IRAN NUCLEAR PLANS…..LITTLE DO WE KNOW

IRAN NUCLEAR PLANS…..LITTLE DO WE KNOW

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(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

A bunch of US Senators send a nasty open letter to the leadership of Iran, Congress invites a foreign leader address a combined session of those dudes…..without the president’s approval. Huh, I guess it’s finally happened, something that’s near and dear to my heart, something that I’ve been preaching for some time now…..isolationism. Hurray, halleluiah and a great big mazel tov, somebody somewhere finally got their head out of, well, you know what I mean.

 

But alas it’s not true, very few people want isolationism, don’t you all know that the only way that the United States is every going to stand on its own is to stand alone. Americans are self-reliant, Americans are resourceful, and Americans raise to the challenge…..any challenge.

 

Whenever I read about how the United States reacts, and is wary of another nation (in many cases any nation), developing nuclear progress and capabilities, I have to smile, it’s like the pot calling the kettle black. The US has developed one of the top nuclear programs in the history of the world. Wasn’t the United States the very first military powers in the world to use an atomic bomb, wasn’t the United States the very first country in the world to more or less publically the first nation to advocate proliferation of atomic weaponry first and then publically advantages research second?

 

The open letter that was sent to Iran…..(I wonder, did they send it through the regular mail, or did they air-mail it, huh, one of life’s little secrets I guess). Anyways there are several misconceptions attached to the letter…..some huge misconceptions that I think need addressing.

 

A. there aren’t any negotiations with Iran presently, regarding a nuclear program because the world’s intelligence agencies (including the United States) do not believe that Iran is currently building nuclear weapons.

 

B. An active Iranian nuclear weapons program would render the current negotiations moot because Iran would be in fundamental violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)…..that Iran signed.

 

C. Iran is within the terms of the NPT which allows nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.

 

D. The current negotiations are focused on strengthening verifiable safeguards against weaponization over-and-above those required by the NPT.

 

E. negotiations are not between the US and Iran alone, included is Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China.

 

F. the deal being pursued reflects an international consensus, the same consensus that had made sanctions against Iran so effective.

 

G. any agreement reached would be endorsed by the UN and any US new administration would be obliged to uphold, and any attempt by the White House or Congress to abrogate, unilaterally modify or impede such an agreement would be a breach of United States obligations.

 

WHAT THE 47 SIMPLY DON’T UNDERSTAND INCLUDING WAR-MONGER JOHN MCCAIN

 

The Middle East is a hodge-podge of volatile countries that have been at one another’s throats a total of 88 times since the turn of the 20^th century, 19 times since the turn of the 21^st century, which have claimed in excess of 2,000,000 lives.

 

There have been religious wars, wars over property, wars over mineral rights, wars for independents, revolts, coups, civil wars, pro-Communist wars, pre-emptive wars, religious holiday wars, wars of unrest, and even a PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan), war with the KDP (Kurdish Democratic Party).

 

There has been war in the region for centuries, war has evolved into a way of life for some of these people. They can trace their lineage through centuries of dead relatives, leaving them wondering how there were enough able adults left to pro-create.

 

Many Middle Eastern conflicts are actually decade’s old and only flare up periodically and usually in isolated areas. Those people who keep track of such skirmishes don’t even take notice because they don’t consider them worthy of reporting because only a couple dozen people die.

 

These people, when they hear about 47 United States Senators sending a letter to either their countries leaders, or a neiboring countries political potentate simply giggle, shake their heads on move on with their lives. It’s what these Middle Eastern countries have come to except about the United States…..clueless.

 

This area, the Middle East, has a combined population of 410,154,000, and collectively, as a species have never ever been defeated in a war…..they lose battles, but never the war. This area or member nations brought Russia to its military knees, bent the will of Britain to continue its empire in the area, and is breaking the military bank of the United States.

 

These people (as a whole) pass their fears, their anger, and their attitudes down to their children who pass it on to their children who pass it down to…..well you get my drift! And in actuality, in the high tech world of 2015, they only thing that they’ve got going for themselves is black gold…..Texas tea, or in this case, Middle Eastern tea.

