The Western Kentucky Worker
Official Newsletter of the Western Kentucky Area Council, AFL-CIO
Prepared by Berry Craig, AFT-Kentucky and KEA-NEA
Volume 9, Number 12, December, 2008
At least ‘Mrs. Mitch’ got ditched
on election day
By Jeff WIGGINS
Area Council President
Well, we weren’t able to ditch Mitch on Nov. 4. But his wife soon will be unemployed. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, McConnell’s spouse, will go out when President Barack Obama goes in Jan. 20.
Her exit will be a great day for unions. Chao, a Republican labor-hater like her husband, was one of the most anti-union labor secretaries in American history,
Meanwhile, from what I’ve seen, Obama’s short list of possible labor secretaries is filled with labor-friendly names.
Nationally, Nov. 4 was a glorious day for the working class. Union members played a big role in Obama’s historic victory.
Obama was our candidate, hands down. He has been one of the most pro-labor senators in Washington. He has voted the union position on labor legislation 98 percent of the time, according to the AFL-CIO’s Committee on Political Education. His 2007 score was 100 per cent.
Union members got the message from our national AFL-CIO Labor 2008 program and from their unions. Of those who voted, 67 percent cast their ballots for Obama.
John McCain, whose lifetime COPE score is 16 percent, managed just 30 percent of the union vote, the AFL-CIO said. Even so, to my way of thinking, that’s 30 percent too much.
A union member voting for Sen. McCain would be like a chicken voting for Col. Sanders. Few members of the U.S. senate are more anti-labor than McCain.
McConnell is one of them. His COPE percentage is 11.
But when the new Senate is sworn in, he won’t have as many union-busting buddies on his side of the aisle. So far, it looks like the Democrats will have 58 seats to 42 seats for the Republicans and one independent, Joe Lieberman. A recount has begun in Minnesota. It is way too close to call. We have an outside shot to win the Georgia runoff.
Unfortunately, while a lot of other places went blue Nov. 4, Kentucky remained one of the reddest of the Red States. “I want to be in Kentucky when the end of the world comes, because it’s always 20 years behind,” Mark Twain supposedly said. I hate to say it. But it seems like he was right.
McCain carried Kentucky big while McConnell edged Bruce Lunsford, the labor-endorsed Democrat. At least we forced McConnell spend a bundle of his own cash to defend his seat. That made it harder for him to aid fellow union-hating Republicans, several of whom lost. Across the country, the Democrats were also able to add seats to their House majority. Several Red States began to take on a blue hue. Unfortunately, Kentucky stayed the same shade. Our congressional delegation will again be four Republicans and two Democrats. The General Assembly will look about the same.
Meanwhile, I haven’t seen any numbers on how the union vote split in Kentucky. I hope we weren’t too far behind the national percentages. But I suspect that had most Kentuckians voted like most union members, we’d be a new Blue State.
Still, our support for Lunsford
helped him make a real run at McConnell. Maybe Lunsford’s good showing
will encourage a strong Democrat to take on -- and take out – Sen. Jim
Bunning in two years.
This time, we had expected to take out two other right-wing Republicans in our end of Kentucky – State Sen. Ken Winters and State Rep. Steven Rudy. Both hitched their wagons to McConnell’s star.
True to form, Winters – who calls himself a “born-again Christian” – used gutter tactics to smear his opponent, former Congressman Carroll Hubbard, just a few days before the election. Hubbard was labor-endorsed.
At least Winters is consistent. He similarly slimed Democrat Dennis Null, our candidate four years ago. I am sorry to report that Democrat Mike Lawrence lost to Rudy. Rudy has claimed he is our friend. But he is yet to be tested.
Of course, all the election news wasn’t bad in Western Kentucky. Our good friend Gerald Watkins won a second term on the Paducah city commission. He will be joined by Richard Abraham, a former commissioner. Both were labor-backed. Another newcomer, Carol Gault, shows promise. From what I hear, she is labor-friendly, unlike Bill Paxton, probably the most anti-union mayor in the city’s history. I am sad to report that Paxton seems to have been reelected by a mere 48 votes over our longtime ally, Robert Coleman.
