Hate to say I told him so..

A "Your Turn" article that I wrote a month or two ago was rejected by the St. Cloud Times editorial board. In it I said that the Right to Work amendment would make it to the ballot in November.  I admit that I was wrong about that, though given what happened last night, I believe it will happen next November.  

What I was correct about was thus: 

...when the union leadership organize angry demonstrations like so many 60s hippie throwbacks or a cadres of Bolsheviks running roughshod in near-riotous mobs, they’re not doing themselves any favors. At the same time, they just don’t seem to have a clue as to just how precarious their position is, or how to fix it.

Up to this point, Minnesota’s teacher and other unions, having had the luxury of being able to act like spoiled teenagers; largely without consequence, have been virtual one-trick ponies in terms of defaulting to in-your-face, thuggish tactics to get demands met.

As Minnesota native Bob Dylan once crooned, “Oh the times, they are a changing. If Minnesota’s unions want to survive, they better damn well change with them.

Randy Krebs, St. Cloud Times editorial guru, stated that my language was too strong.  Sometimes though, the truth hurts.  Those who work in the media, above all, should know this. 

My point was that "in your face" demonstrations no longer work.  The unions instead need to focus on winning the hearts and minds of the electorate, and that would need to take place via a positive public relations campaign (See the Mormon Church, for example).  I am a union member, but I am also far-enough removed from the kool-aid drinking, monolithic union culture to know how the public views unions; and that in this economy, there is precious-little sympathy for their 'plight' and their propensity to throw temper tantrums over health care benefits, tenure issues, and the like, when many non-union counterparts are worrying about simply finding a job in this rotten economy that the democrat party, abetted by those same union footsoldiers, have created. 

The Wisconsin union goons sealed their fate when they laid siege to the Capitol in Madison.  The Wisconsin Democrats sealed their fate when they retreated like 'Brave Sir Robin' across the Illinois border. 

There is, thankfully, a different political course upon which we as a nation are embarking; a course in which reason is gaining an equal footing with, and dare I say, is on a trajectory to soon overtake 'might makes right' thug tactics.

I'm just wondering how long it will take before the unions (and, incidentally, the media that blindly support them) realize this.  Or will they instead find themselves huddled together, and pouting in a feckless corner of irrelevance as the rest of the world moves (and prospers) beyond them.

Regarding One Trick Ponies.

The cover from this month’s edition from my teacher’s union magazine:

Minnesota, like many other states, is about to become a “Right To Work” state, and it is the unions themselves that are unwittingly helping it to happen.

The unions and the democrat party have long had a nearly exclusive, symbiotic relationship. As long as the democrats remained in power, the unions were protected by the democrats; and in turn, the unions were free to act in a blatantly partisan fashion and be an unrepentant, militant arm of the democratic party.

Because of this relationship, the unions never had to worry about public relations. They could afford to be as-in-your-face-nasty-as-they-damned-well-wanted-to-be. Conservative rank-and-file members were summarily ignored. They didn’t care what the average non-union person thought. They didn’t care about winning the hearts and minds of the average American voter. They were quite comfortable in their roles as the enforcement/thug/footsoldier arm of the democratic party. But now that the democrats are largely out of power in Minnesota, as well as in a host of other state legislatures, the unions are suddenly finding themselves in the precarious position of being the toady left on a street corner whose protector has suddenly left the scene.

Now, given that “Right To Work” will no doubt make it on the ballot this November as a Constitutional amendment in Minnesota (and other states) , one would think that the unions’ very survival would depend on improving their public image. One would think that the unions would be running a full court press on public relations, running ads 24/7 extolling their virtues, and the services that their members provide to the public.

But instead, the public unions, including the teacher’s unions (of which I’m a member) have doubled-down on their self-serving, narcissistic thuggery. They haven’t yet awakened to the fact that with Right to Work going to the ballot this fall, it will no longer be the legislators (whom they used to have in their hip pocket) that they’ll have to convince. They’ll have to convince the very voters of Minnesota why they should remain a viable, omnipotent, political force.

Ergo, when the union leadership organize angry demonstrations like so many 60s hippie throwbacks or a cadres of Bolsheviks running roughshod in near-riotous mobs, they’re not doing themselves any favors. At the same time, they just don’t seem to have a clue as to just how precarious their position is, or how to fix it.

Up to this point, Minnesota’s teacher and other unions, having had the luxury of being able to act like spoiled teenagers; largely without consequence, have been virtual one-trick ponies in terms of defaulting to in-your-face, thuggish tactics to get demands met.

But as Minnesota native Bob Dylan once crooned, “Oh the times, they are a changing.”

If Minnesota’s unions want to survive, they better damn well change with them.

SEIU #FAIL in St. Cloud

It was not a good night to be an SEIU union thug.

I attended a legislative hearing hosted by the Minnesota House Health and Human Services committee held tonight at the Stearns County building. The hearing, chaired by Steve Gottwalt, was to hear different views of the debate as to whether to allow unionization of independent daycare providers. The meeting was also attended by Republican House representatives King Banaian, Mary Kiffmeyer, Mary Franson, Joe McDonald, and Bob Barrett, as well as by Democratic legislators Larry Hosch, Patti Fritz, Diane Loeffler, and Erin Murphy. When I arrived at the meeting, there was a rally/press conference/photo op hosted by purple-shirted SEIU members, who were giving their spiel to local reporters without any return questions. There were a cadre of purple shirts there, including children of union organizers/members carrying signs saying "Do it for the children" (I kid you not!). They had their obligatory oversized, professionally-created placards of pictures of families. It was then that I asked them this question.. and it went something like this:
Notice how the SEIU thug at first tries to poo-poo the fact that non-union daycare providers will still have to shell out fair share costs to the union ("Fair Share" in the State of Minnesota is 80 percent of union dues-still a hefty price in anyone's book); but after being pressed on the issue, explains away the higher cost of daycare via unionization by saying that "the increased subsidies" as a result of unionization will "more than offset the (increased) cost.