 

EDUCATION BEGAN THERE, AGRICULTURE BEGAN THERE, RELIGION BEGAN THERE

 

Education, culture, religion, not necessarily in that order all had their origin in the Middle East, do you understand how silly the United States most look to some of these people. An open letter…..ya, well, I’m sure that some in the Middle East would love to tell these 47 Senators where to stick their letter.

 

Unrest in the Middle East is a way of life, death, rape, a subservient attitude towards women, mayhem, and racial discord are just a tip of the iceberg when you start talking about the Middle Eastern culture. Believe me, I am not an expert on affairs in the Middle East…..and more important, I could care less about the area. It’s thousands of miles away, costly to…..do anything with, peaceful, or militarily, and with regards to petroleum products, we can get that stuff closer to home.

 

Partisan politics can put a country on the road to ruin pure and simple, and the United States’ brand of partisanship isn’t getting to be less…..far from it. Obama is the president for the next 21 months, let’s make the best of it and move on from the constant child-like bickering before somebody gives us a good switching…..and we lose our collective best stuff…..our country and our identity.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

CONSERVATIVE POLITICKING AT IT’S WORST

CONSERVATIVE POLITICKING AT IT’S WORST

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(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

The word has many meanings, almost like “in the eye of the beholder”, in today’s world, when people talk about an issue there’s a twisting, a bending and for goodly measure a bunch of mud thrown onto an issue to darken the waters even further. What word that I’m talking about…..well gee whiz…..politicking is the word, and it’s the single most abrasive act that elected officials practice to sway their constituents and opponents alike.  

 

I’m working up to my eighth decade on the planet and I’ve seen a bunch of crap come down the pike and get flushed away…..the good as well as the bad, but I got to admit that the past few months the politicians on both sides of the aisle have created some of the most vile stuff I’ve ever seen or heard of.

 

Those of you who read my blogs understand that I’m just a kind of country bumpkin, just trying to impart some of my opinions, and hopefully get the pot to boil quicker. What I attempt to do is to share my thoughts with people…..and make them think.

 

We now have 47 Republican Senators who have signed and sent an open letter to the Islamic Republic of Iran which details to them how parts of our constitution works, and also has a warning that any kind of nuclear agreement that the current US President might sign could become null and void if a Republican wins the elections of 2016.

 

Has this ever happened…..as much as I can find it hasn’t, there’s several different issues connected with the letter that include acts of sedition, and the very legality of sending such a document to a foreign country while you are a duly elected official at least on the federal level. Now I can write that letter, and I can get my friends and neighbors to co- sign it and airmail it to whomever I want and that my friends…..is legal.

 

In January of this year, House Speaker John Boehner invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address congress on the threats that an Iranian nuclear program would be to the Middle East and the United States as well.

 

Of course Netanyahu accepted, giving a speech to the joint session of the United States Congress on February 11. His speech was critical of the president and his administrations nuclear talks with the governing body of Iran.

 

We now, as American citizens, are saddled not only with part of the US Congress disrespecting the country’s president, but 47 senators signing a letter to a foreign government’s leaders that shows exactly how they feel about America’s president.

 

WHAT’S UP WITH THAT

To understand and to have an opinion about the letter…..you need first to read the letter; so without further to-do:

An Open Letter to the Leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran:

“It has come to our attention while observing your nuclear negotiations with our government that you may not fully understand our constitutional system. Thus, we are writing to bring to your attention two features of our Constitution-the power to make binding international agreements and the different character of federal office-which should seriously consider as negotiations progress.

 

First, under our Constitution, while the president negotiates international agreements, Congress plays the significant role of ratifying them. In the case of a treaty, the Senate must ratify it by a two-thirds vote. A so-called congressional-executive agreement requires a majority vote of both the House and Senate (which, because of procedural rules, effectively means a three-fifths vote in the Senate). Anything not approved by Congress is a mere executive agreement.

 

Second, the offices of our Constitution have different characteristics. For example, the president may serve only two 4-year terms, whereas senators may serve an unlimited number of 6-year terms. As applied today, for instance, President Obama will leave office in January 2017, while most of us will remain in office well beyond then-perhaps decades.

 

What these two constitutional provisions mean is that we will consider any agreement regarding your nuclear-weapons program that is not approved by the Congress as nothing more than an executive agreement between President Obama and Ayatollah Khamenei. The next president could revoke such an executive agreement with the stroke of a pen and future Congresses could modify the terms of the agreement at any time.