Robert was one of our best friends ever on the council. He didn’t just vote union – he was union. He has carried a union card for more than half a century.
He is also part of our fraternity. He is a W.C. Young Award winner.
Even though Robert is gone from the commission, it looks like we will have won the edge on the commission. Paxton can only count on Gail Kaler, the new mayor pro-tem. Kaler has proved to be about as anti-union as Paxton.
With what looks like at least a three-to-two majority on the new commission, we can reasonably expect that our city employee unions will finally start to get a fair shake. But union-busting is still going on at the Housing Authority. (See letter from Jeff Duncan, President of AFSCME 1586-3 below.)
In Frankfort, we probably won’t get a fair shake from Brent Housman, the Republican who upset labor-endorsed Democrat Zana Renfro for the state house seat vacated by Frank Rasche.
Housman is a smooth talker. He campaigned as a moderate. But he’s another Religious Right Republican who is for right-to-work and against the prevailing wage. Hopefully, we can retire him in two years.
It is no secret that we backed Gerald Watkins for Rasche’s seat, although Zana is a personal friend of mine. Her husband was one of my union brothers. While we did not support her at first, we did all we could to help her beat Housman. Gerald showed a lot of class by supporting her, too.
Housman’s win is hard to figure. Even the Republicans considered him a long shot. He is the first Republican to win the seat ever.
Two years ago, Rasche clobbered Republican Bruce Brockenborough. His family owns the union-hating and rabidly Republican Paducah Sun, which endorsed McConnell and gives U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield great press. Whitfield won big again, crushing largely unknown and heavily under funded Heather Ryan.
Well, it’s about time to wrap things up. It’s time to start thinking about the new
year. We’ll be electing council officers and choosing the 2009 W.C. Young Award recipient. But thanks to everybody who helped with the Labor 2008 campaign. We trod many a mile on our labor-to-labor walks, made many a phone bank call and distributed a mountain of literature.
I felt good about the Lunsford race even as late as the night before the election when our candidate, Gov. Steve Beshear and Rich Trumka, the AFL-CIO secretary treasurer, made a campaign stop at Barkley Regional Airport. We had a good crowd and lots of enthusiasm. But we won the largest and most important prize on Nov. 4: the presidency.
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‘…We made a difference in getting out the vote’
Here are a few comments from our Central Labor Council Leaders who reflected on the election.
Keith Adkins- Ashland Area CLC: “The election was very important, our country was headed in the wrong direction and we needed a change. We didn’t make all the changes we wanted, but congress overall saw a change that was more labor friendly. It was interesting and heartening to
see that more people voted in the presidential election than in the past. I feel that getting out the
message to members and their families made a big difference. The point was to let them know what candidates were for the labor movement so they could make a decision that was for their own interest. I think we accomplished that.”
Charlie Clephas- Greater Louisville CLC: “I think the election turned out good. I think we made a difference in getting out the vote. A lot of the state races and Congressional races were victories. I also think we gave a good race against McConnell. What we did made the race a close one. With Obama in office, we can work through the economic problems we face today. Hopefully we can stay together and work through this hard time.”
Donna Haynes- Owensboro CLC: “The McConnell race was actively campaigning against labor, we realize that he is against Labor. I find it very interesting that Elaine Chao was able to come to campaign but she never came to the safety conference in Ky, which she was invited to each year. This shows her lack of dedication to working families. Labor played an important part in this election through phone banks, labor walks, worksite leaflets and local union mailing. The labor movement made the Senate and Presidential races really close in Kentucky. We also made some very good strides towards defeating Mitch McConnell.”
Tim Donoghue- Northern KY CLC: “Labor played a large role in all elections, though we didn’t succeed against Mitch McConnell. We proved that we are a force that any anti-labor candidate, even one running with a 24 year record, will have to recon with.”
