Denver Post Changes Tune on Card Check

Newsbusters ^ | November 16, 2008 | Joshua Sharf

[St. Louis Conservative]

The Denver Post comes out against card check this morning:

If Obama or congressional Democrats now put a card-check bill high on their agenda, they will risk a "Ritter moment" that would damage their relations with moderates and the business community. That's what happened to Gov. Bill Ritter in 2007 when a bill gutting long-standing rules limiting "union shops" in the Colorado Peace Act hurtled through the legislature with little public input.

Ritter rightly vetoed that bill, but the move angered his labor supporters. Later that year, the governor tried to make amends by granting limited collective-bargaining rights to state employees. That move, in turn, alienated much of the business community. This year's wholly avoidable fights over a right-to- work initiative and four anti-business initiatives that labor later withdrew all followed.

The Colorado squabbles weren't worth it. Whatever benefits labor might have gained by disrupting a decades-long accord with business were far outweighed by the disruption these duels caused.

This, coming from a paper whose editorial page never mentioned card check as an issue, and whose campaign coverage rarely mentioned it at all. From an editorial page that repeatedly blamed business for instigating this year's ballot initiatives fight,

Now that Right to Work is safely dead and buried, and now that their candidate - candidates, if one includes Mark Udall - are safely elected, they tell us that it would be in the Democrats' best interests not to reward their largest, most organized constituency.

Forgive me for doubting their sincerity.

[Red Badger]

Is the Denver Post a union shop?................

[Obadiah]

Didn’t the Denver Post endorse Obama?

[gieriscm]

A request to business owners whose employees want to form a union: just shut down rather than having to ask the government for a bailout in ten years. There’s less shame in it.

[Portcall24]

The “O” said he’d lower the working man’s taxes. Who’d have thought he meant by cancelling the earnings.

[Paine in the Neck]

Atwater Kent was a very prominent maker of radios in the 1920s — sort of the Michael Dell of his era. He told his factory workers that if they ever voted to unionize he’d shut the business down. They did. He did.

[VeniVidiVici]

Who’d have thought he meant by cancelling the earnings.

I seriously doubt Obama meant he would lower the working man's taxes by cancelling his earnings.

Unemployment compensation is still taxable. ;-)

[RikaStrom]

sort of the Michael Dell of his era. He told his factory workers that if they ever voted to unionize he’d shut the business down. They did. He did.

Having just sat through 3 days of practice for taking the PHR (Professional Human Resource) and having 1/2 of a day on Labor relations, I can tell you that to make the above statement today would get you in trouble. You can tell them that it is "possible" that the company would be closed, but you can't out and out state it. It's considered a "threat" to the process, and mercy on you if you piss off the NLRB (National Labor Relations Board) 'cause they will install a union in your business whether they employees voted for it or not, if the board thinks you are being difficult.

I loathe unions, but the stuff I learned about the board is scary. The Director of the NLRB is appointed by the President. And the country's president-elect is very pro-Labor.

Every HR manager in the seminar with me was very concerned about the next 4 years.

[reformedliberal]

But can they stop the owner from shutting down the business?
I can understand the logic of calling this a threat, but I don’t see how they could stop anyone from just shutting down if a union is either voted in or installed by NLRB fiat.

[RikaStrom]

No, they can't actually stop him from shutting down, he just has to be careful not to say he is going to shut down if they vote in a union.

The power that the NLRB has is pretty scary, the union attempting to form could just accuse you of not allowing a valid vote and presto chango, you're a union shop.

And to vote in a union, they only need 50% + 1. It was a fascinating day of study, that we'll all need to brush up on, and Texas is a Right to Work state.