Unions: A tumblr Grab

rowantheexplorer 

Unions are why you have 5 day, 40 hour full-time work weeks. Unions are why they have to pay you in actual dollars instead of “company credits” that you can only spend at the company-owned stores. Unions are why there are f-- fire exits at your place of work. Unions are why it’s not okay for your supermarket ground beef to be any percentage human.

You think your company pays you out of the goodness of their hearts? Or even out of “market pressure?” The “job market” is a myth perpetuated by the capitalists. Corporations would pay you nothing if they could get away with it. And you argue “oh, but if they paid me nothing I’d just go to another one.” Wrong. Because to maximize profits, they all want to pay you nothing. Corporations exist to maximize profits while reducing risk for investors. It’s part of their entire function to find ways to cut costs as much as possible, and that includes finding ways to pay you nothing.

Unions are your defense against that. You think all a union does is strike? If you pay union dues, a lot of that is spent on lobbyists in various governments reminding your lawmakers that you have rights as a living human being that a corporation should not be able to stomp all over. Unions hire lawyers so that if you’re fired for bullshit reasons, the union can stand up for you against your boss. They’re called unions because workers are uniting to pool resources so that they can stand up to these corporate overlords with more money than God. Unions exist because you might not have the words, resources, or time to fight workplace injustices all by yourself. That’s the whole fucking point.

And if a business shuts down because a union is striking, it’s because the business was abusing people and didn’t deserve to be in business anyway. Don’t make excuses for the corporations. They already have trillions of dollars and a couple million lawyers to do that for themselves. They don’t need your help.

starfleet-louvelune 

All that and also, the idea that unions go to war whenever anything is done to any employee even for good reason, is: a lie.
It’s the same PR scam as the “old lady sued McDonald’s for millions because her coffee was hot” shit.

The *company* is the one that wants you to believe, just because they said so, that the firing was legit and the employee’s fault. But guess what? Doesn’t happen. When someone is fired for refusing or failing to do their job, the other employees are *relieved*, because they’ve been the ones catching the consequences.
Look a bit closer, and you find the union’s strike responds to OUTRAGEOUS moves, either “she got cancer and it would have been a drag on the company to finance her sick leave”, or “we made profit this year but not enough to our liking, so we’re cutting off 10% of the workers to pocket more."

A Preliminary Strategic Cultural Assessment of the US 2020 Political and Election Operating Environment

by Adam Silverman, writing for Balloon Juice
…
It is exceedingly important to understand the American operating environment in 2019 and going into 2020, especially for those planning on running for office or working on their campaigns, and to place their campaign strategies and planning, and, perhaps, their campaigns themselves within the context that the US is at war. Putin has made it very clear since 2014 that as far as he was concerned Russia was, at least, in a new cold war with the US and the US was the aggressor. And 2014 is around when he started to really ramp up his active measures and cyberwarfare campaign of information and psychological warfare against the US, the EU, and NATO. At the same time the US is also enmeshed in a low intensity internal war between revanchists who seek to establish a white Christian herrenvolk state and society and those that don’t. This is largely breaking along party lines. The Republicans, especially the base that supports the President, fighting for herrenvolkism. The Democratic Parties broad multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, and multi-religious coalition fighting against it. And Putin’s active measures campaign, his war against the US, is stoking the Republicans and seeking to demoralize and deactivate the Democrats. This is the theater of operations in which everything – from the primaries to the general election to senatorial and congressional elections to state and local elections – will take place over the next two years... read more.

Shut Down Webgrabs

David Martin Micky... Try to understand this. Your guy slashed taxes on the wealthiest Americans driving the deficit up to $779 billion, which must be borrowed at interest, raising the deficit even more. Now he wants $5 billion more to pay for a wall he promised us Mexico would pay for. And now you’re praising him for “saving billions”? Think again. Government shutdowns do not save anything. Workers who are now showing up to work without pay will have to be paid eventually. Projects that are put on hold will have to be completed. The delays will likely cost more in the long run. The good news is you don’t have to support him to be a conservative. There is nothing “conservative” about this man. He is rash, foolhardy, impulsive, and wasteful - the exact opposite of conservative. He tells you one thing then does or says something else - because he thinks you’re stupid. Please prove him wrong.

