GOP to Conservative Voters: Suck it Up?!

So Christie is rethinking running for president?  Well, what a surprise.  We are just shocked.  Shocked!  Word is he’s told his staffers to shut up (probably in just those words, too) and put out the story that it was the GOP elite who convinced his wife to reconsider.   Rumors are rampant about when he’ll announce.  One thing is certain – he doesn’t have much time before the deadline to register for the first primary.

Tell everyone you know Herman Cain is the guy.  If you look at the present field – including the coy Mr. Christie – you’ve got a main course of Mitt “Liberal Limousine Cuisine” Romney who will add his imprimatur to Obamacare.  He’s rich, but government-fattening.  The alternative is Rick “Pecos Patty” Perry, who comes across as 100 percent U.S. Grade A Beef.  But the side order with him is Illegal Immigrant chile, sure to give you heart-burn.  For a Texan, he’s a poor marksman; he managed to shoot himself right in the foot.  The next heavy-weight is the probable-candidate, our own N.J. governor Christie “Purple Couscos” Christie.  He’s one salty pretzel who fought the unions, yes, but refused to fight Obamacare, approves of green initiatives, defends illegal immigration, appointed a Muslim judge with a very questionable background to the N.J. Supreme Course, and he’s seriously considering making Palin’s mistake of abdicating his first-term governorship for a run at the White House.  Vote for him, but be prepared to take a hefty dose of Mylanta afterwards.  If he’s in favor of those fluorescent, corkscrew light bulbs, he ought to know that even though they save money while they’re on, constantly flipping them on and off wastes money and energy through the burst of energy it takes to get them started.  Christie has great energy and charisma.  If he were on our team, I’d be the first to sign up as one of his cheerleaders.  Alas, having him on the GOP ticket is waste of time, energy, and votes (he needn’t bother sneering back that he wouldn’t have a Tea Party conservative on his team, either; that’s already rather obvious).

What kind of menu is this to be offering to Conservative voters?  Do you know what diners who don’t like what’s on the menu do?  They stay home and cook their own dinners.

The rest of the candidates – except for Cain – are all side orders – lightweights.  Bachmann has good Conservative credentials but she needs more experience – at something.  She has had her own business, but she still seems a little green.  Cain’s experience has been at the corporate level and comes across more confident.  He’s obviously used to speaking in front of large gatherings.  Palin would have been great, but she was plucked off the vine too soon.  She should have been allowed to finish at least one term as governor, and maybe even another, then appointed to either a cabinet seat (Energy Secy) or run for the national senate seat.  For some reason, Pawlenty, who seemed to be pretty viable to those of us unacquainted with the ways of the Party Machine, dropped out.  Some skeleton must have been rattling in his closet.  Huntsman is an Obama buddy.  Scratch him off the menu. Gingrich would have been great but he sold out.  Former N.M. Gov. Gary “Don’t Boo the Gays” Johnson.  Sorry, but a military barracks or a naval sub isn’t the place to be displaying your sexual preferences.  You’re supposed to be making war, not love.  Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was the right move.  Salt and pepper in separate shakers at the commisary, please.

Those are the candidates:  A liberal in every pot, no matter who you pull the lever for. Some choice:  either you get one great big Liberal, like Obama, that we can doggie-bag for the next four, or worse, eight years.  Or we can take a little dose of liberalism.  Which means one of a number of things:  illegal immigrants will swarm over our borders and put a Liberal into office anyway at the next convenient presidential election.  We could have a green GOPer who’ll put every free market business out of business with green energy, global warming mandates.  Or we’ll all be under the yoke of socialist health care, paying for aspirin and sex-change operations for illegal aliens. 

Some Conservative voters are already talking about staying home.  Wouldn’t the Liberals and the GOP just love that?  Any way they look at it, they win and we lose.  Can’t you just hear the evil-villain snickering?  Or we can push back now, while we still can.  Most great presidents were already well-known long before they ever got to the White House.  Our best well-known prospects were shot down by the media long ago or were corrupted by the Liberals and their minions.  We may just have to take the gloves off and go back to our town squares, no matter what Glenn Beck thinks of signs, and give the Moderates what-for and one last wake-up call.  We can’t be nice it about, either.  We’re going to have to come straight out and let them know that they’re idiots.

We’re running out of time before the Liberals finish their mouse trap.  But for the GOP to tell us we have to lump it and eat our Moderate/Liberal greens does not bode well for people who care about America and freedom.

 

 

Stop Asking Christie to Run – Please!!

Why shouldn’t N.J. Chris Christie for president?  Well, let us count the ways: 

1. He’s on board with the anti-global warming cause – he’s against offshore natural gas ports but in favor of offshore wind farms
2. He won’t fight Obamacare in New Jersey
3. He doesn’t believe illegal immigration is a crime
4. He appointed a Muslim to the state supreme court
5. He favors the federal assault weapons ban
6. He believes in civil unions for gay couples, though not gay marriage (some conservatives have a problem with this; others don’t)
7. He’s seriously overweight and health issues are part of his baggage.
8. The Media likes him even when he’s rude
9. He hates the Tea Party
10. He hasn’t finished his job as governor of New Jersey

Out in Iowa and California, Christie may look and sound like hot stuff.   He’s certainly got the charisma thing down and his tough guy image is solid.  But Californians didn’t watch on our local news as Christie wrapped his arms around Democrat Congressman Bill Pascrell, sneered at the camera, and boasted about his bi-partisanship.  It looked as though even Pascrell cringed and gave Christie an odd, ‘is-he-out-of-his-mind-disparaging-his-own-constituents’ look.

They weren’t at Morristown Tea Party’s first rally in April 2009, in freezing rain, when Christie, arriving late, discovered that the panel questions would be drawn from a hat.  After fuming for a moment, he verbally berated the poor teenagers assigned the task of holding the question hat for the fact that the politicians didn’t all get the same question.  This, in front 2,000 unhappy, mostly Conservative voters.  One of the organizers, a woman, apologized to the big man profusely, claiming she never agreed to this method of questioning, even though town hall meetings are known for their free-range, ask-me-anything style questioning.

