Bloodthirsty Liberal

Shame if something happened to it.

I was wondering how long this would take:

Labor leaders are pushing hard on President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats to drop a proposed new tax on high-value health insurance plans, warning of political consequences.

The White House has indicated the tax may change so it hits fewer workers — but it’s not going away.

A Monday evening meeting at the White House between Obama and about a dozen heads of the country’s biggest labor unions capped a day when two union leaders fired broadsides at Obama and Senate Democrats over their plans to pay for overhauling the nation’s health care system with a tax union leaders fear could hurt their workers.

The 40 percent tax would fall on employer health plans worth more than $8,500 for an individual or $23,000 for a family. Although Obama terms them “Cadillac” plans, union leaders say numerous working-class Americans who’ve negotiated good benefits in exchange for lesser pay would be hurt.

The president of the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka, warned that Democrats risk catastrophic election defeats similar to 1994 if they fail to come up with a health bill labor likes.

“A bad bill could have that kind of effect — a place where people sit at home” — as happened in 1994, when Democrats lost 54 House seats and eight in the Senate, costing them control of Congress, Trumka told reporters.

The head of the International Association of Firefighters, Harold A. Schaitberger, made similarly threatening remarks in a statement Monday. “The president’s support for the excise tax is a huge disappointment and cannot be ignored. If President Obama continues to support it and signs a bill that includes the excise tax on workers, we will hold him accountable,” said Schaitberger, who was not among the attendees at the White House meeting.

Didn’t the British burn the White House during the War of 1812? So it can happen, I guess. I’d want the firefighters on my side if I were him.

As much as anyone, Big Labor got this guy elected. Like everyone else—everyone—they’re wondering what the hell they did that for.

We’ve already covered the whole kerfuffle over the WSJ op-ed written by the CEO of Whole Foods.

It just keeps getting better and better (or worse and worse):

The UFCW (United Food and Commercial Workers), whose president earns $626,769 a year, has launched a campaign against Whole Foods, whose CEO earns $1 a year in salary.

Whole Foods CEO John Mackey’s total compensation is $33,831, and he has implemented executive pay limits for all of his executives.

Mackey’s sin? He offers his employees good benefits, and UFCW wants them to unionize so that their union bosses can make more money.

…

On Monday, August 24, 2009, the UFCW will be in front of the Whole Foods in Columbus, Ohio, at 3670 W. Dublin-Granville Rd., from approximately 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., and at the Whole Foods at 1555 W. Lane Ave. in Upper Arlington, Ohio, from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is liberal fascism in its purest form. Martino (or anyone else in the vicinity), sic ‘em.

I shop at Whole Foods, and find it more than a little precious in its presentation. But that’s fine. I just want to know if they have to import the Untied Nations represented by their workforce, or do they really all live locally. I mean, on any given day their cashiers look like they come from Jordan, Nepal, Mexico, Barbados, and Pakistan. I’m not kidding. Try finding an Irish kid from Southie anywhere near the place. Again, fine, but how—or why—do they accomplish that?

I just love to watch the unshaven, matted-haired, BO-ed shoppers at Whole Foods (and that’s just the women) flip out over this news that the CEO of their beloved grocery store believes in free enterprise and at least a somewhat limited government. Takes the firmness right out of their tofu.

Street gangs? Motorcycle toughs? Feuding hillbilly clans?

Nope, the New York Times:

The New York Times Co., which has threatened to shutter The Boston Globe, is seeking deep concessions from the Globe’s largest union that could include pay cuts of up to 20 percent, the elimination of seniority rules and lifetime job guarantees, and millions of dollars in cuts in company contributions to retirement and healthcare plans.

…

The list of possible concessions includes pay cuts, which could range from 5 to 20 percent, depending on what other cuts the union is willing to give up. For example, a pay cut could be lower if the union gives up paid holidays, union officials said.

Other concessions proposed by the Times Co. include the elimination of contributions to the pension fund and 401(k) retirement plans and a $1.5 million reduction in the company’s contribution to healthcare. The company also proposed the elimination of sick days, a 50 percent cut in severance pay for layoffs, and the lengthening of the workweek to 40 hours from 37.5.

Among the most controversial proposals are eliminating contract provisions that grant lifetime job protection to about 170 veteran Guild members and seniority rules that govern layoffs. Under the rules, the most recent hires are the first to be laid off.

Another management proposal seeks a one-time round of job cuts without regard to seniority, including those with job guarantees.

I like that approach to pay cuts and holidays: “Nice Easter ya got here. Shame if somethin’ happened to it.”

