Card check

[phuloi]

March 11, 2009 | Vol. 4, No. 10


Dancing to Big Labor's Tune
by Newt Gingrich

After spending an astounding $61 million to elect Democrats in the 2008 elections, union bosses are getting their payback this week.

Yesterday, so-called "Card Check" legislation was introduced in both the House and the Senate.

Card Check strips American workers of the right to a secret ballot and gives the federal government the right to impose labor contracts on workers.

The timing of this assault on the freedom of the American workplace could not be worse. A new study shows that for every three workers coerced into joining a union under Card Check, one job will be eliminated by besieged American businesses.


Card Check Could Eliminate 600,000 Jobs In Its First Year



That means that an estimated 600,000 jobs could be lost due to Card Check in the first year alone - and that's on top of the over four million jobs already lost to the flagging economy.

Card Check is a job killer. Even Obama supporter Warren Buffet opposes it, saying "I think the secret ballot is pretty important in the country. I'm against card check." Watch him here.

But as far as Big Labor is concerned, a deal's a deal. Their goal is to get their allies in Washington to ram Card Check through Congress this week, before anyone notices that American workers and businesses are losing fundamental rights.

That's why we need to act, and we need to act today at AmericanSolutions.com/FreedomNotFear.


Biden to Unions: "You All Brought Me to the Dance...It's Time We Start Dancing"
What's happening in Washington this week is old style, quid-pro-quo politics - the kind President Obama pledged as a candidate to end. Supporters of the so-called Employee Free Choice Act (that's their Orwellian name for Card Check) claim to be all about protecting American workers.

But leave it to Vice President Joe Biden to inadvertently tell the truth.

In a meeting with the AFL-CIO last week, Biden made it clear who's calling the shots when it comes to American workers, businesses and jobs. He told the gathering of union big-wigs:

"You all brought me to the dance a long time ago, and it's time we start dancing."


82% of Democrats Oppose Eliminating the Secret Ballot
For big labor and their allies in Washington, it's time to start dancing - and dancing fast.

Vice President Biden and the union bosses hope to duplicate with Card Check the Obama Administration's success in rushing the mammoth $787 billion stimulus bill through Congress so quickly most members never had time to read it.

The reason they have to act quickly is simply this: The vast majority of Americans - 77 percent of Republicans, 82 percent of Democrats and 79 percent of independents - oppose what they're trying to do. (Source)

Not only that, but the latest surveys show that a full 82 percent of Americans say they don't want to belong to a union.


The Stakes Are High This Week
But it's precisely this kind of pro-secret ballot, pro-freedom sentiment among the American people that makes union bosses so eager to pass Card Check.

Under Card Check, union organizers and their enforcers will be able to go into any small business, hospital or construction site and coerce workers into signing cards. If they get 50 percent plus one, the deal's done, and the workers are forced into a union. And if management and the new union fail to reach a negotiated contract, the federal government will just impose one. Coerced unionization allows for what is effectively a new, unaccountable form of forced taxation. Workers will have a portion of their paycheck going to the union to be spent as the bosses see fit, including political donations to parties and candidates that the workers may not even support.

Talk about an "offer you can't refuse." There's no vote. No secret ballot. No right to freely negotiate the contract. The workers, the workplace, and a portion of the worker's paychecks are controlled by the union bosses.

For Americans like you and me, the stakes are high this week. Hanging in the balance are literally hundreds of thousands of jobs, not to mention fundamental freedoms like the ability of small businesses to create and sustain jobs, the freedom of American workers to have a say in how their workplace is organized, and the freedom of American workers to freely choose whether they want to give money to politicians and political parties.


Congress Is Holding Hearings This Week
Make Your Voice Heard at AmericanSolutions.com/FreedomNotFear

The time to act is now - this week, while Congress holds hearings on Card Check.

You can make your voice heard by the people who matter most by joining in American Solutions' "Freedom Not Fear" campaign.


Former Michigan Republican Chairman Saul Anuzis has agreed to lead this effort for American Solutions.

Freedom Not Fear is grassroots petition drive to preserve American jobs and preserve the right of the secret ballot for American workers. Over 80,000 Americans have already gone to AmericanSolutions.com/FreedomNotFear and signed the petition, but we need more help.

Remember the "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less" campaign from last summer? With your help we were able to change hearts and minds on Capitol Hill about the necessity of using more safe, clean American energy.

We can do the same with Freedom Not Fear. Congress needs to hear from the sweeping majorities of Americans of all political parties who oppose this massive power grab by Big Labor.

The union bosses want to silence the voices of American workers and businesses. Go to Americansolutions.com/FreedomNotFear today and let them know that we won't go down without a fight.

Your friend,

Newt Gingrich

[darrels joy]

Government-forced contracts are Card Check's real threat


By: F. Vincent Vernuccio
OpEd Contributor | 6/30/09 11:38 PM



The Employee Free Choice Act includes a Card Check section to eliminate the secret ballot in union organization elections. The outcry against this antidemocratic process may result in its removal. But even with Card Check removed, the most insidious section of the bill will still remain.

Card Check's third section, innocuously called "Facilitating Initial Collective Bargaining Agreements," would go much further than simply "facilitating." It would allow the government to impose a contract on many businesses and workers who would otherwise negotiate terms for themselves.

Businesses and workers would have only 120 days to negotiate and agree
to possibly hundreds of pages of contract terms and conditions until one side could force the other to accept the two-year government-imposed contact. Card Check calls the process "arbitration," but the procedure described in the bill is known as compulsory binding interest arbitration, which is quite different from the arbitration most people know.

Most arbitration in the private sector is known as grievance arbitration. Here, an arbitrator is voluntarily chosen to interpret an existing contract, which was originally freely agreed to by both parties. Everyone is there because they choose to be.

Card Check, on the other hand, would allow one party to force the other into compulsory binding- interest arbitration. Both parties would be required to abide by terms of a contract to which neither had previously agreed. Essentially, it would impose a contract on a party against its will.

This allows the government to write a contract from scratch, going much further than the traditional role of an arbitrator interpreting existing terms. Even if a representative of a newly formed union requested arbitration the workers would still have little say in the final outcome.

Unlike today where the workers can vote on an agreement, Card Check would give a union representative the power to present the union's position to the arbitrator. The arbitrator would then create the contract, essentially erasing the worker from the final decision.

The arbitrator will have say over every aspect of the working relationship between the workers and the employer. This includes pay, work schedules, safety, health benefits, vacation, and possibly forcing workers into a union's under-funded pension plan.

This harsh arbitration will be run by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, which is headed by a political appointee. Politics could enter the arbitrator's decision. One party may request an arbitrator knowing they supported the administration in power, expecting to be rewarded by a favorable contract.

Abolishing the secret ballot in the workplace incentivizes the most depraved instincts of labor officials to pressure and intimidate workers into joining their union; the arbitration section of Card Check rewards the worst instincts of government, to arbitrarily impose its will on private businesses.


F. Vincent Vernuccio is a former Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management at the Department of Labor under President George W. Bush. He is editor of efcaupdate.org

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