Christie has never “forgiven” the Tea Parties for the slight, either.  But then, we were forewarned that he was a purple RINO.  The crowd, for their part, didn’t want any politicians up there at all. At indoor meetings, we had a hard time making them understand that America was, is, and should be a republic, which means representatives.  We told them there would be a new meaning of “nightmare” if we were to ever become a definitive “democracy.”   If they thought getting people to come out to a rally, when we already have a low voter turn-out, was difficult, what did they think would happen in a democracy where crowds virtually run everything, with invisible puppet masters pulling all the strings from behind?

The real Christie has leaned towards the left on everything from illegal immigration to global warming.  He’s scrupled not to call Conservatives who objected to the appointment of a Muslim to the N.J. Supreme Court “crazies” even though countless books by knowledgeable authors who’ve studied the subject for decades are a red-light indication that they shouldn’t be trusted.

Christie’s real problem is probably his one-time opponent, Steve Lonegan, who scrupled not, I have it on good authority, to engage in a rant in a Newark neighborhood.  Not a really good idea, either.  When the MTP was first forming, we were somewhat suspicious of the videos of the Florida Tea Parties running around aimlessly.  Yikeys!  That’s not us, we thought.  We decided to organize our rallies in a more orderly and civilized fashion, and so did the other N.J. Tea Parties.

The N.Y. Post is reporting that Christie is still on the fence.  They think that pleadings from GOP elites has affected his decision.  Well of course he’s on the fence; he’s a RINO after all.  Pleading and begging, while gratifying to his ego, won’t light a fire under this guy; opposition will.  If you really want him to run (why, for heaven’s sake?), the way to spark his passion is to tell him not to.  The guy lives for challenges.  Ask him politely, and he’ll politely decline.  Tell him to get lost, and he’ll be in your face.

Even if he were a solid Conservative, the biggest problem with his candidacy is that he hasn’t finished his first term as governor.  We made that mistake with Sarah Palin.  We also have the example of the short-term senator, Obama, but that’s Progressive Liberals for you.  We don’t want to make the mistakes they do – or the mistakes they want us to make.  Yet we keep doing it – putting up weak candidates, moderates who anger the base (who then don’t vote), and not-yet-ready-for-primetime-players like Christie.  He needs to finish what he started before he goes on to the next job.  It’s called the dependability factor.

But please, all of New Jersey is begging the rest of Red State America – don’t ask Christie to run.  Please!!  You’ll be sorry; trust us.

 

The National Labor Relations Act and Other Liberal Misdeeds

“To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical.”   -Thomas Jefferson

It’s very embarrassing to be a Tea Partier and yet have such a Liberal luminary skeleton hanging in one’s closet.  But there it is, as the English say – Sen. Robert Ferdinand Wagner, author of the National Labor Relations Act, was my grandfather’s half-cousin.  Pretty scary, huh?  I could hang him outside my door for Halloween.

Wagner was elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate in 1926, and reelected in 1932, 1938 and 1944. He resigned on June 28, 1949, due to ill health (congestive heart failure, like his aunt, my great-grandmother). He was unable to attend any sessions of the 80th or 81st Congress from 1947 to 1949 because of a heart ailment (see?). Wagner was Chairman of the Committee on Patents in the 73rd Congress, of the Committee on Public Lands and Surveys in the 73rd and 74th Congresses, and of the Committee on Banking and Currency in the 75th through 79th Congresses. He was a delegate to the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire in 1944.

Wagner, who had known the future President when they were in the New York state legislature together, was a member of  Franklin Delano Roosevelt‘s Brain Trust. He was very involved in labor issues, fought for legal protection and rights for workers, and was a leader in crafting the New Deal.

His most important legislative achievements include the National Industrial Recovery Act in 1933 and the Wagner-Steagall Housing Act‎ of 1937. After the Supreme Court ruled the National Industrial Recovery Act and the National Recovery Administration unconstitutional, Wagner helped pass the National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act) in 1935, a similar but much more expansive bill. The National Labor Relations Act, perhaps his greatest achievement, was a seminal event in the history of organized labor in the United States. It created the National Labor Relations Board, which mediated disputes between unions and corporations, and greatly expanded the rights of workers by banning many “unfair labor practices” and guaranteeing all workers the right to form a union. He also introduced the Railway Pension Law, and cosponsored the Wagner-O’Day Act, the predecessor to the Javits-Wagner-O’Day Act.

Wagner was instrumental in writing the Social Security Act, and originally introduced it in the United States Senate.  (There are photos of him looking on gleefully as Roosevelt signs it.)  The Wagner-Hatfield amendment to the Communications Act of 1934, aimed at turning over twenty-five percent of all radio channels to non-profit radio broadcasters, did not pass. He also co-sponsored with Rep. Edith Rogers (R-Mass.) the Wagner-Rogers Bill to admit 20,000 Jewish refugees under the age of 14 to the United States from Nazi Germany, but the bill was rejected by the United States Congress in February 1939.

Wagner and Edward P. Costigan sponsored a federal anti-Lynching law. In 1935 attempts were made to persuade President Franklin D. Roosevelt to support the Costigan-Wagner Bill. However, Roosevelt refused to support the bill, not wanting to alienate Southern Democrats in Congress and lose their support for New Deal programs. There were 18 lynchings of blacks in the South in 1935, but after the threat of federal legislation the number fell to eight in 1936, and to two in 1939.  (The one truly good thing he tried to do and Roosevelt refused to sign it.  Go figure.)

The National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act (after its sponsor, New York Sen. Robert F. Wagner) (Pub.L. 74-198, 49 Stat. 449, codified as amended at 29 U.S.C. § 151–169), is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions (also known as trade unions), engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in support of their demands. The Act does not apply to workers who are covered by the Railway Labor Act, agricultural employees, domestic employees, supervisors, federal, state or local government workers, independent contractors and some close relatives of individual employers.

