I watched CSPAN in horror yesterday as billionaire bullys', House of Representative, Teaparty traitors rammed through a bill in the House of Representatives to destroy what's left of the National Labor Relations Board. This push to end the NLRB is a continuation of the massive campaign which attempts to end American unions and the middle class jobs they create. It is no doubt organized and funded by the billionaire bully, Koch Brothers, David and Charles.
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/09/koch-brothers-million-dollar-donor-club
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/irishred/wisconsin-recall-election-races_n_921215_101864009.html
Currently the NRLB is nearly toothless as a result of previous Republican Robbercons attacks. But what tiny bits of power it has left to protect our right to get middle class wages and benefits is being targeted for elimination by this bill.
Robbercons and the billionaire bullies that hire them want no shreds of regulation and power left to protect the middle class. All will be gone if this bill passes the Senate and if President Obama yet again 'compromises' with the Billionaire Bullys,' bought and paid for members, of Congress by giving in and allowing them to walk all over him.
Let's fight back against this attack.
Read the alert below on this same topic from the AFL.
Republicans Push NLRB Attack Bill Through House
http://blog.aflcio.org/2011/09/15/republicans-push-nlrb-attack-bill-through-house/
by Mike Hall, Sep 15, 2011
House Republicans today continued their attack on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) when they passed (238-186) a bill that would cripple the agency and allow employers to retaliate against workers who exercise their workplace rights. Under the bill, employers would even be able to legally eliminate workers’ jobs. The bill is not expected to be brought up for a Senate vote.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says about the bill (H.R. 2587):
Instead of creating good jobs, Tea Party Republicans are wasting time and playing partisan politics. H.R. 2587 is an over-reaching, special interest bill that advances the interests of corporate donors while attacking working people, their rights and their jobs. It’s one more example of an anti-worker agenda that’s bad for America and bad for the middle class.
Republicans, tea party extremists and business groups have used a routine complaint the NLRB issued against the Boeing Co. in April as cover for their near hysterical and sweeping attacks on workers and the NLRB.
In April, the general counsel of the nonpartisan, independent NLRB issued a complaint against Boeing for moving a planned production line for its 787 Dreamliner from its unionized Puget Sound, Wash., plant to a nonunion facility in South Carolina. The complaint says the move was in retaliation against the Puget Sound workers for having previously exercised their federally guaranteed right to strike against Boeing and to prevent these workers from striking in the future.
In a videotaped interview with The Seattle Times, a senior Boeing executive said, “the overriding factor” in the company’s decision to move the line wasn’t “the business climate. And it wasn’t the wages we’re paying today.” It was, he said, to avoid strikes. That is illegal. (For more information, check the NLRB’s fact sheet on the complaint against Boeing.)
In a letter to House members, AFL-CIO Government Affairs Director Bill Samuel says:
Retaliating against workers for exercising their legally protected rights, as Boeing is alleged to have done, is against the law, and has been for 75 years. H.R. 2587 would take away the NLRB’s authority to restore workers to their jobs when companies simply eliminate work in order to get rid of employees who are pro-union or when companies eliminate work to avoid their legal obligation to bargain.
Earlier this week 250 professors said the bill would mean that:
Employers will be able to eliminate jobs or transfer employees or work for no purpose other than to punish employees for exercising their rights and the Board will be powerless to direct the employer to return the work regardless of the circumstances. And these employees will lose their jobs because they tried to exercise their federally protected rights.
In June, an NLRB administrative law judge rejected Boeing’s motion to dismiss the charges. The case is now being heard in Seattle.
Yesterday, NLRB acting general counsel Lafe Solomon issued a statement, saying his decision to issue a complaint against Boeing “was based on a careful investigation and a review of the facts under longstanding federal labor law.”
The decision had absolutely nothing to do with political considerations, and there were no consultations with the White House. Regrettably, some have chosen to insert politics into what should be a straightforward legal procedure. These continuing political attacks are baseless and unprecedented and take the focus away from where it belongs—the ongoing trial in Seattle.
Says Trumka:
The American people are calling on Congress to focus on job creation. Shame on those who are pursuing a political agenda that does the bidding of big corporations.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Music program likely to be cut again this January 2012
The elementary music program has temporarily been re-instated by VUSD school board trustees.
http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/vista/article_03f567f3-a913-5dc1-815b-94657b480bba.html?mode=story
The music program is unlikely to survive past January when the new state projection of tax revenue income will be released. The January report will likely show that the state is not meeting the very rosy revenue projections found in last July's budget projections for this year.
Already the first month of the new budget year showed more than one half billion dollar shortfall over the July rosy scenario. This report, http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifreleased in August, from the State Comptroller’s office indicates more than a 10% short fall in revenues. Push that same shortfall forward six months to January and it could easily top six billion dollars.
http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/node/9248
Given the present economic condition, it is very unlikely that the January report will be anything, but awful. If that shortfall trend holds out until January, the state will be forced immediately to cut state funding to every entity that gets state funds including K-12 school district like VUSD.
At that point what the state promised in this years July 2011 budget to provide to VUSD won't matter. State promises for funds are all predicated on the state actually taking in the money needed to meet those promises.
Without expected money coming in, the state will be forced to make cuts in January to match its expenditures. This will require drastic reductions in state funds to school districts, state colleges, and health and welfare programs for elderly disabled and ill. State expenditures must match income, as required by law.
This coming January cut will also have TWICE the impact because at that point in time, the state will have already supplied money (at least ten percent too much) for the first six months of the budget year to K-12 school districts, etc. That previous July-January funding will have been based on the state tax income coming in at the predicted level which we already know it will not. Since the tax revenues will likely not come in the state will have spent "too much" for that first six months.