Wanda Mitchell-Smith- Greater Louisville CLC: “The importance of the election was to change our leadership from the national leadership on down. We were successful in that we were able to tap into resources like never before: young people and people of color. Labor, with the National AFL-CIO, moved greatly for diversity, which allowed us to have more inclusion. We also included special interest groups. We saw labor playing a great and significant role in serving with these groups so that we had a great GOTV effort. Even though we didn’t win in all areas that we wanted, it was a huge win for everyone. We had to make some decisions to help with this historical Presidential election. So now we can move on to greater things in 2010.”
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Sun editorials remind us of Pravda, the old Soviet propaganda paper
By JEFF WIGGINS
Was
anybody surprised that the Sun endorsed Mitch McConnell? The way the Sun
did it was predictable, too.
Reasoned editorializing hasn’t been the Sun’s style for years. Ranting is.
The endorsement editorial was filled with the right-wing cant we've all come to expect from the Sun. The paper says McConnell is upholding "against great odds...conservative principles." He is battling an "increasingly left-leaning majority in Congress." He is standing firm against "punitive taxes on entrepreneurs and small businesses," "wealth redistribution on a massive scale," "activist judges" and "European-style socialism." The Sun says Bruce Lunsford, McConnell's Democratic opponent, has proved he can be "actually to the left of Obama." The Sun complains that poor McConnell is the victim of "cheap shots." I guess it’s okay to cheap-shot Democrats.
Anyway, propaganda is propaganda. The Sun is just as guilty of propagandizing as the far-left-wingers if often decries. When it comes to propagandists, I guess it takes one to know one.
Propaganda always aims for the gut, not the head. Calling Democrats “socialists” or implying they are only shows how far to the right the Sun has drifted. The Sun long ago crossed the line from conservative to reactionary. Maybe it's just a coincidence, but subscribers have steadily declined, too.
I don't know if the guy who writes editorials for the Sun is old enough to remember the cold war. But the Soviets and their friends were big on ranting, too. I remember they called us "Yankee
imperialists" and "capitalist bloodsuckers." They called "European-style" socialists "capitalist dupes."
The Sun's editorialist is guilty of the same kind of demonizing an opponent he would doubtless have denounced had it come from Pravda, the Soviet propaganda paper. Only the subject of the
Sun's ire isn't a nuclear-armed enemy that threatened all our lives. The Sun is viciously attacking a group of fellow Americans who just happen to disagree with the newspaper.
We suggest the Sun's editorial writer take a course in world governments. If he did, he would see that compared to political parties in other democracies, the U.S. Democratic Party is centrist or even center-rightist. Real socialists don't claim the Democrats. They say Democrats are moderate to liberal capitalists.
The Sun is the largest newspaper in Western Kentucky, where most citizens are moderate to conservative. They are not extremists. Maybe they are sending the Sun a message by not buying the paper.
Anyway, the Sun's editorial writer puts me us in mind of another editorialist, Alan Barth of the Washington Post (doubtless not one of the Sun editorialist's favorite reads). "Character assassination is at once easier and surer than physical assault; and it involves far less risk for the assassin," Barth wrote. "It leaves him free to commit the same deed over and over again, and may, indeed, win him the honors of a hero in the country of his victims."
No doubt, the Sun's editorialist is a hero to his boss. Shrinking circulation numbers suggest he might not be a hero to people who used to read the Sun.
EDITOR’S NOTE:
Council president Jeff Wiggins received this letter from Jeff Duncan via email on Nov. 24:
Greetings:
On Friday a co-worker came to me somewhat troubled. He told me that Cal Ross, our Executive Director, asked him if he would paint the apartments by way of a contract. He asked Cal why. Cal told him that he had a maintenance company from Alabama that is going to take over maintenance operations of the Housing Authority. He assured him that “no one would lose their jobs; instead of working for the Housing Authority, they would be employed by a maintenance contractor” (i.e. we would lose the state retirement, pay, and other benefits we have worked hard for). Since Friday, I have spoken with other management employees that have confirmed this to be true.
