Our Changing Globe

Archive for the ‘lawmakers’ Category

Boeing union approves 737 pact – Business – The Olympian …

www.theolympian.com12/8/11

Machinists union members gave a strong endorsement Wednesday to a labor contract extension that promises to keep final assembly of Boeing's most popular airliner in Renton and gives the company nearly five years of …

Boeing Deal Clears Path For Production Boost | Business News …

www.minyanville.com12/8/11

Boeing's biggest union ratifies a historic contract that will be in place for nearly five years.

Update September 15, 2011

*House Passes Bill to Limit Labor Relations Board Authority.

The measure, approved on a 238 to 186 vote, would ban the National Labor Relations Board from ordering any employer to shut down plants or relocate work, even if a company violates labor laws.

Obama has begun his reelection campaign by siding with the unions against big business!

After failing to negotiate a contract with unions, the Boeing corporation moved a portion of its Dreamliner 787 production line from Washington state to a $750 million South Carolina facility.

And now with the East Coast facility just three months from initial production, the Obama administration’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has filed what may be the largest labor lawsuit in fifty years against Boeing to prevent the South Carolina plant from coming online.

You might remember those two recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board?

The guys who are now making decisions affecting the commanding heights of the American economy were never confirmed by the Senate.

What is the supposed case against Boeing?

The federal lawsuit alleges that Boeing built the plant in South Carolina to retaliate against the machinists union for past strikes.

And that’s it.

Reactions from Boeing and lawmakers

Boeing commented on the lawsuit calling it "frivolous" and promised to open the South Carolina plant as scheduled.

Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) said, "This is nothing more than a political favor for the unions who are supporting President Obama’s re-election campaign".

And Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) added, "If successful, the NLRB complaint would allow unions to hold a virtual ‘veto’ over business decisions".

Is there a stink?

Strangely, but perhaps not, the first hearing will on June 14th before a judge that works for the NLRB: after which the NLRB will review that judge’s decision.

The argument

The machinist union has gone on strike against Being five times costing billions of dollars to the airplane builder and while opinions vary, Boeing could simply be making a precautionary move to prevent future strikes, which would be a responsible action.

The Threat!

If Boeing were to lose the lawsuit it would allow the federal government to mandate that the 787 production be done only in Washington, and open the doors to many similar lawsuits.

The Politics

President Obama’s 2012 re-election prospects are heavily dependent on support from organized labor, so last-minute legal maneuvering by the National Labor Relations Board to block Boeing’s imminent expansion into South Carolina should come as no surprise.

Democrats will desperately need union votes and organizing skills next year and they don’t need Boeing, or for that matter, South Carolina.

2011: Rise of democracy; decline of the West | Firstpost

www.firstpost.com12/30/11

It was a year that celebrated the new — the power of the people — and underlined all that is now old and stale: the irretrievable decline of the West.

Flag burning at Occupy Charlotte creates divide among members …

latimesblogs.latimes.com12/31/11

The burning of an American flag by members of the Occupy Charlotte encampment has drawn sharp criticism of the group, but has also created a divide among its members.

Flag desecration in the US is not new and in 1862, during the Union army’s occupation of New Orleans in the American Civil War, the military governor, Benjamin Franklin Butler, sentenced William B. Mumford to death for removing an American flag.

In 1864 John Greenleaf Whittier wrote the poem Barbara Frietchie, which told of a probably fictional, incident in which Confederate soldiers were deterred from defacing an American flag.

The poem contains the famous lines:

“Shoot, if you must, this old gray head. But spare your country’s flag, she said”.

Flags can be destroyed by burning or can be defaced with slogans or daubed with excrement, etc.

Flags can be walked upon, spat upon, or dragged through the dirt or they can be hung upside down or reversed, and toilet paper and doormats might bear a flag’s image.

Some Common Reasons For Destroying Or Defacing Flags Are:

1. As a protest against a country’s foreign policy.
2. To distance oneself from the foreign or domestic policies of one’s home country.
3. As a protest at the very laws prohibiting the actions in question.
4. As a protest against nationalism.
5. As a protest against the government in power in the country, or against the country’s form of government.
6. A symbolic insult to the people of that country.

So What’s New About Flag Destruction And Defacement?

American flags were vandalized and burned across the U.S. over this year’s Memorial Day weekend and in Wooster, Ohio, around twenty five flags were set on fire early Monday.

In Minneapolis, a fire was set late last week to an American flag hanging outside a Marine veteran’s home.

In Portland, Ore., Christian Ashby and his wife awoke Sunday to find their American flag torn down, covered in obscenities and burned outside their home.

And although the stories go on, three things about this appear to be very different to me.

Firstly the flags were burned anonymously which seems new.

Secondly, other people’s flags were burned without their permission.

Thirdly, and perhaps most ominously, a check of the various newspaper talkbacks revealed that many, albeit a minority of Americans, expressed an understanding and even a sympathy to the flag burnings.

Not Just In The USA

A Wikipedia link about flag burning and defacing describes in great detail where and when the events have occurred and is well worth checking out.

Is Flag Desecration Legal In The U.S.?

"Yes“,

In 28 Jun 2006 s constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration died in a Senate cliffhanger and it was just a single vote short of the support needed to send it to the states for ratification a week before that year’s Independence Day.

The 66-34 tally in favor of the amendment was just one less than the two-thirds required.