Labor Union Blog

Progressives are taking back the momentum in town hall meetings across the country by organizing and coming out to tell the truth about the need for health care reform. While the media focuses on the hysterics of angry mobs that demonize President Obama and health care reform supporters, the real story is that the voice of progressives is getting louder and stronger at the town hall meetings.

Working In These Times blog reports that Democrats and progressives are pushing back on several fronts against the campaign of misinformation being waged by extremist  groups, some with corporate donors and right-wing Republicans. 

According to the website, the counter-punching by progressives

includes everything from massive ad buys to pro-reform viral e-mails to aggressive PR about productive congressional town hall meetings that featured strong liberal turnouts.

For example, in Kokomo, Ind., union members and activists helped counter the anti-reform crowd at a town hall meeting held by Rep. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind). Members of the IUE-CWA and others were on hand. In fact, there were so many people at the meeting that it had to be moved outside to accommodate the crowd.

Members of the Alliance for Retired Americans showed up in large numbers at town hall events in Arizona, California, Georgia, Iowa, Maryland, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin this week to fight back against the right-wing mobs.

Says Alliance President Barbara Easterling:

Alliance members are doing a great job of refuting lies and myths about health insurance reform. The truth is that Medicare will benefit from cost containment across the entire health care system.

Dan Buckley, president of AFT Local 6308 in Bergen County, N.J., attended four town hall meetings hosted by Rep. Steven Rothman (D-N.J.).  Buckley says pro-reform speakers outnumbered opponents at two of the events and that several speakers, including Rothman, made very strong points in favor of reform.

As more and more town hall meetings are being held during the August congressional recess, it is becoming clear that the anti-reform mobs are not what they seem. While the progressives at the meetings are from the local congressional district, many of the opponents are not, according to several sources.

The Huffington Post reports that with connections to ultraconservative Republicans, insurance companies and other opponents of the health insurance reform effort, including FreedomWorks, headed by former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Tex.), have organized many of the protests.

And a Retired Americans member reported that a person at a town hall meeting this week told her their group had been bused in from a surrounding state, given $100 and a T-shirt, plus a script to follow at the meeting.

Hundreds of Netroots Nation attendees are showing their support for health care and the Employee Free Choice Act—and getting to sample a great union-made beer at the same time.

More than 200 people already have signed up to join Working America, the AFL-CIO’s community affiliate, and hundreds more have taken action on key issues at the AFL-CIO/Working America booth in the Netroots Nation exhibit hall. Then they’re “raising a glass for the working class” at our union beer tasting. It’s a hit among Netroots Nation attendees.

Chad Cyrowski, a blogger for Progress Michigan, was among the hundreds who took action and enjoyed a union brew:

I signed up in support of the Employee Free Choice Act. I think it’s a really important way to give workers the ability to get ahead. We have to do it to fix our economy. I hope we can pass it this year.

Kim Rogers, a web strategist, was excited to take part:

Working America and the AFL-CIO have really gone above and beyond typical convention swag with the union beer booth. I like supporting union-made products, and I’m proud to join Working America. The work they do mobilizing and educating voters is great.

Pittsburgh-area Working America canvassers staffed the booth, signing up conference attendees and talking to them about Working America. Jonathan Sharwarko, Kate Pratt, Marlon Washington and Wes Gadson all came by to help out. Pratt said the event has been very successful:

The convention has been great fun. We’ve met and signed up many great new members. Working America has grown significantly, and folks at the conference are thrilled to come visit the booth.

If you’re at Netroots Nation, stop by and pay us a visit! If not, you can follow Netroots Nation events here, here or on the AFL-CIO Twitter feed.

Speaking at Netroots Nation this morning, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) said there was “no doubt” he would vote in favor of cloture on the Employee Free Choice Act, allowing the critical bill to get a floor vote in the Senate. It’s a welcome development and a good sign for workers’ freedom to form unions and bargain.

You can see video of Specter’s statement here.

In March, before his party switch, Specter claimed he would join a minority filibuster and block a Senate vote on the bill, despite his past co-sponsorship of the legislation and a 2007 vote to break a filibuster. Since then, he’s heard from constituents around the state, who have delivered thousands of letters and petitions asking him to support the freedom to form unions.

Specter also said he’d vote for cloture on health care reform that includes a public plan option.

Check out live webstreaming of Netroots Nations events here and here.

Here’s the latest example of how far opponents of health care reform will go to stop the real changes the nation needs.