President Roosevelt signed the legislation into law on July 5, 1935. It defined and prohibited five unfair labor practices. These prohibitions still exist, while others have been added under later legislation. The original employer unfair labor practices consisted of:

• Interfering with, restraining or coercing employees in their rights under Section 7. These rights include freedom of association, mutual aid or protection, self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively for wages and working conditions through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other protected concerted activities with or without a union. Section 8(a)(1)
• “Dominating” or interfering with the formation or administration of any labor organization . Section 8(a)(2)
• Discriminating against employees to encourage or discourage acts of support for a labor organization. 8(a)(3)
• Discriminating against employees who file charges or testify. 8(a)(4)
• Refusing to bargain collectively with the representative of the employer’s employees. 8(a)(5)

The key principles of the NLRA are embodied in its concluding paragraph of section 1 including:

encouraging the practice and procedure of collective bargaining and by protecting the exercise by workers of full freedom of association, self-organization, and designation of representatives of their own choosing, for the purpose of negotiating the terms and conditions of their employment or other mutual aid or protection.

The key principles also include:

• Protecting a wide range of activities, whether a union is involved or not, in order to promote organization and collective bargaining.
• Protecting employees as a class and expressly not on the basis of a relationship with an employer. Sections 2(5) and 2(9).
• There can be only one exclusive bargaining representative for a unit of employees.
• Promotion of the practice and procedure of collective bargaining.
• Employers have a duty to bargain with the representative of its employees.

The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, sponsored by U.S. Senator Robert A. Taft and Representative Fred A. Hartley, was designed to amend much of the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (the Wagner Act) and discontinued parts of the Federal Anti-Injunction Act of 1932.   The Taft-Hartley Act was the first major revision to the Wagner Act, and after much resistance from labor leaders and a veto from President Harry S. Truman, was passed on June 23, 1947.

The Taft-Hartley Act provides for the following:

It allows the president to appoint a board of inquiry to investigate union disputes when he believes a strike would endanger national health or safety, and obtain an 80-day injunction to stop the continuation of a strike.

• It declares all closed shops illegal.
• It permits union shops only after a majority of the employees vote for them.
• It forbids jurisdictional strikes and secondary boycotts.
• It ends the check-off system whereby the employer collects union dues.
• It forbids unions from contributing to political campaigns.

The act also required union leaders to take an oath stating that they were not communists. Although many people tried to repeal the act, the Taft-Hartley Act stayed in effect until 1959 when the Landrum-Griffin Act amended some of its features.  Prior to the enactment of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, 61 Stat. 140, 8(3) of the Wagner Act of 1935 (NLRA) permitted majority unions to negotiate “closed shop” agreements requiring employers to hire only persons who were already union members.

Any resemblance between my grandfather and his much older cousin ends at the portrait.  Grandpa was a conservative.  His daughter – Mom – was more moderate, except when it came to labor unions.  When the drivers of the bus company organized a union and went on strike, she refused to join.  The bus drivers tried to stop her bus from leaving the yard and got physical.  At one point, she and a union member were on the bridge leading into the bus yard.  The union gal wouldn’t let her over the bridge.  So my mother challenged her.

“You wanna fight?  Let’s fight, then!”  Mom, being bigger, had every intention of throwing the other woman over the side of the bridge and into the stream (it was only a few feet down).  My mother complained to the police, but they refused to get involved.

“We’re union, too,” the officer said.  Mom pointed up to the American flag waving over the police station.

“You see that flag?” she thundered.  “That’s the American flag.  That makes you American first, before union.  And that means that you have to protect me.  It’s your duty to protect me so I can go to work.  My right as an American to go to work and your duty to protect me as police officer comes before your union solidarity.”

