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They can’t seem to get it right. Instead, they just get it rightwing which is never right. But when you are losing the battle for the hearts and minds of the public and lying might get you back in the game, then lying it is. It is classic NeoCon strategy but this time it won’t work.
The drum banging by Fox News about the Employee Free Choice Act has been a one note song. They keep claiming that the EFCA will take away the secret ballot in union certification elections but that claim belies the very name of the legislation. If it really does that then what does the Free Choice part of the Act refer to? Fox News hopes the viewing public is too stupid to recognize the huge lie sitting right before them that Fox keeps repeating when the truth is the Act gives employees more choice, not less. It gives them a right to form a union using a card check instead of an election. If Fox told its viewers that simple fact their main issue would go away and they would not be able to keep trumpeting about this boogyman under the bed that does not exist.
Fox is clearly in bed with the republicans and their big business allies on this issue. They want you to forget the impact that unions have had on the economic health of this country. If we look back into our nation’s history we discover some pretty cogent facts about the power of unions.
No wonder that businesses do not want to level the playing field for union workers. They have been on the run since Ronnie Ray-gun blasted the Air Traffic Controllers union out of the sky. Four successive anti-union administrations have dealt serious blows to unionization forces in this country. The EFCA is a step to restoring fair play and equality between the workers and management. Government has stacked the deck over the last 40 years and management has taken advantage of that crooked deal to freeze unions out of constructive participation in the economic health of the United States. The race to the bottom in terms of wages and health care has not gone unnoticed and the middle class is under an increasing attack from corporate interests who care only about their bottom line and nothing else. Fox News caters to just these interests. Small wonder that they are so adamantly against an expansion of workers rights.
Keeping the argument in perspective is vital to the passage of the EFCA. Calling Fox out on their campaign of lies is just a first step. Remember, the EFCA is an expansion of employee rights, not a denial or a contraction. Current law allows for a company to allow collective bargaining with a union if they realize that the majority of the workers want the union or they can force an election (which is tilted in favor of management despite it being a secret ballot). All the EFCA does is to retain those two options and then add a third one: allowing a union to be formed if the majority of a company’s workers sign a card check indicating they want a union. It’s a simple option but one that management cannot easily control and, thus, the outcry and the lies. Even Warren Buffet has bought into the lies since his comments on the subject shows he’s gotten his talking points from Fox News and he has not read the bill in question. Sad.
Fox News should be ashamed of themselves for passing out this catalog of lies masquerading as fact. But, hey, it’s Rupert Murdoch, king of the NeoCons, and lying is SOP in the book of business ethics he follows. No surprise.
It’s pretty rare that a piece of legislation comes along that motivates the big business bosses, rightwingers, and anti-worker wingnuts into supporting a secret ballot election for union workers but the Employee Free Choice Act has managed to do just that. Imagine that all these forces are now aligned in promoting the secret ballot election to determine whether a company’s labor force should unionize when they have spent decades manipulating the process to circumvent this very action. They have taken control of the National Labor Relations Board and stacked its membership with pro-business and virulent anti-union shills. They have gotten republican Congresses to pass more restrictive legislation that makes it harder for unions to come into being and allowing more and more interference by employers to legally prevent elections from even taking place. What changed these closed minds into rabid advocates of this heretofore unwanted election? The card check. Simple.
What exactly is a card check? It is a card that a person signs when they want a union to come in and represent them in labor negotiations. If more than 50% of workers sign this card, the union is authorized. Boom. Just like that. Well, no wonder these bosses don’t like it: they have no control over the process. They have control over the hours a person works, they have control over their health benefits (if any), they have control over the wages they pay a worker, they have control over whether that worker gets promoted, they have control over the vacation days a person gets, they have control over the number of sick days that are allowed, they have control over the computer you may have to use to do your job, they have control over your contarct with the outside world while at work, and many other things but they do not have control over whether you decide to sign a card that gives you union representation and that pisses them off.
Look at this like voting, if you will. Most people wait for election day to cast one’s ballot. During the course of the campaign, the various candidates bombard you with their messages appealing for your vote. Some use straight forward messages telling us what they plan to do. Some appeal to our patriotism. Others descend into scare tactics to frighten you to vote against your own best interests. There are some voters who made up their minds early on and want to vote and be done with it. It’s called Early Voting. They cast their ballot before the polls open officially but their votes are counted as if they voted on election day.
The workers who do a card check are essentially doing the same thing: they are voting early to avoid the hassle of management intimidation and election manipulation on the part of the bosses. No wonder management is now screaming about wanting elections. They can control that process and push their agenda over and over again until the voting actually starts. It gives them a big advantage. The card check levels the playing field and gives workers a chance to organize for better wages, health care benefits, better work rules, and quality workplace issues that acting alone they may not have a chance to get.
What scares pro-business types about this legislation is that it gives workers a choice on how to unionize: pursuing a secret ballot election OR doing a card check. Thus, the name of the bill, the Employee Free Choice Act. Anyone who tells you that this bill eliminates the secret ballot either did not read the bill or they are lying about it.
The challenge for these business types is simple: if you really want a secret ballot for unionization elections, stop putting up roadblocks to the process. Stop hiring union buster anti-labor goons to break up unionizing efforts. Stop firing workers who express an interest in unionizing. Stop delaying elections numerous times. Stop intimidating workers with browbeating meetings on the issues. Stop threatening to close the company if the union wins. Stop negotiating in bad faith with workers. A secret ballot election should be done promptly with a minimum of hassle from either side but that is not the reality of labor relations in America today.
When businesses can agree to stop the illegal practices they have used for years there would not be the need for this legislation but that doesn’t look like it will happen in this century. The Employee Free Choice Act is a simple tool to help level the playing field for workers. No wonder rightwingers, businessmen, and corporate shills don’t like it. Fair play has never been their strong suit because they know if the field is level they lose most of the time. Let’s hope a Democratic Congress can help clear the mines from the grounds and give American workers a fresh start.
About author
A proud St. Louis Cardinals fan since 1959 as well as a committed, unreconstructed, Yellow Dog Democrat since the autumn of 1960. Politics and baseball... as American as apple pie.
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