somehow Congress will make it legal, before or shortly after it happens in reality.
As Jesse Lichtenstein details in his amazing 10,000-word Esquire story about the Post Office, the organization does actually have a detailed plan for becoming fully self-reliant over the next few years. Abolishing Saturday delivery is just one small part of that plan; all of it, by law, requires Congressional buy-in. The plan may or may not be successful, but, as they say, plan beats no plan. The big problem is simple, but huge: Congress isn’t playing along, and instead is just making matters worse, unhelpfully micromanaging everything from postage rates to delivery schedules to health-care contributions.
That’s why I love the idea of the Post Office doing something that’s clearly illegal, putting the ball squarely in Congress’s court. The idea is both delicious and dangerous: go ahead an implement the plan whether Congress likes it or not. And then dare them to bring down the hammer, or simply capitulate to the inevitable. They might not like the latter option, but the former would surely be worse for all concerned.
Today’s announcement says to me that relations between the Post Office and Congress have deteriorated so much that the Post Office has given up on getting Congressional buy-in for its plans. At the same time, the plans are necessary (sufficient is a different question) if the Post Office is going to survive for decades to come. And so the Post Office is just going ahead with what needs to be done, and has decided to treat Congress as an adversary, rather than as a key partner in its evolution.
The risks of this move are obvious: Congress is the government, and has awesome powers, should it choose to use them. But there’s a very good chance, here, that Congress will blink first, and end up giving the Post Office at least some of what it wants. Including five-day delivery. Sometimes, you’ve got to get tough with those legislators.
http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2013/02/06/the-post-office-gets-tough-with-congress/
Thanks To Congressional Incompetence, Saturday Mail Delivery Is History
By Annie-Rose Strasser on Feb 6, 2013 at 9:25 am
The U.S. Postal Service announced on Wednesday that it will discontinue first class Saturday mail delivery, marking another milestone in the decline of the once-ubiquitous government service. But it isn’t a switch to online mail that’s causing the postal demise — it’s Congress.
Under the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, Congress has for years forced the USPS to pre-fund 75 years’ worth of pensions for its employees, a requirement not made of any other public or private institution. That means that the Postal Service is footing the bill for employees it hasn’t even hired yet.
The USPS doesn’t actually receive money from the government, but still needs Congressional approval to make any changes to its structure. An analysis in July showed that the USPS, without its pension requirement, would have a $1.5 billion surplus.
But Congress has repeatedly failed to address the issue. Last year, the Postal Service defaulted on a pension fund payment for the first — and then second — time in its history, and political infighting stopped Congress from bringing any remedy to the floor.
Postal access is, ultimately, a rights issue for rural Americans; since they live in areas where internet coverage is inconsistent, post office closures and slowed-down delivery can mean big limitations on communication. A lack of access to postal services can lead to a growth in economic inequality. The new rules for Saturday delivery, set to take effect on August 1, 2013, will continue delivery of packages, but discontinue basic first-class mail.
Tags:
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/02/06/1547551/postal-service-saturday-delivery/
Republicans Applaud The Slow Death Of The Postal Sevice; Post Master General Pat Donahoue Responds:
Video: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/45755822/ns/msnbc-the_ed_show/#50725523
Read more: http://www.randirhodes.com/pages/homework.html?feed=364336&article=10786209#ixzz2KHU04j6l
[Removed]
Great news source for the hard working American postal employees
http://www.postalemployeenetwork.com/
OMG!
The mother load of data!!
Great news source for the plight of America's great postal employees:
http://www.postalemployeenetwork.com/
I know right. Updated regularly. A dependable clearinghouse.
Enjoy. And use it well.
You mean this awesome link: http://www.postalemployeenetwork.com/
That's the one!
