Trivia quiz for union-member NFL fans

The Sheet Metal Workers' International Association asks this trivia question:

What football legend has a father who lost a college coaching job because the college board of trustees considered him "undesirable" due to HIS father being a union organizer?

You probably guessed from the photo that the answer is "Bill Bellichick." SMWIA tells us Bellichick's father, a coach himself, was dismissed by the Board of Trustees at Vanderbilt University because he came from what they considered "bad stock" - that being Belichick's grandfather having been an organizer with the United Steelworkers in Youngstown, Ohio.

Here's another one: Which NFL quarterback is a union activist and member of the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) Executive Committee"

According to American Rights at Work, the answer is New Orleans Saint Drew Brees, a model athlete who's been deeply involved in the reconstruction of New Orleans. Brees is trying to avert a lockout by the owners next year. A lockout would cost hundreds of thousands of jobs in cities that host NFL teams. American Rights at Work asks that you sign a petitition urging the NFL not to lockout the players.

Show your solidarity with the jobless on 12/7

Brother Fred Crow from Cleveland urges us to take two minutes tomorrow to show our solidarity for the millions of jobless Americans.

Here's what you do: replace your Facebook and Twitter images with this jobless avatar (left). And change your status to: “We Are All Jobless.”

The purpose of the campaign is to raise awareness so people will tell their elected representatives in Congress to extend unemployment insurance.

You can also click "Attending" on your Facebook page to show you're participating in the event.

The AFL-CIO has a web page explaining the whole campaign and how you can help here.

Credit problems for 22% of people with bank account in past 2 years

This is what we mean when we say the middle class is being destroyed. One out of five Americans with a bank account had credit problems in 2007-09. You can guess the reasons -- unemployment or shrunken income.

Below are the kinds of problems they're dealing with, according to a consumer lending survey by the Deloitte accounting firm:

These are scary, scary numbers. They suggest that millions of working families are struggling to survive on wages that are at or near poverty level.   

For these families -- and for many of us -- the recession is far from over. Friday's frightening unemployment numbers made that clear. Here's a chart from the New York Times that shows the abysmal rate of job creation during this "recovery," compared to the others in the past 30 years.

Today's Teamster News 12.06.10

Foreclosures paperwork miscues piling up  Denver Post   ..."We are not in default and they do not have authorization to sell our house," a frustrated Wendy Diers said...
Amex chief calls for jobs task force  FT.com   ...Ken Chenault, the chief executive of American Express, has called for an alliance of business leaders and politicians to find concrete ways to create millions of jobs in the US and kick-start the anaemic economic recovery...
France Finds Continental Guilty in Crash of Concorde  New York Times   ...A French judge ruled on Monday that Continental Airlines and one of its mechanics were guilty of involuntary homicide for their role in the 2000 crash of an Air France Concorde jet that killed 113 people...
Bill to outlaw wage theft is sent to N.Y. Gov. Patterson  New York Daily News   ..."This groundbreaking legislation puts New York at the top of the list in terms of labor protection laws," said Andrew Friedman of Make the Road New York...
Kenny Perdue: Public safety workers deserve a voice (opinion)  Charleston Gazette ...today in many states, firefighters and police officers are still told to be seen, not heard ...
Kasich: Provisions force nurses, others to unionize  Dayton Daily News ...Republican John Kasich said Friday that he would rescind two executive orders signed by Gov. Ted Strickland that authorized home- health care and day-care workers to unionize...

Today's Teamster News 12.05.10

Participation Rate of 25 to 54 Age Men at Record Low  Calculated Risk   ...The collapse in the labor force participation rate has been one of the key stories of the great recession...
72 super PACs spent $83.7 million on election, financial disclosure reports show  Washington Post ...The newly created independent political groups known as super PACs, which raised and spent millions of dollars on last month's elections, drew much of their funding from private-equity partners and others in the financial industry...
Mounting State Debts Stoke Fears of a Looming Crisis  New York Times ... many state and local governments have so much debt — several trillion dollars’ worth, with much of it off the books and largely hidden from view — that it could overwhelm them in the next few years...
Running Backwards in the U.S. Economy  Gregor.us   ...a handful of Americans are going back to work in our surging export industries, but, they are doing so at much lower pay...
It's Ugly Out There  Financial Armageddon  ...Roundup of stories about homeless camps...

U.S. bails out Europe, not its own jobless

Here's a great rant from David Rothkopf in Foreign Policy (thanks to naked capitalism) about the stupidity of bailing out foreign banks.  Calling his screed "Empire of Schmucks," he writes,

Beijing appears to have enough money to commit $1.5 trillion dollars to prime the pumps for seven "strategic" industries (as they announced they were considering doing this week)… while we don't seem to have enough cash to pay for extending unemployment benefits for victims of the economic downturn. Mull that one over for a second: We have enough money to bail out big European financial institutions and their fat, happy shareholders, but not enough to help out struggling American families? We're paying for euro problems and unwinnable wars in the Middle East and China is saving its yuan for other activities -- like figuring out how to clean our clocks in the global marketplace of five minutes from now?
We are not just the uncontested Megapower of Schmuckdom, we are a deeply confused nation led by people with profoundly twisted priorities -- who clearly believe they report to higher powers than mere American citizens.
Today we discovered that U.S. unemployment is at 9.8 percent, that we have broken the 1980's record for most consecutive months of unemployment above 9 percent, and we are nonetheless forced to stomach the current charade on Capitol Hill in which the Republican party fights for tax cuts for millionaires while callously allowing Americans in need twist in the wind. All this, while it turns out that across town in the Fed's corner of Foggy Bottom it doesn't even take a vote to provide handouts for rich foreigners in want?

Meanwhile, in other fallout from the Federal Reserve's revelations this week about who it loaned money to, the New York Daily News reports on potential conflicts of interests (on Wall Street, of course) that arose from the Fed's emergency lending programs. Reports the Daily News,

the central bank used companies to help design or run programs they could then use to their benefit.

One firm gave advice on a program to prevent a run on money-market funds, then borrowed $8.9 billion from the same program.

Others helped the Fed value stocks -- and then traded in those same stocks.

The Fed consulted with GE on a program to give corporations short-term loans -- and then GE borrowed $16 billion from the program.

Read the whole thing here.

Today's Teamster News 12.04.10

FedEx To Raise Ground, Home Delivery Rates by Net 4.9 %  Wall Street Journal   ... effective Jan. 3...
U.S. Trade Pact Set With S. Korea via Auto Tariff Deal  New York Times  ...The agreement ...would be the largest trade accord since NAFTA...
Obama’s Decision to Push Bush’s NAFTA-Style Korea Trade Deal Without Real Fixes Is Major Policy, Political Mistake (opinion)  Public Citizen   ...Why the administration would consider moving another NAFTA-style trade deal is inexplicable...
Are Railroads the Future? Why… Yes They Are.  Small Cap Network   ...(the)  truth is this: We must have them...
Increased jobless rate casts benefit fight in new light  Philadelphia Inquirer   ...
Two separate bills that would extend unemployment benefits for a year may come up for votes in Washington on Saturday...
Teamsters Canada announce organizing website for CN is online  Teamsters Canada  (Le site Internet de la campagne de recrutement au CN est en ligne)