Remember when the Unions Crashed the Economy with Ill-Advised Derivative Trading?
Josh Barros tries to sacrifice the credibility of unions, ends up sacrificing his own again.
Josh Barros, National Rectal Review:
Yes, Layoffs are Bad
Unions are bad. This isn’t so much a truism for the brave warriors of National Review Online, but rather an article of faith. Every Sunday, they gather around the dark portal in their best Sunday clown shoes and sacrifice rubber chickens on the altar to reinforce their faith.
And it makes it difficult when the other article of faith is that management and business can do no wrong. A tenuous position to hold in this era of massive layoffs, outsourcing, and of course the 1% mooning us in the street after collapsing the global economy.
But Josh Barro is no mere neophyte to the order. And he knows that the two beliefs can be brought together in one glorious explosion of bullshit.
In his “Theodore Roosevelt” speech in Osawatomie, Kan., President Obama heaped praise on a Minnesota company, Marvin Windows and Doors, for its worker-friendly policies. Marvin weathered a recession that battered the construction industry without laying off any of its workers.
Apparently the order came down from on high for conservatives to try and hide the obvious racism and contrarianism that Obama brings out in them, by praising the parts of Obama’s speeches and plans that are his compromises to them and their worldviews.
It’s a first step?
The president is right: When times are tough and the amount that companies can spend on labor declines, it is usually better for the economy as a whole if that pain is spread across all workers in the form of compensation cutbacks than placed on a few in the form of layoffs.
Well, yes, when the choice is between those two, then yes it can…well depend on the situation. It’s sort of like being the Donner Party. You can all take the risk of freezing hungry and tired in the night or take the hard hit of eating Harold (he knows what he did).
And such decisions usually have little to do with “amount available to spend on labor”, but rather “amount willing to spend on labor”, often seeing unilaterally breaking employment agreements and contracts that were instrumental to getting the workforce you had for X years as a “necessary evil” of making the company more money to send to stockholders.
But let’s take a closer look at the Marvin model that Obama is praising. The president noted that Marvin’s workers “agree[d] to give up some perks and some pay,” but there wasn’t really an agreement — the workers’ options were to take the pay cut or quit. As one incensed FireDogLake contributor notes, Obama is praising a non-union company for unilaterally cutting its workers’ pay. And the cutbacks to compensation were substantial.
So he praised a unilateral gutting of worker’s rights, slashing salaries, work hours, any possibility of raises, promotion, and a number of the few remaining benefit programs that could help the workers get out of the dead-end job which was now officially a dead end job. And this, given the lack of a union, was the lesser of two evils in our dysfunctional economy where labor has about as much strength and impact as the Pittsburgh Pirates.
I can see why the wingnuts are salivating.
While all of that is painful, the avoidance of layoffs is a major offsetting advantage. But this model works only where compensation is not collectively bargained. Marvin’s non-union workers don’t engage in collective bargaining, and neither do federal employees (for wages and benefits), so it was possible to force concessions on them.
And by knocking that hooker unconscious and tying her up in my bedroom, it was easier to force sex on her, but I’m not exactly clear what part of that is her fault for usually resisting that sort of thing.
Many state and local workers can use the collective-bargaining process to block wage and benefit concessions. Layoffs, which fall on a junior subset of workers, are more appealing than wage concessions to longstanding employees who know their jobs are safe — meaning that unions are not as afraid of layoffs as you might expect.
My word, unions resisting giving up the hard-fought labor rights they spilled blood over for decades to secure? Does their evil know no bounds?!?
Why I bet they even think that said victories were instrumental to having a motivated and skilled workforce and workplace recruitment back when the company was on top (including concessions on salary, hours, or safety for the promise of long-term benefits), those devious commie bastards.
Also, I didn’t know that unions were the ones in charge of firing employees or driving a company so far into the ground that the only choices to keep things running are firing a huge section of the staff or reducing their salaries and benefits to that of a retail worker.
Man, labor unions sure got powerful. They managed to completely eliminate management altogether.
Also, I’ll note that when the battle is between “factory is shut down” and “less benefits”, the unions have stepped up where management has refused, slashing their benefits and salaries while management, the management that brought the company down, keeps theirs the same. Many companies have started using this as a cudgel against labor, threatening to move the factory to a no-union state if the labor unions don’t match salaries and benefits to the poor abused suckers of those states.
Might explain the hesitancy when the threat is “sacrifice all you fought for or we’re firing a bunch of you”.
For example:
In 2010, when Gov. Chris Christie’s fight with the New Jersey Education Association was at its peak, his request was that teachers should take a one-year freeze on base pay — annual increases had been running at 4 percent for the previous several years — and contribute 1.5 percent of salary to pay for health benefits, up from zero in most districts. Concessions of this magnitude would have eliminated the need for any teacher layoffs due to cuts to state education aid.
Yeah, Chris Christieson, son of Christian Christensen did basically try a hard-sell unilateral violation of the contracts of teachers. Teachers already a segment of the population that subsists on poverty wages for one of the hardest jobs because of a crisis he created by deciding to underfund the schools even more than they already were.
