BASIC REPUBLICAN PHILOSOPHY

Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan realizes that the Republican Party has shrunk. He is launching a campaign to create a bigger tent. He does not seem to realize the reason his party is so small is that they base Party philosophy on catering to the rich, and there are very few rich. What he is asking the people to do is to accept something that is diametrically opposite their basic party policy. Ronald Reagan put this country on a course of to plutocracy guided by the famous Milton Friedman of the Chicago school of economics. Friedman was obviously wrong, as was the Nobel Prize Committee for awarding him a Nobel Prize. An average working person can look at the situation and know his economic policy was wrong for the working class and the country. He or she does not have to be an economist to know that money at the top does not “trickle down.” The idea that if money has to be in the hands of job creators if we expect them to create jobs seems irrefutable logic until all the money is in the hands of the job creators and we realize they do not create jobs. The missing element is human greed. Mr. Ryan knows almost everyone now knows that wages are low, productivity is high, and executive salaries are sharply increasing, which is exactly the idealized model Ayn Rand promoted and what Reagan wanted. Rand was a refugee from communist Russia. Anti-communism is the basis for the Republican brand of “anti-communism” that is, and has been, so pervasive it has dominated the political thinking of that Party. Rand Paul is a disciple of Ayn Rand. We all know that Ted Cruz and Marc Rubio are both candidates for President. It has not been lost on the people that they both consider themselves refugee from Cuban communism. We know that Allen Greenspan was also a disciple and Ben Bernanke leans in that direction. We know that billionaire David and Charles Koch are sons of the founding father of the rapidly hateful John Birch Society. Just as we know that Paul Ryan is a native of Wisconsin, the home of the headquarters of the ruminants of the John Birch Society. I say to the people Paul Ryan is talking too, “If you believe that Republicans will support the working people in this country, you have a serious mental problem with your reasoning power.” URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

WORKERS SAVE CONSERVATISM FROM THE RICH

Small government conservatives have to take back their party. The only way they are going to do that is to join the liberals in overturning the Supreme Court’s “Citizens United” decision. We, as liberals, need the conservative party balance if we are to have good government. The rich do not want good government, in fact they do not want government. I feel that decision was the worst decisions that court has ever made in the history of this nation. It undermines the principle of democracy. We have a congress controlled by Republicans but that party title has become no more than just a label for hating all government, which is not the same thing as the classic GOP call for small government. Of course, both Democrats and Republicans should want government. However, people, such as the Koch brothers do not want any government because they are there to make all the decisions, which they feel they have the right to do. The basis of this feeling that is the subject of this post. Think about the mind set industrialist have. Most people, regardless of political affiliation, understand the sense of ownership. For example, it is my house, my car, my family, and my neighborhood. Industrialists, such as the Koch brothers, have the same sense. They are spending huge sums of money to buy government representatives and the Supreme Court judges; therefore, they own the government and the court. If they own it they should have the right to control it just as you own your home or your car. However, in addition to the sense of ownership, most people also understand that we have to live together. The only way we can do that is through organization, which is government. Since the Court made that terrible decision, I am seeing a pervasive switch in the attitude of industrialists toward the people who work for them, which curiously seems shared by the workers. What is most troubling is that Congress is supporting that change in attitude of both the people and the industrialists. The “disconnect” is between the government and the congress but also is between the worker and the government. Examination of why this is the case reveals that it is directly traceable to laws related to labor unions. This is not surprising because such laws are standard Republican tactics. What is different is that now it seems there is no longer opposition, so the laws not only pass, but also are much more restrictive. No matter how unfair or unbalanced the work place becomes and no matter how angry the workers become, they do nothing because they do not want a government. In fact, they do not want unions. The curious thing is that more and more workers seem to believe intensely that government is bad to the point that boarders on hate. They believe what the Koch brothers who use their money to saturate the media, which is telling workers the government is evil and labor unions are bad. Workers no longer vote and if they do vote, it is to vote for a candidate the Koch brother financed. In other words, the candidate is someone who will work against the workers. The Citizens United decision has created a downward spiral of hate that will end with workers destroying the only thing that can protect them the tyranny of the rich. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

ORGANIZED LABOR IS SILENCED

Has big business so decimated labor that Unions cannot even mount a cry for support in a presidential year? We can list the tie between our current difficulties and the weakness of labor in the political arena. The major economic issues in our nation have to do with increased productivity and decreased wages. The fact of economic disparity between the very rich and the poor is clearly a major issue. The hero of the far right is Reagan, the author of the supply side economics, which is at the heart of our nation’s current economic dilemma. We can tie labor union difficulties directly to the Republican Party. There can be no question. A direct connection exists between labor unions membership and wages because as union membership goes down, wages go down. Republican majorities in legislative bodies have destroyed unions by writing laws with misleading names, such as the right to work law yet Republicans dominate governorships and dominate legislatures in a majority of states. Everyone knows about this, and I write and write about his disparity, but still workers, small farmers, and their families go out and vote against their interests. Yes, corporate farmers have destroyed small farmers just as industrialists have destroyed labor union. It makes no sense that the workers in America are silent in the election year. Yes, we hear about Democrats as liberals on social issues here and there but we do not hear from workers. The only time we hear from small farmers is when they complain about the price they get for their produce as if they don’t realize they are in competition with highly subsided corporate farms. I get the impression they are more concerned about registering a gun then they are about their livelihood or spend their time with their mind on put on idle while driving a tractor 12 to 14 hours a day worrying same-sex marriage will force them to marry someone of the same sex. There can be no question when unions existed they donated to political campaigns. By destroying unions, the industrialists have destroyed labors’ voice in politics, and the same forces corrupted the Supreme Court when ruled “dollars are words”; thus, the rich are free to buy elections. The country is way out of balance! As I have posted before, if this country survives from Reaganomics, organized labor will have to do it. I want to hear from them in this campaign. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