In other words, the SEIU leadership acknowledges that they will attempt to shift the cost of union membership of daycare providers to taxpayers (yes, that means you and I). After stating what he said, they hastily ended their press conference and headed into the hearing room, which had over 100 people. The hearing was divided into three sections; one section allowing meeting attendees in favor of the proposal to speak, one section allowing those against the proposal to speak, and finally, the last portion in which the legislators were allowed to share their views, as well as to ask questions of those who spoke earlier.

A total of 8 speakers rose in favor of unionization of daycare providers, five of them were wearing purple SEIU shirts, and one of them spoke twice. Two of the speakers identified themselves only as daycare providers, although they did not disclose that they were also highly paid SEIU organizers (a fact that was later brought out by Representative Mary Franson). All spoke of the virtues of daycare as a profession, but not one of them gave a cogent argument as to how unionization would help the daycare providers do their jobs, or help the children in their care-- a complete disconnect. They also berated the existing professional daycare organizations as doing nothing to advance their cause.

When it came time for those against unionization to speak, no less than 16 speakers rose (including myself). Two of those speakers were from professional daycare organizations (not unions)-- both of those self-identified as such before they spoke, and both stated that polls of their membership indicated that very few, if any of their ranks were in favor of unionizing. No less than three of those testifying stated that they were pressured into and/or mislead into signing union cards under the guise that "it was only for further information" only to be blocked out of those "informational" (actually organizational) meetings because they would not commit to the union cause. "Heavy handed" doesn't even begin to describe it. One childcare provider testified that she was visiting her husband in the hospital and that her mother was helping with the daycare. The union organizer came to the door and had the provider's MOTHER sign the card, saying it was just "to get more information." Most there who did sign cards complained there was no informed consent, that they were asked to sign the cards just "to get more information"-- it was not explained to them that the cards were in fact a consent to unionize. The providers wanted their cards back, but under current Minnesota labor law, those signatures are irrevocable.

In other words, it was a campaign of fraud by the union.

Most all of the anti-union providers stated that they are independent business people, who decided to run their private daycares as independent business people, so they could be their own boss. They didn't want unions coming in and telling them how to run their business.

It was quite clear (as I later testified) that the unions were not interested in helping daycare workers improve their lot in life or their business; they were not there to help children; they were there only as a means, as one person put it, "to fatten their ranks and raise more money." And they pulled out all the stops (including using children as props) to make it seem all warm and fuzzy.

Yeah. The SEIU is all warm and fuzzy, alright. So warm and fuzzy that they knocked on daycare providers doors, pressuring them and/or downright misleading them into signing union cards that CANNOT be revoked.

When it came time for the legislators to finally chime in, the DFL legislators present (as well as the SEIU membership) appeared to be very uncomfortable, trying not to step on the toes of their Union benefactors, with Republicans leading the charge in terms of calling for investigations into how union card signatures were obtained. Add that to the mountain of substantive testimony given by independent daycare providers vs. the nonsubstantive testimony given by their pro-union counterparts, it was quite apparent that the SEIU membership was mopped across the floor, brought through the wringer, and hung out to dry.

New Motivational Poster...

Speaking Words of Wisdom...

Since this Greek comedy-tragedy has been playing out in my old stomping grounds of Madison, Wisconsin and throughout The Dairy State, I’ve corresponded with a lot of friends and acquaintances–some who have been backing the Republican-led legislature and Governor Scott Walker; and others, most of them fellow union members, who believe that Wisconsin’s actions will portend a dead-end to collective bargaining; some going so far as to defend runaway democrat Wisconsin state senators, stating they are merely buying time until ‘cooler heads’ can prevail.

Yes, I’m a member of a union–but I can also see the fact that the taxpayers cannot sustain carte blanche bankrolling of never-ending union-based benefits. Even when Ronald Reagan broke the Air Traffic control union back in the early 1980s, it wasn’t the end of collective bargaining. Far from it.

There does comes a time, however, when the rights of public sector workers needs to be balanced against the rights and the well being of those whom they serve. This, in my opinion, is a long-awaited correction in a bubble of unsustainable growth in spending.

BTW–correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t the majority of Wisconsinites vote for the Republicans to balance the state budget and to end runaway spending?

And yes, the democrat Senators ARE being derelict in their duty. Of course they don’t want legislation that will halt the union gravy train–the union is for all practical purposes a political arm of the democrat party that contributes hefty financial resources to its workings, not to mention nearly limitless footsoldier hours to help in their favored party’s re-election efforts.

Again–I’m a union member. I know that in the long term this will likely have significant repercussions in my now-home state of Minnesota, but the fact of the matter is that we are spending our great-grandchildren’s inheritances for present-day opulence, and it just has to stop, somewhere.

One of the long-loved mantras on the left during progressive rallies has been the time-honored favorite song by John Lennon called, “Give Peace a Chance.”

To my union brethren, the time is now indeed nigh to pay heed to another one of Lennon’s words of wisdom, “Let it be.”