Got it!! This awesome link:
Postal Employee Network : PEN
Visit PEN's Inside Front
February 12, 2013 - Comments (3 Comments) The collateral damage of cutting postal service - Washington Post
Confederate postal services suggest folly of USPS strategy - The Sun Herald
You Should Be Outraged By What Is Being Done to Our Postal Service - Huff Post
In suit, newspaper association argues U.S. Postal Service gave mass mailer an unfair advantage - Poynter
NALC: 2013 National Rap Session USPS future, new contract were hot topics at rap session
OIG: Fuel For Thought
http://www.postalemployeenetwork.com/
Every worker is threatened when unions are attacked.
Do Corporations go it alone? Not even in name!
Corporations love non union labor. They can keep pay low, cut benefits, steal pensions, outsource, increase healthcare costs.
Massive confusion on USPS debacle.
Senate hearing on USPS this morning. No change will occur without the Repub house caving.
Union busting Bastards.
Some people believe (who should know better) Dems are responsible for the poison pill USPS legislation! And some truly believe the Post Office no longer provides needed services!! We're back to square one! Do you have that info handy, I thought we were miles past that nonsense!
Some movement is happening but the workers will still feel much pain.
We'll see.
Here's a current story and a site with more info.
http://postandparcel.info/53881/news/regulation/us-congress-talks-rightsizing-usps-in-critical-postal-reforms/
Yeah, I can't sort through all that, I need concise stuff.
The vote was unanimous consent in Senate and voice vote in house as far as I can tell.
So it is hard to find evidence of mainly republican support.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:HR06407:@@@X
But again we can look at who is now supporting saving the post office and who isn't.
This article is pretty good.
http://my.firedoglake.com/mmonk/2011/08/19/the-pre-funding-mandate-bringing-down-the-american-postal-workers-union/
Then why wont Dems reverse it?
It's hard to believe anyone who would search out and post/reply on this board could or would ask such a question; although, in your case, I'll say it's a combination of dishonesty and ignorance.
Due to Congressional rules and regulations, and the fact that we have a democracy, not a dictatorship, the POTUS and Dems can't just do stuff they want to do. Also there is GOP obstructionism, filibusters and hostage taking. Cons will do bad stuff to Americans (like stop UI or SS checks) to get their way.
Anyone with dial up, rabbit ears, or the ability to read should know this already.
This is NOT a Democracy. This is a Republic.
LEARN THE DIFFERENCE.
Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote. -Benjamin Franklin
Industrialization is replacing human labor with machines
One would think that balance of power would prevent things like this: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/02/25/executive-order-libya
Theres a lot of favoritism when it comes to construction contracts and unions. Sometimes workers DO get screwed.
Yeah, like NO-BID Defense contracts for Contractors CEOed by shameless GOP criminals like Cheney!!
Um, I was talking about construction contracts in NY with Dem politicians.
How old are you?
If it makes any difference, excuse me.
I don't see any reference to NY contracts by Dems.
I would hire union labor over nonunion any time.
I've seen real evidence of racism as well as nepotism.
I've also seen efforts to correct those serious problems.
In any event existing problems within unions is no reason to bust them or destroy them. I do not favor "throwing the baby out with the bathwater"
Unions serve as the only power/leverage that labor has against an otherwise unchallenged management/corp 1% oligarchs.
It is simply a clear issue of standing with decent hard working Americans. It is simply supporting the 99%. It is why OWS supports the walmart & fastfood strikes & attempts to unionize, as well as the verizon, con ed, sothebys, and numerous other unions/labor actions.
It is purely an Occupy thang!
Right! Cons always want to make the exception the rule, for or against. "I saw a Postal Worker talking while on the job, so they're all a bunch of lazy Union bums!" Or "I'm a responsible gun owner, so we don't need any gun laws!" Simpletons.
Right wingers frequently resort to negative generalizations & fear to create support for bad policy.
Postal workers are like any workers. Decent hard working Americans trying to get by and support their families.
Support the union & the 99%!
You make the entire place look dumber than Republicans when you lump massive amounts of individuals all under one umbrella in that MSM tone.
Have you learned nothing from Occupy?
Just STFU, gnat!
The republicans want to do away with the post office?
They want to Privatize it and kill Organized Labor!
There's a lot of info here, check it out.