ONLY UNIONS CAN SAVE DEMOCRACY

Saturday, April 18, 2015 ONLY UNIONS CAN SAVE DEMOCRACY Over 90% of people in the United States feel there is too much money in politics. In addition, we can pinpoint why; it clearly centers on the Supreme Courts decision to turn money into words. Of course, even prior to that decision, political operatives have manipulated and otherwise corrupted the our system of government to allow big money contributions directly by lobbyists and other maneuvers such as the now 501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) categories made so infamous by Karl Rove. Justice Alito is the poster child of the decision. However, it took five justices to make the horrible decision that is well on the way to destroying our democracy. The fix is easy; Congress could pass an amendment and 2/3rds of the States could ratify it thus amending the constitution and override the Supreme Court Decision. In addition, the Supreme Court could overturn their decision but they obviously will not admit they were wrong. Am I talking hyperbole when I say that it is a decision that is destroying our democracy? Ask yourself, if it is so easy to do what 90 % of the people want to do and amend the constitution why don’t they do it. If our representatives in Congress represented the people, they would but they don’t represent the people; they represent a very small group of very rich people. Because they do not represent the people is why the Senate does not impeach Supreme Court Judges for doing what the few rich people want. Nobody wants a second amendment solution. First, the right to own guns is a result of a misreading of the Constitution by judges in the same court system, the Federal Courts, that gave us Citizens United, but more important absolutely nobody wants violence. There will never be a French Revolution-style uprising where people sharpen the blades of guillotines and heads roll. Instead of guillotines, we need the entire social structure. The biggest is the voting box, which is an uphill climb. Look at what happened in Wisconsin when the people tried to recall an openly corrupt Governor. People including massive numbers of union workers filled the streets for months on end, yet Scott Walker won at the ballot box. The Koch brothers’ money bought the people. For example after the election, I heard union workers say they voted for Walker because they thought it was unfair to try to recall him. They parroted what they repeatedly heard every hour on every station and read in every newspaper for days. To believe to recall a bad Governor is unfair is unbelievable; well-paid talking heads on TV and radio convinced enough union workers into voting to support the man who took away their unions freedom to bargain collectively. In addition, The only argument I have heard in support of Citizens United decision is industrialists needed it to counter unions giving massive amounts of money to certain candidates. Check out Congress; after what I just wrote about recalling Scott Walker or overturning Citizens United, do you think Unions have a majority in that body? “We the people” means much in America, and I am here to remind you that unions are “We the people” in contrast to me, me, and me in boardrooms around the country. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

CUBA AN EXCITING EXPERIMENT IN MIXED GOVERNMENT

Cuba is in the news big time because President Obama has started to move toward normalizing relations between our two countries in a new and unique way. One of the arguments for establishing relation was that it would allow capitalism, or privately owned businesses, operate into Cuba, which will allow us to have influence in that country. One of the presidential candidates in the United States, Marco Rubio to be specific, cites the situation in China as evidence that allowing relations with Cuba will do nothing to advance human rights in that country because allowing capitalization in China has not done so in China. In fact, human rights have markedly deteriorated in that country. His contention is that communism and private capitalism cannot exist in the same country at the same time. This argument brought to my mind a bit of a dilemma. What he said about capitalization entering China and predicting that capitalism will enter Cuba is true. However, I strongly feel human rights will improve markedly in Cuba even though I am aware that they have deteriorated in China with capitalization. That being the case, what then is the difference between these two countries? Political scientists tell us that communistic governments base their form of government on giving power to the people, the workers, of those countries that have this form of government. They say the two forms of capitalization of corporations cannot work. The big selling point in trying to convince a population they should switch from capitalism to communism, it that it will empower the worker over the industrialist. The truth is that in democracy, the capitalization of industry is by the government versus capitalization by private individuals or corporations if the size of the investment corporations need to start the business exceeds the capabilities of private individuals, such as for a transcontinental railroad. The marriage of the two systems takes place when the government provides tax money to a privately managed corporation to build a company, which is what happens now in the United States and many other democracies. The other extreme of the private ownership scale is that one or more industrial dictators, such as we see in many third world countries. To avoid the perils of the extremes of all government to all private, a very wise president, FDR by name, allowed worker’s unions to form to counter management and to establish a fair wage. In contrast, Russia allowed workers to divert state capital to private workers without private management to counter this movement of cash, which as we all recognize was a recipe for disaster. We have the success of the United States as evidence of capitalization with unions. Lately, the Republican Party is trying to unbalance this success in the US by destroying unions. Given that background, why is Rubio so wrong in comparing China to Cuba? He is saying capitalism will not change Cuba because it did not do that in China. The difference is that the Chinese government is the management of the government corporations it capitalizes. In other words, the government diverted profit away from workers and into to government operations in its best interest, which is the diametric oppose to what happened with Russia. In Cuba, the Castro government wants to make money for the workers. The private owners are there to counter the greed of workers now in the form of the government, not unions. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

TRUMP: TRICKLE DOWN CLOWN

The real danger in the Trump candidacy for president is that the voter might elect him. I lived in Minnesota at the time of Jessie Ventura, professional wrestler, when the good people of that state elected him 38th governor (1999 to 2003). The man had achieved notoriety, as a wrestler and as a navy seal that is in fields other than politics. It was a difficult time in Minnesota politics because people were disgusted with the failure of politicians to solve economic problems among other things. As my brother-in-law said after he voted, he said, “a voted for anyone else was a vote for politics as usual. The general mood in the country right now parallels that in Minnesota at that time. Most people did not vote, and those who did vote were a minority disgusted with government. The electorate resembles a conservative primary; first discourage turnout and unite and control the minority with the hateful rhetoric, which drives them to the voting booth. If we elect him in 2016 presidential election, we could end up with a trickle down clown even worse than Ronald Reagan was. The humor of a clown is that you can throw him or her into the air and invariably land on their heaviest part; in Donald Trumps case, it would not be his head. He would land on his pocketbook. Need I remind you, that is not the pocketbook of the working American. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

