The Colorado Index

Unions Never Seem to Learn

If one thinks back to the auto industry in the 1950-1970 period, one remembers the whipsaw tactics that the UAW used to jack up wages and benefits.  

They would strike one of the big three and extract a contract that the company couldn't afford.  Then they would use that contract as a model for the other two who couldn't afford either, but agreed to to avoid a strike.

The companies might have been able to afford the contracts in a buy American environment, but the world economy was coming on strong by then.  They didn't have a buy American environment.

Worse, the unions used their clout to prevent the auto companies from disciplining workers who routinely took Monday and Friday as sick days.  The assembly lines were so disrupted by replacement workers who didn't know the job they were doing that day that 40% of the cars being produced had a high chance of being lemons.  

Of course, the buyers had no way of knowing which cars were lemons, so they avoided the brands entirely. It dosn't take much analysis to see that the companies didn't destroy the American Auto industry, the unions did.  Isn't it ironic that the people who are going to be left with the big piece of that very small pie are the people who caused the problem?  That is socialism for you.

The only defense a company has against whipsaw tactics is to agree that if one is struck the others will lock their employees out.  That way the union cannot confer an advantage to one company while damaging another.

Here in Colorado, the grocery unions want to do the same thing to the grocery industry.  Their allies in the legislature want to help them by requiring that workers locked out by companies determined not to be whipsawed get unemployment benefits.

Fortunately, that bill, HB 1170, was vetoed by Bill Ritter.  Ritter may pay a price for it, but the business community will have a reason to back him over another Democrat.  Unfortunately, his veto message invited the sponsors to put the bill up in a future year.  Does anyone think a Bill Ritter who is safely past his last election will veto it a second time?

The sad thing is that what seems to be good for the union in the short and medium term can be very bad for it in the long term.  Ask the UAW.  No, they won't give an honest answer.  Ask the auto dealers who got bad news last week and the communities that will be hurt by their closure.

If You Act Like a Thug, You Deserve to be Called a Thug

If ever there were an argument for secret union elections, Mike Cerbo, executive director of Colorado AFL-CIO made it this week.

A GOP "tracker" filming appearances of Senator Michael Bennett was surrounded by union thugs and was sufficiently fearful for his safety that he called 911.

But...what did Mike Cerbo claim?

By [ Mike } Cerbo's recollection,  [ Matt ] Milner offered to erase his tape because he hadn't been invited to the event. Milner says he was barred from leaving until he agreed to erase the recording and that one of the men briefly took his camera to make sure it was.

It seems that In a union thug's view of the world, intimidation isn't intimidation.  It is victim volunteerism. That is what makes card check so dangerous.

If you act like a thug, you deserve to be called a thug.

Stop Playing Defense - Part 2

 This is the second in a series of essays suggesting that Republicans go on the offense using the initiative process.

An obvious target for an initiative is a corrective sentence to Amendment 27:  

In Amendment 27, the people of Colorado specifically forbade unions and corporations from making campaign contributions.  Unions may not circumvent the plain language of this prohibition by using the small donor committee loophole or any other mechanism to influence Colorado elections.  

Deadline December 15th

If you are a teacher or know a teacher who is even an accidental union member (that happened one year to my wife) watch this video:

The More Things Change...

Last week, we wrote about our experiences in a union some fourty years ago.  The union was taking money and providing no benefit.

Face the State provides us with information that the unions continue to pull this sleazy stunt with a twist.  They don't even bother to negotiate the 5 cent an hour "raise."  The union boss and his family are taking salaries totalling over $400,000.

Yes, I was a Union Man, Reluctantly

Someone wanted to know if I had ever been in a union.  Here is an excerpt from a letter I wrote on that subject last week.

In 1966, I belonged to a union in a state that lacked right to work.

I was a part time bag boy in a grocery store. The union negotiated a wage for me that was exactly five cents an hour over the minimum wage. Five cents doesn't sound like much, but the minimum wage at the time was $1.25, meaning that I was making four percent more than the minimum wage.

It turned out that the union dues were five cents an hour. Without thinking it through, you might say that I wasn't any worse off, but you wouldn't have thought it through. I had to pay income taxes, social security taxes, and medicare on that 5 cents an hour. Who was freeloading off whom?