 

We hope this letter enriches your knowledge of our constitutional system and promotes mutual understanding and clarity as nuclear negations progress”.

                                               

                                                            Sincerely,

 

PRESIDENT OBAMA A DUNCEL

A relatively new term (computer age) but non-the-less appropriate here, what the term dunsel means literally is that a machine part, or the officer of an organization has absolutely no use! So I guess at least 47 Republicans figure that President Obama has no use, and is simply a lame duck for the next year and a half. Hummmmmmmmm, I wonder if Republicans, wide-spread, feel the same as these Senators do: Cotton, Hatch, Grassley, McConnell, Shelby, McCain, Inhofe, Roberts, Sessions, Enzi, Crapo, Graham, Comyn, Burr, Thune, Isakson, Vitter, Barrasso, Wicker, Risch, Kirk, Blunt, Moran, Portman, Boozman, Toomy, Hoeven, Rubio, Johnson, Paul, Lee, Ayotte, Heller, Scott, Cruz, Fischer, Capito, Cassidy, Gardner, Lankford, Daines, Rounds, Perdue, Tillis, Ernst, Sasse, Sullivan?

 

Over Obama’s 2^nd term there has been little that I’ve agreed with as far as the president’s foreign policies are concerned. I think that he’s pulled some real booboos that have come back to haunt the administration, and more important the country. However the way I look at the situation is that he and his administration are what we are stuck with no matter their actions, or reactions, and for a segment of our elected officials to openly show it’s hostility towards the president and his decision aren’t in bad taste…..there in deplorable bad taste.

 

Is this how far our democratic system has sunk, how partisan the operations of what we call “our government” is now operated…..mean spirited, and taking cheap-shots whenever possible…..and in the long run, disregarding the very system that those 47 joker senators seem intent on circumventing…..what have we, as the electorate to do…..DOES ANYBODY HAVE A CLUE?

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!

A DOUBLE EDGED SWORD

A DOUBLE EDGED SWORD

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(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

 

“When they outlaw guns…..only the outlaws will have guns”, catchy phrase, I’m wondering if some Wall Street advertising agency wasn’t commissioned to think it up. It is estimated that 30,000 people die every year from gunshot wounds, I say estimated because some deaths actually slip through the cracks, I’m not really sure how a death…..caused by any reason could slip through the cracks but they do.

 

The United States has had its share of shooting deaths just this year, in the first three months of 2015, there have been 83 recorded shooting deaths by police departments around the country. January has been the bloodiest month so far with 39, while February had 37. Of course there’s more out there, but they slip through the cracks!

 

These shooting deaths run the gamut of circumstances from cops being shot at by the descendants of a women with a knife, to a man hitting a police dog with a hammer and advancing on the dog’s handler, to mental patients, to a man being shot by undercover police officers in Scottsdale, Arizona.

 

I’ve written about what I perceive as a huge social problem here in the United States, and I know that there are other people who feel exactly as I do, but for a myriad of reasons, the cause for gun control of some sort hasn’t gained much traction.

 

Without exception here in the United States, every policing agency, city, county, state and at the federal level have had incidents of violence, whether in how prisoners are processed and handled, to profiling traffic stops to actually shooting to death a potential perpetrator.

 

I also am convinced that many, many police agencies throughout the country, and the offices of the prosecuting attorney at some time is just one step above those vile criminals that they deal with on a daily basis. It’s all in the numbers games that these law enforcement officials play to convict at any cost. As one cop told me, “a good criminal case is a closed criminal case”.

 

Politicians and law enforcement authority figures protect their turf as if it were their own, they have no clue that they are just renting the space that they occupy…..there’ll be another official to take their place when they either are voted out of office or retire.

 

ONE SUCH CASE

On March 6, 2015 at 6:30 P.M. a 19 year-old biracial teenager was shot to death in Madison, Wisconsin by a white 45 year old cop…..Matt Kenney. The shooting took place because the teen was darting in and out of traffic…..on foot!

 

Kenney said that the shooting victim, Tony Robinson had allegedly committed battery against him and during the scuffle the police officer drew his weapon and shot Robinson. It is still unclear how many times the police officer shot Robinson, but however many, the shooting did the job, killing the young man.