I know!
Today I saw a similar show of oppression and lack of empathy for one’s fellow man when a bully victim turned to his bullies and told them to knock off that shit now or he would call his mom at work, thus totally ruining that bully’s whole rhythm and showing painful disregard for the wimpy kid the bully will have to beat up later to make up his hurt feelings. Sniff, it breaks your heart.
Christie got agreement on those concessions almost nowhere — unlike the Marvin workers, New Jersey teachers were able to say no, and they did. Layoffs ensued. Christie did eventually get higher teacher contributions toward health insurance, but only because the legislature passed a law to remove that matter from collective bargaining.
And it’s teachers fault all this happened. They taunted him, made him feel small and no one makes Chris Christie feel small. So when they didn’t accept his ass fucking with no lube, he laid a bunch of them off, thus making the New Jersey school system even more understaffed and underserved to the community’s needs, and he managed to get the legislature to piss on their contracts and force the concession later just to show them who’s boss. Then they forced him to beat his spouse and kids and run over that homeless person. Why must over-powerful unions keep forcing assholes to be vindictive assholes?
Do they have no shame?
Liberals often point out that public employment has been declining in 2010 and 2011, partly offsetting job growth in the private sector. They bemoan budget cuts that lead to shrinking headcounts.
Yeah, it’s almost like they see it as a bad thing and thus think the conservatives should actually start allowing them to fund such areas, instead of deliberately sabotaging them and making them even more untenable as a back-end attempt to privatize everything.
But then they — including President Obama — defend a public-sector collective-bargaining regime that takes non-layoff savings options off the table. If liberals really want state and local governments to be able to maintain their headcounts, they should push to end collective bargaining for public employees, not to strengthen it.
Yeah! Once businesses are allowed to do anything they want with no labor checks against their power, the companies will totally stop laying off workers.
What’s that? We tried that? The businesses without unionized employees have the greatest periods of layoffs? And we found businesses just raced to the bottom, abusing and firing their labor force to raise profits rather than focusing on making and selling quality products people would enjoy? And that was also met with the same businesses then attacking the public safety net after removing their own contributions to pensions, unemployment, and health care for laid off workers? This request to eliminate collective bargaining once and for all is a transparent effort to fully transition us into being a third-world hell-hole?
But, but, unions.
They’re bad.
I’ve got the rubber chicken on the altar and everything.
Fine, but the dog I punch tomorrow is totally on you.
No dog punching. Just eat Harold.
Many state and local workers can use the collective-bargaining process to block wage and benefit concessions
Does this bonehead not possess a dictionary? “Concessions” (unless you’re talking about a hot dog stand at the ball park) mean the unions that represent state and local workers in collective bargaining concede to management’s proposals to cut wages and benefits.
The “concession” part is the union’s. They hardly ever block concessions after they’ve made them to management.
Now I’m sure this idiot mean “reductions” when he wrote “concessions,” but that’s because he doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about.
Oh, and fuckstick – you don’t use collective bargaining to “block.” things – you negotiate them. That’s what “bargain” means. When you bargain with employers on wages and benefits, what you end up with is called an “agreement.” Meaning both sides agreed on those wage and benefit levels.
Which Side Are You On
– Dropkick Murphys
Man, labor unions sure got powerful. They managed to completely eliminate management altogether.
I wouldn’t mind. If unions ran companies, they might not do any better than Masters Of The Universe we’ve had for the last thirty years, but it’s hard to imagine them doing any worse.
I always wonder how they think the race to the bottom, once started, is going to stop at their low-wage-right-to-work-red-state and not keep on going right to Mexico or China.
Which Side Are You On
I’m on Blue Highway’s side.
I’ll try that again. I’m on Blue Highway’s side.
Preview you lying bitch.
Blue Highway’s side
OK, I get it, I’ll go away now.
Blue Highway
Which Side Are You On WP, I believe you’re on the side of the rich man and not makin’ the union strong.
The fact is, liberal bias in the media and class warfare and PC is unsustainable, we don’t have any more money, so those overpaid lazy teachers need to suck it up some more, most of us in the prirate sector haved take lots of pay cuts and pay our own way for everything, and we are the ones making money the governemnt jst takes it all and gives it to lazy black people to vote Obsama.
If liberals really want to help workers, they should crush them like bugs.
If liberals really want to help goateed hacks, they should get them soft jobs at wingnut welfare think tanks.
If liberals really want to help pirates, they should push to restore collective rum guzzling.
Waddaya mean: “restore”? Arr-Arrr!
Oh, and I missed the last thread, so I’m just gonna throw this in here:
The women in Seattle are probably systematically above average (Typical Blanchet graduate). If you like southern-style shellacked hair and faces, or California-style beach bunnies, you’re mostly out of luck, though.
