Today's Teamster News 01.29.12

State senate will hold right to work hearing Monday  Post-Tribune   ...On the heels of the Indiana House passing divisive right-to-work legislation, the Indiana Senate will hold a committee hearing Monday with the goal of sending the bill to the governor before the Super Bowl...
Dave Bachman: Prison makeover is too big and too fast  Tallahassee Democrat   ...The one consideration that I feel has not been sufficiently aired is the potential that such widespread changes may have to upset the good order, control and discipline in some institutions, resulting in "unintended consequences..."
Scott Walker Faces Tightening Noose in John Doe Investigation  Veterans News Now   ...a John Doe investigation covering Walker’s tenure as Milwaukee County executive and his successful 2010 run for governor has reached into the inner circles of Scott Walker’s longtime aides and allies. “A criminal complaint has uncovered a ’secret email system’ that was ‘routinely used by selected insiders within the Walker administration’ for county business as well as unofficial purposes such as campaigning...
A Victory for the Public on Foreclosures?  Rolling Stone   ...this deal ... appears to have been effectively negotiated down from a bloocurdling outrage to whatever it is now, which is probably something far less than that: it may still be a serious underpay, but it's not the unreal, criminal giveaway it was originally meant to be...
Trying to Inch the WTO Away from Extreme Financial Deregulation  Eyes on Trade   ...The World Trade Organization’s General Agreement on Trade in Services limits the kinds of financial regulations countries can impose...
Erie Teamsters vote to give leaders strike authorization  Go Erie   ...The union represents about 160 city of Erie workers, including Bureau of Streets employees...

Today's Teamster News 01.22.12

Indiana House Democrats could end boycott Monday  Associated Press   ...The Indiana House’s Democratic leader said Friday his boycotting members are willing to return at “high noon” Monday to begin debating a contentious right-to-work bill, although the ongoing dispute over whether a statewide referendum on the issue is constitutional could prevent legislative action...
Our view: Protect the public's money (opinion)  St. Augustine.com   ...While privatization may be a good idea, it is a bad idea when it is cloaked in so much secrecy that it smacks of backroom deals...
Tonette Walker, GOP leaders rally governor's supporters  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel   ...For about three hours, a large crowd stood on packed snow and ice to show they were standing with the governor during the first large Republican rally of the recall season...
How U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work  New York Times   ...Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that “Made in the U.S.A.” is no longer a viable option for most Apple products...
Did Mitt Romney really create jobs at Bain Capital?  Christian Science Monitor   ...Bain made $2.5 billion in profits on $1.1 billion invested in 77 separate deals. Of those 77 transactions, 22 percent ended with the firms in bankruptcy after the eighth year of the Bain investment...
Hunts Point produce workers vote for new contract  Crain's New York Business   ...Market employees vote yes by a 95% margin to a contract offering wage, pension and health care gains covering 1,300 people...

Today's Teamster News 01.03.12

The penny finally drops. Pay people properly and you will get better results  The Independent   ...A decade of hard graft by Living Wage campaigners has forced employers to recognise that higher salaries boost productivity...
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: 2012 could be the year Germany lets the euro die (opinion)  The Telegraph   ...All policy levers are set on deep recession, and deep recession is what Europe will get...
Prayer group gets waiver on Statehouse access  Associated Press   ...(Indiana) AFL-CIO Spokesman Jeff Harris said the special access is part of an effort to limit public debate at the Statehouse. "I think it's just incredible that the state is now in the position to pick and choose who gets access to the Statehouse,"...
Montana High Court Says 'Citizens United' Does Not Apply In Big Sky State  Move To Amend   ...Montana’s Supreme Court has issued a stunning rebuke to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision in 2010 that infamously decreed corporations had constitutional rights to directly spend money on ‘independent expenditures’ in campaigns...
Governor Walker Is Not Actually a Good Person  Esquire   ...It's going to be hilarious watching this guy flounder through the next several months. He may wind up signing one of his own recall petitions before it's through...
Hampton reaches contract deal with Teamsters  Seacoast Online   ... the agreement for the Teamsters ... calls for a 2.5 percent increase in wages over a two-year period.

Rays of hope from behind the cheese curtain

Wisconsin voters will almost certainly get a chance to vote to recall Gov. Koch whore Scott Walker. Today We Are Wisconsin announced they collected 507,533 signatures to put the recall on the ballot. They're very close to the 540,208 needed by Jan 17.

Reuters reports,

Organizers of a petition drive to force Wisconsin's Republican governor into a recall election next year said on Thursday that in just one month they had collected 94 percent of the signatures needed for the special election.

The group United Wisconsin, which opposes the collective bargaining changes Scott Walker pushed into law earlier this year, said it now hopes to gather more than 720,000 signatures to recall the first-term governor by the January 17 deadline -- nearly 200,000 more than needed.