From that point on, the police were on the scene to make sure the bus drivers could enter and leave the yard.  Mom is not, and never was, one to take things lying down.  She got busy writing letters to her representatives and to the National Right To Work Committee, which sent her information on her legal rights and the issues facing workers who don’t want to join unions.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, established in 1968, is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by abuses of compulsory unionism.   The Problem   “To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical.” -Thomas Jefferson   These words of warning, written in 1786 by the father of American liberty, have gone unheeded in today’s labor scene. Federal labor laws have, since the 1930s, permitted and encouraged the growth of compulsory unionism arrangements between union officials and employers, forcing millions of employees to pay dues to unions as a condition of employment. Workers subject to these forced unionism schemes have been denied their freedom of choice as to joining and financially supporting a labor union.The power to compel employees to financially support a labor union is still granted to union officials by federal law in 28 states. In these states that have not yet passed a Right to Work law, this power has led to abuses of workers’ human rights and civil liberties.   Even in the 22 states that have such a law, enforcement is very difficult. Many employees are never told by union representatives that they cannot be required to join the union-a practice that is illegal-and most do not know that there is a law protecting their rights. In addition, many union agents take advantage of the special legal privileges and immunities they enjoy under federal law to institute the “pick-handle closed shop” – join the union or else!   The Need   Prior to 1968, victims of compulsory unionism abuses were in a lonely, exposed position if they tried to fight back. They had been unjustly treated by their unions or employers, often by both. Government agencies tended to turn their backs to the problem. And even if workers could afford them, most labor law specialists worked either for unions or for management-not for the employee.  In the words of noted labor law professor and Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox: “Individual workers who sue union officials run enormous risks, for there are many ways, legal as well as illegal, by which entrenched officials can ‘take care of’ recalcitrant members.” The National Right to Work Committee was then active in Congress and state legislatures, pressing for elimination of compulsory unionism, but it was not structured to give legal aid to individuals   So by 1968, the time had come for an organization that could provide free legal aid to these victimized employees. Rather than working in the legislative arena, such an organization could fight through the court system, to protect employees from violations of their rights resulting from compulsory unionism. The time had come for the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.   The Program   The Foundation’s legal aid program is designed to fulfill two objectives: (1) to enforce employees’ existing legal rights against forced unionism abuses, and, (2) to win new legal precedents expanding these rights and protections. The Foundation’s caseload is growing every day with new complaints of coercion and denial of individual rights by union officials. In order to use its limited resources in the most effective and efficient way, the Foundation’s legal staff evaluates every request for help in each of the following categories: The severity of the injustices suffered by the employee; The factual strength of the employee’s situation as a basis for legal action; The possibility of establishing new legal precedents that would benefit other employees; The probable cost in view of the available resources of the Foundation. Abuses arising from compulsory unionism take many forms. In order to better plan our direction and check our progress in each area of litigation, all Foundation cases are divided into one of six categories: Misuse of forced union dues for political purposes; Union coercion violating employees’ constitutional and civil rights; Injustices of compulsory union “hiring halls;” Union violations of the merit principle in public employment and academic freedom in education; Union violence against workers; Injustices of union organizing; Violations of other existing legal protections against union coercion. In addition to litigation, Foundation attorneys and consulting academic researchers are constantly searching to develop new legal theories, economic data, and social science findings that can be used to help win cases in court.   The Result   Since 1968, the Foundation has received charitable contributions from more than 350,000 Americans dedicated to the protection of individual freedom. The Foundation’s staff of expert, innovative attorneys has fought for the rights of more than 20,000 employees in more than 2,500 cases, all the way from arbitration hearings to the U.S. Supreme Court. Millions have felt the impact. Through a coordinated system of legal actions, the Foundation steadily is shaping the law to protect the basic constitutional rights of the nation’s workers. The Foundation is presently litigating on behalf of employees against a long list of unions, including the National Education Association (NEA), American Federation of Teachers (AFT), United Auto Workers (UAW), International Association of Machinists (IAM), and the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA).   Among the Foundation’s victories are Communications Workers v. Beck, Abrams v. Communications Workers, Chicago Teachers Union v. Hudson, Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, Ellis v. BRAC, and Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Association.   The Foundation is a charitable organization and engages in no legislative activities whatsoever. Like any other charity, it works and hopes for the day when it is no longer needed. Until then, the Foundation will continue to protect the rights of all employees to live and work free of union violence, coerced support of union politics, and other abuses of compulsory unionism.   The Foundation and its supporters believe strongly that an individual’s constitutional rights take precedence over the rights of any private organization. In the words of Leon Knight, a university professor and Foundation plaintiff, “The idea of the dissident person, the idea of a person who marches to a different drum, is very precious. And yet unionism is coming in and saying I must march to that drum.”   With the help of hundreds of thousands of concerned Americans, the Foundation is helping workers like Leon Knight march to their own drum, in pursuit of freedom and justice.   The Foundation in Brief   The Foundation is a charitable organization. It operates solely through the generous support of concerned Americans dedicated to the protection of all employees from abuses of compulsory unionism. The Foundation provides legal aid only at the request of individual employees suffering violations of their rights resulting from compulsory unionism.   The Foundation is totally independent. It accepts no contributions for the purpose of financing a case on behalf of a contributor or an employee of a contributor. The legal staff operates under guidelines set by the Board of Trustees.   All contributions to the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, Inc. are tax deductible. Individuals, corporations, companies, associations, and foundations are all eligible to support the work of the Foundation through tax-deductible gifts. The Foundation is a public foundation granted tax exemption under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. The Foundation has background material available to substantiate the tax deductibility of your contribution.   Last night on his television program, Glenn Beck urged his GBTV viewers to pass the word on to non-viewers.  The NRWLDF provided some key talking points for both non-union and union members who didn’t bargain on selling their American voting rights away.  Private sector union members are easier to convince than public sector, government workers who have inserted a political agenda into their contracts.   There is also the NRWC, which engages in political action.  Visit both their sites and learn what you can do to throw the unions over the bridge.

UNION PRIVELEGES: Exemption from prosecution for union violence. Exemption from anti-monopoly laws. The Clayton Act of 1914 exempts unions from anti-monopoly laws, enabling union officials to forcibly drive out independent or alternative employee bargaining groups. Power to force employees to accept unwanted union representation. Monopoly bargaining, or “exclusive representation,” which is embedded in most of the country’s labor relations statutes, enables union officials to act as the exclusive bargaining agents of all employees at a unionized workplace, thereby depriving employees of the right to make their own employment contracts. Power to collect forced union dues. Unlike other private organizations, unions can compel individuals to support them financially. In 28 states under the NLRA (those that have not passed Right to Work laws), all states under the RLA, on “exclusive federal enclaves,” and in many states under public sector labor relations acts, employees may be forced to pay union dues as a condition of employment, even if they reject union affiliation. Unlimited, undisclosed electioneering. The Federal Election Campaign Act exempts unions from its limits on campaign contributions and expenditures, as well as some of its reporting requirements. Ability to strong-arm employers into negotiations. Unlike all other parties in the economic marketplace, union officials can compel employers to bargain with them. Right to trespass on an employer’s private property. The Norris-LaGuardia Act of 1932 (and state anti-injunction acts) give union activists immunity from injunctions against trespass on an employer’s property. Ability of strikers to keep jobs despite refusing to work. Union-only cartels on construction projects. Under so-called project labor agreements, governments (local, state, or federal) award contracts for construction on major projects such as highways, airports, and stadiums exclusively to unionized firms. Government funding of forced unionism. Union groups receive upwards of $160 million annually in direct federal grants. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. In 2001, the federal Department of Labor doled out $148 million for “international labor programs” overwhelmingly controlled by an AFL-CIO front group

ACTION PLAN FOR UNION WORKERS:

No employee in the United States can legally be required to be a full-dues-paying, formal union member. But in many states, an employee can be forced to pay certain union dues or be fired from his or her job.

Union members have the right to resign from formal membership at any time. However, dues deduction authorizations may limit when they can be revoked.

Employees covered by state Right to Work laws can not lawfully be required to pay any union fees to keep their jobs. But state Right to Work laws do not protect railway and airline employees and employees of private-sector contractors on some federal properties.

Because they enjoy the special privilege of exclusive representation, unions have a legal duty to represent fairly all employees in their bargaining units. Unions are legally required to represent nonmember employees the same as members, but unfortunately this duty is often breached.

If a law or bargaining agreement permits it, employees can be forced to pay certain union fees. If you don’t join the union, or resign from membership, and notify the union that you don’t want to pay full dues, the required fee must be limited to the union’s proven costs of collective bargaining activities. This fee may not lawfully include things like political expenses.

Nonmembers with religious objections to supporting a union have the right to ask the union to redirect the forced dues amount to charity. Religious objectors do not have to belong to a specific church to claim this right.

A union member who wants to work during a strike should resign from union membership BEFORE going to work. If the resignation is mailed, the employee should not work until the day after the resignation is postmarked. Otherwise, the employee could be fined by the union. If you are already a nonmember, you can work at will during a strike and not be lawfully fined.