Some other union news.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/16/panera-bakers-union_n_2688639.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/employee-free-choice-act
Unions are not given proper attention. Even on this board, there is more gossip and bickering over who is on or off the board than the issues involving the Class War waged by the 1% against the 99%, that most of us are completely oblivious to and, BTW, we are are losing!!
distraction strategy in full force when the trolls focus on gossip, bickering, creating new forums, sock puppets, points etc at the expence of real issues like union struggles.
Some month old union news.
http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2013-01-02/news/os-ed-oped-mary-sanchez-20121231_1_bakers-union-grain-millers-international-union-union-dues
Do you think people even have a clue as to why they should care about unions?
When will a union rep be seated at the table of every board of directors?
That would be revolutionary, and when will unions start demanding shares of ownership in corps.
We need that too!
You know Germany has this, we installed it after WW-2.
Let's get jurisdiction first.
Didn't know that about germany. We were a more labor centric govt then.
FDR was great.
Yeah, that's what we did in Germany and Japan to quell FASCIST tendencies, and it worked. Truman tried it here and was blocked. And look at our FASCISTS running roughshod over our country!!
Maybe with our current efforts we will correct that.
When people wake up.
Yeah.
Where you been.?
Everything ok?
Working on other projects. End run around the BSers! On a more influential field.
It will be intresting to see who ends up with all that prime real estate that the PO hapens to use.I do belive that it is the people's land?I am sure that some corporations will pay bottom dollar .
Let's hope that atrocious day never comes!
I think it is already baked into the cake.
A hack saw!!
Reasons to Save the Post Office
http://www.esquire.com/video/reasons-to-save-the-post-office-video-2114632350001
[Removed]
UPD : War on USPS workers
http://truth-out.org/news/item/15822-congress-refuses-to-allow-usps-to-fix-its-budget-woes
Or any regulation on the weapons that are killing thousands of Americans. And the Righties were so worked up over the few deaths in Benghazi. Not thinking allows all sorts of NONSENSE!
"Must kill union labor..."
The Libertarian/conservatives have been busting unions for decades.
We haven't done well but we continue to fight.
They are dumb, lazy, pussies; we don't give up.
Never give up.
Congressman Finally Takes Action To Remove Needless Requirement Bankrupting The Postal Service
By Annie-Rose Strasser on Apr 25, 2013 at 11:45 am
[Sometimes writing your Congressman WORKS!!!]
Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) has introduced legislation to try to save the US Postal Service from its incipient bankruptcy, and he is asking for the public to help him pass it.
DeFazio’s bill would repeal the needless requirement — one no other business or entity must face — that the Postal Service pre-fund 75 years’ worth of employee health benefits. [Put in place by Union-Hating RepubliCons to kill America's largest remaining Labor Union!] That requirement has hugely contributed to the USPS defaulting for the first and then second time in its history last year. Analysis from 2012 estimated that the USPS would have a $1.5 billion surplus without the benefit requirement.
But DeFazio recognizes that facts alone will not influence his colleagues to take up and pass the legislation, so he has also turned to the White House’s petition platform, We The People, to petition President Obama to take a stand against the health benefit requirement. He also points out many of the other flaws in how Congress has managed the postal service: About 80% of USPS financial losses since 2007 are due to a Congressional mandate to prefund 75 years of future retiree health benefits over 10 years. In 2012 USPS lost a record $15.9 billion, but $11.1 billion of that loss went to prefund healthcare. This must change.
USPS shouldn’t move to 5-day delivery. This would only save 3%, risk further revenue losses, and slow mail delivery.
USPS needs to re-establish overnight delivery standards to ensure the timely delivery of mail and prevent the closure of mail plants.
USPS needs to generate more revenue by ending a 2006 ban prohibiting USPS from offering new products and services.
Does the Administration support HR 630 and S 316 to make these changes, save American jobs, and allow USPS to remain competitive?
