Reason TV Takes on the FedEx/UPS Fight

November 12, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

The best one-liner? “It tells us who the real villain is here… a federal government that is big enough and powerful enough that it can absolutely, positively guarantee that it can crush any business over night.”

Of course, we talked about this FedEx/UPS argument last June.

Women Becoming Majority of Union Workers

November 12, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, Capitalism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, President, Socialism, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Associated Press had an interesting article reporting that women are fast becoming the majority of union members and will be the majority in 10 years if current trends continue.

As it stand now, women make up 45 percent of union members today, up from 35 percent in 1983. Apparently white men now only make up 38 percent of the union workforce, down from almost 52 percent in ‘83.

The AP notes that this preponderance of women is changing the goals of union negotiators.

“When you have a majority of women in the labor movement, issues like work-family balance, paid sick days and paid parental leave become more important,” said John Schmitt, an economist at the left-leaning think tank and one of the authors of the report.

And what has caused this change? The growth of public, government unions. At this point, the AP reports, that 49 percent of all union members are now working for local, state, and federal workers in public employees unions. 61 percent of public employees are female.
Read more

A Victory Against Obama’s Unionism in New Hampshire

November 11, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Capitalism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Society/Culture, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a victory for free labor, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has cancelled its solicitation for bids to build a new Jobs Corps Center in the state of New Hampshire. Why is it a victory? Because initial plans to receive bids would have discriminated against non-union construction companies per President Obama’s orders. Over 80% of all construction companies are non-union.

Executive Order 13502, signed early in Obama’s term, was applied to the New Hampshire construction project and instituted what is known as a Project Labor Agreement (PLA). A PLA is a way to force all companies working on a construction project to agree to union rules, dues, pensions and payments whether they are union shops and their employees are union members or not.

In effect, a PLA turns every employee and company working on a PLA enforced project into a unionized force. Naturally, this drives up costs, lengthens deadlines, and forces employees to fork over dues money even if they don’t belong to a union.
Read more

Steve Rauschenberg: Why is Ill. 46th in Job Creation?

November 6, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, Chicago, Conservatives, Cook County, Elections, GOP, Government, Corruption, Illinois, Jobs, Republicans, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

Steve Rauschenberg (R, Elgin) is talking jobs for the Illinois economy. Rauschengerger says in his new video, “For Illinois to have a strong future we need strong job growth in Illinois and today we don’t have it.”

Steve Rauschenberger is running to regain his old Senate seat in the 22nd District which encompasses part of DuPage County and western Cook County.

(Cross posted at RedCounty.com)

Union Plans Voted Down by Home Healthcare Workers

October 20, 2009 | Filed Under ACORN, Anti-Americanism, Business, Chicago, Communism, Cook County, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Free Trade, Freedom, Government, Corruption, Health, Jobs, Liberals, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

If CBS News has it right, the majority of in-home healthcare workers in Illinois voted not to join a union despite the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and Governor Quinn’s best efforts to force the issue.

Earlier in the year, Governor Quinn signed Executive Order 09-15 that gave away the private information of every in-home healthcare worker in the state to several unions so that they might begin a campaign to cajole these workers into joining a union by calling them on the phone and visiting them at their homes.

In-home healthcare workers receive a stipend from the state in order to help them care for developmentally disabled or medically at risk family members.
Read more

Carly Fiorina: Looking Like a Good Fit for Conservatives

October 13, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, California, Capitalism, Congress, Economy/Finances, Environment, Free Trade, GOP, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Republicans, Senate, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, The Law, Warner Todd Huston | 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Cary Fiorina, former Hewlett-Packard CEO and probable candidate for U.S. Senate from California, is starting to look like a viable choice for conservative voters in the Golden State, giving the GOP two conservatives from whom to chose.

Fiorina’s bona fides have been a question to many California Republicans because she is a relative newcomer to politics and many are not familiar with her political philosophy or what her campaign will stand for. But her recent hard hitting editorial in the Fresno Bee helps bring her ideals better into focus for the voters.

Firoina’s editorial in the Bee focuses on the water controversy of the San Joaquin Valley. As many know, a federal bureaucracy has summarily shut off water to thousands of acres of farmland merely in order to save a fish; the delta smelt. This enviro-activism has shut down thousands of acres of farmland and put thousands of residents out of work. Down the line it will also negatively affect the nation’s food supply because the San Joaquin Valley supplies much of our vegetables and fruits.
Read more

Economic Freedom Alliance Targets EFCA

October 13, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Chicago, Congress, Cook County, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, House of Representatives, Illinois, Jobs, Liberals, President, SEIU, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

A rather new group called the Economic Freedom Alliance (economicfreedomalliance.org) is now taking on the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) by erecting billboards to target five key Democrat congressmen in hopes of getting their constituents to urge them to drop support of the EFCA.

