http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mike-elk/teabaggers-are-what-worke_b_262538.htmlMike Elk
Campaign for America's Future
Posted: August 19, 2009 11:20 AM
After reading this article the other day, I noticed the the strong similarities between union busting and the tactics of teabaggers -- namely, how they suppress, intimidate, and delay action at all costs. They both rely on intimidating people to the point where there is no longer any space left to make any logical argument.
From Chris Townsend, who started off his career as union activist thirty years ago as a garbageman in Upstate New York and thirty years later is continuing to take out the trash in Washington, D.C. as a Political Action Director for United Electrical Workers (UE):
House and Senate Democrats should know that what they are now witnessing in their meetings is nothing more than what hundreds of thousands of working people are subjected to every year when they try to join a union. The only difference is that working people are forced to endure months of intimidation, lies, disruption, and chaos - and frequently termination from their jobs -- when they try to exercise their right to join a union. The Democrats should be glad that they are only forced to tolerate a few hours of this corporate attack.
Think about the hell that these Congressman are going through at these meetings and then think how intense these union drives must be must be day in and day. You'd be folding the way Democrats are folding on the public option out of fear of losing your job.
Last week, Betty Castor was greeted with a firestorm of teabaggers at her town hall that would make you think she was in an overwhelming Republican distinction. When infact she was in a district with over 66% Democrats and the majority of the teabaggers had been shipped in from rural parts of the state by corporate lobbyists.
Similary bosses rely on irrational threats like threatening to close factories. In 57% of all union drives they threaten, but only closes them in 2% of all cases. Indeed, they do fire workers in about 34% of all union drives just to intimidate the rest of the works.
From Townsend:
When workers try to join a union today in the private sector, in almost every case the boss goes into action; he hires a lawyer to delay, and then he hires a union busting consultant to launch the legal and illegal counterattack. The boss never admits to this, however, and claims throughout that he just wants everyone to have a "secret ballot" election someday to settle things fair and square.
Hmm sound familiar? We just need some more time to make sure we do this right? Isn't this what Republican and their corporate allies Blue Dogs in Congress did last month hoping to buy some time so they could get to the violent intimidation sessions of August. Townsend goes on to explain:
The boss and
consultant then turn the workplace upside down -- just like they are doing in the town hall format -- with their contrived chaos and terror. They lie, misrepresent, instill fear, generate chaos, and completely muddy the waters with their sophisticated and unsophisticated tactics at the same time. And not satisfied to browbeat workers in a group setting.
The boss and his consultant then subject workers to one-on-one interrogation and humiliation sessions all intended to make it clear to the worker that voting "no" is their only option. By the time the "secret ballot" election rolls around the damage is done. Confused and terrorized workers then vote "no" and against joining the union. Their desire or need for a union does not matter any more. The laws protecting the worker don't matter because they are rarely enforced. By election day workers just hope to just have some sense of normalcy returned to their workplaces after the bosses contrived turbulence has run its course.
FULL story at link.
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