Stronger unions, better jobs: Why middle-class families need the Employee Free Choice Act

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2009/03/15/2009-03-15_stronger_unions_better_jobs_why_middlecl.html

Sunday, March 15th 2009, 4:00 AM

The all-out campaign by Republicans in Congress to kill the Employee Free Choice Act will be the next big political showdown between President Obama and the GOP - and by far the most important.

Thanks to the lobbying efforts of anti-union forces - led by the Republican National Committee and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is spending $30 million to zap EFCA - the debate over the bill has been distorted almost beyond recognition.

Countless radio, print and television ads harp on a false accusation that the proposed law would abolish the use of secret ballots during union certification elections.

That is not true. EFCA would allow workers to choose a traditional, government-supervised election with secret ballots, or a simpler checkoff on a form.

As reporter Melanie Trottman noted in a Wall Street Journal news story on Feb. 4, "the bill does not eliminate a union's ability to seek a secret-ballot election, but opponents say it's hard to imagine the circumstances in which a union would prefer an election to a faster and more discreet card check."

The secret-ballot canard, and the spurious charge that the bill will kill jobs, distracts the public - perhaps intentionally - from discussing the crucial economic issues that make pro-union legislation so badly needed.

FULL story at link.

[FLAprogressive]

1. not gonna happen thanks to the reactionaries that have infested our party

[midnight]

2. So glad to be the first to rec this. Of course we want this

access to unions for our family's. All the hard work is always for our families. At least that is how I was raised.

[pleah]

3. K&R