TPP FREE TRADE AGREEMENT IS GOOD FOR UNIONS

Ed Schultz, the host of a talk show on MSNBC, often rants and raves about the TPP or the Trans-Pacific Partnership sometimes to the point of being an embarrassment. As a liberal, he considers himself a champion of Labor Unions. Union leaders join Ed on his show; thus, giving him credibility in his criticism of President Obama, who is working hard to promote TPP counter to the wishes of all unions, not just some but all unions. The office of the president tells us the trade agreement is dedicated to expanding economic opportunity for American workers. The aim is to promote trade with some of the most dynamic and fastest growing countries in the world. This is a big deal. Obama has been and is a champion of labor, so what is the basis of what seem to be a serious conflict? Republicans join President Obama in supporting the Trans-Pacific Partnership while union leaders are uniformly opposed to the President. This is a complete role reversal. A Republican spokesperson, Genevieve Wood was a guest on the Ed Show last night. She represents the Heritage Foundation, thus is as far right as you can get. Her nature of her defense of TPP surprised me and she apparently surprised Ed because she left him speechless when she was talking about the impact of international trade deal on world labor. Most republican speak of how good those deals are for business and manufacturing interest because of access to cheap labor, avoidance of environmental regulations etc. On April 26th of this year, I posted a blog on Firetreepub.blogspot.com titled, TPP, OBAMA, WARREN, UNIONS, AND WORKERS. The thrust of that blog was exactly what Genevieve Wood’s main point; what free trade agreements do is open up United States Market to the world, from which international workers benefit. Among things such as child labor laws and environmental concerns that have gotten better in those countries, wages in Korea, Mexico and South America have all gone up as well because of past trade agreement the union leaders are now condemning and using as examples of what will happen with the successful passage into law of TPP. Trade agreements are far from perfect, but they are moving in the right direction. Over the course of my life, I had to deal with an organization with the name of International Labor Organization (ILO). I lived in Belize, Central America and in Java, Indonesia. I feel I know a little about the sorry state of international labor as well as environment, and standards of living. In most countries, the ILO has littler or no power. The thing about this TPP is that President Obama now has had some experience in trade agreements and is a champion of labor is at the helm, and not Bush or Reagan, who let an unfettered business world write the agreements. This agreement is not perfect, but it is the best one we have ever had by far, thanks to him. Like me, he is a free trader interested in the will being of workers around the world. As I often say, we are all a little bit greedy, some more than others, which is what divides Republicans from Democrats. Our labor union leaders are letting their selfishness get the better of them. They want everything they can get for American workers and to hell with the workers of the world and the ILO—more power to the conservative nature in them. On the other hand, President Obama is not only a leader of the United States, but also he is the first true world leader this nation has ever had, and best of all, he is a liberal. I oppose union leaders and Elizabeth Warren and stand solidly with our President on this, after all this is a little blue planet. I see it as a great opportunity for the labor movement to expand internationally, but also know that the labor union leaders will not take advantage of this opening as long as they allow their conservative leanings blind them to the realities of the world. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

LABOR UNIONS ARE CHANGING

Change is in the air. It is time for union leaders to embrace the change.I have hinted at it indirectly several times in several different blog posts, but it is time to say it directly. It is time to realize what is happening and for labor unions leaders to take charge of the labor market. No doubt, taking over the labor market will be a complicated affair requiring a number of changes in the basic way we think about the social order. It is imperative we do not damage our capitalistic system in the process. Some will think we cannot have labor unions controlling labor markets and still have corporate structures. I disagree. Companies hire and fire workers, which would not change. However, what would happen is we organized unions so that companies would come to union leaders to find workers to hire? Start with skilled labor. If the only way a company executives could find well-trained skilled workers were to go to the unions, then they would come to the union leaders to hire people. Just the idea that a company executive could come to the union and find a worker with the skills they are looking for would be the chief selling point of the union. The lazy and the drunks and in incompetent are not there. Just that one little step would shake up society in a good way. As a reminder, much of this is what unions are doing now; that is the objective of journeyman programs. In a way is what Angie’s list is all about but without proper evaluation of who is on the list. I want to hire a skilled finish carpenter and go to a union, who says that person is a journeyman; the union guarantees that I am hiring a skill individually. For example, union leaders would be promoting technical education in state and federal legislature by asking for tax money for those institutions in an organized way. Now, the general population, one parent at a time, asks for taxpayers to supports technical training and colleges for their children in an unorganized way. Technical school and college administrators have no sense of the job markets, but unions would have. In addition, unions would have been a source of skilled individuals in their regular members to help with the training. The objective of journeyman training is to know and keep the workers updated. Unions would be promoting job fairs and be able to take applications for skilled labor, but also be in a position to evaluate the skills of those workers. Union representatives would know how to correct the deficiency. This change would involve programs that are not now included such as both skilled and unskilled service jobs but are unionized. This segment of society represents the most workers; this is equally important to the union movement. With unions leaders putting emphasis put on worker integrity and experience where skill was not as big a factor as it is with skilled labor. Nevertheless, the union would function in finding labor to fill myriad job types. In addition, the unions would be in a position to promote updating skills and function by providing training centers for manufacturers to introduce widely used new programs, equipment, and machines both for skilled and unskilled workers. Just the idea that a manufacturer could go to a union leader that has access to all journeymen concerned with that type of equipment, and say they have designed and are selling new computer controlled equipment would be a great advantage to all manufacturers of complicated equipment. There is a lot of it out there ranging from floor vacuum cleaners to rocket engines. It should be obvious that this change would require a shift in the nature of union leadership from the historic 19th century contentious, head banging, fight over higher wages to 21st-century collaboration in the business world. The suggested change is from labor fighting business interest to and manufacturers and unions collaborating, which would be historic. URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com Comments Invited and not moderated

TPP, OBAMA, WARREN, UNIONS, AND WORKERS

Humans seem to have a deeply ingrained lynch mentality that is a tendency to respond to the situation without evaluating the facts first and without thinking what the resulting consequences might be. Most of us recognize this as an individual trait, but it can be a group trait as well. Recently, the transpacific partnership trade agreement (TPP) has divided the Democratic Party with Senator Elizabeth Warren leading the ‘lynchers’ and President Obama being the ‘lynchee’. What was particularly striking was it appeared that Obama and the Republican Part set aside their history differences.

When a group of voters takes a lynch stance, the term tyranny of the majority applies. Everyone in the mob votes to hang this or that person for this or that crime. What is the President Obama’s crime? Senator Warren and her followers are accusing him of committing a hanging offense. In addition, the uniting force or rational behind her and her followers versus the Presidents position is a very revealing problem in terms of how government should work versus how it works.

This scenario is very strange because the President and labor unions are clearly on the opposite side of this issue. There has to be a solid reason. Every union leader in the country and many if not most liberals united behind Senator Warren. Past international trade agreements have caused our country to lose manufacturing factories, jobs and increased our trade deficit. President Obama is saying that is true; however, international corporations negotiated past trade agreements. In addition, our government even under Democratic presidents ratified them.  His position is that he is not like previous presidents; he includes many clauses that protect wages, the environment, and workers health, for example. Some of his opposition says that is so, but the agreements are structured to ignore such opposition and so the argument rages. Of course, a number of spineless, undecided, elected officials who hide behind the ruse that the agreement is secret so they cannot make a judgment. It is not, every senator has access to the entire agreement as negotiators do their job. Avoiding making a decision is reminiscent of the climate change debate; how many times have we heard a cowardly politician from an energy producing state say, “I am not a scientist . . .”