Some conservatives have made the argument that having a national postal service is frivolous in the age of private delivery companies and email, but that ignores the fact that rural Americans don’t enjoy those services with the same regularity that urban and suburban Amercians do. For the elderly and for rural Americans, closed post offices and slowed delivery mean less consistent communication. It can also mean more economic inequality. Update
President of the National Association of Letter Carriers Fredric Rolando told ThinkProgress that he was happy with DeFazio’s efforts, which he called a fight “for meaningful comprehensive postal reform aimed at strengthening the Postal Service so it can continue to provide Americans with the world’s best and most efficient delivery service.”
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/04/25/1919381/postal-services-defazio/
I hope this is real progress.
It's a shitload better than what we had before it!!
Write your damn Congresspeople to support it!!
My guys are usually ok, but I agitate then continually.
It's mainly the small "flyover" red states representatives who need flipping.
Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR)'s save the USPS bill needs support by other Reps.
I will agitate ALL pols. It is House leadership that will stop this.
They must be targeted especially
Keep it up, phone and postcards work best. They basically ignore email. And I'm still working on postcard website (occupy congressional mailbox), not as easy as originally thought, but sure could have used it on all these post-election issues, like this one.
USPS is a big issue, definitely postcard worthy.
OMG, GF and Odin have gone tinfoil hat! Is there something going on I'm not aware of? A Unicorn convention or...? There seems to be no end to what they're omitting and/or oblivious to, or suspicious of.
Apparently the new strategy for the Unicorns is to say we are all the same person. I'm apparently you, are you being called me?
and also this:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/the-gops-new-plan-hit-dems-from-the-left-old-news-/
I am so tired of those pre occupied with IDs & karma points.
There are a couple here (odin, Builder/engineer that accuse all progressives as being VQkag (my former ID)
I take it as a compliment,clearly I have consumed their feeble minds.
LOL. I own them. LOL I am livin in their geads. LOL
Outa replies below
I think the ID thing is a ploy to claim that there are only a few people who understand this American government, politics and democracy. And thereby suggest that most believe gubmint, politics and democracy are all BS, and know a superior, more enlightened, harmonic convergence way to address issues and stuff. Again, is there some kind of OWS poll or vote coming up? Maybe they are trying to render OWS completely irrelevant and pointless. And if that's the case, if they're not Con plants, they might as well be. GF thinks, no... believes I'm playing some "game" and trying to get her to "campaign" for me. Do you have any idea wtf she's talking about?
Or does the link below really explain it all?
I think the builder/engineer, odin/forkleva contingent just police the site to harrass any pro Dem/anti repub comments.
Once foundthey harrass until the user relents & submits to their bullying tactics.
The ridiculous accusations that you are VQ is simply their recognition of how well I've beaten their sorry asses.
They accuse anyone of being me. I take it as a compliment as I've said.
Mostly I ignore the goosestepping, fascist, political police of our little forum.
They are a big joke.
Why did Post Office give over $30 mil to Lance Armstrong? And $100 million to the '92 Olympics?
Oh, they told me that they did that and the other just to piss YOU off!!
Did it work?
Not really.
O'Really!
No. Not really. And next time you are at the Post Office, tell them to stop talking to you and get back to work. No wonder they are in trouble.
One of the best and most efficient (services to cost) businesses operating in the world EVER!!! And it's UNION OPERATED!!!
No wonder you sick, GREEDY RepubliCons hate it!!
I've never heard someone be so impassioned about the post office. Not sure whether to be impressed or concerned. Sound you're going, dare I say it, "postal"
Maybe FedEx should be worried.
the US budget 2012 was 3.800,000 million
Bet they'd love it back
Union Busting 2.0: Wisconsin Republicans Target Private Sector Unions They Previously Praised
By Pat Garofalo on Feb 20, 2013 at 9:30 am
When Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) initiated a high-profile effort to bust his state’s public sector unions in 2011, he said that he had no interest in pursuing similar efforts against private sector unions. “Private sector unions are my partner in economic development,” Walker has said. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel noted that he “has consistently downplayed seeking any restrictions on private unions in public statements.”