The group said it had already collected 507,533 of the 540,208 signatures required and now hopes to gather 720,277 in all. That latter figure would represent 33 percent of the 2010 general election turnout, although petition gatherers only need 25 percent to force a special election.

It will be tough to get rid of him, though. Walker will collect tens of millions of dollars in campaign cash from front groups funded by Wall Street billionaires and corporate CEOs. He'll use that money to spread shameless lies about his "accomplishments."

There are some reasons for hope, though. A cloud is hanging over Walker's head as the federal investigation into his administration continues. A commercial real estate broker and Walker supporter was arrested on Tuesday for refusing to cooperate with investigators.

Another bright spot is the strong support rural voters are showing for recalling Walker. As John Nichols points out in Nation of Change,

The first counties to approach their goals for the entire recall drive have been rural ones -- all of which send at least some Republicans to the legislature.

Indeed, a number of counties that backed Walker in 2010 are leading the pack when it comes to producing recall signatures.

A third factor, albeit an unfortunate one, that will contribute to Walker's downfall is rising joblessness in Wisconsin. Employment is the most reliable predictor of an election's outcome. Wisconsin has lost jobs in the five consecutive months since Walker's "reforms" took effect.

Finally, Mahlon Mitchell, the charismatic president of the Professional Fire Fighters of Wisconsin (that would be a union), may just decide to take on Walker. And he could be a formidabloe opponent.

Today's Teamster News 12.15.11

Enough Signatures Gathered, Walker To Be Recalled!  New Dog Democrat   ... The word has spread that over 550,000  signatures have been gathered to recall Scott Walker! This means the movement is passing its first milestone. Now they must gather more signatures to pad its victory in case some are thrown out by the Secretary of State...
Obama, Dems drop millionaire surtax to pay for payroll tax cut  CNN   ...In what would be a major concession, President Obama and Senate Democrats will drop their insistence that a surtax on millionaires pay for extending the payroll tax cut...
Sotheby's Handles Lockout, Costs Rise $2.4 Million, Ruprecht Given Bonus  Bloomberg   ...The temps and enhanced security since the lockout began helped account for a $2.4 million jump in “other compensation” expenses in the first nine months of the year...
The ALEC-Koch pipeline to Wisconsin Legislators and the Mining Bill  Badger Democracy   ...The Mining Bill released by Assembly Republicans late last week is clearly a case of Legislative patronage to a corporate sponsor – in this case, Gogebic Taconite Mining, LLC. Not surprising, but more disturbing, are the covert links to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Koch Industries, and closer to home, Hamilton Consulting in Madison...
Oklahoma to bring back state prison labor program; communities get help with maintenance work  Associated Press   ...the program will involve about 40 inmates who would be paid about $2 a day to do landscaping and cleanup tasks, the Tulsa World ...  reported...
Inmates provide cost saving labor  Rome News-Tribune   ...66 work inside the prison, and another 28 have other prison details. That’s the majority, but the rest work in areas throughout the county, including public works, animal control and the Rome-Floyd Parks and Recreation Authority...
Marriage Rate In America Drops Drastically  Huffington Post   ...it's important, at least for men, to be financially able to provide for a family before they get married. It may [also] be that some couples feel they don't have the financial wherewithal to have a wedding yet...

Today's Teamster News 12.02.11

For Jobless, Little Hope of Restoring Better Days  New York Times   ...just 7 percent of those who lost jobs after the financial crisis have returned to or exceeded their previous financial position and maintained their lifestyles...
In Recording, American Crystal Sugar President Likens Union Workers to Cancerous Tumor  Minnesota AFL-CIO   ...The already strained relationship between management of American Crystal Sugar Company (ACSC) and its 1,300 locked out workers was dealt another serious blow when recordings of anti-worker statements by ACSC President and CEO Dave Berg were made public this week...
Speaker O'Brien Lies in Press Statement, Unable to Name a Single Business to Move to NH if HB 474 Had Passed  Granite State Progress   ..."Not once has the topic of right-to-work ever come up in all of [their] discussions with New Hampshire businesses and prospective businesses..."
Opinion: N.J. unions will achieve goals by speaking with collective voice  Times of Trenton   ...When our political system gets so out of whack that it stops working for the very people it represents, working- and middle-class voters do what too many politicians have been refusing to do: Come together to restore balance to our economy and our politics...
Wisconsin Recall Drive Surpasses 300,000 Signatures  The Nation   ...What is truly remarkable is where the signatures are coming from: rural and small-town Wisconsin communities are contributing disproportionally high numbers of signatures to the total...
How Republicans are being taught to talk about Occupy Wall Street  The Ticket   ..."I'm so scared of this anti-Wall Street effort. I'm frightened to death," said Frank Luntz, a Republican strategist and one of the nation's foremost experts on crafting the perfect political message. "They're having an impact on what the American people think of capitalism..."
Mayor Bloomberg: ‘I Have My Own Army’  New York Observer   ...“I have my own army in the NYPD, which is the seventh biggest army in the world..."