In one section of Illinois, for instance, the billboards say simply “DoNotLetBillFosterKillJobs.com.” Bill Foster is a Democratic Representative from south west of Chicago who now holds the seat that Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert once occupied.

Other Democrats that the billboards are targeting elsewhere in the country are Democrat Representatives Debbie Halvorson (Ill.) and Ike Skelton (Missouri), as well as Democratic Senators Evan Bayh (Indiana) and Claire McCaskill (Missouri).
Read more

Smosska’s ACORN Smoke Screen

October 11, 2009 | Filed Under ACORN, Anti-Americanism, Business, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, President, Society/Culture, State Government, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

This is an update on a story about a company in South Carolina named Smosska that I covered back in July. At this point, it seems beyond question that Smosska is a sham organization that was set up by ACORN in order to hide “community activism” behind a false front in South Carolina.


Back in July I reported on a corporation that swept into Florence, South Carolina promising all sorts of new jobs with wonderful new benefits. Naturally none of these jobs have materialized. Looking into this Smosska, Corp. proves that the company is a sham group formed to serve the needs of the criminal ACORN organization.

Well, for an update, it looks like this sham company is getting served with an eviction notice.
Read more

Mayor Daley: How a Politician Lies

October 11, 2009 | Filed Under Chicago, Cook County, Crime, Democrats/Leftists, Government, Corruption, Illinois, Jobs, Liberals, Security/Safety, Society/Culture, State Government, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

This week we’ve seen King Daley’s desperate attempt to get past his deep humiliation on losing the 2016 Olympics after spending so many years trying to convince the world that his corrupt kingdom was the ideal place for the games. The King’s brilliant idea was to reveal how he was going to save the city from its epidemic of youth violence.

A Chicago Tribune story reported the diminutive King’s plan to cure the city of violence in the wake of the death of a student near Fenger High school.

emphasized that families and parents need to take responsibility, but he also said the city would seek jobs for youths and expand current intervention programs in an attempt to address youth violence in Chicago.

Well, that is just a plain lie, Mr. Daley. It’s all just happy talk and BS, sir.

First of all, a Mayor cannot make any jobs, so the “seek jobs” line is so much stuff and nonsense. But wait, you may ask, can’t he make city jobs for these needy folks? Not really. In fact, the Chicago Reader has detailed how many jobs the city has had to cut because of budget shortfalls.

According to payroll records, the administration cut 2,245 jobs between March 2008 and October 2009, reducing the total city workforce to 36,296.

The Kingie can’t even produce any make-work city jobs for people… unless he wants to fire the children of his mobbed-up buddies that already have all the fake, make-work city jobs, that is.

So the city is going bankrupt, King Daley didn’t get his graft infusion by getting the Olympics, and all he can do is go begging to President Obama for some leavings from the federal table and hope he can make do with that.
Read more

More Big Labor Angst over Obamacare

October 11, 2009 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Business, Capitalism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, President, Socialism, Society/Culture, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

It is often portrayed by the Old Media that Big Labor is lining up behind Obamacare with gusto. While many unions are doing just that, the not all unions are so happy with Congress’ current plans. We discussed this last month when we reported that the various propositions to tax so-called Cadillac healthcare plans has gotten some unions nervous.

Now, 157 House Democrats have sent a letter to Speaker Pelosi (D, Calif.) declaring their opposition to taxing high-end healthcare plans. One of those reasons is that many unions have given away pay raises in order to enlarge their benefits packages and such a tax will hit union members hard.

Rep. Joe Courtney, D-Conn., who organized the petition, said the tax would hurt too many middle-class people in addition to the wealthier people it is intended to hit.

“This would have an impact far wider than just the Paris Hiltons of the world,” Courtney told reporters Wednesday.

Leading the charge against these tax plans is the AFL-CIO. As IBD reports:
Read more

Chgo Trib: Bush Was as ‘Socialist’ as Obama

October 9, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Capitalism, Communism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Free Trade, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, President, Republicans, Security/Safety, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

In another Obama loving column, Chicago Tribune writer Steve Chapman took pains to assure readers that Barack Obama is no socialist, calling the charge a “fabrication.” To prove that Obama’s attempted take over of the nation’s healthcare and his actual take over of the financial and auto sectors isn’t a step toward socialism, Chapman countered that President Bush, “a conservative hero,” did it too.

Obama, it’s true, has done things that involve enlarging government — bailing out banks, taking over General Motors, proposing a “public option” for health insurance and spending $787 billion to stimulate the economy.

But it was George W. Bush, a conservative hero, who tossed a federal lifeline to financial institutions and automakers, as well as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He also signed the 2008 stimulus package, which was billed as a tax cut but was nothing more than a handout of $168 billion the government didn’t have.