So in January 2012, the cuts for the last six months of the budget year (January to June) must be double. The state must make up for the too much money already given out PLUS reduce the amount it had planned to spend for the next six months. That means DOUBLE the impact on school districts for the last six months of the school year.
To match local VUSD spending to these likely massive January cuts, look for the elementary music program to be lost again this January. That music program cut will be one of many other onerous reductions in local school services needed at that time.
I see no way but a shortened school year for VUSD and other school districts in the state, perhaps by as much as a month, to meet the looming January shortfall in revenue from the state. (A shortened school year reduces school district costs by cutting employee salaries, as well as school site lighting, heating and AC costs).
The cause of this funding gap is the direct result of SACRAMENTO Republicans who refused to allow, we the people, to decide for ourselves whether we wanted these drastic cuts to our schools or whether we might chose to extend existing taxes for five more years.
A special election was needed last June to allow, we the people, to stop these cuts with a tax extension but that did not happen. Washington DC http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giflobbyist, Grover Norquist, convinced (cowed with threats?) every single Sacramento Republican and got them all to say “no” to the people’s right to vote. http://www.sacbee.com/2011/05/25/3651880/jerry-brown-grover-norquist-spar.html
Due to the archaic 2/3rds majority rule in California, Republican votes were absolutely required for this measure to reach the ballot. Only four elected Sacramento Republicans were needed to allow us the right to vote. But every single SACRAMENTO REPUBLICAN refused to allow us that right to decide.
OUR LOCAL SACRAMENTO REPUBLICANS:
California Assembly
Martin Garrick (R) (760)929-7998(When not drunk driving, now running for Mark Wyland's state senate office)
Nathan Fletcher (R) (858) 689-6290 (running for mayor of San Diego)
Diane Harkey (R) (760) 757-8084 (Jim Gibson ran a nasty campaign against her for her Sacramento Assembly seat and lost a few years back.)
California Senate
Mark Wyland (R) (760) 931-2455 (term limited out of office in 2012-- by far the most personable of our local Republicans)
*The State of California provides between 80 and 90% of the funds to run local schools. Local taxes are the far far less important than state revenues for vast majority of school districts in the state including VUSD.
http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/vista/article_03f567f3-a913-5dc1-815b-94657b480bba.html?mode=story
The music program is unlikely to survive past January when the new state projection of tax revenue income will be released. The January report will likely show that the state is not meeting the very rosy revenue projections found in last July's budget projections for this year.
Already the first month of the new budget year showed more than one half billion dollar shortfall over the July rosy scenario. This report, http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifreleased in August, from the State Comptroller’s office indicates more than a 10% short fall in revenues. Push that same shortfall forward six months to January and it could easily top six billion dollars.
http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/node/9248
Given the present economic condition, it is very unlikely that the January report will be anything, but awful. If that shortfall trend holds out until January, the state will be forced immediately to cut state funding to every entity that gets state funds including K-12 school district like VUSD.
At that point what the state promised in this years July 2011 budget to provide to VUSD won't matter. State promises for funds are all predicated on the state actually taking in the money needed to meet those promises.
Without expected money coming in, the state will be forced to make cuts in January to match its expenditures. This will require drastic reductions in state funds to school districts, state colleges, and health and welfare programs for elderly disabled and ill. State expenditures must match income, as required by law.
This coming January cut will also have TWICE the impact because at that point in time, the state will have already supplied money (at least ten percent too much) for the first six months of the budget year to K-12 school districts, etc. That previous July-January funding will have been based on the state tax income coming in at the predicted level which we already know it will not. Since the tax revenues will likely not come in the state will have spent "too much" for that first six months.
So in January 2012, the cuts for the last six months of the budget year (January to June) must be double. The state must make up for the too much money already given out PLUS reduce the amount it had planned to spend for the next six months. That means DOUBLE the impact on school districts for the last six months of the school year.
To match local VUSD spending to these likely massive January cuts, look for the elementary music program to be lost again this January. That music program cut will be one of many other onerous reductions in local school services needed at that time.
I see no way but a shortened school year for VUSD and other school districts in the state, perhaps by as much as a month, to meet the looming January shortfall in revenue from the state. (A shortened school year reduces school district costs by cutting employee salaries, as well as school site lighting, heating and AC costs).
The cause of this funding gap is the direct result of SACRAMENTO Republicans who refused to allow, we the people, to decide for ourselves whether we wanted these drastic cuts to our schools or whether we might chose to extend existing taxes for five more years.
A special election was needed last June to allow, we the people, to stop these cuts with a tax extension but that did not happen. Washington DC http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giflobbyist, Grover Norquist, convinced (cowed with threats?) every single Sacramento Republican and got them all to say “no” to the people’s right to vote. http://www.sacbee.com/2011/05/25/3651880/jerry-brown-grover-norquist-spar.html
Due to the archaic 2/3rds majority rule in California, Republican votes were absolutely required for this measure to reach the ballot. Only four elected Sacramento Republicans were needed to allow us the right to vote. But every single SACRAMENTO REPUBLICAN refused to allow us that right to decide.
OUR LOCAL SACRAMENTO REPUBLICANS:
California Assembly
Martin Garrick (R) (760)929-7998(When not drunk driving, now running for Mark Wyland's state senate office)
Nathan Fletcher (R) (858) 689-6290 (running for mayor of San Diego)
Diane Harkey (R) (760) 757-8084 (Jim Gibson ran a nasty campaign against her for her Sacramento Assembly seat and lost a few years back.)
California Senate
Mark Wyland (R) (760) 931-2455 (term limited out of office in 2012-- by far the most personable of our local Republicans)
*The State of California provides between 80 and 90% of the funds to run local schools. Local taxes are the far far less important than state revenues for vast majority of school districts in the state including VUSD.
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