As a liberal trying to look at the workers of the world, the same way I look at workers in the United States. I have to reveal that I am a dual citizen; because of this, I came to know the rules of the International Labor Organization (ILO). Perhaps because of this, my view of the TPP is different. That agreement would make it better for workers in the countries of our trading partners. In the United States, workers and their unions fear a loss of jobs and lower wages. Their displeasure with the agreement they base on workers selfishness. We are all greedy. The offset of lower prices in markets on imported products, workers do not see in light of making it better for them.

President Obama is looking at the world through different colored glasses; we call it macroeconomics. The world can continue to struggle with war after war, or we can choose to live in peace. Our President, the great man he is, sees the road to peace is by establishing fair competition. Opening up world markets includes opening up our markets to the world. Of course, this would be devastating if done wrongly. With Obama at the helm, I feel we can safely take a step in that direction. To be candid, he is the only leader we have ever had that I would trust to do this. If he opened the negotiations to Congress, the results would be disastrous; workers and unions would destroy it and enterprises would dominate any agreement as the have in the past. His steady hand is critical. Contrary to what his Republican detractors see, he wants fair business competitive with countries and not military domination as our inglorious history indicates we have done in the past; as Stephen Kinzer points out in, Overthrown: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq (2006). We have used military force to overthrow many, many governments to gain business interests. Charles Krauthammer’s book, Things That Matter: Three Decades of Passion, Pastimes, and Politics (2013) gives a synopsis of the philosophy of International Republican greed in all of its disgusting trimmings. 

Workers in my adopted country did not have social security. I saw their dire need and witnessed their silent suffering up close. They worked for wages so low that it would make an employer in the United States blush. After I had tried to double the wages of my farm workers, others ranchers came to me and complained bitterly that I made it hard for them. When a worker quits or I did no need them, I willingly paid pension money based on how long they had worked for me according to the ILO rules plus a bonus. Although there was no rule or law forcing me to do so, I paid for their healthcare and for sending their children to school: those who did not live on the ranch, I picked up in the village and brought them to work every day.

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ONLY UNIONS CAN SAVE DEMOCRACY

Over 90% of people in the United States feel there is too much money in politics. In addition, we can pinpoint why; it clearly centers on the Supreme Courts decision to turn money into words. Of course, even prior to that decision, political operatives have manipulated and otherwise corrupted the our system of government to allow big money contributions directly by lobbyists and other maneuvers such as the now 501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) categories made so infamous by Karl Rove.

Justice Alito is the poster child of the decision. However, it took five justices to make the horrible decision that is well on the way to destroying our democracy. The fix is easy; Congress could pass an amendment and 2/3rds of the States could ratify it thus amending the constitution and override the Supreme Court Decision. In addition, the Supreme Court could overturn their decision but they obviously will not admit they were wrong.

Am I talking hyperbole when I say that it is a decision that is destroying our democracy? Ask yourself, if it is so easy to do what 90 % of the people want to do and amend the constitution why don’t they do it. If our representatives in Congress represented the people, they would but they don’t represent the people; they represent a very small group of very rich people.  Because they do not represent the people is why the Senate does not impeach Supreme Court Judges for doing what the few rich people want.

Nobody wants a second amendment solution. First, the right to own guns is a result of a misreading of the Constitution by judges in the same court system, the Federal Courts, that gave us Citizens United, but more important absolutely nobody wants violence. There will never be a French Revolution-style uprising where people sharpen the blades of guillotines and heads roll. Instead of guillotines, we need the entire social structure. The biggest is the voting box, which is an uphill climb. Look at what happened in Wisconsin when the people tried to recall an openly corrupt Governor. People including massive numbers of union workers filled the streets for months on end, yet Scott Walker won at the ballot box. The Koch brothers’ money bought the people. For example after the election, I heard union workers say they voted for Walker because they thought it was unfair to try to recall him. They parroted what they repeatedly heard every hour on every station and read in every newspaper for days. To believe to recall a bad Governor is unfair is unbelievable; well-paid talking heads on TV and radio convinced enough union workers into voting to support the man who took away their unions freedom to bargain collectively.

In addition, The only argument I have heard in support of Citizens United decision is industrialists needed it to counter unions giving massive amounts of money to certain candidates. Check out Congress; after what I just wrote about recalling Scott Walker or overturning Citizens United, do you think Unions have a majority in that body? “We the people” means much in America, and I am here to remind you that unions are “We the people” in contrast to me, me, and me in boardrooms around the country.

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UNIONS MUST CHANGE

It is no longer optional, unions must change.

Three more workers die, and one seriously injured in a state plagued with OSHA violations. Scaffolding collapsed at an11 story building under construction in Raleigh, North Carolina. This specific report seems accurate; however, we have no idea of how many workers die on the job across the State of North Carolina because the state Labor Department reports are unreliable. For example in 2012, the report said there were 35 workers killed while the National Council of Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) put the number at 150, which is an error that favors who?

Even an untrained amateur, such as me, could see that the workers tied themselves off to the scaffolding and not the building. Where were the inspectors? Where were the regulations? Need I mention that our States is under complete Republican control? Hardly a day goes by that we do not hear how government regulations kill jobs; regulations should be removed and let the job-creating businesses flourish. By the word of mouth, businesses know that our state government does not regulate business because our state government underfunds regulation agencies. Our radical right wing Governor has appointed political appointees to every state agency including Department of Labor. As an aside, the same thing is happening to our election commissions, which along with gerrymandering and voter suppression of minority votes gives Republicans perpetual control of state government. Advertisements invite businesses to come to our state because we have low taxes, low utility rates, no business taxes, not property taxes on business, and strong anti-labor union legislation. Have you ever wondered why your utility rates are home utilities are 17% higher than and corporate rates. I look at what this government has done to workers, the middle class and say North Carolina was a slave State and still is.

Radical politicians Senator Thom Tillis, Governor Pat McCrory, and state Senate leader Phil Burger, Jr. are responsible for killing those three workers just as I am responsible for what I am writing this blog post.