 

I have had a problem with how and where the assault and death occurred, according to reports that cop entered the apartment of Robinson in a confrontational manner and seemed somehow to lose control of the situation and had to resort to violence and ultimately had to shoot Robinson in his own apartment.

 

Of course Robinson had a criminal record and was on probation after pleading guilty to armed robbery in 2014. An uncle had written Robinson’s defense attorney warning that he (Robinson) faced a decision, whether he wanted to fall deeper into a life of crime or to change his attitude and life a better life.

 

Of course the Madison Mayor, Paul Soglin, the Madison police chief, Mike Koval, and the cop, Matt Kenny are all white, while the shooting victim, Tony Robinson was black. I have an observation here; it may not be pertinent, but do I detect a pattern here, of white cops shooting black people and then have their authority figures back them up, protecting them from prosecution.

 

Of course this is exactly what happens time after time in the United States, and I for one am sick and tired of this action. I’m white…..100% and I still have a problem with this type of treatment that black people get. Can you imagine how blacks feel about this action…..if you’re white like me, like me, you can’t imagine the outrage?

 

THE ALTERNATIVES

There are a bunch, but until, as a country and a species of people, we honestly address our racial differences we will be doomed to continue the idiotic activity that we now practice. Until white people decide not to cross the street to avoid a group of blacks we are lost.

 

Until we not only voice are outrage at shoddy and illicit handling of minorities, but step up and voice that outrage to the authority figures…..things are going to remain the same. Until we become aware of the fact that we need to police ourselves we are in the deepest of dodo!

 

The gun advocates out there aren’t all bad, nor are those people who want strict weapons controls all good. But I can tell you this, if a cop enters my home for some kind of a bust operation, he’d better be righteous…..and right.

 

I don’t own a gun, I don’t hunt nor am I interested in target practice. I love a good hamburger or a steak, but am also not interested in harvesting my own meat, I don’t even fish. So it wouldn’t bother me if nobody had guns. I have nothing that is important enough for me to take a life, that is until time that somebody threatened my family, I suppose than I would want a weapon.

 

However, believe it or not, I don’t blame a person who figures that they might need a firearm for personal, or property protection. But this people would be far and few, and would need a huge reason to be packing.

 

And please spear me the argument about the US Constitution’s 2^nd amendment protecting it’s citizens the guaranteed right to keep and bear firearms…..it’s not the way that it is read. As a country we do not need to shoot our breakfast, lunch and dinner, and by and large we don’t need a weapon to protect ourselves. Those people who want a six shooter strapped to their hip, or have a rifle slung over their shoulder are usually simply frustrated Clint Eastwood wanna-bes.

 

This issue, to keep and bear arms, is one of the few complicated issues that the country faces today. This attitude and the atmosphere that nobody can enter my space, or that police officials are untouchable for their actions is just so much malarkey.

 

The issues here are huge, police brutality, police killings, authority figures covering thing up, keeping score of arrests and convictions like you would in a bowling match, and you red-necks out there who figure to waltz around with a hand-gun and a rifle always at the ready…..get a grip before its simply too late.

 

Do you realize that if 30,000 people die of gunshot wounds every year, no matter the reason, no matter the circumstances, the number is more than all of the US military personal that have died in the war on terror by a factor of…..well I don’t know, but I do know it’s a huge figure.

 

For me, the Double Edge Sward axiom is an issue with varying sides and differing opinions, and again…..one that we need to, as a country address, and deal with.

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!

VENEZUELA MAKES THE CUT

VENEZUELA MAKES THE CUT

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(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Now you’ve gone and done it Venezuela, you’ve gone and gotten the United States mad at you, shame on you. The decree was handed down on Monday, March 9, when the United States declared that Venezuela was a national security threat and order sanctions against seven officials.

 

Strange that the US declared sanctions against individuals and not the entire country…..oh wait a minute, Venezuela has oil doesn’t it? In fact the country is swimming in petroleum potential, unless you’d call between 297 and 513 billion barrels of reserves not enough to swim in. Now I pride myself on staying abreast of what is going on in the world…..more or less, but in this instance, my knowledge of Venezuela oil reserves was painfully lacking. You see the world leader in proven oil reserves is Venezuela, not Russia, not Saudi Arabia, or Iran, but Venezuela.