First Reaction: False Equivalency Edition

I can see the headline now: 

"25 HIGH SCHOOL KIDS KILLED BY MAN WITH CELL PHONE"

From The Comments, Welfare Edition

Robert Reich posted on Facebook a New York Times article about the impending stock market crash, of which he said, "A recession is on its way. But don't join Trump in blaming the Fed. The real problem is Trump himself: His tax cut for corporations and the wealthy -- almost exactly a year old -- were frittered away as corporations used their tax savings to buy back their own shares of stock, and the wealthy used theirs to gamble in the stock market. These steroids wore off as soon as the spending stopped. The rest of us are left holding the bag of a giant deficit. 
And Trump's trade war with China is causing the entire global economy to quake. No surprise there, either. When the largest and second-largest economies in the world collide, the losses are huge.

No, the Fed isn't doing this. Trump is. He took the credit for the stock market boom. But the odds he’ll accept responsibility for the bust are zero."

. From the comments: 

I have read many of the comments here, not all. Let me tell you how it works for the poor people who are not in the stock market. 15 years ago I was working making $50,000 a year. I had already worked for 20 years and I was doing well. 14 years ago I was in an accident that broke my body so bad that I was unable to work anymore. I had to apply for disability. During the time I had to wait and appeal (because they always turn you down the first time), I was forced to use my savings to live and pay bills, including doctor, hospital, and prescription bills. By the time my disability was approved, I had lost my house, all of my life savings, my wife, and had sold almost everything of value that I spent a lifetime acquiring. I kept my son who is the most valuable thing in my life so that was the only good thing that happened. So after the government made sure I was poor they started their ongoing effort to keep me poor. Just as they do with the elderly, disabled, and the rest of the poor in our country. My son and I found ourselves living on $1,000 a month. Of course, we had assistance with Medicare, Medicaid, and other social service programs. These were services that I had paid into my entire working life to ensure that I would have income in case something happened and I couldn't work. I paid my share of disability insurance premiums out of every paycheck, then had to fight my own government to get what I was promised. When Obama was in office things got a little better for us and it looked like we might be able to live with some dignity. When Trump was elected it seems like the first thing he and the Republicans tried to do was take the things away from us that we needed to survive. We rely on food stamps to eat, and I'm not ashamed of that. But people don't understand how that works. My son and I get less than $200.00 a month for food, they don't pay for any prepared food, or toiletries, household goods, or many of the other things needed to live. Even with food stamps and assistance, you are never allowed to get a dollar ahead. A good example is my $10.00 raise in my disability payment. The day after I got my 2019 statement showing my increase I received a letter saying my food stamp amount was reduced by $11.00 due to my raise. Now the Republicans want to cut my disability, they want to cut Medicare, Medicaid, reduce or end the food stamp program. They want to eliminate the prescription medications that control my pain and allow me to do things most people take for granted, like basic hygiene, and simple household duties. Since Trump was elected it appears that the Grand Old Party is engaged in an all-out war to kill me and people like me. When Obama was president I could go to sleep at night thinking that things were getting better for us. Now I go to bed and I can't sleep because my government is trying to kill me, and everyone else who isn't rich, white, and male. So how well the stock market is doing is a worthless measure for people like us. I know the economy directly affects all of us but those of us at the bottom don't celebrate when the rich get richer. I get tired of hearing that people in my situation are the problem in this country. I get tired of being called a taker for using the programs that are in place to assist people like me. I'm tired of my own government giving trillions to the rich, paying for more than a dozen wars, and conflicts around the world that we have no business being involved in, and giving money away to foreign countries while taking it away from American citizens. All in all, I'm just tired of our country being run by a bunch of old, white millionaires who are so power mad that they don't care if the country goes to hell, as long as they are in charge when it does. - Jim Schoeff

The Non-Citizen Welfare Recipiants of Foxworld

In Foxworld, non-citizens are able to get welfare and free medical care, 

and that's why "illegals" (yes, there are Fascists living in Foxworld) like

living in America so much.

First Reaction: Gun Control Edition

Soo... if the Government tells me they're going to tear down my house to build a highway,

who do I shoot?