A lot of crops are grown here that won’t actually grow here. Go out east and drive through Carnation and Duvall, and you’ll see row upon row upon row of quarter-mile-long “greenhouses”* that supply all those vegetables you see in the Pike Place Market, while supermarkets carry rubber tomatos from California.
Interesting factoid: half the berries grown in the US come from Vashon Island, so instead of The Egg and I, it should have been The Blackberry and I. (Can’t explain the movie moving them out to Cape Flattery, on the Makah reservation).
*Actually flimsy tents made out of the flimsiest framework that will stand up, and covered with sheets of clear plastic.
…the Walter B. Wriston Fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
“Countries don’t go bust.”
– Walter B. Wriston, while leading the lending charge that resulting in Citibank and others being bailed out by the U.S. government back in 1980s.
~
we don’t have any more money
Who’s this “we,” white man?
Man, this place is out of control.
.
NOOOOOOO! When the unions have real power to direct company operations it inevitably means the company will end up broken, unable to produce anything. This is obvious because Germany, where that is the case, can’t manufacture anything to save their lives and their exports amount to diddly squat. think about it – no one buys anything made in Germany!
Soooo, you can’t lay them off, you can lay them off. Josh, Jonah, who can tell?
NOOOOOOO! When the unions have real power to direct company operations it inevitably means the company will end up broken, unable to produce anything. This is obvious because Germany, where that is the case, can’t manufacture anything to save their lives and their exports amount to diddly squat. think about it – no one buys anything made in Germany!
Wow, that’s something I didn’t know about the Germans. Good on them.
Boy, I love it that we now have National Review quoting Firedoglake, united in their hatred for President Obama and the Democratic Party.
no one makes Chris Christie feel small.
Dumbo? The blue whale at the Museum of Natural History? T-Rex? Godzilla? Jabba the Hut?
Shorter everything these assholes ever write about labor: “Be grateful you have a job.”
For too many shitheads, that is the alpha and omega of employee relations.
In the 80s there was an auto assembly-line worker who published poetry under the name “Rivethead.” One of his poems contained the line “It’s not enough to take shit / Now we have to eat it, too.”
OT: I’m no Pats fan but SUCK ON THAT, TEBOW! That 30 yard sack was precious, wunnit?
meaning that unions are not as afraid of layoffs as you might expect.
Because junior guys can’t join the union, right? Wait, they can? And they can vote? And they work cheek by jowl with the slightly more senior guys who will be the next set of necks on the line, who can also vote? Tell you what, why don’t you just prove that instead of the argumentum ex culo?
And no, the NJ teacher’s union v Christie is not proof, especially when you ignore just about every demand on both sides and oversimplify it to BOOHOO TEACHERS WANT MONAY.
no one makes Chris Christie feel small
They also don’t make him breathe easier going up stairs.
So, they hate the rampant budget cuts to programs they support, and yet they also hate the results of those budget cuts!
What hypocrites.
Wow, everybody here is really down on the CEOs. Don’t you realise laying off those jobs creates jobs?
They are the Job Creators. What about that don’t you people understand?
SUCK ON THAT, TEBOW!
Tebow T-boned.
There is a dog.
And dog done kilt the thread…
Hey, in that picture, Josh Barros’s head is a different colour than his arms!
I’m starting to think the photos on this site aren’t real!
Obligatory Song for any thread about Unions
I seldom leave the shadows to comment, so howsabout I compensate with a Really Long One? (not so VPR).
[apologies: I forgot how to do ‘href’ links.]
The song’s agrarian imagery comes from The Grange movement:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_National_Grange_of_the_Order_of_Patrons_of_Husbandry
Re: N—B
You want labour? You want unions?
Rivethead: Tales from the Assembly Line by Ben Hamper.
(Sorry, don’t know how to do that imbed hyperlink thing)
Boy, I love it that we now have National Review quoting Firedoglake, united in their hatred for President Obama and the Democratic Party.
I’m saddened that we are still waiting for President Obama and the Democratic party to find their ‘comfortable shoes’ and join the rest of us in fighting off the corporations that are crushing us into the dust.
I’m sure Obama’s Job Council Head (and former G.E. C.E.O.), Jeffrey Immelt will locate them soon.
~
wiki: The motto of the Grange is: “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”
Re: N—B
You want labour? You want unions?
Yes, yes, and thanks.
Cerebrus: I’m glad you have the Great and Powerful Poster Key! Use it only for good!
To whom it may concern:
I fookin’ hate the new commenting format. But screw it; I’m a fookin’ Luddite.
no one makes Chris Christie feel small
He does the feeling through his own volution. Privately too. And size has nothing to do with it, amirite?
I’m
saddenedhardly surprised that we are still waiting for President Obama and the Democratic party to find their ‘comfortable shoes’ and join the rest of us in fighting off the corporations that are crushing us into the dust.Fixxeted for you, Ibn
My work here is done.
I’m saddened that we are still waiting for President Obama and the Democratic party to find their ‘comfortable shoes’ and join the rest of us in fighting off the corporations that are crushing us into the dust.