 

The Orinoco Oil Belt is a monster and stretches about 400 miles in length and is between 50 and 60 miles wide. There’s also the Intercampo, the Maracaibo Basin and the Bolivar oil fields as well as offshore platform derrick in Lake Maracaibo as well the Caribbean Sea.

 

The White House said the order targeted people whose actions undermined democratic processes or institutions, had committed acts of violence or abuse of human rights, were involved in prohibiting  or penalizing freedom of expression, or were government officials involved in public corruption.

 

Gee that sounds kind of like what happens here in the United States at times, of course maybe President Obama is discounting Ferguson, Missouri, or Brooklyn, New York, or Cleveland, Ohio where state law enforcement shot to death black men who were unarmed. Maybe the president forgot all of the restrictions on freedom of speech that goes on every day, or how state and federal government officials have been convicted of graft, misappropriating funds, or committing heinous acts against their constituents…..hey who am I anyways, just some lowly frustrated blogger who’s voicing his opinion.

 

LET’S GET DOWN TO IT…..TO ME THIS IS SIMPLY A CLEAR CASE OF A POWER GRAB

Yes, just another example of how the US government works it’s magic in the international-political gamesmanship. Without exception whenever the United States has sanctioned a country it’s been to enhance the US economical standing…..like petroleum, precious metals or a boot-print in that country.

 

We are the most sanctioning government in the world today…..and the actions can either be comprehensive or selective. I’m not sure what the exactly means, comprehensive or selective! Blocking assets, trade restrictions or denying aid are the usual tools that are used, but clandestine military aid, or actual overthrowing governmental authority has also been used as a kind of wedge to achieve whatever results are desired.

 

At the present time the United States has 27 different sanctions acts that involved either individuals or entire countries. And of course the activity used, which is highly classified runs the gamut of whichever tools are deemed necessary…..but good luck finding out about these tools.

 

Consider this, Burma (Union of Myanmar), Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) and Cuba are all being sanctioned for human rights and political reasons. Aside from Cuba (who is just 90 miles off the US coast), what in the world is the United States even involved with these nations for?

 

I do not take lightly human rights issues, and I do understand that in many cases there is a strong link between human rights violations that are perpetrated by political acts, but in some cases, what is perceived as human rights by the United States, violations are simply a way of life for some people.

 

Without exception, with regards to placing sanctions on countries, the United States has an atmosphere of exceptionalism connected with the activity. Contrary to popular belief by most of those authority figures in Washington, the United States does not have all of the answers, and is usually guilty of having ulterior motives for most of its political dealings in the world today.

 

THERE’S LITTLE DOUBT HERE

It’s only a matter of time before the US’s actions with regards to how she deals with other countries on the world stage is going to come back and take a serious bite out of our behinds. One of the biggest mistakes that the country has made over the forty something years was to eliminate a conscriptive military service.

 

With a totally volunteer military, the United States has made military involvement with countries almost a minor issue. Those that serve do so on a volunteer bases, and as such know almost exactly what they are in for.

 

I can guarantee you if there was a military draft where little Johnny didn’t have a choice but to serve in the military once his number was called, there would be a total outcry by the civilian population whenever Washington, or the Pentagon deemed it necessary for the American people to become involved with other country’s business.

 

It is also only a matter of time before the actions of the United States towards other countries is going to come back with a vengeance. There’s more than a handful of countries out there right now who view the US with disdain, and as time goes by, as the US spreads itself thinner and thinner through its military deployments…..there will be an opportunity to strike, and they will.

 

Like I said earlier, “I am just a frustrated blogger speaking my piece,” so I guess you can take this for whatever you thinks it’s worth.

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!

RIGHT-TO-WORK LAW WILL ALTER UNION EQUATION

RIGHT-TO-WORK LAW WILL ALTER UNION EQUATION

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(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Ya think…..Wisconsin will pass their right to work law on Monday, March 9 unless  Madison burns to the ground. Governor Scott Walker has vowed to sign the bill when it crosses his desk, which will be Monday. The landscape of union influence in Wisconsin will be changed for the foreseeable future…..not forever, just the next several decades.