We are begging for help and support from anyone! It is well known that Rev. Henderson opposes such action, but it is also known that Cal has three votes on our board for whatever he wants. If this isn’t stopped, this will utterly destroy the livelihood of many people. Three people are less than five years from retirement, and several more are less than ten. But Cal is already retired with thirty-seven years at HUD, and now makes over one-hundred thousand dollars per year destroying the livelihood of hardworking, loyal employees. Any assistance you can provide is appreciated.
Sincerely,
Jeff Duncan
President AFSCME Local 1586-03
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Why working people need the Employee Free Choice Act
Thanks in large part to the efforts of union volunteers around the country, working families won strong victory on Nov. 4, sending Barack Obama to the White House and electing a stronger pro-worker majority of senators and representatives.
However, winning an election isn’t the end of the fight. Now, our elected leaders need to tackle the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. They have to keep their promises to the people who voted for them—and we have to give them the support they need to make the tough choices. We need an economic recovery package that will turn around this broken economy for working families with good jobs, green jobs, re-regulation of our financial system and health care that works for all of us. But no matter what else we do, it won’t result in real shared prosperity unless we restore workers’ freedom to form unions so they can bargain for a better life with better wages and benefits. That’s what this proposed legislation, the Employee Free Choice Act, will do.
The Employee Free Choice Act will:
- Put real teeth in the laws that are supposed to bar companies from intimidating, harassing—even firing—workers who want to form unions.
- Allow workers to form their union when a majority signs cards indicating that’s what they desire.
- Require arbitration to end corporate foot-dragging when workers try to get a first contract.
The Employee Free Choice Act will level the playing field that today leaves all the power in the hands of corporations, not workers. And Big Business and the front groups set up by corporations are preparing an all-out, $200 million propaganda and lobbying war to block it.
Unions have made passage of the Employee Free Choice Act a top priority for this year because it is the key to good wages, benefits, a voice in the workplace and the amplified political voice unions bring workers. In 2007, the U.S. House passed the measure and it had majority support in the Senate, but a minority killed it with a filibuster, emboldened by President George W. Bush’s promise to veto the legislation. Now we have elected a new Congress that has promised to be beside us in this fight and a president who has promised to sign the Employee Free Choice Act.
Here are the facts on why we need the Employee Free Choice Act:
Working families are struggling. For too long, workers haven’t had the power to get their fair share of the value they create. Workers are finding it harder and harder to stay in our homes, pay for our health care and save for our retirement. And our economy is suffering as a result.
Unions make people’s lives better. The freedom to form unions and bargain for a better life is a basic human right, and it makes a difference: Union members make 30 percent more than workers who don’t have unions. They’re 59 percent more likely to have health benefits and four times more likely to have pensions. That’s real economic security. Communities with strong unions have higher standards of living for everyone.
But the system is broken. More than 60 million workers who don’t have a union would join one if they could. But under existing law, corporations essentially have a veto over the process. In our company-dominated system, workers can be intimidated, coerced and even fired by their bosses for trying to form a union. A decision that should be in the hands of workers is instead in the hands of corporate executives.
Why union members should support the Employee Free Choice Act. The Employee Free Choice Act doesn’t just matter for workers who are trying to form unions. When more workers are in unions, workers have greater strength in numbers to demand good wages and good benefits across communities and industries. That raises the living and working standards for all workers and helps us all bargain for better contracts and counterbalance corporate power.
The Employee Free Choice Act means long-term shared prosperity. The Employee Free Choice Act is essential to rebuilding the middle class and ensuring the survival of the American Dream. We can build an economy that works for everyone if workers can exercise the freedom to form unions.
Happy Holidays from the Western Kentucky Area Council, AFL-CIO!