When the chain agreed to "pay" bag boys an extra 5 cents an hour, it had to cut hours to make that money up. You can correctly assume that I would have been much happier to get to work an extra hour of work a week at minimum wage than see that money go into some union boss' pocket.

Oh, lest you claim that I didn't pay income taxes because I earned so little, let me tell you that when I began working in the early 1960's, I got to pay income taxes one year when I only made $400 in the whole year.

Making Extortion Illegal

Those of you who have been out of town all week may want to know that the Denver business community sold its honor and set itself up for future extortion by paying $3 million to get four poison pills off the ballot.

Every crook in the state will be looking at putting something on the ballot in 2010 so that they can extort a million dollars or so from those who would be affected.  It is really hard to triple one's money in six months these days, but that is exactly what the unions did. 

One wonders if the labor organizations considered the tax implications for this deal.  No one can claim that the $3 million was a completely voluntary payment to a non profit.  It looks like a very taxable exchange of things of value from this corner.  The profit would be short term, payable at the highest rate.

Face the State is reporting that Representative Amy Stephens and Senator Mike Kopp will be putting legislation on the ballot that will put an end to this kind of thing.

It is no secret that I plan to get something on the ballot in 2010.  I was tempted to wonder publicly what the media and the lawyers would pay to keep it off the ballot, but such ill-advised humor would be used against me.

I've been writing letters of late.  My bet is that my name, my intentions, and my justification for change is well known at the legislative council, the several major papers, Denver University, and elsewhere.  On the off chance that anyone is taking what I have written seriously and is looking for a way to head me off, let me state flatly that you don't have enough money and can't lay your hands on enough money.

I'd be disappointed if the Amy Stephens - Mike Kopp effort failed to pass.

Added:  The Rocky Mountain News disagrees in an irresponsible editorial. 

Mark Udall as a Completely Unethical Candidate

If I had it to do over again, I would have started a separate blog whose only focus would have been the lack of ethics being used by both Mark Udall and his main stream media cheerleaders in this campaign.  There was easily enough material.

Name Calling:  While Mark Udall campaign spokespeople were piously claiming that they were above name calling, both Mark Udall and his campaign manager personally signed fund raisers that used name calling.  That information never made it to the public via the msm.  Rocky Mountain News reporter Lynn Bartels went out of her way to chastise Bob Schaffer's campaign manager when he used a "Boulder Liberal" tag at a time when a quick trip to schaffer v udall would have shown that Mark Udall's own allies routinely referred to him as a liberal, progressive, or even extremist.  That was below Lynn Bartels radar.

Sweatshop Fundraising:  This is a story that is just breaking this morning.  The Denver Post spent days castigating Bob Schaffer over a trip he took in the late 1990's.  You would have thought that Mark Udall's hands were clean on the subject.  You would have been wrong.  It will be interesting to see if the media spends half the ink on Mark Udall's ongoing connections with sweatshop owner Susie Tompkins-Buell that it spent on Bob Schaffer's trip. 

Vote Selling:  Mark Udall is running a ad claiming that Bob Schaffer was selling out to special interests. when he was in congress.  "We deserve better," the ad piously intones.  In this Congress, Mark Udall not only voted for a union friendly bill that he publicly claimed to disagree with, he sponsored it.  In the same quarter, he took $75,000 in contributions from unions.  Likewise, he can't seem to tell the environmentalists to get lost when he wants to authorize the cutting of dead trees near mountain towns, not because they can make any claim that they are saving the environment, but because he is taking so much money from them.

Youthful Indiscretions:  This year too much msm ink was used on reports about comments made in Facebook by Bob Schaffer's 19-year old son, as though they reflected on Bob Schaffer.  Mark Udall had a much more serious youthful indiscretion that should reflect on him, and yet he has been coy about releasing information about it.  When making a comparison, Mark Udall's arrest for possession of dangerous drugs and the subsequent forfeiture of his car, suggesting he was suspected possessing enough drugs to be dealing, is a lot more serious than anything Schaffer's son did.

Out and Out Lying:  I didn't start out thinking that Mark Udall  was a liar, but there is abundant evidence that he is.  The first time I noticed it, I was very gentle with him.  I poked fun at his different positions on corn ethanol before different audiences, sometimes supportive and sometimes dismissive, depending on what he thought the audience wanted to hear.  I called him "cornfused."  There are too many examples to provide here, but when I regularly wrote on schaffer v udall, I used a "Udall as a liar" tag and routinely provided links that demonstrated that he was a liar.  Pick a subject, and he has lied about it.  Currently, he claims to be for offshore drilling but is supporting a deceptive bill that forces the drilling to be done so far offshore that the reality is that it bans offshore drilling where the oil is.