It is amazing to compare the Bush bailout package to Obama’s policy of actually taking possession of business by government as if they were one and the same. But even more ridiculous is to claim that Bush is a “conservative hero” in the context of bail-outs and finances as if it were a true statement.
Read more

And Now Senator Schumer is Lying about Job Loss

October 5, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Capitalism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Free Trade, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Journalism, Liberals, Media Bias, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

You know, our job loses are bad enough without President Obama and now Senator Chuck Schumer lying about it all and making it sound even worse than it is. But this particular lie is a very particular lie, one that is aimed to make the presidency of George W. Bush the bad guy.

Job loses occurred during Bush’s last year in office, of course. But both the president and now Schumer are blatantly lying about the extent of that loss. Just last week President Obama used this lie, as he did in mid September.

Here is what the president keeps saying:

“When I came into office, we were losing 700,000 jobs per month. Credit was frozen so that small businesses and large businesses alike couldn’t borrow. You couldn’t get an auto loan even if you had good credit. People were losing their homes at an extraordinary pace.”

Of course, the truth is that he did not inherit any loss of 700,000 jobs a month.
Read more

Why do Obamas Have to Lie?

October 3, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Barack Obama, Business, Capitalism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Security/Safety, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | 3 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Barack “Hessayin” Obama lied repeatedly throughout the campaign and has not stopped as president. And now, even Michelle “Never Been Proud of My Country” Obama is joining him at the liar’s rostrum.

Our favorite watchdog Michelle Malkin caught this little lie in The First Lady’s Olympics pleading.

Some of my best memories are sitting on my dad’s lap, cheering on Olga and Nadia, Carl Lewis, and others for their brilliance and perfection.

LIAR!

If Michelle Obama was sitting on her father’s lap watching Carl Lewis perform in the Olympics she would have been a grown woman because Lewis was first in the Olympics in 1984 when Michelle was 20-years-old.

In fact, Carl Lewis wasn’t even born until 1961 so he was a little kid at the same time as Michelle Obama, who was born in 1964.

Why do these people have to lie so blatantly like this?

As to the liar in chief, his latest constant lie is the claim that 700,000 a month have lost their jobs since the end of Bush’s term. Maggie Thurber of Thurber’s Thoughts has been following this lie, too. Maggie notes that Obama keeps using this false number even though the total job loses for both September and October of 2008 were 792,000, so this 700,000 a month lost during Bush’s last year is a lie. Not only that but even in his own presidency we lost 598,000 in January of 2009 and 651,000 in February.

Clearly we have not been losing “an average” of 700,000 jobs every month “since last winter” as Obama keeps claiming.

And yet, do we see the Old Media calling these liars on the carpet?
Read more

AWF: Ill. Gov. Invades Privacy of State’s Citizens

October 1, 2009 | Filed Under ACORN, Business, Capitalism, Children, Cook County, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Family, Freedom, Government, Corruption, Health, Illinois, Jobs, Liberals, SEIU, Socialism, State Government, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Alliance for Worker Freedom has decided to send a letter to replacement Governor Pat Quinn of Illinois asking him how much his favoritism and goodies given to unions in the state have cost the taxpayers of Illinois. (I say “replacement gov.” because Quinn is the former Lt. Gov. that became the accidental gov. when Rod Blagojevich was indicted and then impeached from office)

Quinn is guilty of handing over the personal information of thousands of Illinois home-based support workers that receive state aid to take care of family members with severe medical conditions to several unions so that the unions could attempt to strongarm these people into a union. The executive order is #09-15, the Collective Bargaining By Individual Providers of Home-Based Support Services order.

Without regard to the privacy of the personal information of these people that receive state aid to take care of their relatives in their own homes, Gov. Quinn freely handed over their phone numbers and addresses to any union that wanted them. Many home healthcare workers have since been accosted by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) recruiters as well as operatives from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).
Read more

The Many Vulnerabilities of an Open Internet

September 29, 2009 | Filed Under Budget, Business, Capitalism, Computers, Congress, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Inernet, Jobs, Liberals, Scott Cleland, Society/Culture, Technology | No Comments

-By Scott Cleland

What an “Open Internet” does not mean is as important as what it does mean. Surely an “Open Internet” is not intended to mean what it certainly could mean: unprotected, unguarded, or vulnerable to attack. Thus, it is essential for the FCC to be explicit in defining what the terms — “Open Internet,” “net neutrality,” and Internet non-discrimination — don’t mean, as well as what they do mean.

The word “open” has 88 different definitions per Dictionary.com and the word “open” has even more different connotations depending on the context. While the term “open” generally has a positive connotation to mean unrestricted, accessible and available, it can also have a negative or problematic connotation if it means unprotected, unguarded or vulnerable to attack.

