Free Republic

Labor officials try to lure employees into unionization with a simple (but unfair) process of signing a card, but then turn around and demand a formal election for employees to get rid of bad unions. True secret ballot elections overseen by the National Labor Relations Board are clearly recognized as the most democratic means of choosing unionization. The D.C. Court of Appeals said in 1991 that "Freedom of choice is a matter at the very center of our national labor relations policy, and a secret election is the preferred method of gauging choice." And the Miami Herald recently editorialized that...

It's like watching a tragedy unfold, what's happening at the top of the auto industry. A happy ending, in any true sense, isn't in the cards. At best, after thousands are off the scene, survivors still may be standing on U.S. soil. But forget happy. The scene: bankruptcy court. No, General Motors and Ford aren't there yet, although their share prices seem to discount it, at about $20 and $8 respectively. But how grim it was for Delphi Corp, the nation's largest auto parts supplier, to ask a bankruptcy judge in Detroit to throw out its labor contracts and approve...

States are helping public schools escape potential penalties by skirting the No Child Left Behind law's requirement that students of all races must show annual academic progress. With the federal government's permission, schools aren't counting the test scores of nearly 2 million students when they report progress by racial groups, an Associated Press computer analysis found.

DEMOCRATS TRAP BLACK CHILDREN IN FAILING SCHOOLS For Immediate Release Contact: Frances Rice National Black Republican Association 601 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Suite 900-S Washington, DC 20004 (202) 638-6940 (202) 639-8238 Fax NBRA websiteDEMOCRATS TRAP BLACK CHILDREN IN FAILING SCHOOLS Washington, D.C. - January 7, 2006 - On the heels of a protest rally by Democrats in Florida to shut down a privately funded program that gives school choice vouchers or "opportunity scholarships" to black parents, the liberal Florida Supreme Court ended the state-sponsored opportunity scholarship program, slamming the door in the face of black parents. The National Black Republican Association...

The U.S. attorney for the northern district of Indiana is being asked to investigate an alleged incident of voter fraud. The name of a man who died more than three years ago has shown up on paperwork requesting a mailed absentee ballot.The man's name is Stanley Grygiel. He was a staunch democrat, a UAW member and somewhat politically active. Up until now, it appeared that activity ended when he died in June of 2001.Mail from the Democratic Party still occasionally shows up at the home of the late Grygiel, according to a son who still lives there. The son expressed...

I have created a public register of "bump lists" here on Free Republic. I define a bump list as a name listed in the "To" field used to index articles. Free Republic Bump List Register

WASHINGTON - The AFL-CIO is enduring a budget shortfall so severe that its own workers are taking two days of unpaid leave to avoid layoffs, even as the labor federation attempts to mobilize its largest-ever political campaign. Dubbed "solidarity days," the days off were agreed to this past summer in contract negotiations between managers and the union representing about 200 workers at the AFL-CIO, an umbrella organization of 64 international unions. Managers also have agreed to take the unpaid time. AFL-CIO spokeswoman Lane Windham said employees covered by the Newspaper Guild Local 32035 decided they would rather lose pay for...

CROSS LANES, W.Va. — To find the cause of the nation's three supermarket strikes, just follow Judy Ranson's shopping cart. An inveterate bargain hunter, Ranson used to chase down the best grocery deals at three stores: her local Kroger in Cross Lanes or down the road at a Fas Check in Dunbar and at a Poca Supermarket in Poca. Now she makes one trip a week, to the Wal-Mart Supercenter, which opened five years ago a mile and a half down the road and across Interstate 64 from Kroger. Ranson, who is 57, spends about $90 for herself and her...

Stolen Computer Search October 14, 2003 — The search goes on for a stolen laptop computer, a computer that contains sensitive information about security at all the commercial airports in the U.S. It happened during an airport security training seminar at the Embassy Suites near Philadelphia International. Police and the FBI have not located that computer nor have they made any arrests. I am told it contains sensitive information about security at the nation's 429 airports. A source tells Action News they do not believe this was the job of a professional who knew what was on the computer, but...

