As a former Wisconsinite, and inhabitant of the great city of Milwaukee (which featured a number of Socialist Mayors, including Emil Seidl and Frank Zeidler) it pains me no end to behold what's going on now in my birth state. What we have is the spectacle of a newly installed Repuke governor, Scott Walker, attempting to balance the state's budget on the backs of workers ...in order to give more tax cuts to the state's wealthiest. This cannot be allowed!
Already protestors have occupied the State House in Madison, the capital, and thousands of teachers and other union workers are on strike, as Walker threatens to restore order by hunting down vacated Dem legislators and siccing the National Guard on protesting citizens.
Make no mistake this is a brazen attempt to not only disenfranshise workers of their collective bargaining rights (so it will go the way of pathetic Florida - which has had de-balled unions since 1963) but also split the vast middle and working classes- pitting unionized workers against non-unionized, public-sector workers against non-public, older workers within sight of Medicare and Social Security against younger workers who don't believe these programs will be there for them, and the poor against the working middle class.
This is why it must not be allowed to happen, and instead, Wisconsin show other states the template to use for confronting similar cost-slashing tactics.
As for Walker's National Guard threats, this hearkens back to the dark days in this country (around the middle of the last century) when corporations hired goons to bust unions and also enlisted military and other surveillance in their nefarious plans.
With enormous leaps in worker (Union) power, culminating in the achievement of the 40-hour week in the 1940s, the proto-fascist Corporate State began to feel itself under siege. Somehow a means had to be found to dilute the power of unions and, if possible, eliminate them entirely.
Unions largely were for the goal of representing the person and workers' rights. To prevent child labor, to make sure working conditions and remuneration were reasonable, and the work site as free from harmful and deleterious conditions as feasible. The trouble was that all such concessions were overly costly to the corporate state. In actual fact, the appearance of unionization threatened to level the playing field of capital, and make a more equal ownership possible, between corporate 'super-persons' (as declared in the 1886 Santa Clara decision by the then Supreme court) and ordinary flesh and blood persons.
This equalization of capital ownership was something the corporations couldn't tolerate. They didn't want to shrink the working week to 40 hours, for example, because that would inflate the cost of their capital. They'd need to hire more workers, at the same or higher wages, to maintain the same production levels- thereby lowering available capital. Much better to have fewer slaves.....errrr ...workers...and pound them for 60-70 hours at a time with the same low wage rate.
The same rationale applied to paying overtime for weekends or after hours work, or using millions of dollars to render a workplace safe. Or shelling out health or pension benefits. Or ceasing to use child workers where it suited their needs. In each of these, the dilution of capital threatened the corporation's hegemony and existence. (In its own perceptions.)
With this in mind, programs and strategies began to unfold that thwarted the aims and progress of unions. But a security apparatus had to first be formed that would accomplish several objectives:
i) Track and monitor all union and/or anti-corporate activity
ii) Maintain dossiers on all individuals workers - particularly union members and sympathizers
iii) Implement a unified strategy to penalize these individuals, by excluding them from the workforce.
To accomplish these goals, the American Security Council was formed. As a (much later) article in The Washington Post observed (1/8/79, p C1):
"It has been called 'The Cold War Campus' and 'The Heart of the Military-Industrial Complex'"
The origins of the ASC begin almost at the apex of Trade Union power in the United States, after Army and business surveillance of workers became linked in common cause (Russ Bellant, Old Nazis, The New Right and The Republican Party, South End Press, Boston, 1991, page 30):
"the ASC is not just the representative of the military-industrial complex, it is the personification of the military-industrial complex....it began in Chicago in 1955, staffed primarily by former FBI agents. In its first year it was called the Mid-American Research Library. Corporations joined to take advantage of what former FBI agent William Turner described as ...'a dossier system modeled after the FBI's, which was intended to weed out employees and prospective employees deemed disloyal to the free enterprise system..