Many employees have a legal right to petition for an election to oust an unwanted union from their workplace or to eliminate the union’s ability to collect forced fees. You should contact us if you want to do this.

Your best source for information about your Right to Work rights is this web site. Foundation attorneys have represented many employees like you, and have taken several cases all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to protect workers’ rights.

If, after reviewing the information available through the links below, you are still unclear about your rights, or believe that you need legal aid because union officials have violated these rights (as they frequently do), call us at 800-336-3600 or send us an e-mail here.

 

A Big Swarm of Pests

A group of young people, trying to relive the Sixties, is staging an “occupation” of Wall Street.  Actually, it’s been going on for two weeks. But New Yorkers being New Yorkers, used to stepping over the bodies of hobos, bums, and bag ladies either sleeping or passed out on the sidewalk, commuter barely noticed this 21^st Century version of a sit-in.

Frankly, Wall Street just has more important things to worry about.  If the Dow keeps plummeting, those kids occupying the street might just have to start dodging the falling bodies of desperate traders. 

According to Raimound Viejo, of Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain:  “The time has come to deploy this emerging stratagem against the greatest corrupter of our democracy: Wall Street, the financial Gomorrah of America. It’s time for Democracy Not Corporatocracy.  The anti-globalization movement was the first step on the road.   Back then our model was to attack the system like a pack of wolves. There was an alpha male, a wolf who led the pack, and those who followed behind. Now the model has evolved. Today we are one big swarm of people.”

Actually, Spain’s economy is supposedly faring better than some of its European neighbors.  Funny, that a Liberal would use the term “Gomorrah”.  Maybe his English isn’t so good and he doesn’t quite understand what Gomorrah was.  If we use his illustration, Wall Street wasn’t a “financial Gomorrah” under Capitalism.  But it certainly will be under government Socialism.

Secondly, it bears repeating that America is a federated republic, not a democracy.  We practice democracy certainly.  But the reason democracy isn’t our form of government can be aptly illustrated by the scene of new hippies staging on a sit-in on lower Manhattan’s narrow streets:  decisions are made by civilized voting not by mob rule, marauding wolf-packs, and swarms of people, unaccountable, irresponsible, and uncivilized.

The Dow is plummeting thanks to the financial destabilization of the European economy.  The Euro, as most people predicted when it was first introduced, is a disaster.  That’s why Great Britain refused to jump on the Euro bandwagon.  The disease has now spread to America, with a great deal of help from the Obama administration.  Like the rats they are, Euro-trash students hope to infect the brainwashed, socialized students here.  They want to feed on what they consider the carcass of Capitalism.

Meanwhile, it’s one more distraction for the NYPD in a time of serious and costly security problems.  The cops have been roughing these “students” up a bit, scraping their pretty little faces on the sidewalk and ruining their mascara with pepper spray.  The poor little dears.  The NYPD doesn’t take kindly to having its time wasted by sophomoric antics.  Among the many facets of American history that the students ignored while studying the glories of communism, they seem to have forgotten that they’re sitting-in within blocks of the fallen World Trade Center, where many of the NYPD and NYFD’s brothers and sisters died. 

People who work for a living and depend upon investments in capital know that while there are certainly corrupt capitalists on Wall Street, it’s the U.S. government which corrupted them.  Get rid of the corrupt bureaucrats and politicians and corrupt capitalists will follow.  The taxpayers indeed bailed out some of America’s biggest companies – at the behest of the U.S. government, in order to bail-out corrupt unions which had bled the companies dry.  Unions that are, by their very nature, Socialist.

This is the 21^st Century, not the 1960s.  Progressives can no longer play this game of creating a crisis and then blame it on their adversaries.  Our technology and means of communications are better now.  Conservative students are waking up – thanks to the Tea Parties – and finding they have a voice.  They are going to be a mighty force with which Progressives must content in the future.  Harvard Law School even has a Tea Party.  We highly recommend that they study this current situation and devise some ingenious strategy for pest control.  Start boiling the water, Harvard Teap!

What Are the Odds?

The chances of being hit by Nasa’s six-ton UAR satellite – about the size of a bus – were 1 in 22 trillion. You’re 700,000 more times likely to be struck by lightning. The odds of getting hit by a bus are one in 500,000. Unluckily for a 15 year-old student in West ilford, the odds were against him.

 A heavy fog on Friday morning on busy Macopin Road increased his odds. He was hit by a school bus on its way to West Milford High School when the student crossed in its path. The driver subsequently suffered chest pains. Then the first ambulance dispatched to the scene got into a fender bender in the fog, and a second ambulance was sent out. When the second ambulance arrived, the medics determined the boy’s injuries were severe enough to warrant rescue by helicopter.

Only the fog was so heavy, that the helicopter couldn’t make the flight. The boy was taken to Morristown Memorial Hospital where he is presently in stable condition. The bus driver was taken to Chilton Memorial Hospital and admitted for chest pains. The name of the driver has not been released. The accident is still under investigation but the police are reportedly not considering charges at this time.

We live in a dangerous world, some of us on dangerous roads, and all of us under a debris-laden sky. We face dangers from terrorists, diseases, and weather. The bus-size satellite was scheduled to land in the Atlantic yesterday, along a corridor of highly-populated cities; instead, it seems to have landed somewhere in the less populous regions of Alberta, Canada. There are no reports of injuries.

Instead an unlucky student, having missed his own school bus, darted across a fog-covered, busy road yesterday and got hit by another school bus, instead, sending him and the unlucky driver to the hospital.

All you can do is prepare as best you can for the unexpected: make sure you get up in time to catch your school bus rather than being hit by it, slow down on foggy mornings – most school bus drivers are extremely cautious, especially when they have kids on board; most commuter drivers, on the other hand, don’t slow down for anything – fog, rain, sleet, snow, school buses, pedestrians, ambulances.

 With the falling space debris, now not only do we have to look both ways in traffic, but we have to look up.

 

Filet Mignon in Every Pot

GOP candidate Mitt Romney said in the Republican debate last night that he wants everybody to rich.  It’s not enough anymore to just have a chicken in your pot, to have a job that will pay for the basic necessities of life.  Now, everyone has to have an HDTV, an X-box, an IPAD, a new car, a no-money down mortgage on a McMansion, a computer with Internet access, and free health care.