An “issue brief” released by the House Republican Caucus this week attacks the United States Postal Service (USPS) and its 700,000 employees nationwide in what the Letter Carriers (NALC) union calls a “transparently partisan attack on the health insurance reform legislation now being considered by Congress.”

 Workers across the country are fighting back against the lie-filled campaigns by extremist groups—some funded by corporate donations and backed by extremist Republican leaders who are vowing to kill health care reform.

The NALC is setting the record straight about the misinformation campaign being waged by the Republicans against health care reform. In a public memo, the union issued a point-by-point response to the House Republicans.

 NALC President Fredric Rolando says:

This smear cannot go unanswered. This attack on America’s most-trusted agency is deliberately misleading and unjustifiably undermines public support for the Postal Service.

The NALC says misinformation about the Postal Service is being used in the most dishonest way to discredit the government’s ability to provide high- quality services in an affordable way.

Specifically, the NALC memo says the Republicans’ statement that the Postal Service does not pay for itself is just wrong. In fact, the USPS is self-funded and receives minuscule appropriations to pay for free mail to the blind and military voting.

Another untrue claim by the Republicans is that the cost to consumers to mail a letter has increased. The truth is the price of a first-class stamp has increased by 33 percent over the past 10 years. But adjusted for inflation, stamp prices are no higher now than they were in 1970.

The memo also points out studies that show the Post Office’s level of service is as good or better than commercial delivery companies and cheaper.

The bottom line, the memo says, is:

The shoddy and misleading…brief issued by the Republican House Conference is an insult to the 700,000 men and women who are working so hard to help the Postal Service survive this national crisis. The House Republicans should withdraw it and give the American people what they deserve: an honest debate about the need for health care reform.

 Read the entire memo here.

The governments of the United States, Canada and Mexico must take serious and comprehensive measures to address the dual impact of the global economic recession and the 15-year legacy of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), labor leaders of the three countries said in a joint declaration.

The “Tri-National Labor Declaration on Social and Economic Prosperity for North America” points out that the Leaders Summit in Mexico City earlier this week was an opportunity to lay out a new agenda for North America, one that could make our region competitive, sustainable and just.

NAFTA did not create thousands of promised good jobs—the jobs it did create were less stable, with lower wages and fewer benefits, the leaders said. Increased trade largely benefited the corporate elite in all three countries, and income inequality has also grown in the region, they said. And the economic crisis has only exacerbated the problems.

These problems must be addressed through an open process that includes workers and unions, said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, Canadian Labor Congress President Kenneth Georgetti and  Francisco Hernández  Juárez, co-president of the Mexican Unión Nacional de Trabajordes (UNT).

Fixing the many flaws in NAFTA is only one part of the challenge the North American nations face, the leaders said. We also need to work together to address a number of pressing issues, which include labor law reform, migration and development and the promotion of the rule of law.

Specifically, they called for:

• The United States, Mexico and Canada must fully comply with the core labor rights of the International Labor Organization (ILO), including freedom of association and the right to organize and bargain collectively. All three countries restrict the freedom to form unions, both in law and practice, they said.. The North American countries must ensure that workers can exercise their most basic and fundamental rights or face appropriate sanctions.
• Ensure that all workers, regardless of immigration status, are protected by labor laws and able to exercise their fundamental human rights. They said NAFTA’s failure to create decent jobs forced many workers, especially those in Mexico, to search for employment in other countries. In the U.S. and Canada, on the other hand, employers with access to a large and poorly regulated workforce of undocumented and temporary migrant workers have undermined all workers by failing to afford the basic labor rights and protections to everyone.
• Foster economic development in all three countries by helping to stimulate more robust, equitable and sustained economic growth. In exchange for investment in Mexico’s economy—the poorest of the three—Mexico should agree to changes in laws and institutions to better protect the rights of Mexican workers and allow their income to rise as their economy grows.
• Rebuild our industrial base, which is essential for maintaining our living standards. As high-wage countries in a globalizing world, we must restore our competitiveness by developing national industrial strategies centered on innovation.
• Make a true commitment to the rule of law to end human rights violations in Mexico committed by police and the military. At the same time, the United States should reduce the demand for illegal narcotics and stem the flow of arms to the drug cartels, but also foster respect for human rights and an end to impunity for Mexican security forces.

Without serious consideration and incorporation of these dimensions—repairing the critical flaws in NAFTA, effective and authentic compliance with international labor standards, migration and sustainable development, and human rights and rule of law—the vital and essential security agenda involving our three nations ultimately will not succeed, the leaders said.

In conclusion, the leaders added, it is time

to recalibrate our relationship and focus on a path built upon shared economic growth and sustainable development.