Walker also said in December that “he wouldn’t pursue any new bills on public or private unions in the coming legislative session.” However, word evidently did not get down to his Republican colleagues, who introduced and are fast-tracking a bill to allow employers to cut hours of union workers without the unions’ consent:
Republicans are hurrying bills through the Wisconsin Legislature that they say could prevent layoffs by allowing companies to cut back workers’ hours, but Democrats on Tuesday called them a renewed GOP attack on unions.
The bills wouldn’t require companies to negotiate with unions about cutting back hours, in contrast to almost all similar laws in other states. But a spokeswoman for the author of the Assembly version of the Wisconsin proposal said there was no intent to harm organized labor.
The Wisconsin GOP is moving this bill under the guise of creating a “work-sharing” program, which is an idea aimed at using government support to allow businesses to cut back worker hours while not laying off employees (with the government picking up the tab for the hours workers miss). However, “in all but one of the 24 states with work-sharing laws, union representatives must agree to the reduction in hours for their members.” Wisconsin’s bill does not include a similar requirement.
“Republicans began their war on bargaining rights with Act 10, and with this bill they have now turned their attention to private sector unions,” said state senate Minority Leader Chris Larson (D). “This bill is a clear opening shot at undermining private sector unions.” “The Farrow-Brooks bill says that private sector unions shouldn’t be able to negotiate for their members. It’s one more step toward their goal of ending the right of Wisconsin citizens to have their voice heard in the workplace,” added State Senator Julie Lassa (D).
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/02/20/1614021/wisconsin-private-sector-union-busting/
http://blog.ourfuture.org/20130210/you-should-be-outraged-by-what-is-being-done-to-our-post-office
The working public loses a little more.
Alec wins a little more.
Will we ever learn?
With the level of short shifting ALEC gets around here?
I doubt it.
Did you mean short "shrifting"?
Like I just commented to Bensdad, there seems to be some very curious attempts to diffuse/vilify politics in general here. Weird Witchery!
More concern over the latest "Old ????" and a "banned" ass kisser.
Yes, shrifting. My mistake, thanks for the correction.
There's a plethora of folks around here giving short shrift to not only ALEC, but the Koch's and WallStreet in general.
And the sick and twisted political equivalent to the shamed and disgraced Catholic Clergy: RepubliCons!!
Not to forgive their level of disgrace, but religious hypocrisy isn't limited to the Catholics.
Watching the Pope say bye bye. All religion. But the sexual "problems" and treasure "hoarding" are especially evident in Catholicism. At least on my antenna.
Stop electing people who accept their board members money.
Gosh. You should stop supporting everything Wallstreet makes money on.
When you get back from Jupiter?
Let us know how it went.
Not everything, just the politicians and the big multinationals like Walmart.
Draw that line in sand.
Back from Jupiter so soon?
So tell us what part of WallStreet You support in full?
You post yours, and then Ill just scratch off about 80% of it. That will save me some time...
Actions speak louder than words. And DC's actions are speaking very loudly the last 30 years.
Are you mad?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-HDWOo1eaT4#!
Scratching 80%?
Stop supporting everything that WallStreet makes money on!!
Not just 20%.
BTW I've told you before, I've known it since the 70's.
And yet you keep voting for their people.... 40 years of voting for Wall St puppets...Damn!! :)
Even the politicians, right?
Here's some more of your WallStreet friends good work in Florida.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/21/geo-group-wikipedia_n_2730220.html
Schools to prison!!!
Yay for the corporate Florida dollar!!
if there are no jobs , jobs will be created
such is the wages of the continues demand to a monthly debt
one can never afford not to be making money
As soon as they call it "OccupyObama".
Like it is in your book.
Until then, it's all about YOU making excuses for WallStreet.
Petitions Have ZERO effect on the outcome of this or any issue.
Publicity!
People do not give a crap.Sad but very true.The sheep are in a deep coma and no amount of shouting will awaken them.
It's going to be difficult, but we can do it.
Never underestimate the power of WE!
doom