Perhaps it is overkill to state that workers across the state of North Carolinas are also responsible for letting this happen. Unions have a major responsibility in forcing government to benefit workers in all aspects of the workplace. Unions are not big enough consequently do not have the power they should have because many workers do not like unions. As followers of my blog post know, I am a strong supporter of unions; however, I am not above criticizing them for not doing their jobs properly. The leaders the members elect focus on wages or protection of incompetent workers while ignoring safety. They often work hard to protect ill-trained and lazy workers at the expense of ensuring their members can do the job the unions say they can do. Where there are unions, they seem to ignore government agencies responsible for inspecting job sights. How much times have you heard of a Union leader complaining that OSHA is only capable of inspecting around 2% of all construction sights?

Face it; corporations supported by Republican have drastically changed the labor scene. They have all but eliminated legal unionization: Taft-Hartley, Right to Work, eliminating public service unions, etc. Unions not only have to form completely independent of the workplace, but they must. If you take this approach, corporations will immediately challenge your constitutional right of “freedom of assembly”. They do this by firing anyone who joins a union no matter where it is. Of course, in the company’s eyes, if there are no unions to protect workers, the workers are at their mercy. As things now stand, they are right about that.

Future unions can gain fame and purpose by doing a number of things. One of the major things they can collectively do is to protect the safety and health of their workers by demanding regulations, and that companies follow those regulations—it is too late for the there mentioned workers. Unions should regulate skill training. If all skilled workers are union members, then where will corporations hire skilled workers? If skilled workers demand properly trained apprentices and train them, corporations will have no choice. If Union leaders demand a living wage, and stop theses ridiculous ideas of demanding outlandishly high wages, low hourly wages for truck drivers but the right to drive 20 hour out of every 24 hours, or the three day work week with a living salary for those few hours. They must stop protecting racist cops, drunks, and incompetent teachers, or allowing undertrained workers to be members. The constant threats of paralyzing strikes that can and will destroy the companies where they work we can number among the other irrational things that result in people hating unions. Who among you can deny that many people hate Unions? Scott Walker of Wisconsin has built and funded and entire presidential campaign on that idea.

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UNDERSTANDING HATE FOR UNIONS AND TENURE

A person, who hides behind the name Greyguy, as part of a running dialogue, posted something I found very interesting. The entire conversation can be found published under the Personal Liberty Digest article, Would privatized police be better police? At the end of his tirade about how bad unions and teacher tenure are, Greyguy wrote, “First, pick one, tenure or unions, try neither [sic] or all you get is the weak being protected.” He wrote this as if there is something wrong with protecting the weak.

My point is that the entire system of government, not just teacher tenure and workers unions, is designed to protect the weak—that is its purpose. It is what distinguishes us from being ignorant beasts, which is what moves us away from elementary “might is right”. Political scientists refer to this as the “watchman” function of government and recognize it as the first function of all governments. It is so fundamental that I could not believe a person who is intelligent enough to know how to write would say such a thing. However, after considering it for a while, I finally concluded there is only one way such a statement could make sense to him and people like him.

I read Bob Livingston’s Personal Liberty digest for the same reason I listen to Morning Joe on MSNBC, which I do to get my daily dose of Libertarians and the right-wing poison. By reading and listening to them, I find what the current thing they hate is; there is always an underlying theme of hate in both but one never knows from day to day what will be the specific object of their hate nor knows its intensity. Unlike Fox News, that does not tell the truth so I ignore it, these other outlets twist and distort the facts to fit their agenda, which makes it interesting. I comment from time to time on articles in Personal Liberty Digest and invariable receive responses to what I write. Greyguy, apparently a Libertarian and an avid reader of that paper, only sees the world through his eyes, which means like all Libertarians he sees himself as living in a world of seven billion people as if  he is the only one who counts; in his mind, he is the epitome of righteousness and strength. Tenure and unions, in fact, government of any kind, prevents him from being the dominant force in their lives; therefore, they are wrong. As ridiculous as it  is, it is only with that understanding does what the authors of articles published in Personal Liberty Digest make sense.     

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UNION LEADERS AND UNION HATING

Sometimes I feel compelled to write about something I feel people will take the wrong way; today is one of those times. I am a strong support of unions; however, I see things their leaders do that is terrible wrong. I have written about unions defending incompetent workers when they should be doing the opposite. Today, I want to address something that is a little more difficult to understand. It has to do with “the tyranny of the masses”. We all understand the political excesses related to the tyranny of a dictator or a plutocracy, which is a group of rich people dominating the working class. They make decisions driven by greed for riches or power or both. This happens even in a democracy where we elect our representatives but once elected they cease representing the people who elected them and represent their own interest. We had a stark example of this in North Carolina when the Speaker of the House of Representative, a fellow named Thom Tillis, used the power of that office to create a situation, which would not only elect him as state Senator but would enable him to maintain that office: voter suppression, gerrymandering districts, appointments to election monitors, etc.

I was shocked to hear that at a National renowned theater were management paid stagehands $400 per hours, which had to be the result of tyranny of a single union. I reviewed salaries and pension plans of public workers in a number of East Coast cities. Obvious excesses were evident. Why? As union supporters, we know these are exactly the things that cause serious, widespread anti-union rhetoric, and worst of all, anti-union laws. We see Republican Governors around the nation use these facts as their reason for destroy public serve union bargaining. The sad part is they have widespread support of massive numbers of workers who are employed in private industry; perhaps it is jealousy but mainly because workers know overpaying wages is as wrong as underpaying wages.

When union leaders get management at the bargaining table through strike or threat of strike, work stoppage or perhaps work slow-down rather than ask for a living wage or a fair wage. These drastic actions give unions leaders the power of the masses and management caves; once they cave, union leaders routinely ask for excessive wages. Management decides to either pay what union management asked for or fire the workers and close the business—both can be drastic steps decided in crisis, which is never a good time to make rational decisions. Simply because of the massive number of variations, in negotiations there can be no general rules to follow. For example, public service union leaders are dealing with politicians who are one-step removed from taxpayers; therefore, they consider tax money to be free money so why not pay a huge wage and outlandish pensions if asked? After all, closing down the government is not an option but cutting services or closing public schools is. Only after we stop educating our children do politicians realize that the taxpayers are unhappy with what they have done. This is not unlike the $400 stagehand salary or signing outlandish professional player contracts; keep raising salaries thus be forced to keep raising the cost of tickets to plays or games until no one can afford to attend. Because “management” disperses the cost in this manner, the tie to excessive salaries or contracts, ticket buyers like the parent so children who have no school to go to, do not make the connection.