It’ll be a while. Even FDR governed to shield capitalism and Wall Street from the consequences of their fuckups rather than tear them down (though by and large they were too stupid and too high on themselves to realize it), and we’re unlikely to get a president more radical than him, certainly in our lifetimes.
(Pity – President Huey Long could probably count on my vote).
I don’t know, Prez Rickard was pretty radical.
James McMurtry
Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign
Sitting there by the left turn line
Flag on the wheelchair flapping in the breeze
One leg missing, both hands free
No one’s paying much mind to him
The V.A. budget’s stretched so thin
And there’s more comin’ home from the Mideast war
We can’t make it here anymore
That big ol’ building was the textile mill
It fed our kids and it paid our bills
But they turned us out and they closed the doors
We can’t make it here anymore
See all those pallets piled up on the loading dock
They’re just gonna set there till they rot
‘Cause there’s nothing to ship, nothing to pack
Just busted concrete and rusted tracks
Empty storefronts around the square
There’s a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere
You don’t come down here ‘less you’re looking to score
We can’t make it here anymore
The bar’s still open but man it’s slow
The tip jar’s light and the register’s low
The bartender don’t have much to say
The regular crowd gets thinner each day
Some have maxed out all their credit cards
Some are working two jobs and living in cars
Minimum wage won’t pay for a roof, won’t pay for a drink
If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. CEO
See how far 5.15 an hour will go
Take a part time job at one of your stores
Bet you can’t make it here anymore
High school girl with a bourgeois dream
Just like the pictures in the magazine
She found on the floor of the laundromat
A woman with kids can forget all that
If she comes up pregnant what’ll she do
Forget the career, forget about school
Can she live on faith? live on hope?
High on Jesus or hooked on dope
When it’s way too late to just say no
You can’t make it here anymore
Now I’m stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store
Just like the ones we made before
‘Cept this one came from Singapore
I guess we can’t make it here anymore
Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin
Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I’m in
Should I hate ’em for having our jobs today
No I hate the men sent the jobs away
I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams
All lily white and squeaky clean
They’ve never known want, they’ll never know need
Their sh@# don’t stink and their kids won’t bleed
Their kids won’t bleed in the da$% little war
And we can’t make it here anymore
Will work for food
Will die for oil
Will kill for power and to us the spoils
The billionaires get to pay less tax
The working poor get to fall through the cracks
Let ’em eat jellybeans let ’em eat cake
Let ’em eat sh$%, whatever it takes
They can join the Air Force, or join the Corps
If they can’t make it here anymore
And that’s how it is
That’s what we got
If the president wants to admit it or not
You can read it in the paper
Read it on the wall
Hear it on the wind
If you’re listening at all
Get out of that limo
Look us in the eye
Call us on the cell phone
Tell us all why
In Dayton, Ohio
Or Portland, Maine
Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains
That’s done closed down along with the school
And the hospital and the swimming pool
Dust devils dance in the noonday heat
There’s rats in the alley
And trash in the street
Gang graffiti on a boxcar door
We can’t make it here anymore
~
(Pity – President Huey Long could probably count on my vote).
“All the King’s Men” was on the other day. DVR’ed it and watched yesterday. Hi ho.
And WTF is witch all you canukistanis Making snide ass comments about OUR FUCKING COUNTRY?!?!?!?! AMERICA – LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT BITCHES!
Off-topic –
KIM JONG IL DEAD? YIPPEE!!!! Osama, Qaddafi and Kim all in one year? Well, vive la liberté!
KIM JONG IL DEAD? YIPPEE!!!!
Uh…Yeah, it’s good he’s dead, but that doesn’t mean things aren’t about to get worse.
R.I.P. Vaclav Havel. A truly great man.
Uh…Yeah, it’s good he’s dead, but that doesn’t mean things aren’t about to get worse.
As with the first two – I don’t know what’s coming next and am under no illusions that this is where it ends. Just for now, though, the guy’s dead and richly deserved it.
R.I.P. Vaclav Havel. A truly great man.
I saw that too. Communism and anti-communism each lost a champion on the same day, it appears.
Yes, indeed… and they have nukes. One of his sons is supposed to become Kim III, but a lot of people think that the generals are going to have him for breakfast. We shall see.
Kim Jong-Il could at least write.
These right-wing dingbats don’t have the moral courage to admit our elites have fucked us.
Thank you for exposing all of the gratuitous attacks on unions that politicians are using these days for political posturing. And thanks for being the first to pay attention to a song of mine that is now gaining steam on the college radio circuits.
I just heard that WRCT-FM, an open-format college station at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, PA, added it to their play list. Without you, and, the band Cake, who included me on their video for Short Skirt/Long Jacket, I wouldn’t possess this underground cult hero status. Oh, yeah, I almost forgot, as an underground cult hero, I’m supposed to hate it when that happens.
Merry Christmas from me, Dr BLT!
You’re Not the Kinda Ho (That Santa Had in Mind). Those who weren’t around when Sadly No debuted the song can stream it here:
http://www.reverbnation.com/play_now/song_9987918
OMG DR. BLT IS BACK!!!
