Free Republic

The Service Employees International Union on Sunday reported spending nearly $1 million on an independent expenditure television campaign praising eight House Democrats for backing a health care bill earlier this month. Here's how the SEIU spent $998,000 among the eight districts: Baron P. Hill, Indiana's 9th district ($162,000); Dina Titus, Nevada's 3rd ($157,000);

Union blocks teacher bonuses By Edward Mason  |   Wednesday, November 18, 2009  |  http://www.bostonherald.com  |  Local Coverage Photo by Matthew West Grinchlike union bosses are blocking at least 200 of Boston’s best teachers from pocketing bonuses for their classroom heroics in a puzzling move that gets a failing grade from education experts.The Boston Teachers Union staunchly opposes a performance bonus plan for top teachers - launched at the John D. O’Bryant School in 2008 and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates and Exxon Mobil foundations - insisting the dough be divvied up among all of a school’s teachers, good and bad.“It’s insanity,” said Jim...

17-year-old Kevin Anderson wanted to add another Eagle Scout badge to his well-earned collection and so spent some 200 hours over several weeks to clear a walking path along the river in east Allentown park in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Little did young Mr. Anderson know it but he was about to prove once again that unions have a pernicious influence on governments everywhere. After Kevin's good deed the city's public employees union went gunning for the poor kid with threats and gyrations meant to shake down the city and scare off any citizen that might dare to imagine that they could...

A state worker is recovering after a bloody brawl at a union hall. He says members of the local SEIU 1000 beat him up and sent him to the hospital all because he wanted to expose alleged corruption within the union. Ken Hamidi is a state worker at the California Franchise Tax Board. Last night he walked into a union hall in Sacramento for an SEIU local 1000 meeting."We had every right to be here, very simple; it wasn't anything private or anything exclusive," said Hamidi. But Hamidi says the union members did not want him there. "Three, four people...

Americans Take a Turn to the Right, Poll Shows John D. McKinnon reports on politics and polls. Among the striking findings in a new Gallup Poll on Americans’ shifting political attitudes is their growing anti-labor feeling. The percentage of Americans saying they would like to see unions have less influence in the country spiked to a record-high 42% in August 2009, compared with 32% a year earlier. That could spell trouble for some of the Obama administration’s policy priorities, including easing union-organizing rules and advancing “green jobs.” It might also complicate the president’s broader ambition to rebuild the economy in...

Andy Stern -- SEIU President: "People at the Chamber of Commerce have ruined the country."

Remember the Chrysler "hedge fund investors" that President Obama berated on national TV? Among these people labeled as "no-goodniks" by the President were organizations such as the the Indiana State Teachers’ Retirement Fund, and the Police retirement fund. The President of the United States was trying to intimidate retired teaches from exercising their rights as primary investors. That's the politics of change, screw a bunch of retired teachers to reward the UAW for helping you get elected. Apparently it was not only retired cops, teachers and other primary investors screwed by the GM/Chrysler Bailout deals (along with the American taxpayer),...

Two hours into a government shutdown last night, the Michigan legislature caved on passing a set of budget bills and instead approved a temporary measure that keeps the government running for another 30 days. The midnight hold-up: approval of a K-12 budget that cuts school aid fund spending by less than 3% ($218 per pupil). The demand: higher taxes on Michigan residents...

<p>NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Peterbilt Corp. permanently closed its truck plant in Nashville.</p>

Occasionally, watching the hate speech of MSNBC provides useful information. Last night, the two most influential leaders of the American labor movement clearly laid out their plan to partner with the Democratic Party in foisting the “public option” on the American people. It sounds exactly like the one I outlined two weeks ago, and it may be unstoppable. The new president of the nation’s largest union demonstrated seriousness in his interview. Richard Trumka made his first television appearance as head of the AFL-CIO on The Rachel Maddow Show last night. Maddow introduced Trumka, whom she said had been “named”...

… and will your state government give them the power to do so? Kansas’s Democratic governor has just announced he’s thinking better of his decision to use the state’s resources to help the Service Employees International Union target home care workers as new union members. SEIU — part private sector union and part government union — grows by getting friendly Democratic governments to allow the union to collectively bargain for independent home care workers paid by state agencies. Sure, it’s a bad deal for taxpayers: rates go up and their side of the “negotiating” table is run by a union...