 

No matter the pros or cons of the issue, one thing everybody involved with the issue will have to admit is that both the public and private sectors of labor will be losing a strong supporter of the worker. Wrapped up in the debate are several issues, is it ever any different in the United States with controversial subjects where government allows public debate?

 

The issues with union representation in the workplace in Wisconsin has several layers that need to be peeled away to give the people involved with the issue an honest and concise view of exactly what is connected with the issue, and also allow for the reasoning behind the basically conservative move.

 

There is at least envy involved with the right to work issue that boarders almost on hate by some. There also is much misconception by many, and I’m talking about huge amounts of misconception.

 

There is politics that are involved with the right to work issue (a whole bunch of politicking), but that is the way that in today’s political world things are accomplished. There is ignorance involved with the issue, mostly by lawmakers, how can somebody who has been involved with being an elected official understand the rigors, hardships, and the trials and tribulations of labor in the work-place?

 

Conservatives as well as public management and private business have actually conspired to completely take the teeth out of the union power, not only in Wisconsin, but the entire United States. I’m not too sure that people understand the path that government has taken, but at least here in Wisconsin it was 1^st the public sector unions that lost their molars, and now it’s the private sector that has been gutted. 

 

To understand the issues involved people in both the public and private sector need to understand the history of unions not only in Wisconsin, but in the entire United States. Union organizers and the membership that evolved from their efforts didn’t happen overnight, and in the beginning were desperately needed.

 

UNIONS IN THE 21^TH CENTURY AND BEFORE

Labor unions are legally recognized as representatives of workers in numerous industries in the United States. Today union activity centers on collective bargaining over wages, benefits and workplace conditions for membership. In addition unions also are representatives of their members over disputes with management over violations of contract provisions, and also have engaged in lobbying for certain candidates at the city, state and federal elections process.

 

In 2014 there were 14.5 million dues paying union members in the United States, down from 17.7 million two decades earlier. Most unions in the United States are aligned with two large umbrella organizations; the AFL-CIO created in 1955, and the Change to Win Federation which splintered from the AFL-CIO in 2005.

 

Contrary to what some conservatives think, or say, the union movement in the United States has been around since the Polish craftsmen, who produced glass, pitch and tar called for a strike all the way back in 1619…..the reason, these people did not have voting rights. The incident ended peacefully when the Poles were granted full voting rights.

 

In today’s work world here in the United States, many, many workers take for granted labor laws which protect them from the evils of unregulated industry. Possibly lost in the equation when arguing the merits of free enterprise and the removal of restrictions on capitalist’s corporations is the fact that throughout US history, workers have fought and died for protection from these US corporations, and their deregulating attitudes.

 

In many instances government troops were called in to not only quell labor activity, but to crush it completely out of existence. From early minimum wage work stoppage by the Philadelphia printers in 1786, to Philadelphia carpenters striking unsuccessfully for a 10 hour work day, to children employees in the Paterson, New Jersey silk mills going out on strike for 11 hour work days/six days a week…..the struggle has encompassed men, women and children.

 

The history books are filled with atrocities committed by corporations against their laborers, and the graveyards holds thousands of hard-line union organizers, sympathizers and rank and file workers, brothers, sisters, fathers, sons and those young children who were put to work in all sorts of menial labor for pennies a day, six days a week.

 

What happened when the union movement gained first a foothold, and then a stranglehold on corporations was, and is predictable…..they asked for, and received all sorts of concessions from management. These concessions are exactly what has caused a rift between union members, and the general public, those workers unaffiliated with labor unions.

 

In the 1950’s there were about 65 million people in the work-force, of those men and women who worked during this time, about 35% were dues paying union members. In the late 1970’s union membership was around 21 million card carrying membership. By 2013 there were roughly 125 million workers in the United States, but only about 14 million union workers, or right around 11% of eligible workers.

 

Way too much of a good thing is what happened to the unions and those dues paying workers who advocated all sorts of silly demands. Sick days, personal days, escalating vacation time, medical insurance demands without out of pocket money to the rank and file, and retirement plans that were really the envy of every non-union worker throughout the United States.