Those who are not currently writing a shit-ton of comments in this thread should visit Roy’s Voice column and watch the Ron Paul maniacs go to work at the foot of it.
Hat-trick.
Also it could be time for a Ron Paul column here. Lookit the traffic!
It is a time-honored and ancient ritual for partisans of one party to quote-mine dissidents of another. Most at least have the honesty to find a yoostabee of appropriate politics – the Dems going for Huntsman, who is, constellations having shifted, basically a Blue Dog now; the Republicans going for Zell Miller and David Lieberman and other frothing crazies – but there’s never any ruling out odd cases like left-libertarian Glenn Greenwald slobbering over Rno Pual or National Review conscripting Firedoglake into their fantasies about the permanent Republican majority that has been around the corner for thirty years.
PS: KILL YOUR PARENTS
It’s a bitchy line to take, but half of the media was close to tripping over itself to blowjob Yeltsin’s corpse, and Yeltsin was what Kim would have been if, in 1991, he had decided that the age of gray-faced bureaucracy was over and ‘privatized’ the organs of state responsible for the few scraps of food or dignity left for the populace after the army was fed and clothed right into the pockets of his family and cronies, then won a series of shambolic elections and retired to exactly the same life of luxury and ease he had in our history – Japanese chefs, Jaguars, henny every night – while his people starved in exactly the same way they are now.
Juche created him and Juche will consume his dead flesh and it will do the same to his heir, and whenever it is that the international community decides to prevent North Korea’s people from starving they’ll just be virtual slaves to Japanese and South Korean megasyndicates, with the fun bonus of lacking an organized, effective government to respond to surging racism against them in a wealthier and more powerful society in any substantial way.
So what exactly does ‘deserve’ mean? My English, she is not so good, yes?
Even the mightiest East Asian tyrant must die some day, but blog-whoring lives forever.
OMG DR. BLT IS BACK!!!
Yeah. woo.
Clearly.
I feel so sorry for the poor little rube followers who think this guy is smart. It took over twenty years of union busting to open the door to globalization. All those jobs that went overseas? They didn’t have strong unions to protect them. Anyone in the U.S.A., U.S.A.! camp should be looking for the union label and buying American and should learn something about value. It is sad that so many Americans think the four dollar piece of schlock T-shirt they got at the box store is a bargain, and the twenty dollar T-shirt is just paying for a name. The U.S.A. used to know quality and used to buy quality and used to make quality. There was a time when everything in Sears was made in the U.S.A. And it was good. And the whole world wanted to buy it because it was well-made, beautifully designed, and durable.
But countries keep letting the Masters of the Universe make big decisions. And the minions of the Masters of the Universe keep doing their level best to convince as many people as possible that what the MOUs want is not only the best of all possible worlds, but is fair and good.
Those jobs going overseas? Yeah. It’s the MOUs.
Those low, low prices? Yeah. It’s so the MOUs can make more money making crap at a low price by exploiting cheap labor; and using cheap materials, poor design, and worse instructions.
And something else about those low, low prices— they’re votes to pay all you working people less money, to offer you fewer benefits, and to make your workplace more unsafe.
No one has to be that stupid all of their lives. Insisting that someone lower the quality of your life in order to satisfy people who aren’t satisfied with billions of dollars to do whatever the hell they want, including bribing Congress to pass laws to make it easier for them to make working people’s lives worse yet is tragically stupid beyond words.
OMG DR. BLT IS BACK!!!
Even the mightiest East Asian tyrant must die some day, but blog-whoring lives forever.
Kim Jong Il named Kim Jong BLT his successor.
Oh, foo on you. I just saw Black Flag perform live.
I missed this the first go around but his whole “oh, the last hired are the first fired in unions” shtick?
Yeah, they’re the first fired in non-union plants and jobs as well. Fuck anyone who’s worked holiday retail knows that the order of eliminations as things slow down over the holidays is pretty much reverse order of the hiring order minus the people who go “fuck this shit” and stay home.
The only change might be that non-union plants that still have pensions (which aren’t many) might do nasty shit like firing an employee the year before their retirement packages kicked in (and that’s something that unions like to halt), but for the most part, the new blood is first out in the layoffs (usually because that has the least impact on overall morale and because the bosses have the least amount of opinion on them).
So yeah, he’s trying to smear unions over something that most every institution does when it comes to layoffs. Hey, it wouldn’t be a wingnut argument if it wasn’t based in ignorance and hypocrisy.
I like to interpret it that he’s complaining that unionized firms can’t do exactly what you point to – hire under the promise of automatic benefits of some kind, then fire immediately before they kick in.
You’d think that someone who was so big on the market, and indeed probably willing to follow Hayek’s assertion that incomplete information dooms markets that deviate in any way from perfect free markets to inefficiency and failure, would balk at systematic fraud that makes accurate signalling for employment contracts impossible.