The trouble with a Utopia is that it’s a utopia – it’s not for real.  Utopia is a place someone cooked up in their imagination.  Wouldn’t it be great if none of us had to work for a living and yet had everything our hearts desired?  I’d have a little house with a yard where my two cats could chase butterflies in the summer and leaves in the autumn, I’d have a dog, and I’d never have to listen to my bellowing new neighbor ever again.  In fact, I’d have my loud-mouthed neighbor’s glossy black Lab.

But thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s glossy black Lab.  Those are the rules.  Someone has to do the work and you can’t expect them to do it for nothing.  That’s not called “volunteerism” or “charity” – it’s called “slavery.”  If I didn’t have deadlines for my company’s website, I’d be doing a number of things.  I’d be working on my Greatest Books for Conservatives megalist.  Owing my employer a day’s work for a day’s wages, I’m obliged to type it at home.  I’d be working on my own future novels and films about freedom.  I’d be writing speeches for Tea Party candidates.  Oh, the things I could do if I didn’t have to work for a living.

Soon enough – all too soon – I will have all the time in the world.  But I won’t have all the money in the world.  Comes March, I’ll be unemployed.  My severance pay and unemployment will carry me for awhile, but I’m far from being so independently wealthy that I can afford to remain in that state of freedom indefinitely.  By this time next year, I will be obliged to sell my time, if I’m lucky, to another employer with deadlines.  The Greatest Books list at least offers me one useful solace – it’s improving my typing speed and accuracy.

Up until the creation of the Great Society, we had a reasonably balanced society economically. Blacks needed to be allowed to work.  Once that huge mistake was corrected, our economy hummed like a well-oiled machine.  Sure, there were socialist cranks squeaking their wheels because Capitalism was flourishing and socialism wasn’t.   But who cared?

Still, the Socialists persevered in their designs to upend society.  Thanks to Obama’s “transformation” our economy has been upended.  Thanks to all the entitlement programs, the money is not only flowing downhall to the dregs of society, but it’s draining right out of economy altogether.  If something is done to correct the many problems, the American engine will seize up and break down entirely.

The present GOP field is not encouraging.  Romney is Obamacare lite.  Perry doesn’t care that illegal immigrants are flowing over our borders.  Social Security is a Ponzi scheme that holds our senior citizens – and the politicians for whom they would vote – hostage.  None of these candidates can or will do anything about it.  Bachmann needs to polish her image.  Ron Paul is a Truther.  Palin is pro-union.  Christie is a moderate.  Yet we must put one of them in office. 

Bachmann at least has all her conservative ducks in the right row.  Like Palin, she may be too much of a lightweight, though.  The heavyweights, unfortunately, are overweight from too much compromise and Kool-Aid drinking.  Unless there’s a Conservative Superhero waiting in the wings to announce their candidacy, we’re in trouble.

If the Socialists win in 2012, we’ll be lucky if we have a pot left in which to put our poor, scrawny chicken, much less filet mignon.

Classless Clown

You’d think we’d all be used to Obama and his faux pax by now.  Bowing to Middle Eastern potentates.  Insulting the Queen of England and her country by returning a bust of former Prime Minister Winston Churchill.  Declaring that the automobile was invented in the United States, of which he claims there are 57.  Stuttering through numerous speeches.  Some president of the United States he is.

Just when you think he can’t get any worse – he does something to top the last humiliation.  On Tuesday, he was part of a photo op at the United Nations.  Behaving like the class clown, he put his hand up in front of Mongolian President Tsakhia Elbegdorj’s face as the camera flashed.  Photographers are used to this sort of nonsense, although they expect it of school kids, not world leaders.  Still, put people in a group and a class clown usually turns up.  Sadly, for the United States of America, that clown turned out to be our president.

The photographer took other photos, but of course it was the picture of our president making a fool of himself that made the papers, websites, blogs, and Twitter.  Nothing like a little adolescent humor to distract everyone’s attention from the fact that the Arab world is hell-bent on wiping Israel out of existence.

Obama, the sophomore, is wise enough to know that he must vote against recognizing Palestine as a state if he doesn’t want to alienate the solidly Democrat-voting American Jewish demographic.  Goodness knows why.  To hear crooner Tony Bennett – who left his mind as well as his heart in San Francisco – sing it, the United States is to blame for the 9/11 attacks by supporting Israel and “occupying” the Middle East.  Never mind that Saudi Arabia requested our help to fend off Saddam Hussein’s depradations.  Never mind that a war in Iraq was preferable to a war in Afghanistan’s trackless mountains, a scenario Osama Bin Laden favored.  According to Bennett, he lent Bush his ear, into which Bush whispered his regret that we’d ever gone into Iraq.

Wars are costly affairs, indeed.  That’s why we should go in as quickly and with as much firepower as possible, win it and put an end to it.  Neither of the Pres. Bushes created the modern nation of Iraq.  That nation’s creation goes back to the World War II era and beyond.  Israel was the price Europe had to pay for centuries of mistreating the Jews.  As for the Muslims – tough luck; the Jews were there first.  They built Jerusalem, not the Palestinians, a minor tribe the Jews conquered centuries ago.

How long is the West going to allow itself to be held hostage to Islam’s revisionist history of the world?  Palestine has not agreed to a single term of peace with Israel.  In fact, Israel has surrendered far more than it ever should have in the constant wars with its Arab neighbors.  Palestinians want recognition for themselves, yet refuse to recognize the existence of Israel.  Abbas’ single term for peace is the annihilation of Israel. 

Finally, in this week of absurdities, New York City is “celebrating” the opening of the Ground Zero Mosque (a.k.a. as the Islamic Center), right around the corner from the finally-built World Trade Center memorial.  Manhattan’s considerable Jewish population has absolutely no problem with this.  In fact, they decry out-of-town protestors who object to the building of this mosque, a la the al-Aqsa mosque (which Muslims are demanding to be “returned” to them).  Observant Jews say that these Metro Jews care nothing for the religion, that they’re non-practicing Jews – JINOs – Jews In Name Only.  They care only for power, politics, and profits from a one-world government.  Israel means nothing to them at all.