Although the ASC began as an anti-labor operation with support from Sears, and other businesses, it soon became involved in foreign policy issues. It co-sponsored a series of annual meetings from 1955 to 1961 called National Military-Industrial Conferences in which elements of the Pentagon, National Security Council, and organizations linked to the CIA discussed cold war strategy with leaders of many large corporations, such as United Fruit, Standard Oil, Honeywell, U.S. Steel, and of course, Sears Roebuck"
What we see then is that Walker's tactics aren't novel. With the rise of trade unionism, a virulent merger of interests began to metastasize - bringing in corporate, military and intelligence interests for suppression of the rights of workers, while placing all workers in increasingly compromised positions by virtue of steady and aggressive surveillance. (Jensen, J.M.: Army Surveillance in America: 1775-1980, Chapter 7: Watching the Workers, Yale University Press, 1991. )
This reached its culmination in corporate America by the mid-1990s with special technology to monitor computer keystrokes, and installation of video cameras behind mirrors in various places, i.e. restrooms, storage rooms, lunch rooms or even in light fixtures above toilet stalls. Some managers have even been known to carry concealed micro-video recorders, i.e. mounted on tie pins, to record employees words and actions during critical discussions.
Throughout corridors, the movement and facial expressions of employees can be rigorously tracked using other hidden cameras inside other fixtures, such as 'Exit' signs. Digital records can also be made, and kept in employee files, along with comments regarding the expressions, or perceived behaviors at the time observed, i.e.:
"Displays overt hostile demeanor, and shifty eyes, suggest increased surveillance..."
"Displays passive-aggressive behavior and tendencies, recommend more complete monitoring...."
In point of fact, the American worker - once he enters the hallowed halls of a Corporation, is never alone. What's more, the employee foregoes all rights, including free speech. (Say, like responding in a positive manner to this post, and your employer picks it up) In a 1994 decision, 'Waters vs. Churchill', the Supreme Court made clear:
" that an employee's speech is not protected."
- if the Corporation perceives the speech "detracts from effective operations."
Now, the Fascist Scott Walker wants to complete the process and render public workers total serfs without any power at all, even as he guts their pay and benefits - demanding they take an effective 15% pay cut to pay for their own benefits! This means a worker earning $44,000 a year will now, after taxes, bring home barely $28,000 and won't likely be able to make rent anymore - especially as food prices are exploding through the roof because of commodities increases (made worse by this idiot country still persisting in burning corn to get ethanol!)
Wisconsinites must fight until the last dog is hung! They can't let this neo-Confederate reverse Carpetbagger destroy the state and its unions!
Already protestors have occupied the State House in Madison, the capital, and thousands of teachers and other union workers are on strike, as Walker threatens to restore order by hunting down vacated Dem legislators and siccing the National Guard on protesting citizens.
Make no mistake this is a brazen attempt to not only disenfranshise workers of their collective bargaining rights (so it will go the way of pathetic Florida - which has had de-balled unions since 1963) but also split the vast middle and working classes- pitting unionized workers against non-unionized, public-sector workers against non-public, older workers within sight of Medicare and Social Security against younger workers who don't believe these programs will be there for them, and the poor against the working middle class.
This is why it must not be allowed to happen, and instead, Wisconsin show other states the template to use for confronting similar cost-slashing tactics.
As for Walker's National Guard threats, this hearkens back to the dark days in this country (around the middle of the last century) when corporations hired goons to bust unions and also enlisted military and other surveillance in their nefarious plans.
With enormous leaps in worker (Union) power, culminating in the achievement of the 40-hour week in the 1940s, the proto-fascist Corporate State began to feel itself under siege. Somehow a means had to be found to dilute the power of unions and, if possible, eliminate them entirely.
Unions largely were for the goal of representing the person and workers' rights. To prevent child labor, to make sure working conditions and remuneration were reasonable, and the work site as free from harmful and deleterious conditions as feasible. The trouble was that all such concessions were overly costly to the corporate state. In actual fact, the appearance of unionization threatened to level the playing field of capital, and make a more equal ownership possible, between corporate 'super-persons' (as declared in the 1886 Santa Clara decision by the then Supreme court) and ordinary flesh and blood persons.
This equalization of capital ownership was something the corporations couldn't tolerate. They didn't want to shrink the working week to 40 hours, for example, because that would inflate the cost of their capital. They'd need to hire more workers, at the same or higher wages, to maintain the same production levels- thereby lowering available capital. Much better to have fewer slaves.....errrr ...workers...and pound them for 60-70 hours at a time with the same low wage rate.