If you were too dumb to get that the only person entitled in wingnut economics to unmolested information is the biggest boss in the room, that is, which is to say dumb enough to drown on falling rain.
I missed this the first go around but his whole “oh, the last hired are the first fired in unions” shtick?
Yeah, they’re the first fired in non-union plants and jobs as well.
The difference being that unionized plants codify this into the contract, whereas in non unionized plants, you can always try blowing the boss.
Kim Jong Il named Kim Jong BLT his successor.
Bibimbop, Lettuce and Tomato?
I don’t follow Ron Paul much. Does his cult always swarm every article about him then collectively shit their pants?
Yes. The true Paul believers shit other peole’s pants as well.
People, too. Rassin frassin virtual keyboard…
Interesting fact: During the Great Depression, the Marvin family purchased the local bank and immediately stopped foreclosing on mortgages.
Maybe we ought to cut them some slack, eh?
During the Great Depression, the Marvin family purchased the local bank and immediately stopped foreclosing on mortgages.
With a little help from Clarence the Drunken Angel
With a little help from Clarence the Drunken Angel
There was some bell ringing, no doubt.
Marvin has an interesting history, tho. It was one of the first companies to have an employee profit sharing program, one of the first manufacturers to use recycled products in its processes, one of the first to permanently employ a majority of women in one of its factories, and one of the first to eliminate mandatory retirement ages.
It also has some pretty dark marks against it, to be sure, but it seems to learn from its mistakes.
I don’t envy Marvin their choice. The facts we know are, the choice was layoffs or paycuts. Given that either way, they’d be getting more value from the remaining workers, it seems to me they made the right choice: they avoided burdening the community with more unemployment and providing social services, kept good paying jobs, and will probably make up the shortfall when things turn around, given the company history.
I’d bet that if you offered Marvin workers unionization, they’d vote it down, again, based on the company history. They seem to never lay off anybody, no matter how bad things get. Meanwhile, unionized window companies have been laying people off.
Oh, you were serious. Well it sounds like a great place. The kind where the men throw their hats in the air when the owners walk by and the women bare their breasts.
My spidey-sense was tingling, that can only mean
someone said something bad about Dubba-G. Isn’t that like the political version of making fun of South Park?*
*(Not that I care one way or another; I’ve just witnessed this guy going after people who dared criticized him)
*(Not that I care one way or another; I’ve just witnessed this guy going after people who dared criticized him)
OBAMABOT!!!
And the wingnuts keep cheering on the race to the bottom. Feudalism FTW!
Feudalism FTW!
That’s what it boils down to, isn’t it? Some kind of quasi-coporate-monarchy that rules over the masses by destroying education, working rights, civil rights and a whole bunch of other staples. And these jerks actually think they’ll get some crumbs from welcoming their new overlords with open arms and attacking anyone who actually doesn’t want to work paycheck-to-paycheck for the rest of their life.
The kind where the men throw their hats in the air when the owners walk by and the women bare their breasts.
Oh, I have no doubt that they have a capitalist streak in them. It just seems to me there are worse companies to pick on than one that seems to have its heart in the right place.
attacking anyone who actually doesn’t want to work paycheck-to-paycheck for the rest of their life.
I know, right? Then they go into some fantasy about how things were so much better in the 50’s, conveniently ignoring that during that time unions were strong and taxes were high (under a Republican president!).
I like Glenn Greenwald just fine, and he serves a vital basic function in performing as a civil libertarian in the strict sense rather than in the sense that he wants to shoot guns or smoke green all day and suborns his whole politics to that. He’s brilliant, and incisive.
An unaccountable unforced error like accepting Pual as a big-l Liberal instead of just a crotchetmaster from glibbie country – which he did, for years, and has only recently begun actively repenting of – is a black mark because he is otherwise so spotless. On a funny-voice-making Viacom prostitute like Jon Stewart, it’s barely noticeable.
(The one thing I will say is that he’s the worst writer on Salon by a long shot – awkward, long-winded, pompous, tone-deaf, humorless, by turns hysterical and Sahara-dry; incapable of delivering a joke, prone to capitalizing words in his diatribes At Random, and overall just a shade short of intolerable. But one of the better writers is Mary Elizabeth “Getting Gardasil early ruined my child’s precious innocence, but let’s hold off on the Big Pharma stuff until Merck’s check to my oncologist goes through” Williams. If I wanted bad points dressed up well instead of the reverse I’d read Slate.)
And don’t even get me started on Parker and Stone.
Are we all spelling Ron Paul’s name on purpose? Do his minions have some sort of trawling service?
Do his minions have some sort of trawling service?
Yes. It’s called Paultards.
Are we all spelling Ron Paul’s name on purpose?
Each time we spell it, we’re supposed to leave off one more letter and substitute a clap.
much as i enjoyed family christmas over the weekend, i am deeply saddened to find i missed a jeannie post…imma check that out…i’ll be back…
Each time we spell it, we’re supposed to leave off one more letter and substitute a clap.
Or wear a condom, if you don’t want the clap.