Osama can’t be in fear of these people, who are his solid supporters.  Strangely, he’s more fearful of a small minority of observant Jews, and their much larger, Christian backers who are appalled at the notion of this tiny but democratic country being wiped out of existence.  Though it might seem odd, in Israel, American Christians see the writing on the Wailing Wall.

If Israel goes, we’re next.

 

 

Eliminating the Competition

Obama and the Liberals are still following their progressive agenda of spreading the wealth, making things “equal” for everyone, eliminating all sense of competition.  In their utopia, everyone will just feel so good.  Everyone will be a winner.  There will be no “losers”.  Or more, to the point, everyone will be a loser, like in the Great Depression.

Well, here’s what’s wrong with that:  The Bloomingdale Cornet Band has been participating in the N.J. Firemen’s Convention Parade for 27 years.  In the early days, we had plenty of competition.  We didn’t win first place in the beginning, but we were game for the competition for Best Senior Band.  In fact, it took us a couple of years to get to first place.

The first year was rainy, wet, and very windy, just like this past weekend.  I can’t recall whether we had jackets or not, but it didn’t matter; they got soaked through.  We still had our old, long-sleeve shirts, of varying shades of faded blue.  Yet, just as we got to the judging line, the sun came out and shone on us.  When we learned we’d won second place, among quite a number of larger bands, we were ecstatic.

As we kept winning, our band grew and grew.  At one point, we had 45 musicians, 20-some color guard, and our drum major.  We were awesome.  Those were the band’s glory days.  Every year, we found something new that we could do better.

Good times never last for long, though.  A couple of things happened.  The other bands got tired of always coming in second-place and so they stopped coming to the parades.  We were dismayed.  As officers, we even tried to hint to the judges that it would be all right if they notched us down a little and let the other guy win.  But they said they couldn’t do that; if we were the best band, then we were the best band.

Being the best band is no fun if you’re the only band on the street.  Inevitably, politics also interfered.  We began to lose musicians both to boredom with always winning in Wildwood with no competition and to infighting.  Other people wanted to be officers and have the glory of leading the best band in New Jersey.  One of the political battles was over giving participation money to the musicians in Wildwood, based on attendance, something I always maintained was a bad idea.  The trouble began when a young high school musician demanded his attendance money even though he wouldn’t be going to Wildwood.  The money was for the purpose of defraying the ancillary costs of going to Wildwood (gas, tolls, dinner, amusement park rides, arcade games and so forth).  Technically, we are a volunteer, non-paying band.

Our musicians were getting older, too, and retiring.  Young people weren’t as willing to play with a community marching band.  The high school bands were having their own problems getting kids to buck the new counter-culture grain and learn traditional music.  Some played with us for awhile during their high school years.  But hardly any New Jersey students actually go to New Jersey colleges.  Once they went off to school, they were gone for good.

Younger kids are no longer interested in serving on our band front, either.  They’re too busy playing soccer where they earn free “participation awards.”  The daughter of one of our musicians (musicians are invited to bring their families down to Wildwood), when the former band front advisor asked her if she’d like to carry a flag, haughtily told the woman, “I have better things to do than march with the band.”  When the new officers took over, the kids on the front demanded new uniforms.  They were literally wearing the uniforms their mothers wore.  However, those uniforms were quite attractive; the new replacements, not so much.  To young ladies, appearance is everything.  The old uniforms, bright and colorful, attracted many new recruits to the front.

That’s the way the band was in the 1960s and it seems we’re back to those bad old days again, where we have barely enough musicians to put on the street.  We’re really desperate for tuba players.  Our most faithful tuba player is 75.  He’s a youngish 75, but his ankles are starting to bother him and there’s no young tuba player to take over his spot, or at least help him out.

Finally, 9/11 affected us, in an indirect way.  In the post-9/11 age, volunteer firefighters are required to take more training, which eats into their volunteer time.  Between training and fighting actual fires, they have little time for fund-raising and parades.  They can barely afford to hire us, even at a lower rate, much less host a full-scale parade.  Many of the parades we used to do 30 years ago have been cancelled altogether.  In any case, we don’t have enough musicians to cover an 18-parade schedule.

That’s what happens when you eliminate competition, give everyone a “participation award” (all marching units receive one in Wildwood), and try to “spread the wealth” around; it just doesn’t work.  Manners go right out the window.  The fresh little girl who denounced the idea of marching is no match in manners for her counterpart on the band front.  In fact, she and her friends, also musicians’ daughters, as well their brothers, would benefit from the discipline our band front members learn out on the street.  How to stand at attention, focus on what’s ahead and not be distracted; how to take orders; how to work as a team; how their individual contributions adds to the group’s spirit; how to respect the American flag and how to respect others as well. 

Whatever it is those spoiled little boys and girls learn at their soccer games and cheerleading practices and so forth, good manners and respect aren’t among them.  A generation of youngsters is learning they can get something for doing something totally useless like kicking a ball around a field, admiring sports heroes, while our band front kids spent this weekend honoring real life heroes – the firefighters of New Jersey.

 

 

 

Turban Terror

Guess the Danish cartoonist who portrayed the Prophet Mohammed wearing a turban with a fuse can be let off the fatwa hook now.  Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, a leader in the Afghan peace council, was killed in his home today by a terrorist who hid a bomb under his turban.

According to NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, two suicide bombers, “feigning a desire to conduct reconciliation talks, detonated themselves.”  The attack occurred when a meeting scheduled between Rabbani and a Taliban delegation representing the insurgency was due to meet.  Four other people were wounded, according to CNN’s report, including one Rabbani’s key advisers.

Current Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, whom Rabbani opposed, cut short his visit to the United Nations to return home.  The English translation of Taliban, or Taleban, as the current spelling goes, means “student militia” or “student group.”   According to Michael Scheurer’s book, Osama Bin Laden, this uniting of Muslim student groups was long in planning and a great dream of Bin Laden’s.  He had called for student uprisings all across the Muslim Middle East.

The long-delayed war in Afghanistan was also something Bin Laden had hoped for.  He poured a great deal of money into Afghanistan’s insurgent Taliban and into the country’s infrastrure, building roads and hospitals, and an army to repel whatever Western super power had the temerity to cross its borders.  After 9/11, we only spent two months in Afghanistant before Pres. Bush turned our attention to Iraq, greatly disappointing Bin Laden by not engaging in a mountain war which we could not win, and mounting a desert war, which we certainly could.

