WorkDoctor
WorkDoctor's JournalUAW strike is about more than threat to economy
Getting sick of MSNBC "coverage" of the pending UAW strike against auto makers. They frame it only as costly to the poor corporate auto makers and its impact on future car availability for consumers. Yikes.
Alternative coverage ideas:
- showcase how Shawn Fain challenged former UAW rules & entrenched "leaders" that never allowed one member/one vote to democratize his union
- have union people on as guests (Labor Day was not just a shopping holiday)
- visit diners where union families eat, interview them as you always do with Trump voters
- find labor economists who can support unions, not just stock shareholders
- the UAW flexing its muscle is part of the larger movement to embrace unions (unless MSNBC is anti-SAG/AFTRA, too), celebrate it and the generational enthusiasm to balance power
- embrace support for workers who are powerless to effect change in their workplaces without unions to balance the power held by corporate masters
- research salaries required to match what it costs working families to live, is the raise requested really too much?
- detail the profits of auto makers - at some point profit margins have to be branded obscene & unconscionable
- critique the threat to move more jobs in Mexico by the auto makers as blackmail and anti-American
- didn't auto makers get huge federal PPP funds during COVID, talk about obligations to the country (meaning its workers)
- and if the strike happens, visit the picket lines, interview strikers and ask about hardships they will have to endure to get justice
I'm not naive. I know NBC-Universal is massive corporation. I know anti-pharmaceutical industry coverage is taboo, given that it seems that over half of all advertising is for new drugs.
But workers are good Americans who just want a piece of the profit pie that they create for the C-suite. Tell their stories.
And while we're at it, Democratic Party, see the above list to recruit enthusiastic voters. We're gonna need them in about 400 days.
SCOTUS Barrett: Simply adopt the unwanted baby
Wow. "Just" carry the fetus to term. No concern for mother's health along the way or the power of maternal bonding with the baby she spends 9 months making. Just adopt. Solution.
The attorney in support of Roe had just got started when Clarence Thomas interrupts and goes down an unrelated path. Then all the anti-Roe justices starting piling on. The woman never got to deliver a linear argument. She sure is qualified to handle everything thrown at her. Then, at the end, Thomas said I know the concern is abortion (ya think????). She answers it is about liberty.
My body, my choice, baby (pun intended).
New contract for student loan vultures
Bad news: 2 yr. contract extensions for 6 collection agencies - Great Lakes, HESC/Edfinancial, MOHELA, Navient, Nelnet, and OSLA Servicing; loan repayments begin again Feb 1, 2022; Social Security deductions up to 15% of benefit withheld by collectors; no forgiveness of ANY kind from Biden on the horizon despite campaign pledges.
Possibly good news: at the Dept of Education Federal Student Aid office (FSA) with authority over the collection vultures, the COO is Richard Cordray (the original head of Elizabeth Warren's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB)). In lieu of discharges of all student loans, in his new role, he announced more pressure on collection companies to be transparent and more "customer service" friendly. Hope he is allowed to do much more in the coming years.
From an Oct 15 press release: "FSA will take additional steps to implement a broader vision focused on ensuring borrowers have easy access to the clear, accurate, and timely information they need to manage their federal student loans. In addition to building on enhancements to FSA’s digital platform – including StudentAid.gov and the myStudentAid mobile app – the Department will work on a permanent contracting approach to cement greater stability, servicer transparency, accountability, and performance beyond the two-year period authorized by Congress."
The privatization rolls on ...
Any system that is able to torment a disabled person well past retirement age and steal from the tiny SS payment is immoral.
Jen Psaki should replace Rachel Maddow
She checks all the boxes -- smart woman, media experience, thinks on her feet, capable of deeper analysis to link causes to consequences, adequately progressive, cerebral. Hope she can adopt the role of teacher to the viewing public. Lure her out of the White House before she gets worn out dueling with the idiot Fox reporter.
Second best choice: Thom Hartmann: smart, approach to issues is to teach, prolific author on variety of topics, decades of progressive media leadership
Third choice: Ali Velshi -- second best brain on the network now
Worst choices -- any news "reader" -- woman or man -- chosen obviously only to make MSNBC look "diverse"
Narcissist on steroids (literally)
he thought he was king, now with help from the doctors, he thinks he is invincible. In his euphoria, he overrides FDA and stops all talk of helping Americans devastated by the economic impact of C-19. Shouldn't he have signed a form promising to not make major life decisions (especially the lives of others) until the drug wears off?
Sheriffs and pending evictions
Very worried that the same radical RW county sheriffs who refuse to enforce public health policies (e.g., mask mandates) will gleefully support landlords and banks to evict decent people whose money vanished from COVID and repubs failure to feel empathy. We need dissenting, moral sheriffs who refuse to evict. Let's see what happens throughout August.
For once, Dems need to show STRENGTH
by investigating, holding hearings, then summarizing each day's activities in clear language. I want to believe that voters seek information, care about justice, understand the ongoing damage to our institutions, and appreciate the fragility of our democracy. But they don''t. Decisions are emotional. Bullies cloak their abuse as "being strong." Face it, America prefers bullying and ruthlessness. Trump added shamelessness. But the new Dems understand how to message, how to fight back and how to not take shit shoved in their faces. No sense meeting in the middle with others who only condemn you no matter what you do. So, show strength. Of course, we put that strength to positive ends. Just make the emotional message of strength above all else to appeal to our dumb-downed society.
Dem establishment must back Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Just as progressives have to pledge to support the DCCC-backed candidate who beat them in a primary, so now we should expect the same from Schumer, Gillebrand, Tom Perez, Pelosi and the gang. Let's hear it for the democratic socialist. After all, it's the "civil" thing to do.
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Gender: MaleMember since: Wed Dec 6, 2017, 06:40 PM
Number of posts: 60