The same rationale applied to paying overtime for weekends or after hours work, or using millions of dollars to render a workplace safe. Or shelling out health or pension benefits. Or ceasing to use child workers where it suited their needs. In each of these, the dilution of capital threatened the corporation's hegemony and existence. (In its own perceptions.)
With this in mind, programs and strategies began to unfold that thwarted the aims and progress of unions. But a security apparatus had to first be formed that would accomplish several objectives:
i) Track and monitor all union and/or anti-corporate activity
ii) Maintain dossiers on all individuals workers - particularly union members and sympathizers
iii) Implement a unified strategy to penalize these individuals, by excluding them from the workforce.
To accomplish these goals, the American Security Council was formed. As a (much later) article in The Washington Post observed (1/8/79, p C1):
"It has been called 'The Cold War Campus' and 'The Heart of the Military-Industrial Complex'"
The origins of the ASC begin almost at the apex of Trade Union power in the United States, after Army and business surveillance of workers became linked in common cause (Russ Bellant, Old Nazis, The New Right and The Republican Party, South End Press, Boston, 1991, page 30):
"the ASC is not just the representative of the military-industrial complex, it is the personification of the military-industrial complex....it began in Chicago in 1955, staffed primarily by former FBI agents. In its first year it was called the Mid-American Research Library. Corporations joined to take advantage of what former FBI agent William Turner described as ...'a dossier system modeled after the FBI's, which was intended to weed out employees and prospective employees deemed disloyal to the free enterprise system..
Although the ASC began as an anti-labor operation with support from Sears, and other businesses, it soon became involved in foreign policy issues. It co-sponsored a series of annual meetings from 1955 to 1961 called National Military-Industrial Conferences in which elements of the Pentagon, National Security Council, and organizations linked to the CIA discussed cold war strategy with leaders of many large corporations, such as United Fruit, Standard Oil, Honeywell, U.S. Steel, and of course, Sears Roebuck"
What we see then is that Walker's tactics aren't novel. With the rise of trade unionism, a virulent merger of interests began to metastasize - bringing in corporate, military and intelligence interests for suppression of the rights of workers, while placing all workers in increasingly compromised positions by virtue of steady and aggressive surveillance. (Jensen, J.M.: Army Surveillance in America: 1775-1980, Chapter 7: Watching the Workers, Yale University Press, 1991. )
This reached its culmination in corporate America by the mid-1990s with special technology to monitor computer keystrokes, and installation of video cameras behind mirrors in various places, i.e. restrooms, storage rooms, lunch rooms or even in light fixtures above toilet stalls. Some managers have even been known to carry concealed micro-video recorders, i.e. mounted on tie pins, to record employees words and actions during critical discussions.
Throughout corridors, the movement and facial expressions of employees can be rigorously tracked using other hidden cameras inside other fixtures, such as 'Exit' signs. Digital records can also be made, and kept in employee files, along with comments regarding the expressions, or perceived behaviors at the time observed, i.e.:
"Displays overt hostile demeanor, and shifty eyes, suggest increased surveillance..."
"Displays passive-aggressive behavior and tendencies, recommend more complete monitoring...."
In point of fact, the American worker - once he enters the hallowed halls of a Corporation, is never alone. What's more, the employee foregoes all rights, including free speech. (Say, like responding in a positive manner to this post, and your employer picks it up) In a 1994 decision, 'Waters vs. Churchill', the Supreme Court made clear:
" that an employee's speech is not protected."
- if the Corporation perceives the speech "detracts from effective operations."
Now, the Fascist Scott Walker wants to complete the process and render public workers total serfs without any power at all, even as he guts their pay and benefits - demanding they take an effective 15% pay cut to pay for their own benefits! This means a worker earning $44,000 a year will now, after taxes, bring home barely $28,000 and won't likely be able to make rent anymore - especially as food prices are exploding through the roof because of commodities increases (made worse by this idiot country still persisting in burning corn to get ethanol!)
Wisconsinites must fight until the last dog is hung! They can't let this neo-Confederate reverse Carpetbagger destroy the state and its unions!
No comments:
Post a Comment