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YOUR VOTE AND UNION BUSTING

The State Senate in Wisconsin just passed another law on their road to destroy all workers rights. It is the 25^th states to have deceitfully named “right to work laws”, which lawmakers designed to destroy unions. Every year there are more and more anti-union laws. Every economist seems to agree that as unionism disappears from the workplace wages fall. As wages fall, company profits increase and bonuses get bigger, broadening the disparity between the rich and poor. At a time in history when workers should be flourishing because, individual productivity has increased due to automation in some jobs. Technology and education have increased most workers productivity, even those working in service jobs: easier and more efficient transportation, ease of communication, increases in machine efficiency, for example. Instead of sharing the increase in productivity, the executives keep it all for themselves.

Because there obviously are many more workers than there are executives and because we live in a democracy, the objectives of Republican laws, such as this one, are to manipulate the political system. They create a vicious cycle that includes many aspects. They cheat by destroying unions and they destroy unions by electing people who do not believe in workers rights. In the 25-states where these laws are in force, Republicans control the State Legislatures. They work very hard to take away any mention of unions during campaigns; it is all about abortion, same-sex marriage, lowering taxes, liberals who cheat on welfare, gun rights, and not about voting records. We need a pro-union rating like the National Rifleman Association rates every elected individual right down to school boards but especially state elected offices, which is where most of their mischief is done. We need lists of union-busting lawyers, for examples, and avoid hiring one of them for anything. We need lists of union busting news and media outlets and turn them off. We need not patronize stores that mistreat their workers and not buy products made by non-union workers and tell them why we are not doing business with them. If you do not do these things, we will elect people like +Thom Tillis in North Carolina—there can be nothing worse for unions than doing this.

As is the Supreme Court’s Citizen United decision, the “right to work” laws are classic examples of the benefit of controlling elections. Politicians appointed judges and industrialist control the politicians; industrialist Koch brothers bought the court and you set on your backsides on your couch with a cool can of beer watching some meaningless game, while they work to destroy your ability to buy that beer. All you have to do is get up and go voter!!! They elect union hating legislators by voter suppression, gerrymandering, appointing union busting judges. The hate for unions results from the fact that unions collect money and donate to people who support unions—no union no donations. As WW II Stalin used to say; if a man is giving you a problem, if you don’t have the man, you don’t have the problem. We do not want to go that far, but we can make sure they are not elect “that person”. 

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GROW UP AMERICA

Do you think it is time for applause? The IRS has been so underfunded your tax return will be delayed. Your phone calls to this agency may go unanswered. Taxpayer’s return on investment is 214 to 1 that is for every dollar we budget to this agency, it returns 214 dollars. The budget to that department was cut time and time again; who is responsible for such foolishness?

I shake my head in disbelief every time I hear about something like this. It seems to me that the American People have a propensity to work against their own interest. In reality, if one looks worldwide we see the same thing. It is all based on immediate reward versus long-term interest; greed is a universal trait. There is a fascinating experiment where young children, say 3 to 5 years of age, are given candy and told they can eat the candy if they like but if they wait they will be given another piece later; however, they eat the first candy there will be no more. The same children when evaluated 30 years later, the most successful in life were the children that waited for the second piece.

A union charges dues, to defray expenses need to protect the works from unfair employer practices and to fight for a living wage. Union leaders expect members to pay dues monthly; that is pay before they receive any reward. New hires do not realize the wages they receive, when hired are as high as they are because of union workers who came before. In addition, like children with candy on the table in front of them, they have to wait for future rewards. It is amazing how many workers are willing to reap the benefits from those who came before but also will actually fight to prevent unions from collecting dues. In other words, they join management that is those who want to pay them as little as possible; they “fight” against themselves. Of course, the political types, put at label on this to make is sound as if they are working in their own interest; it is called “right to work legislation”, meaning workers do not have to join a union thus do not have to pay dues but are free to reap the rewards of those who pay dues.

Grover Norquist has convinced the American people, at least some of less astute, that they can starve the government thus, using childish humor, make it so small they can “drag it in to the bathroom and drown it in the bath tub”. He and his cohorts have convinced people there is no reward to having a government and use a slogan as powerful as “you have the right to work”, “you earned your money by hard work, so you should be able to keep it”.

When are American people going to grow out of the 3 to 5 year old mentality and start acting like responsible adults?         

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NEW YORK POLICE UNION IS WRONG

A common approach to attacking something is to compile the entire lexicon of horror stories, group them together, and presents them in staccato style to give the impression that what ever it is you are attacking is pure evil. I am in the process of reading, The Fourth Revolution (2014) by Micklethwait and Wooldridge, who are doing exactly that. Of course, the government is the main target of their attack but among the institutions involve in government these two economists vehemently attack are unions. Of course, for them, the underlying theme of all attacks is to gain “economic dominance”, which is to say, the only way to govern is to have money rule everything in our society.

As a strong union supporter, I try to look at the opponent’s side of the union issue, as I am prone to do, to determine if what they argue has merit. To start with, no in social instrument, which is what a union is, is perfect so is vulnerable to attack. It just happens the police union in New York City is being attack by protagonists and, of course, they are counter attacking in a battle aired in the headlines. Police officers, like teachers, offer a public service; therefore, collectively the people are their boss. Unlike a private held company that has just two sides, when the people have a conflict with public servant unions the protagonists divide themselves four or more ways; pro and against the police position and the police who are also divided themselves, which is the case in New York City. It is the Mayor fighting against police Union leaders. In light of the fact there is very little data, the question is who is right and who is wrong. We have a few isolated incidents that we can seriously question. A recent strangling death caught on camera is one of them

Both the people and the police generally do not like police violence but it happens. Hard data concerning police violence is almost impossible to find. However, a recent study reported that wearing body cameras, “accounted for a 59 percent reduction in officer use of force and an 87 percent drop in the number of complaints against officers from the previous year”. To me these figures indicate it is more prevalent than even a bleeding heart like me would have guessed. You cannot reduce something by 59% if it does not exist—this is truly startling. Thinking about his brought me back to a study I read about conducted at a university where a professor allowed one group of students to guard another group of students. Students are students but when the professor gave unquestioned authority to the guards, he had to stop the experiment because of the level of cruelty the one group was inflicting on the other.  There is no question in my mind that the liberal Mayor is right and the union leader fighting to allow unabated police authority is wrong.

