LABOR

LABOR'S SILENCE ON THE WAR

HARRY KELBER, LABOR EDUCATOR - Leaders of the AFL-CIO and the Change to
Win coalition have to concede that the American people, including their
own members, are deeply concerned about what is happening in Afghanistan
and Iraq and the confusing reports on the war on terrorism. These are
issues that will certainly be on the minds of voters as they cast their
ballots in the 2006 midterm elections.

So why are our leaders so doggedly determined to ignore these
life-and-death issues and restrict labor's election campaign solely to
domestic issues? Without any mandate to do so, leaders of both labor
federations have instituted a total blackout of news and information
about the Iraq war, as though it is of no interest to America's working
families.

The war in Iraq does not exist on any of the official labor web sites.
There is no mention of the growing terrorist threat or the weaknesses of
Homeland Security or the spying on U.S. citizens by the Bush
administration. Not a statement about the rising toll of killed and
wounded American soldiers or any comment in the current public debate
about the fate of our 140,000 troops in Iraq.

Why has not AFL-CIO President Sweeney or SEIU President Andy Stern
spoken up? If organized labor is bent on winning back the House and
Senate, what better issues than the Bush administration's failures in
Iraq and the war on terror?. . .

Even more disheartening is how the official labor press has fallen in
line to blot out even a mention of what's happening in Iraq. What is the
rationale for their silence? Can any editor explain who issued the
blackout on Iraq and why union publications followed it so slavishly?

http://www.laboreducator.org/electionsil.htm

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SURPRISE: IMMIHATE LEAVES FARMS WITHOUT WORKERS

MSNBC - Farmers of all types of specialty crops, from almonds to roses,
have seen the immigrant labor supply they depend on dry up over the past
year. Increased border security and competition from other industries
are driving migrant laborers out of the fields, farmers say.Earlier this
year, many farmers were optimistic about finding a solution in the
Agricultural Job Opportunity, Benefits and Security Act, or AgJobs. The
bill, proposed by Sens. Larry E. Craig (R-Idaho) and Edward M. Kennedy
(D-Mass.), would allow undocumented agricultural workers already in the
United States to become legal permanent residents and would streamline
the current guest-worker program. In March and September, hundreds of
growers traveled to the Capitol to lobby for the bill.

But deep divisions within the Republican Party have stalled immigration
reform. Although legislation to build a 700-mile fence along the border
passed the House and Senate, the AgJobs proposal has languished. As the
border tightens, Mexican workers who once spent part of each year in
American fields without a work permit fear that if they go back to
Mexico, they will be trapped behind the border, farmers say. Instead,
they stay in the United States, taking year-round jobs that pay more and
are less backbreaking than farm work, such as cleaning hotels or working
in construction in cities on the Gulf Coast devastated by last year's
hurricanes.

"Frequently you hear, especially from California, complaints about
construction companies actually recruiting workers from the sides of the
fields," said Craig Regelbrugge, co-chair of the Agriculture Coalition
for Immigration Reform. Other industries that depend on immigrant labor,
such as landscaping and construction, "are also concerned about the
overall availability of labor given demographic trends," he said,
adding: "But agriculture is the warning sign, if you will, of structural
changes in the economy."

The problem is now reaching crisis proportions, food growers say. As
much as 30 percent of the year's pear crop was lost in Northern
California, growers estimate. More than one-third of Florida's Valencia
orange crop went unharvested, Regelbrugge said. In New York, apples are
rotting on the trees, because workers who once picked the fruit have
fled frequent raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, said
Maureen Marshall, an apple grower in Elba.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15123111/

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GOP RUN LABOR BOARD MOVES TO KICK MILLIONS OF WORKERS OUT OF ITS
PROTECTION

DALE RUSSAKOFF WASHINGTON POST - The National Labor Relations Board
ruled yesterday that nurses with full-time responsibility for assigning
fellow hospital workers to particular tasks are supervisors under
federal labor law and thus not eligible to be represented by unions. . .
Labor leaders decried the ruling, with AFL-CIO President John Sweeney
saying it "welcomes employers to strip millions of workers of their
right to have a union by reclassifying them as 'supervisors' in name
only." The labor-backed Economic Policy Institute said the new
definition could affect 8 million workers who give direction to fellow
workers in fields ranging from construction to accounting. . .

The ruling defines workers as supervisors if they give assignments to
other workers, if they are held responsible for the performance of those
assignments and if they exercise independent judgment rather than follow
an employer's detailed instructions. NLRB members Wilma B. Liebman and
Dennis P. Walsh, the only Democrats on the board, argued in dissent that
the definition was so broad it "threatens to create a new class of
workers under Federal labor law: workers who have neither the genuine
prerogatives of management, nor the statutory rights of ordinary
employees."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/03/
AR2006100301535.html?nav=rss_nation

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