There is enough material here for a separate blog on Mark Udall's unethical campaign practices, and if I had it to do over again, and enough time, I would have started a blog on that subject.  But who would have guessed?

Will Labor Strife Mar DNC?

Two weeks from today, Democratic nominee Barack Obama will speak to adoring throngs at Invesco Field, the culminating event of the Democratic National Convention.  However, organized labor may ruin Barack Obama's lovefest due to two potential labor strikes.

First, the Denver Classroom Teachers Association will begin a media blitz to explain why they do not want incentive pay.  This incentive pay would result in $3000 to $6000 pay raises and a $44,000 starting salary.

Denver's teachers union is taking to the airwaves and reserving time after school to talk to parents in an effort to explain its side of the negotiation squabble for a new contract.

The publicity effort will include radio advertisements and comes a week before mediation begins between the Denver Classroom Teachers Association and Denver Public Schools with a professional arbiter. (snip)

The union says that the current plan is fair to all teachers but that DPS's proposal would favor beginning teachers over veterans. (snip)

The union also asked teachers Wednesday to wear stickers and take 20 minutes before and after school to explain the union's side to parents.

At least the Denver Classroom Teachers Association does not plan another childish sickout as they did in May.  Still, the veteran teachers should be embarrassed.  The union claims of unfairness in the plan simply means that the union believes that veteran teachers cannot do their jobs and achieve the triggers for incentives.  While this will not escalate to a strike level until after the convention, it still may embarrass Barack Obama, as he has weakly endorsed incentive pay plans similar to the ProComp plan.

An even larger opportunity for embarrassment at the convention is the potential Qwest strike (Hat Tip: Greg Pollowitz at National Review's Media Blog) .  Qwest is providing communications services for the DNC and the RNC in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Members of the largest employee union at Qwest Communications International Inc., have voted to authorize a strike if talks fail to produce a new contract.

Communications Workers of America District 7 said 93 percent of voting members had authorized union leaders to call a strike if needed.

A contract covering about 20,000 union workers at Qwest expires at 12:01 a.m. Aug. 17, a little more than a week before the Democratic National Convention in Denver. The Republican National Convention begins Sept. 1 in St. Paul.

This potential strike would be interesting, especially if they plan to picket the Pepsi Center.  If Qwest workers do picket there, will they be forced into the freedom cage with the rest of the protesters?  Will any Democrats side with the union workers instead of going to their nightly pep rallies? 

Will these labor problems ruin the convention?  Probably not.  Most of the national media will ignore the protesters and only show the made for television convention speeches.  However, at minimum, these situations will only add more chaos to Denver during the Democratic National Convention.

by Civil Sense

Good News on Ethical Standards

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 24, 2008

Contact:   Jon Caldara, 303-641-4255

"Ethical Standards" Question Approved for November Voters

Measure to Clean Up Colorado Government Clears Major Legal Hurdle,

Becoming Fourth Initiative to Appear on Statewide Ballot

DENVER—Secretary of State Mike Coffman today certified petition signatures for the "Ethical Standards" initiative, which proponents say will close an unethical government loophole.

On July 8, Independence Institute president Jon Caldara and state senator Nancy Spence, R-Centennial, submitted to the Secretary of State more than 120,000 collected voter signatures in support of the Ethical Standards initiative, now dubbed Amendment 49. The minimum valid number of signatures for certification is 76,047.

"Thousands of Coloradans are sending a strong message that they want their governments providing them with essential services, not collecting money for special interest groups," Caldara said.

Amendment 49 seeks to set a consistently simple and ethical standard: No state or local government agency can use payroll deductions to bundle and send money to groups that contribute to political candidates and lobby public officials. The conflict of interest goes deeper than just the act of deducting and bundling money.

"This is especially a problem when special interests fund candidates and lobby officials of the very same government that acts as their banker, accountant, and collection agent," said Caldara.

Under the proposal, government workers preserve all their rights of association and may transmit dues payments and other contributions through convenient private banking arrangements.

Ethical Standards Now is a registered issue committee with the State of Colorado.