The tough guys in society that see themselves with the big white hat setting on a tall horse like John Wayne feel it is OK for police to do what ever they need to do for self-protection; so they shoot a few innocent suspects, so what! In contrast, my feeling is that authorities should investigate every incident, openly publish their findings, and clearly give the benefit of the doubt to the police. If law suites develop out of a case, so be it. Nevertheless, mayors and police chiefs should prosecute cruel police officers but also not forgive even minor offences. One form of punishment, such as administrative leave with pay, can never fit all misdeeds. Policing is a tough job—even as navy shore patrol I got knocked on my backsides while braking up a fight—but for society to allow cruelty is not the way to open the gates to good law enforcement. 

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PROTECT UNIONISM AND FIRE LYNCH

Unions are crucial for survival of society

This thing in New York with the police is turning out to be a double tragedy. The tragic death of two police officers at the hands of a lunatic over racial strife is one of the tragedies made worse by over-interpretation on both sides. Just because racial tension is again banner news does not mean it is getting worse. To believe that would be to believe open discussion about thorny issues is not good, which of course is nonsense.  The second tragedy is the strife over policing led by unions leaders.

In previous post, I called fort the firing of Patrick Lynch, the president of one of the five unions involved; that wish hasn’t changed. There seems to be tendency for union members to vote for vocal leaders who act like Lynch acts. In a public rant, this ridiculous man blamed the Mayor of New York City for the murder of the two officers. To add fuel to the fire, Republican operatives with an eye on future elections, jumped on the back of the progressive mayor with the ironic twist that they, as rigid law and order conservatives who support police offices put themselves in a position of supporting unions which they hate including public serves unions. As a student of political behavior, I do not find this at all as a strange way for conservative to act. I am cynical enough to believe they will lie with impunity to achieve there political objective. Nevertheless, we should keep our focus on the union leader and the damage he is doing to the entire union movement.

Aside from the fact they are essential for the working class to function and are critical to survival of society, unions are out of favor. This clearly is the result of a massive effort by the economic elite to trash labor unions and make working people submissive to their every wish and demand. Part of the propaganda campaign focuses on the evil part unions play in protecting bad, lazy, and incompetent workers—the unions should work to fire and not protect such people members or not!

In the police force, there are bullies and race baiters who the Mayor should fire and in some cases persecute. There are also good men and women, who make a mistake or are falsely accused; the unions should go to the mat to protect them. Patrick Lynch is a classic example of someone who sees the dues of a few bad members exceeds the harms they are doing to the union movement and especially those who need the union to protect them. The Lynch form of misdirected leadership, really malfeasance, in union leadership will continue until the rank and file membership sees the harm such leaders are doing to the overall scheme of things and vote to fire people like him. 

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TRANS PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP OPPORTUNITY FOR LABOR UNIONS

Labor unions are a vital part of the American economic environment, which makes them a prime target for conservatives. They exist because the Constitution says we have the right of assembly. In addition, the assemblies of workers are more vital to our way of life, in a fundamental way, than many believe. They are a necessary balancing force in society between labor and management, either of which in dominance is bad; it destroys democracy. We labor under the premise of one-person one-vote and that each vote has equal weight. This is not in conflict with the premise that if you own a business you have the right to decide who works in that business and how much they are paid. Such things as increasing wages where unions exist and the absence of child labor or hazardous working conditions are examples of this. In addition, it is not in conflict, which the abhorred Citizens United Decision that gives corporations “collective” power where none exists; this ruling falsifies the democratic concept of “collective” power. In a corporation, it is a dictatorship but with unions, individual workers vote on who their leaders will be and how they decide issues. Union leaders use dues money to give collective power or voice to individual worker. Theoretically, the leaders represent a majority; however, in many cases, right to work laws destroyed the concept of democracy in unions. These laws, which business owners enacted to destroy unions, distort the concept of democracy in unions by allowing a minority of workers to prevent collective decisions.

I have often complained of excessive of unions and their misguided activities such as defending incompetent workers just as I have complained about excess of management. This is where I can point out that without the balance terrible things can and does happen. I find the most egregious and clearest examples of imbalances in foreign countries. It surprises no one to learn that this is the case because corporations and enterprise have shaped our foreign policy; there are no unions in these countries because that is the way corporations want it. As I pointed out in a previous blog post on this web site, Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and President Obama, our government sanctioned this corporate activity. I pointed out labor unions leaders are adamantly against the president on this issue but enterprises are overwhelmingly supportive. They support it because they see increased profits. Labor unions oppose TPP because of feared job loss. Perhaps in the short term and to a limited extent, their fear is justified for manufacturing jobs. There is a legitimate argument to make that the number of jobs may actually increase. There will be some shift in the type of jobs to the more skilled technical jobs as well as service, retail sales and repair. However, many, many jobs such as those in transportation, teaching, police, health care, and a long list of etceteras will remain the same. Undoubtedly, shifts of this kind are unsettling to works and their leaders.

I would like to point out something that seems overlooked by most. The President of the Untied States is a liberal. He and his executive branch are negotiating the treaties with 11 different countries. MBA profit driven business executives are not negotiating them—that is the big break with the past; in fact, it is huge. The shift represents an earthshaking change in American foreign policy. Finally, American policy is one of reasoned business logic and not one of military might.  The office of the Untied States Trade Representative published on the inter net a summary of U. S. Objectives, from which I copied the pertinent paragraph:      

We are working hard to ensure that TPP will be a comprehensive deal, providing new and meaningful market access for goods and services; strong and enforceable labor standards and environmental commitments; groundbreaking new rules designed to ensure fair competition between state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and private companies; commitments that will improve the transparency and consistency of the regulatory environment to make it easier for small- and medium-sized businesses to operate across the region; a robust intellectual property (IP) rights framework to promote innovation, while supporting access to innovative and generic medicines and an open Internet; and obligations that will promote a thriving digital economy, including new rules to ensure the free flow of data.

The sentence is that of the Government but bold print is mine. My point is simple. This agreement is unlike any foreign trade agreement ever written; IT IS A “PARTNERSHIP”. United States government is pledged to control corporations and is pledged to work with the governments of countries and their workers. It no longer corporations operating at a diplomatic level but our government, as elected by the people. The hope is that his will end the gross contamination of host country environments for a few dollars in profits. Our labor union leaders in the United States should see this for what it is. It is an opportunity for labor unions across these 11 countries to fashion economic labor laws and humane working conditions in concert with those of labor unions in the Untied States; skilled workers, truck drives, hotel service employees, environmental regulators, and a list of etceteras a arms length long. I would be extremely naive to suppose that corporations will not try to corrupt these governments and bribe politicians just as they do ours at home, but at least there is and avenue of hope.

