Comments on: Union Transformation should begin at their Roots

By: my two cents

my two cents — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 05:20:58 +0000

did you ask the non-construction related public service unions to help you?

By: Gloria Ferris

Gloria Ferris — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 03:27:46 +0000

Fred-

I too was a member of a teacher’s union. Cleveland’s to be exact. Some day I will post about that experience.

I have often felt that teachers should not have unionized. I believe that situation may have been the first instance of the phrase “kind of like hearding cats.”

By: TimFerris

TimFerris — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 03:14:02 +0000

I like the part about “Not the reality of a job, but the promise of a job.” It points up how cheap these union people sell themselves, thinking there’s going to be work there with a county that’s flat broke, and getting broker every day.

It’s sort of like the Cuyahoga County Republican Party’s leadership, backing off the put-it-on-the-ballot issue based not on real campaign-contribution money, but on the threat that money might not be forthcoming.

It’s weak leadership like what we have now in the unions and the local Republican Party that are precipitating change, and it will happen quickly.

These are times of maximum opportunity.

By: Fred O'Neill

Fred O'Neill — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 18:45:54 +0000

Good comments (I wanted to get away from the endless nitpicking at BFD for a while) … The question remains - as in Roldo’s original piece posted at BFD - how to make union leaders realize that they are soiling the nest and making their long struggle a redundancy in today’s “I want mine now” society? … Like some others I’ve met and talked to in recent years, I’ve been “double-crossed” by unions too - my situation occurred in Portsmouth, Ohio in the mid-70s when the local teachers so-called “union” (AFT) allowed 15 teachers, myself included, to be “downsized” at the whim of a dictatorial superintendent just to save a “comp-time” provision in the new contract … My attitude now is that they probably did me a favor, but I probably lost some of my original naiveity about union “compassion” in the process … I know that today’s workers need to take back their labor organizations from the special-interest cliques. They need to get “back to basics” … Today, one of my children is a union activist; another is not allowed to join a union … I am familiar with some of what you’re talking about re. the union folks who tried to stifle the tax petition - some who claim to “represent” working-class people forget to do just that … They need to be “reminded” that upholding worker and taxpayer rights is supposed to be part of their job …