  From Pennsylvania Right-to-Work:Most readers are already aware of a growing scandal involving the pro-forced unionism Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN) in New York, Baltimore, Washington, and now, California. For those who missed it, ACORN representatives were caught on camera giving advice to undercover journalists on how to open an illegal brothel, launder its profits, and commit a host of other illegal activities.According to The Washington Examiner, teacher union officials have contributed over 1.3 million dollars (in mostly forced union dues) to ACORN since 2005.We decided to do a little digging into union financial disclosure forms on...

Statement of Andy Stern, President of SEIU WASHINGTON DC--Andy Stern, President of the Service Employees International Union, issued the following statement today regarding recent attempts of right wing extremists to silence working families by attacking progressive individuals and community organizations: "This is a moment of profound change for this country--from kitchen tables to town halls to the floor of the Senate, this nation is engaged in a vigorous and heated debate about how we rebuild our economy, solve our national healthcare crisis and restore the American Dream. "As has always happened when progressive change is in the air, the backlash...

The Alliance for Worker Freedom sent out the following press release: Kansas Gov. Parkinson Refuses to Provide Financial & Email Records between SEIUParkinson’s Departments Use Taxpayer Money to Collect Names for UnionWashington, D.C. — Last week, the Alliance for Worker Freedom (AWF) called on Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson (D) to release financial documents and correspondence surrounding his Departments using taxpayer money and state resources to collect healthcare provider names and addresses for the Service Employee International Union (SEIU)....

Andy Stern, head of the Service Employees International Union, has just released a statement vowing not to be "silenced" by "right wing attack dogs" targeting "progressive individuals" and "community organizations." Stern, whose union has sometimes been linked with the community organizing group ACORN, which yesterday suffered an enormous blow when the House of Representatives voted 345-45 to cut off all federal funds for the organization, said his union will not be intimidated by a right-wing "backlash" that is "fierce, ugly and anti-American." Here is the full text of Stern's statement:This is a moment of profound change for this country—from kitchen...

For one of Big Labor’s most notorious organizing partners, ACORN, the “chickens have come home to roost” thanks to the James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles continuously unfolding ACORN exposé. If you rely on MSNBC for your news, you may not have noticed ACORN’s very thin “community organizer” veneer being sanded away exposing the rotten termite-infested wood underneath. Part of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now’s (ACORN) rotten core includes a very cozy relationship with Big Labor. In fact, in many instances ACORN and Big Labor are one and the same. In 2008, Big Labor funneled ACORN millions of...

An interesting admission by James A. Williams, president of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades in Philadelphia, can be seen in an interview he did with the Philly Inquirer. It is an admission that conforms one of the things that anti-union folks have been saying for years, but one union officials are loath to admit. While discussing the hard economic times, the Philly Inquirer asked how the recession was affecting the union. In his answer President Wilson admitted that his union uses out-of-work members for "political events." Wilson mentioned that they lower dues to $1 a month after...

The Kossack's Site says, "SEIU.org Sponsored Headlines." They have had SEIU thugs supporting them for months and months. Socialists supporting other Socialists

The 2009 AFL-CIO Convention just got a message from the top leaders in Congress: We stand with you and with America’s workers. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the leader of the U.S. House, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) each delivered a video message to the opening session of the convention.Pelosi thanked outgoing AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and the union movement, crediting union members with taking the lead in winning a pro-worker Congress and giving them the momentum needed to pass legislation that really changed lives. Pelosi said: On behalf of the Congress, I thank all of you for your...

With states across the country facing huge budget deficits and potential devastating cuts to services, the time has come to start charging parents tuition for their children’s public school education. If parents of the 47 million students in the United States who attend kindergarten through 12th grade were billed $360 per child per year — that’s $2 a day for each of the 180 days of instruction — nearly $17 billion would be generated. Can half of America’s parents afford $360 per year for each of their children? For the price of a cup of coffee, a child can get...