Obama Tries The Back Door If He Can't Get In The Front Door

When I was running a group of Department stores I used this pitch to help de-certify the unions.  " You  think by going union you will be protected from management."  Let's say,"You are fired for a reason that you think is unfair and you don't have a union to protect you. The NLRB a government body is there to look after your interests and make sure you are treated fairly.  Management, you and a NLRB member sit down and hear your case.  The final decision is made by the NLRB.  You pay no dues and your job is saved.(If the employer was wrong).  Now assume you belonged to a union and the same thing happened.  The meeting would be the same except one more party would be there (your union representative) the results would be the same, but, you would be paying dues.

Now, what happens if a SIEU member (Strongest most powerful union ) becomes the head of the government s National Labor Relations Board?  Well, it has happened and Obama gave him this position after Senate Democrats refused to confirm him to the NLRB.  Now, as a top lawyer for the SEIU Mr. Becker has suggested that the NLRB has the legal authority  to impose card check-which eliminates secret ballots in union elections-without the approval of congress.  And lo, at the end of August the NLRB dropped the bombshell, when, in a 3-2 decision, it decided to re-visit it's important 2007 Dana Corp. ruling.

Card check is a top labor priority because it allows a workplace to be organized if 50% of workers at the site sign a union card. Without a national law, unions have tried to persuade individual businesses to allow card check rather than secret ballots, and some have gone along.

When a workplace is organized after a  secret ballot, workers are barred from a vote to "decertify" the union until after the the first negotiated contract expires.  In it's Dana decision, however, the NLRB recognized that card check was an inferior substitute to secret ballots. It therefore held that when a company recognized a union via a card check, workers had the right to force an immediate secret vote on whether they really wanted to join that union.

The dana ruling is about protecting workers from union harassment.  and if card check is as popular as unions claim, labor leaders should have no problem letting workers vote to ratify or reject a card check process.  As NLRB member Peter Schaumber a Bush appointee, noted in his dissent to the NLRB decision to revisit the case, the dana ruling has in no way chilled the current card check process.

Since dana was decided, unions have been recognized via card check in 1,111 cases.  The ruling has merely provided over site.  In 54 of these cases, workers have demanded and received a vote on organization; In 15 of those elections workers voted against the union.  This Dana reversal raises more questions about Mr. Beckers ethical standards.  The labor lawyer has already refused to recuse himself from cases involving the SEIU, his former employer.  Now, it turns out he has filed a brief for the AFL-CIO in the original dana case, arguing that there is no essential difference between card check and secret ballots and calling dana style protections "bad labor relations policy".  Mr.Becker is clearly biased against dana and by any reasonable standard should not be able to rule on it.

Now that Mr. Obama went around the back door of congress to appoint his Mr. Becker it's time for Congress  to investigate Mr. Becker's conflict of interest and turn the sensible dana decision into a statute that Mr. Obama's appointees can't override!

Government Hit List Is Being Developed

As a consequence of us getting 30 million additional people health care, at the margins that's going to increase our costs-President Obama said "We knew that" at his press conference Friday in response to a question about rising health spending. 

That wasn't how he sold the plan,but, anyway, that's a truism.  Heres another: The White House was always going to blame insurance companies for any cost increases, even when it's own policies cause them.

Witness Kathleen Sibelius's Thursday letter to America's Health Insurance Plans, the industry trade group-a thuggish message even by her standards.  The Health and Human Secretary wrote that some insurers have been attributing part of their 2011 premium increases to Obama Care and warned them that:"There would be zero tolerance for this type of misinformation and unjustified rate increases."

Zero tolerance for expressing an opinion, or offering an explanation to policyholders?  They're more subtle than this in Caraces.

What Ms. Sibelius really means is that the government will prohibit insurers from doing business if reality is not politically convenient for Democrats. Obama Care includes a slew of mandated benefits for next year, such as allowing children to remain on their parents plan until they are 26 and "free" preventive care (IE, no direct out-of-pocket cost sharing for consumers.) The tone of Ms. Sibelius's letter suggests that she doesn't understand that money is exchanged for goods and services, and that if Congress mandates new benefits, premiums will rise.

The Administration estimated that these regulations should increase all premiums by 1% to 2% on average.  That isn't what insurers are finding in practice in the local, price sensitive individual and small business insurance markets, where coverage is typically less comprehensive to hold down costs.
For some current policies in some states, the one-year increase jumps as much as 9%,

Obama Care gives Ms. Sibelius's regulators the power to define "unreasonable" premium hikes, which will mean whatever they decide it will mean later this fall. She promised to keep a list of insurer's "with a record of unjustified rate increases" and then to bar them from Obama Care's subsidized "exchanges" when they come on line in 2014. In other words, insurers must except price controls now or face the retribution of a de facto ban on selling their products to consumers four years from now.

Democrats built this system and now they own it politically.  The least they could do is to take credit for it's consequences.  It seems to me that the Obama Administration is hell bent on driving all of these people out of business so he can have his single payer plan which he has always wanted.

Congress To Send States More Aid

Congress took a decisive step Wednesday toward finalizing a $26 billion bill offering aid to states, a surprise win for Democrats keen to demonstrate they are taking action on an economy showing signs of weakness. The bill, designed to prevent teacher layoffs and help states with their Medicade payments, comes after months of foot dragging.  Lawmakers have proven reluctant to spend money on everything from stimulus projects to additional unemployment insurance, amid increasing voter concernabout the size of the u.s. budget deficit.

Wednesday's 61-38 vote in the Senate overcame a filibuster and made final passage in the Senate likely as soon as Thursday August 5th. Nancy Polisi responded by calling back House Members from their summer recess. ( A rare move ) then she will send it back to the presidents desk.

Republicans warned that states were becoming too dependent on federal aid. "For the first time in our history, the federal government is the single largest source of revenue for the states." Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnel (R.ky.) "When does it end?"

Republicans also complained about the bill's revenue source.  The legislation is paid for in part by imposing new limits on foriegn tax credits used by u.s. multinationalists to lower the taxes they pay this country.  Republicans said this would drive companies, and jobs, overseas.

When so many states so far in debt come to a Republican House for help when they are in control, I'm afraid the answer will be, Sorry!