<p>HUNTINGTON -- Workers at the Special Metals Corp. nickel alloy plant in Huntington rejected a proposed contract offer Monday that their union leadership and company executives said was necessary to keep the plant open.</p> <p>The vote, announced at 8:30 p.m. after a full day of voting, was 236 workers for the new contract and 303 against it.</p>

<p>He said it was $7 million more than nonunion bids for his $46 million makeover of the Cherry Hill Apartments, a rundown landmark on the vital Route 38 corridor.</p> <p>He decided to go nonunion.</p> <p>Now Healey, 74, the son of a former union leader, said unions and their powerful allies in Camden County government are showing him what they think of his decision.</p>

<p>A former accounts manager for the California State Employees Association admitted to a judge Friday that she stole nearly $1 million from the labor union to feed her gambling addiction. Gail S. Jones of Citrus Heights, who has no previous criminal record, pleaded guilty in Sacramento federal court to six felony counts of computer fraud.</p>

WASHINGTON (AP) - Teamsters union plans to endorse Democrat Dick Gephardt for president, union sources say.

Here we go again. Accounting shenanigans, lack of disclosure, misidentification of expenses, off-the-books enterprises, and embezzlement. Who's the corporate villain this time? It's not big business, but big labor. These examples of union financial misconduct investigated by the Department of Labor sound suspiciously like the accounting scandals plaguing corporate America. Last summer, fed up with such scandals, Congress passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act to reform corporate-accounting practices. Its goals received wide support. As AFL-CIO President John Sweeney has said, "transparency, accountability, and full and accurate disclosure should be central goals of financial regulation." He's right. Businesses should make regular, full disclosure...

Former Ullico exec refuses to testify to lawmakers (GLOBAL CROSSING, TERRY MCAULIFFE) Tue June 17, 2003 05:08 PM ET WASHINGTON, June 17 (Reuters) - The former top executive of union-owned insurer Ullico Inc. refused to testify to lawmakers on Tuesday about a sweetheart stock deal that netted board members some $5.6 million and caused his replacement last month. Former Ullico Chairman and Chief Executive Robert Georgine invoked his constitutional right not to testify at a hearing by the House Education and Workforce Committee on the scandal, which is also being probed by regulators and prosecutors. Rep John Boehner, the Ohio...

<p>One of the more important hearings of this Congress will be held today, when House Education and the Workforce Chairman John Boehner airs some of the ugly details of the Ullico scandal. More than just another corporate scam, Ullico is an example of how today's union leadership fails its rank and file.</p>

<p>House Republicans are expected to confront a scandal-plagued former labor leader today in a hearing that will highlight a stock-selling scheme that lawmakers have compared to the collapse of Enron Corp.</p> <p>Robert A. Georgine, former chief executive officer of ULLICO Inc., will be forced to publicly explain for the first time how he and a handful of board members, mostly various union presidents, made roughly $6 million in profit at the expense of other shareholders in the pension fund.</p>

Murray Sisselman, 73 and dying of cancer, walked into the Rascal House deli near his home on Feb. 25 to meet with James Angleton Jr., the chief financial officer of United Teachers of Dade. Sisselman, who served as UTD president for 27 years, wanted to come clean in his final days. He directed Angleton to a file cabinet packed with records showing that longtime union chief Pat Tornillo and his wife were apparently reimbursed for at least $155,000 in personal expenses in less than three years, including: • More than $10,200 during the couple's short stay in St. Bart's and...

Federal and local investigators raided the powerful United Teachers of Dade headquarters Tuesday morning, hauling off boxes of financial records in a quest to prove that the union's autocratic leader of four decades, Pat Tornillo, had siphoned money to pay for homes, hotel bills and other perks, sources familiar with the criminal probe said. Investigators from the FBI and Miami-Dade's Public Corruption Task Force served a search warrant to UTD headquarters, on Northeast 22nd Street and Biscayne Boulevard, around 9:30 a.m. ''The search warrant is sealed,'' said Judy Orihuela, an FBI spokeswoman. ``No one was arrested.'' The search for evidence...

<p>The House of Representatives will hold hearings in the coming weeks to investigate a stock-selling scheme Republicans are calling Big Labor's Enron scandal.</p> <p>Rep. John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican and chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, will lead the hearings on accusations that members of ULLICO, a labor-owned insurance company and pension fund, took part in an illegal scheme in which shares in ULLICO were bought and sold based on inside information gleaned by the board's chief executive officer, Robert A. Georgine.</p>