http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2...525.shtml?s=ic

Thursday, Dec. 7, 2006 12:05 a.m. EST
Pelosi: Union Issues a 'High Priority'


Incoming U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that she expects early 2007 House action on a bill backed by unions, but opposed by business interests, to make it easier for employees to organize.


In remarks after a meeting with leaders from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Pelosi reiterated her plans for quick action in January on issues such as raising the minimum wage.


She also said action can be expected, later in the legislative session, on "repealing of incentives for American businesses to send jobs overseas."


The Employee Free Choice Act was introduced in Congress earlier this year, with support from California Democratic Rep. George Miller and Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy.


Pelosi, a California Democrat, called the measure - also known as the "card check" bill - a "high priority" for Democrats when they take over the House in January.



"We certainly will be passing the card check, the Employee Free Choice Act . . . I can't tell you the exact timetable, but it certainly will go through the committee process and hopefully come to the floor in early spring," Pelosi said after the meeting with union leaders.


The AFL-CIO labor group supports the bill. On its Web site, it says the bill "would strengthen protections for workers' freedom to choose by requiring employers to recognize a union after a majority of workers sign cards authorizing union representation.


The labor group says the bill also would provide for mediation and arbitration of first-contract disputes and authorize stronger penalties for violation of the law when workers seek to form a union.


But in an open letter to members of Congress, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce last month called the bill "an attempt being made by organized labor to eliminate an employee's right to a secret ballot election during the union organizing process."

The chamber is the nation's largest lobbying group for business interests. Its letter said, "Stripping employees of the democratic rights and protections provided by the secret ballot election process raises very serious concerns."


The letter was co-signed by other lobbying groups from the restaurant, hotel, building and retail businesses.


I find it humours that people honestly still believe that a union "protects" the "working class", when constantly it hurts the majority of the working class except for those actually in the union that is hurting there chances, and power.

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Nobody with open eyes can any longer doubt that the danger to personal freedom comes chiefly from the left. - F.A. Hayek

Where have all the Conservatives Gone?

So unions help their members, but hurt the working class as a whole? That doesn't make a ton of sense.

And "captive to unions" or not, card-check simply makes sense. If a majority of employees sign their names saying they want a union, they should be able to unionize. It's not complicated.

Employers say card check would make it too easy for union organizers to "intimidate" workers into agreeing to a union. I'm not sure why an employee would feel intimidated by a representative of an as-yet-nonexistent union, but I have two responses to that: the employer has even more intimidating tools at its disposal, and I'd be perfectly fine with making it clear that coercion is a serious crime, punishable by fines and imprisonment.

Finally, such concerns overlook the fact that unions are democratically organized. If employees decide they don't want to be unionized, they can vote to disband. It's that simple.

Here's an L.M. Sixel piece that lays out the issue:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...l/4338691.html

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Man up.