Are we all spelling Ron Paul’s name on purpose?
If you say his name 3 times he manifests.
Bloody goldie, bloody goldie, bloody goldie!
If you say his name 3 times he manifests.
It takes a few days of scrubbing the clean up the mess, too
It takes a few days of scrubbing the clean up the mess, too
It’s hard to get sulfur and brimstone out of a carpet.
The only change might be that non-union plants that still have pensions (which aren’t many) might do nasty shit like firing an employee the year before their retirement packages kicked in […]
I worked at a plant that had profit sharing. Thing was, management thrived on having employees come and go in less than 1 year. Those short-timers still ‘earned’ their share of the profits but were not vested long enough to receive them. The way this profit sharing plan worked, all the non-vested shares were pooled and divvyed up by those who were vested at the end of the year, namely the top 3 managers in the plant. So in essence 3 guys got dozens of workers’ share of the profits. Nobody, I mean NOBODY, ever lasted the 5 years to be fully vested.
Nobody, I mean NOBODY, ever lasted the 5 years to be fully vested.
This happens a lot more often than you think. An awful lot of retirement plans, even 401(k)s, are designed to include both executives and workers. There are means testing for the plan so that it’s supposedly fair to the workers (it’s a lot easier for an exec to put away the $16,000 or so, so the plan needs lower-level employees to participate so execs can put away their full amounts)
Well, what happens then is, the new hires are encouraged to enroll as fully as possible (company matching, that sort of thing) but once they’re let go or leave, they are still considered part of the plan enrollees.
Also, next time a public company like an airline or car company with a traditional pension plan complains about pension liabilities, keep in mind that the lion’s share of those liabilities are to executives and board members.
It’s hard to get sulfur and brimstone out of a carpet.
And the tar. Eesh.
more dead people breaking news: connie lundstrom died at the age of 73…one less religious grifter down here on earth…
Those who are not currently writing a shit-ton of comments in this thread should visit Roy’s Voice column and watch the Ron Paul maniacs go to work at the foot of it.
It’s … it’s so … so beautiful!
Anyone ELSE been getting a serious whiff of Moonie from Paultards?
Hint For Ron Paul Supporters: if you think your man is AMERICA’S REAL ALTERNATIVE then this is not the droid you’re looking for – he is the GOP’s naive-lefty-vote-siphoning pet, & has been for years. A conspicuous deficit of Paul support from either uterus-enriched or melanin-enriched demographics may also be evidence that your fr33d0m-p3a is under a different shell.
Gack! I’ve been Anonymized!
Don’t forget that Francisco Franco is still dead also, too &c.
“You use the bathroom each morning. When you defecate, do you wear a gas mask? This is not a laughing matter but a serious one. If you are near someone else defecating, you will quickly move a good distance away. But when you smell your own feces, you do not even notice it. This is because that fecal matter is one with your body. Therefore, you do not feel that it is dirty.
“When you were young, did you ever taste the dried mucus from your nose? Does it taste sweet or salty? It’s salty, right? Since you can answer, you must have tasted it! Why did you not feel that it was dirty? It is because it was part of your body.
I was going to make some kind of joke here, but I kind of love the image of Ron Paul proselytizing booger-eatery too much to spoil it with one.
Anyone ELSE been getting a serious whiff of Moonie from Paultards?
Seriously. The whole “Only Ron Paul can save us!” thing reeks of cult.
Once again…
GUIDE ME LANDRU!
I thought he was feeling better.
The thing about the Pualtards that always amuses me is that they seem to completely ignore that he’s been in the congress for about eleventy billion years and has never done anything serious to advance their glorious Randian-superman policies. It’s comical:
Here is the glorious glibertarian bill he successfully sponsored and got passed:
Yeah, a real glibertarian workhorse that one.
The RoPaul Revolution has begun!
The whole “Only Ron Paul can save us!” thing reeks of cult.
It really speaks to how desperate the Republican electorate has become that Ron Paul can be taken seriously as a candidate. The guy’s been running for President for like 20 years now, officially and unofficially, and it’s only this year that he’s gained any real traction, and even then, after the first five Dwarves fell flat.
To follow up since re-reading it I wasn’t completely clear. It’s not that Pual doesn’t try, it’s just that if he’s going to be such a gloriously effective leader of the glibertarian cause as preznit, you’d think he’d actually be getting a few things done in congress. Y’know, leading and shit.
To authorize the Administrator of General Services to convey a parcel of real property in Galveston, Texas, to the Galveston Historical Foundation.
Privatizing the nation, one parcel at a time.
The free market will solve the problem.
Ronald Paul has sponsored 421 bills since Jan 7, 1997 of which 418 haven’t made it out of committee and 1 were successfully enacted.
I know that if I were in his district I’d be bursting my buttons with pride.
I know that if I were in his district I’d be bursting my buttons with pride.
I’d bet they’re even the same 30 bills every year, from disbanding the Fed to counting the gold in Fort Knox.
