AFL-CIO: Reality Check: Here’s the Real Deal on Employee Free Choice

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Reality Check: Here’s the Real Deal on Employee Free Choice
By: Tula Connell Thursday March 12, 2009 1:30 pm

Join me in welcoming AFL-CIO Government Affairs Director Bill Samuel, who provides a reality check for the media spin around the Employee Free Choice Act. Bill was on NPR today in a discussion of the issue with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Check it out here.



As most of you know, the Employee Free Choice Act was introduced in the U.S. House and Senate this week.

Make no mistake: This is a big deal.

This year—finally—we have a chance to restore some balance to our economy and help working people share in the prosperity they help create.

This year—for the first time in 30 years—we will take up the challenge of fixing the nation's labor law that for decades has been badly broken.

Those in the public who rely on traditional political reporting could be forgiven for missing the significance of this moment in history.

Instead of focusing on the substantive issues involved—like, say, how working people in unions are more likely to have health care, pensions, and family-sustaining wages than those who do not have unions—the traditional media seems oddly obsessed with transparently phony rhetoric and parliamentary procedure.

Going forward in this debate, it's important we remind ourselves what this fight is really about—and that means tuning out about 90 percent of the back and forth we’ll hear on this issue, because most of it is complete nonsense.

more...

http://firedoglake.com/2009/03/12/reality-check-heres-the-real-deal-on-employee-free-choice/

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