 

Counting benefits, garbage collectors were never meant to be paid $28 an hour, cops were never meant to be paid $75,000 a year, street workers were never meant to be paid $25 an hour, and firemen were never meant to be paid $60,000 a year…..but they are.

 

General Motors employees were never meant to be paid (with benefits) $35 an hour, and the same can be said for all sorts of other huge corporations throughout the United States that are represented by a union.

 

AN ATMOSPHERE OF ENVY AND TOTAL MISTRUST

During my working life, I was never paid what I figured I was worth, pretty much because the guy next to me was making the same as me, but he didn’t put out the same effort on the job that I did. Now I don’t know whether this is true or not, but it’s the way I felt at the time.

 

I have never been a card carrying, dues paying union member, so thirty or forty years ago I understood little about how unions worked for their members, or what they meant to the rest of those workers, like me, who weren’t union members.

 

But about a decade ago I had to research union activity for a book that I was writing, and the research opened up a whole new territory for me with regards to what unions really were…..in the beginning. 100 to about 140 years ago, when unions in the United States were in their infancy, workers needed them for protection.

 

During the second industrial revolution in the United States, also known as the Technological Revolution which corresponded to the latter half of the 19^th century until World War I. This second revolution which was spurred on by the introduction of the Bessemer steel process in the 1850, calumniating in early factory electrification, mass production and the production line.

 

Before these introductions into the workplace, some of which are still in use in the 21^st century, business owners view their employees almost on an equal footing, referring too many of them as artisans, “experts in their chosen fields”.  

 

However with each innovation into the process of producing products in greater quantities, the need for more unskilled workers was necessary. Gone was the age of the artisan who had honed is efforts in one particular area of an industry.

 

Child labor was used; adults and children alike worked in unsafe working conditions, and were expected to work a minimum of six days a week, sometimes twelve hours a day. If a worker was injured on the job there was no workers compensation, he simply was on his own until he was able to resume his work. If a worker was disabled for life on the job there was no compensation of any kind.

 

It was said by iron miners in the wilds of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that a miner “should either be injured for a short period of time, or die in a work related accident”, because there was no death benefits in the industry.

 

The unions throughout America have come a long way since the dawning of serious efforts which always started in the same way. Union organizers, holding secret meetings, confronting management, and eventually going out on strike, was the usual recipe, which early on did not work.

 

Company’s reaction was predictable, with little exception these companies had been in the driver’s seat for so long that they didn’t know how to function out of it. In the beginning of unionizing efforts the issues were always about workplace safety.

 

As time went forward into the 20^th century other issues became paramount, benefits, the more the better, more pay, better vacation time and many other issues that I am sure made corporation owners cringe. I am also sure that there was a resolve by these businessmen, these owners of companies that were being defeated in union negotiations…..their time would come, and they knew that history is like a wheel, what goes around, comes around.

 

There time is now, and as always these businessmen (many ancestors of men who fought the unions decades ago) are getting help from law enforcement and their political connections. It’s a recipe tested by time from a century ago, even before the word lobbyists was a word.

 

So even though almost 90% of the American worker toils at his job without the benefit of a union representation, if things continue government and business will completely eradicate the labor union, or professional union that actually protect the worker.

 

What most people do not understand is the fact that unions protect their members as well as those people who work without the benefits of union representation. That’s right, business is afraid of unions, and the threat to their bottom line mentality…..to make a buck at all costs.

 

That wheel of history will continue to go around, and after years of worker neglect, and record profits for companies, the union movement will once again rise up and actually smote business and their management agents.

 

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and his cronies in the state legislature have accomplished exactly what the business community of Wisconsin wanted, an unthethered hand in dealing with their workers and the contracts that they sign.

 

What we have just seen is how politics work in the rarefied air of big time business and politician’s hob-knobbing. With just 11% of all workers in Wisconsin, it was deemed by business that they represented a threat to all of the people who might want to apply for a job, but didn’t want to become a member of a union.

 

Plainly that’s just one in ten people who might apply for a job who would be affected, come on, adjust your panty-hose people, the issue was, and is insignificant. But once again we were suckered into a really poor rule that’ll become a state law.

 

Why…..envy, greed and stupidity, you pick whichever one closely matches where you ought to sit the next time you watch Fox News!

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!