Franco is still dead but at least they’re going to dig him up from the creepy mausoleum/chapel he had built as a memorial. Stakes through the heart, quartering and burning, while understandable, will prolly not be indulged in because MODERN EUROPE.
I’d bet they’re even the same 30 bills every year, from disbanding the Fed to counting the gold in Fort Knox.
i always try to be prepared, so this weekend, in light of RoPual’s imminent victory, i purchased a new purse and matching hernia belt…
i also, splurged on, extra commas…
O,o,h, t,h,a,n,k,s,!,,,
Trolling the Paulites. I wonder if they’re still around.
His followers believe in the Pauline Creed, which combines batshit insane libertarianism with really bad religious rock.
Also, Department of Redundancy Department.
with really bad religious rock.
In the immortal words of Hank Hill – “You’re not making Christianity any better. You’re just making rock and roll worse.”
i always try to be prepared, so this weekend, in light of RoPual’s imminent victory, i purchased a new purse and matching hernia belt…
I think he wants to reinstitute the gold standard, not issue gold as currency.
His followers believe in the Pauline Creed, which combines batshit insane libertarianism with really bad religious rock.
Our Lady of the Lead Zeppelin
I think he wants to reinstitute the gold standard, not issue gold as currency.
fine, take the fun and pain out of shopping expeditions!!!
fine, take the fun and pain out of shopping expeditions!!!
I’m male. Shopping is painful already.
Trolling the Paulites
Roy’s Voice column is a house afire!
Roy’s Voice column is a house afire!
The Paultards remind me of something Disraeli once said about Gladstone after the latter stormed into Parliament infuriated about a matter under discussion: “The right honourable gentleman blows in, blows up, and blows out.”
175 comments for god’s sake.
175 comments for god’s sake
Paultards are nothing if not prolific.
Subby –
I responded to you, so I’m sure that I’m now on some Paultard’s list.
Ooooh! Paul Cult party at N_B’s!
I wonder what’s gonna happen when Ron Paul – that’s RON PAUL – dies? Does Rand get the leftover followers?
I responded to you, so I’m sure that I’m now on some Paultard’s list.
You’re safe: they won’t be able to spell your name for sure.
Does Rand get the leftover followers?
Surprisingly, Ron’s will calls for a steel cage match…
Thundra got to the heart of the issue.
Like…to eat…or what?
No, no…but, seriously, I’m pretty sure they all have to commit suicide in that event.
ARCH-DES 597L-1, Structural And Mechanical Systems
While wearing white sneakers.
Hey, ignore the not-properly-copying-new-text-fail.
And yes, I have started drinking.
HOT.
Ron Paul’s had a solution for those for YEARS.
Ron Paul’s had a solution for those
That’s chemistry class.
You that would last long, list to my song,
Make no more coil, but buy of this oil.
Would you be ever fair and young?
Stout of teeth, and strong of tongue?
Tart of palate? quick of ear?
Sharp of sight? of nostril clear?
Moist of hand? and light of foot?
Or, I will come nearer to’t,
Would you live free from all diseases?
Do the act your mistress pleases,
Yet fright all aches from your bones?
Here’s a Ron Paul for the nones.
Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Ron Paul.
Ron Paul who?
Whichever Ron Paul the market determines is proper.
That means he’s had a precipitate for all those years. Which will you choose?
Hint: vaporize the precipitate.
Nothing you could say
Could tear me away from Ron Paul (Ron Paul)
Nothing you could do
‘Cause I’m stuck like glue to Ron Paul
I’m sticking to Ron Paul like a stamp to a letter
Like birds of a feather
We stick together
I’m telling you from the start
I can’t be torn apart from Ron Paul
I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day
When it’s cold outside
I’ve got the month of May
I guess you say
What in the world will make me feel this way?
My girl, talking ’bout Ron Paul
No handsome face could ever take the place of Ron Paul
Unions: Ultimate boner-killer.
Paultards crashing your second-favorite site? You need a “cheer-up”. That’s why new Cerberus Industries has released its new product New Post TM. New Post TM for all your Ron Paul-sadness needs*
*Cerberus Industries is not responsible for induced bile, increased rage, or gnashing of teeth caused by New Post TM. If New Post TM kills your family or causes the screams of the damned to infest your home, Cerberus Industries will deny all knowledge of New Post TM.
New Post TM, it’s just newer!
Teachers already a segment of the population that subsists on poverty wages for one of the hardest jobs because of a crisis he created by deciding to underfund the schools even more than they already were.
Sadly, no. NJ teachers make a fat lot of money, unionized ones, anyway. One friend of mine was making $95K/year when she retired, with lifetime pension, health and dental. A kindergarten teacher we know is making $125,000 with ditto. These were not unusual rates. As a contrast, teachers we know in private schools are making more in the $40-60,000 range.
Teaching is a tough job, but poverty is not what you’ll get if you’re a state teacher in NJ.
NJ teachers make a fat lot of money, unionized ones, anyway.
You’ll need to cite something, because I think you’re wrong
REALLY wrong