Today's Teamster News 11.28.11

Deadline passes for Occupy Philly, LA  NBC News   ...Los Angeles Police Department was on "city-wide tactical alert" after the early Monday deadline for 'Occupy' movement protesters to vacate their encampment near City Hall expired...
A New Twist in FL's Private vs. Public Prisons Feud  Public News Service   ...The legal entanglements and the new presence of the Teamsters Local 2022 on the scene will likely tie up any move to privatize Florida prisons, at least in the near future...
Recall Gov Walker? WI Sierra Club releases official position....  Examiner   ...The John Muir Chapter’s Executive Committee has voted to unanimously to endorse the recall of Gov. Walker and Lt. Gov. Kleefisch...
Secret Fed Loans Gave Banks Undisclosed $13B  Bloomberg   ...While Fed officials say that almost all of the loans were repaid and there have been no losses, details suggest taxpayers paid a price beyond dollars as the secret funding helped preserve a broken status quo and enabled the biggest banks to grow even bigger...
Greeks Balk at Paying Steep New Property Tax  New York Times   ...Many Greeks consider the new tax, which makes no exceptions for the unemployed or the elderly and is much higher than any real estate tax they have paid before, to be one more sign of the tough austerity measures they are suffering under as a requirement for European aid...
High school student reprimanded by principal for tweet criticising Kansas governor  Daily Mail   ...After meeting Mr Brownback, Emma tweeted: 'Just made mean comments at gov brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalot.'  Mr Brownback's office contacted the school and complained about the tweet...

Today's Teamster News 11.23.11

Unions pack Indiana Statehouse to protest 'right to work'  Louisville Courier-Journal   ...Hundreds of union workers crowded the Statehouse hallways Tuesday, waving signs and chanting “shame on you” outside the Indiana House and Senate chambers as lawmakers organized for their 2012 session...
Scott Walker petitions take center stage in Wisconsin  Politico   ...officials are projecting a general election in May or June. That timeline means Democrats want to remain focused on Walker until at least next year...
Bill Cotterell: Teamsters offer extra toughness  Tallahassee Democrat   ...Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-run Legislature still want to privatize prisons in 18 counties of South Florida, and probably the rest of the state, eventually...
Weary, blistered Wall Street protesters reach DC  Associated Press   ...Organizers said the march, which they called Occupy the Highway, accomplished their goal of taking their concerns about income equality and corporate influence in politics on the road, including to rural communities that previously had little exposure to the movement...
The Old Order Stifles the Birth of a New Egypt  New York Times   ...The vestiges of Mr. Mubarak’s order — the military, the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists, or fragmented liberals and leftists — seem ill prepared to navigate the transition from his rule...
Financial Finger-Pointing Turns to Regulators  New York Times   ...The IndyMac collapse, with its multibillion-dollar cost to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation fund, highlights the role played by federal overseers of financial companies in the years leading up to the crisis. It also raises questions about whether government officials should be held accountable for dubious conduct related to the failure of an institution and whether the government has avoided pursuing some cases because of the roles regulators have played...

History, polls not on Walker's side

Graphic courtesy Tracy Knauss

(UPDATES with new signature numbers.)

The campaign to recall Koch whore Gov. Scott Walker is off to a brilliant start with more than 105,000 158,000 signatures collected and as many as 40,000 people showing up for the kick-off rally in Madison.

What will happen is anyone's guess. Walker has plenty of advantages: the Benedict Arnold Koch brothers and their ilk will open their wallets for him; his party controls the state's election machinery; and he doesn't face an opponent -- yet.

However, history and the polls are not on his side. Political scientist David Schecter points out that incumbents have lost recall elections under similar circumstances. He cites the 2003 recall of California Gov. Gray Davis and the 1921 recall of North Dakota Gov. Lynn Frazier. Schecter argues that the conditions leading to the recalls of Davis and Frazier are similar to those in Wisconsin today. They include:

• A divided electorate and a governor who didn't try to heal wounds
• Questions about the incumbent's standing, stature, competency and truthfulness during difficult economic times
• An organized and well-defined opposition
• An interested media
• A contentious legal environment.

The polls are also against Walker. Badger Democracy reports that a recent survey shows 58 percent of respondents would remove Walker from office while only 38 percent would keep him in.