We can set back and watch because as sure as I am writing this, the right-wing, who overwhelmingly support TPP now, will vehemently turn on it as an attempt by labor unions to unite workers in these 11 countries to prevent corporate domination and corruption of workers in those countries as in the past. I can hear it now, “TPP is a communist attempt to unite the workers of the world” OMG, didn’t Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels want to do that?  

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UNDERSTANDING WORKERS VOTING TRAGEDY

Someone made the comment that some people vote against their own self-interest because they do not believe they are voting against their own self-interest. To me, this may sound redundant but it is really perceptive. For example, many workers vote for Republican candidates who are against unions even though they know union workers earn more money than no union workers; this in light of the known fact that wages are stagnant while worker productivity is increasing. At the same time, they know that corporate profits are increasing out of control while their living standard is falling, which is the classic description of income disparity we read about in all the newspapers and hear on all TV news programs. Books have been written about this (What is the Matter with Kansas) and I have written about this several times asking the questions; “Why would workers vote against their own interest?” I tried to explain it away by saying that perhaps they vote way the do because they are innately conservative. I still believe that is true; however, this new dimension may be true as well. Just because this information is available on news programs and in newspapers all over the nation does not mean they read it or understand it. If it is beyond bumper sticker complexity or not on the sports page, they do not bother to try to understand it.

The conclusion that workers vote against themselves because they do not know it is against themselves seems incredible in the current era of massive communications technology but it still could be true. In addition, when they step into the voting booth;  driven by a sense of hierarchy dominance, which also an innate sense; they vote their sense of innate fear, which we all have. The driver of conservatism is the fear that someone is getting something he or she did not work for; which is the Ronald Reagan “welfare queen” definition of all welfare. In other words, they vote their genes because they have not bothered to understand the practical facts of pragmatic political life; for example, how do they justify welfare for a wounded warrior and his young family.
Add to this the craziness of thinking John McCain learned political wisdom in the cockpit of a fighter aircraft. These appear to be matters of “personal” interest and not intelligence. Obviously, skilled laborers cannot do what they do if they were not very intelligent. Just because a person is more interested in a football game played by his college team than in what the political beliefs of the candidate(s) he check off on his or her ballot does not reflect intelligence. This is true but I also think that the way they vote reflect a serious lack of wisdom. Of course, the challenge is to educate voters. Do we have to wait until workers are living in dire poverty before they divert their attention from sports events and“kool” beer advertisements and start to pay attention to politics? Unfortunately, that tragic time seems to be coming BECAUSE WORKERS VOTE THAT WAY.  

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CHANGES TEACHERS UNIONS MUST MAKE

Billionaire Bill Gates was a guest on Morning Joe (MSNBC) mainly because of a $50 million dollar donation made by his foundation to fight Ebola virus epidemic. However, what I found most interesting was his remarks about education, which I thought were especially perceptive. He said “they”, meaning his foundations, have found that schools with 10% excellent teachers are excellent schools but even more important, it happens when these teachers are in the lead in their school. I think what he was saying, and this is the important part, is teachers know best how to teach. At first bluish, most of would agree and say, of course, that should be so obvious that it is trite to have to say it. The truth is that is not what happens; it is much more complex than that.

Start this discussion with unions, specifically teachers unions; therefore, what Gates was saying is not accurate because teachers are in charge of teachers’ unions and still schools are failing. The popular press, especially the right wing press would have us believe teachers are in charge of teachers unions but careful analysis will show this is not accurate. In the unions where so called teachers are in charge, they are teachers in name only, because they are more interested in salaries than they are in the students, which is the major fault of all unions. However, I am aware of a recent move by skill labor union leaders to correct this. My hope is that this will spread to teachers union. With this new brand of leadership, the leaders have recognized that the main function of a union is to guarantee all of their members are highly “skilled”. If I hire a “union member”, that person knows how to do the job and therefore deserves the salary he or she is paid. These unions now have established educational programs and a system of categorizing member according to skill levels of members, which is exactly what teachers union leaderships must do. When that happens, teachers will truly be in charge. That will be the 10% Gates was talking about.

For now, the rightwing is correct; teachers unions are a big problem because teachers unions elect their leaders from people, some of them professional teachers and others who are skilled firebrand union leadership in the manner of Jimmy Hoffa. Teacher union membership commonly elect leaders who put salary and job security first as opposed to putting job evaluation based on teaching skills first as other skilled workers’ unions are starting to do to that end.   

Having said that the rightwing is right in identifying unions as being a problem, they are clearly wrong in the solution they advance, which is to destroy all unions.  

Unions are absolutely critical to any solution. There is no clearer example of the need for political compromise than this situation presents. Of course, classically Republicans have taken a position of “no compromise on anything”—to use and only trope, it is their way or the highway. There is evidence that their way, that is destroying unions, is destroying our public school system; look at current poor evaluations of public schools and match that with the fact that Republican governor after Republican governor has destroyed teachers unions (public service unions). The governors are willingly responding to the public perception, which is bad because teachers unions have degraded themselves, as I explained above, by protecting incompetent teachers and fighting to increasing salaries. The distrust of unions leads to ineffectiveness in salary negotiations. If we do not have teachers’ unions, they cannot do as Bill Gates implies; only good teachers can correct our educations system. They are the only ones who know the problems and how to solve them in a way that benefits students. Unions must insure, and this is not an option but an obligation, only “skilled” teachers stand before their class.  

Am I hopeful this will happen? Yes, and no! Teachers unions will change because they must. However, because the fundamental Republican principle, which is that “they” be in charge, demands they continue to try to destroy—without compromise—all unions no matter how good they are at providing skilled teachers or skilled labor. What has to happen is that unions must overcome this innate bias by providing the best schoolteachers in the world; certainly, a big part of that is to make sure the public will support the idea that teachers are paid and respected for what they do; however, “true teacher”, are a unique breed of people. Teaching is innate in teachers; it is part of their soul. Strangely enough this may be why teachers are generally willing to do their best, even while being paid less than others with comparable education are. Maya Angelou explained what compels a teacher with this innate trait to do what they do, “If you learn, teach”. 

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