The militants consider any Muslim who tries to broker a deal with the West an apostate who deserves death.  Anyone who thinks the Taliban or any other Muslim student militia desires peace with the West is dreaming.  The freedom they want is, first, to rule the Arab world, and secondly, to spread their belief from there.  Scheurer argues that Osama never wanted to dominate the world, only to deliver the Arab world from the Great Satan.  With the West’s open borders, however, that is a specious argument.  If Muslims so hated the West, they would shun us, as the Pennsylvania Dutch avoid contact with the modern world.  They wouldn’t even be here.  Yet the U.S. Muslim population is said to be exploding.  Why are they here, since they clearly don’t believe in freedom?

If the Muslim people are innocent, it is only because Islam holds a dagger to their throats.  They have no choice in the Arab world but to submit, or die.  It’s not much of a choice, worship Allah or die.  So, their young men drink the Kool-Aid, in great guzzling gulps, until they’re driven so mad, brainwashed with such zealotry that they fly planes into buildings or place bombs in their turbans to kill anyone who doesn’t “share” their faith.

Zealots and communists blame America for centuries of madness and for denying a baseless land claim by a tribal people driven not by heritage but religious insanity.  The Palestinians don’t wish to create and claim Palestine for Palestinians, but for a worldwide Islamic state that recognizes no leader at all but a violent camel rider dead these many centuries.  Were a caliphate to be reinstated, Palestine’s boundaries would immediately vanish into the desert wind.  Their only purpose in trying to create a Palestinian “state” is to drive out what they consider an infidel invader – Israel.

Anti-semitism is alive and well 66 years after Adolf Hitler’s death.  A new Aryan leader has taken up Hitler’s banner and his call to wipe the Jewish people (and any other infidels) off the face of the earth.  The Jewish people have been betrayed by their own children, who care nothing for being God’s Chosen Children.  They follow a new, base and unholy faith led by corrupted government servants.  They crave power for themselves; they certainly don’t wish to worship the power of God, that invisible (to them) being who takes all the fun out of life.

How they can be so blind as to the horrors of life under totalitarian Muslim rule can only be attributed to a lifetime of brainwashing and drug use.  What price are they paying to throw Israel, the only democratic nation in the Middle East, under the steamroller of progressive totalitarianism?  What will be left of their souls and our lives and world, when they finally accomplish their mission?

 

Raining On Our Parade

Our band was looking forward to the annual N.J. Firemen’s Parade in Wildwood this past weekend. Initially, the forecast was for very pleasant weather. Sun, low humidity, temps in the lower seventies; perfect parading weather.

By the time we got down to North Wildwood, the weather and the forecast had changed. The wind was starting to blow a gale, the temperature was only in the high sixties, dark clouds were approaching, and our spare rain jackets were back in the storage facility up north. Corps rules: if one member is missing a jacket, everyone has to go without a jacket.

By the time we took our annual group photo, the first raindrops were beginning to fall. One here. Another there. Pretty soon, they were joined by their fellow raindrops. As we got to the line-up street, the drops were increasing and by step-off, it was a genuine show. This wasn’t one of those gentle, summer showers though; the wind was blowing stiff and the rain ate right through our skin down to our bones. We’ve marched in cold rains before, but not without our jackets.

Our very first Firemen’s Convention parade taught us the value of having jackets. We were way down south in Wildwood Crest by the bay, about as far back in the line-up as we could get; the place of honor for new parade participants. We huddled up against a fire engine and the larger men (and women) surrounded us as a windbreak. That night, we all went to the boardwalk, had clam chowder and bought cozy Wildwood sweatshirts.

This year, by the time we got back to our hotel, where we do our traditional two-block triumphal march, our hands were so frozen, musicians in each section had to take turns playing while their partner warmed up their hands.

There was a lot of excitement, too. On Friday night, the North Wildwood F.D. was called out, in earnest, no less than three times. Each time, they came charging up our street (23rd Street). The first time, we learned later, was for a stabbing murder(!). The second time was at 2 a.m., when the company responded to a boardwalk fire. Someone (rumor has it a car was seen with Pennsylvania plates) set fire to Go-Kart garage on one of the amusement piers. Another set of engines came charging up the road a short time later, which means a second alarm. The authorities have been mum about how this fire was set.

Most, if not all, of the northern counties were missing out of the parade. The fire apparatus must be absolutely spotless in judging, and word is the northern fire companies just couldn’t be bothered trying to make their trucks ready for the white glove inspection. Since 9/11, additional mandatory training requirements have doused the enthusiasm and time volunteer firefighters have for such things as parades.

Wildwood built their new convention center in better times, before September 11th and before this permanent recession. Residents were assured the local tax increase would only be temporary. But the giant new hall sits empty, for the most part. Corporations prefer the adult amusements of Atlantic City to the family-friendly fare of the Wildwoods.

At least, the Wildwoods are trying to keep their boardwalk family friendly. The teens and twenties gangs who roam the boardwalk have different ideas. The shops offer an infinite variety of tee shirts from the merely vulgar to the downright profane and sexually explicit. The activity keeps the Wildwood boardwalk police busy.

My “gang” and I had stopped at Kohler’s Custard stand. We stood on the south side of the building to get out of the wind. I have an American flag pin that says, “I Am A Proud American.” Walking along the boardwalk, I noticed the cops giving me queer, angry glances. Now, at Kohlers, a pair of them joined us. My friends thought it was to get out of the wind. However, the first thing they did was read my pin. They didn’t say anything though. Once they got a good look at, they must have realized it was inoffensive and didn’t look again.

There attention was soon claimed by a group of teenagers who demanded an apology for their First Amendment rights. One of them was wearing a profanity-laced, sexually explicit hoody. The cop was very terse. “I don’t care,” he said. “Take it off.”

The teens simply laughed and skipped away into the midst of the boardwalk crowd, filled with parents leading little tykes in search of kiddie rides that were actually open and running. How to explain all the lewd and profane apparel to a four year-old?

“Mommy, what does F&*@ mean?”

“It’s Greek for ‘idiot’, dear.”