Scott Walker’s approval rating has dropped since April – from 46% down to 38%; with his disapproval rating jumping from 48% to 58%. More telling, the 18%, ultra right-wing conservative “strongly approve” rating is unchanged. What has changed, is he has lost 8% in the “approve” column – indicating a loss of moderate Republicans. 

The lousy economy is hurting Walker as well. Despite his claim that his "reforms" are "working," Wisconsin's unemployment rate has been rising faster than the nation's since he took office.

But -- and it's a big but -- Walker will get a ton of money from the Benedict Arnold Koch brothers. WUWM reports he will be able to

...raise and spend unlimited amounts from contributors not only until the January 17th deadline for collecting signatures, but also during the 30 days state officials might need to review the petitions and during any court challenges.

Already, the Benedict Arnold Koch brothers are opening their wallets for Walker through their Americans for Iranian Prosperity Foundation and the MacIver Institute. The Green Bay Press Gazette reports they've already spent more than $500,000 in an ad buy.

And United Wisconsin reports on early electoral shenanigans, including:

A Republican state senator who is closed allied with the governor sought to tighten requirements for notarizing recall petitions in a way that would have made it much harder for citizens to circulate and certify petitions....

The Republican Party of Wisconsin has launched a so-called “Recall Integrity Center,” which seems to encourage intimidation of Wisconsinites gathering recall petition signatures.

As Schecter says,

Welcome to the world of gubernatorial recalls, Wisconsin. It could be a bumpy ride.

'A Teamsters semi is back on the square!!!' in WI

An estimated 30,000 -- or maybe 60,000? -- Wisconsinites return to the streets of Madison today to kick off the "Recall Walker" campaign.

Tweeters were excited to see a Teamsters semi back on Capitol Square. Back during the spring protests, Joint Council 39's semi was parked on the square for weeks. peerless blogger blue cheddar told us how good it was to see such a big, bold, proud union symbol.

@legaleagle tweeted:

Recall Walker rally.

A Teamsters semi is back on the square!!! 

Today, Joint Council 39 is running a can drive in conjunction with the rally ("Can Scott Walker" -- get it?). People are signing petitions to recall both Koch whore Gov. Scott Walker and his lieutenant governor, Rebecca Kleefisch.

The Isthmus explains,

Organized under the banner of United Wisconsin, the campaign officially started at midnight on Tuesday, November 15, and runs for a total of 60 days, during which time organizers will attempt to collect more than 540,208 total validated signatures from state voters to trigger a recall election.

blue cheddar tells us they've already collected 105,000. Out on the Square, people are using recycling bins as tables to sign petitions. The Solidarity Singers (who sing union songs every weekday at noon in the Statehouse) are leading the crowd in the "Roll Out the Recall" Polka.

Inside the Capitol, the Rotunda is rocking with drums and cowbells and chants of "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Scott Walker has got to go." @legaleagle tells us,

"Wisconsin families will not abandon Wisconsin children" gets a resounding cheer from the crowd!

And from @PurrpleCatMama:

Walker supporters.

Teachers on the March in Wisconsin! Teamsters, FireFighters, You and Me, and Puppies for Democracy!

Fifty counterprotesters showed up.

@legaleagle tweeted:

I'd like to thank the 50 counter protesters for coming, as everyone who is here just committed to working harder to defeat you! #WIrally

Today's Teamster News 11.19.20

Hoffa Elected To Fourth Term By Overwhelming Margin  IBT   ...According to unofficial results provided by the Office of the Election Supervisor, the Hoffa-Hall Slate defeated their two challengers with 60 percent of the vote...
Occupy Wall Street protests aren't over by a long shot New York Daily News   ...Then the crowd of nurses and teachers and Teamsters and telephone company workers took up the chant: “All day, all week, Occupy Wall Street.” And for one brief moment, you got an inkling that the mindset of a city, perhaps a nation, was on the cusp of change...
What price the new democracy? Goldman Sachs conquers Europe  The Independent   ...Even before the upheaval in Italy, there was no sign of Goldman Sachs living down its nickname as "the Vampire Squid", and now that its tentacles reach to the top of the eurozone, sceptical voices are raising questions over its influence...
Rally to recall Walker  United Wisconsin   ...Join United Wisconsin, We Are Wisconsin, and our partners on Saturday, November 19th in Madison on the Capitol Steps to Stand up for our values and recall Walker and Kleefisch!...
Newt: Fire the janitors, hire kids to clean schools  Politico   ...Newt Gingrich tonight said at an address at Harvard that child work laws "entrap" poor children into poverty - and suggested that a better way to handle failing schools is to fire the janitors, hire the local students and let them get paid for upkeep...
Nevada Files Felony Charges for Mortgage Fraud  Economic Populist   ...The Nevada Attorney General just filed felony criminal charges for mortgage fraud, but wait for it, so far it is just two little fish...