When such an amorphous, multi-use term like “open” is proposed as a new effective purpose for the FCC, and a new formal basis for new economic regulation, it is essential that the term be defined very specifically, for what it is, and just as importantly, for what it is not.
Read more

School Pensions Making Millionaires out of Retiring Employees

September 22, 2009 | Filed Under Budget, Capitalism, Chicago, Cook County, Democrats/Leftists, Education, Government, Corruption, Illinois, Jobs, Liberals, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Bill Zettler recently submitted a Freedom of Information request on the pensions of 13 retiring public school employees from District 211 in Palatine, Illinois and he found that the people of Illinois are on the hook for over $50 million in pension benefits promised to people retiring at the average age of 58.

Zettler found that these school employees are seeing an average of $96,000 a year in pension benefits whereas the average Social Security benefit is $13,500 a year. SS recipients also don’t get their benefits until they’ve reached 63 at least while the average retirement age of these public employees is 58.

I’ll get right to Mr. Zettler’s pullout quote, one that really puts the whole situation in perfect focus. “If the purpose of taxation is to provide for the common good,” Zettler said, “we may ask what common good is provided by making public employees multi-millionaires in their fifties?”
Read more

Is it American to be Forced Into a Union? In Obama’s America it is!

September 21, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, Capitalism, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Free Trade, Freedom, Government, Corruption, Health, Jobs, Liberals, Socialism, Society/Culture, State Government, Taxes, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Welcome to Obama’s America where you are forced to become a union member even if you had no idea you were being inducted into one. In fact, in Obama’s America you won’t even know you are IN a union until you notice union dues are being withheld from your checks.

This is the case in Michigan where Sherry Loar and Dawn Ives work out of their home talking care of children for low-income families. One Friday the pair realized that union dues were being withheld from the checks they receive from the state for the subsidized daycare they perform for local families.

As it happens, neither woman voted to join a union nor even knew that they’d be forcefully inducted into one. They didn’t even know their job had a union.
Read more

Mob Boss vs. Union Boss

September 16, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Business, Crime, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Jobs, Liberals, Socialism, Society/Culture, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

This amusing, yet sad, video asks the question “should it be this hard to tell the difference between the two?” You’ll see all sorts of threatening, uncivil quotes and you’ll be asked if a famous Mob Boss said them or if AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said it.

Betcha can guess what’s coming…

Federal Agency Fights Card Check For Its Own Employees

September 11, 2009 | Filed Under Business, Capitalism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Unions, Warner Todd Huston | No Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

As the president and Congress considers passing the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) in which the “card check” feature is still a major provision, a federal agency is trying to prevent its own employees from using the card check practice to organize.

The Legal Services Corp., a congressionally chartered, taxpayer-funded entity has hired legal counsel to try and prevent its employees in its oversight office from using the card check procedure to become unionized.

Employees in LSC oversight offices, with the help of the IFPTE, appealed to LSC President Helaine Barnett in a July 20 letter, asking her to accept authorization cards signed by “an overwhelming majority” of workers signaling their intent to unionize. Ms. Barnett dismissed the request in a July 28 letter, saying that “authorization cards are often an unreliable indicator of support for a union,” according to a copy of the correspondence obtained by The Times.

Of course, it is a bit of amusing hypocrisy that a federally created agency is trying to stop employees using card check even as Congress is trying to pass a law that forces card check on the private sector. As they say on TV hucksterism, though, “But wait, there’s more.”
Read more

Are Voters Fed Up at Last? Ohio Congressman Turner Gets Slammed for Earmarks

September 8, 2009 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Budget, Capitalism, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Government, Corruption, House of Representatives, Jobs, Liberals, Republicans, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Much to his dismay, Congressman Mike Turner of Ohio’s 3rd District has just discovered a new attitude from his voters. Unfortunately, it’s a lesson that congress isn’t likely to learn too quickly. But let’s see if Congressman Turner will.

Until now there has been an averting of the eyes at the overspending of “my” congressman. The individual voters have for decades been willing to excuse their own congressman for bringing home the pork even as they complain at the wild over spending by congress as a whole.

For a very long time the voters have been upset at spending by congress, but they’ve completely ignored the excesses of their own congressman because, after all, his wild spending came home to them. Voters have been willing to overlook their own pork if it’s their pork.

But if a recent tea party rally in Ohio is any indication, this permissive attitude so long exhibited by voters might finally be about to change.
Read more

Next Page »

Help the Soldiers!



"Governments are instituted among men,deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." Declaration of Independence July 4, 1776




Technorati Profile
Add to Technorati Favorites

Illini Alliance
Blogroll



Featured Sites

Clicky Web Analytics