Can you imagine how much ink the Times would spill if any other employer tried these tactics? Walmart? Fuhgeddaboudit.

But the Globe isn’t just losing money: it’s hemorraging like a hemophiliac with a pesky case of ebola:

Without the union concessions and other cutbacks, the Globe is projected to lose $85 million this year, following a loss of about $50 million last year, according to an employee briefed on union discussions.

And how did those brilliant business minds as the Glob respond to this financial emergency?

By discouraging demand:

Days after its corporate parent demanded $20 million in concessions from 10 unions, The Boston Globe late Tuesday said it is increasing the newsstand price of its daily paper to $1 from 75 cents in the metropolitan area - and to $3.50 from $2.50 on Sundays.

“While it is never easy to raise the price of the newspaper, we feel it is necessary under current economic conditions,” Globe spokesman Robert Powers was quoted as saying on the paper’s Web site.

The daily cover price will increase to $1.50 outside “Greater Boston,” the Globe said. The Sunday cover price will increase to $4 outside Greater Boston. The Sunday price had been $2.50 inside and outside the city zone.

Price increases of 33% to 60%—that’s sure to increase plummeting circulation.

Are we laughing at the Glob’s misfortune? Sort of, but if they’re not taking this seriously, why should we?

No, I take that back: some of them are serious. In a way:

The long list of union givebacks was greeted with anger, concern, and sadness by some 200 union members who attended the meeting.

There’s that “s” word again. It’s the perfect word to describe liberal disappointment and disillusionment: “I’m sad.” Aww…

PS: It ain’t just the Times bustin’ heads:

Newspaper owners across the country are using dire warnings and, in some cases, blunt threats about economic survival to press unions to make concessions on wages, benefits, and work rules. And it’s working.

Is the Times owned by the Sulzberger family or the Soprano family?

Who keyed your car? A Republican.

Who slashed your tires? A Republican.

Who poured sugar in your gas tank? A Republican.

Who killed Detroit? Who do you think?

Reporting from Washington — The congressional push to help U.S. automakers was generally cast in terms of protecting the reeling national economy from another body blow — the collapse of one or more of Detroit’s Big Three.

But in killing the stopgap rescue plan worked out by President Bush and congressional Democrats, conservative Republicans — many from right-to-work states across the South — struck at an old enemy: organized labor.

Cue the fiendish laughter.

There’s even “proof”:

If the 2008 figures are cut off on your screen, take my word that the percentage donated by the Big Three to Republicans dips below fifty percent—which would suggest that the percentage donated to Democrats by Ford, GM, and Chrysler topped fifty percent.

Is that their point? Isn’t the point that labor donates overwhelmingly Democratic more demonstrable and less refutable?

How smart a strategy is that, Big Labor, to completely alienate one of only two political parties?

And so what if the auto industry total leans back toward Republicans? That’s such a broad slice of different businesses—suppliers, dealers, etc.—there’s no common thread of suspicion or guilt. After all, it’s not exactly a surprise that independent business people hew more toward the Republican course of lower taxes and less government red tape. Why would they endorse a party hostile to their interests?

In other words, this story is bogus. It is unsupported even by the very facts (percentage donated to Republicans vs. Democrats) it presents to support its case. Republicans have no wish to shutter entire industries and throw thousands of people out of work—even the most rabid Republican-hater would agree.

But Republicans are more committed to free enterprise—with the possibility of failure just as real as the possibility of success—than Democrats (or they used to be), and they have no reason to be charitable toward the auto unions who wouldn’t piss on a Republican if he were on fire.

Since when did that qualify as news?

UPDATE
Via Patterico, this story stinks even more:

The L.A. Times story on the failure of the bailout blamed it squarely on Republicans, in a story titled Senate Republicans kill auto bailout bill:

Republican opposition killed a $14-billion auto industry bailout plan in the Senate on Thursday night, putting the future of U.S. automakers in doubt and threatening to deliver another blow to the economy.

. . . .

Senate Democrats couldn’t bring the measure up for a vote without the support of at least 10 Republicans. Ultimately, they were seven votes short.

But wait! Via Instapundit, John McCormick at the Weekly Standard points out that Democrats had 10 Republican votes — enough votes to defeat the filibuster.

Of course, I wasn’t willing to accept that some Weekly Standard blogger got this right and the vaunted fact-checkers at the L.A. Times got it wrong. So I checked the actual votes at the Senate.gov website for myself. Here is the list of 10 Republican Senators I found voting “yea”:

Bond (R-MO), Yea
Brownback (R-KS), Yea
Collins (R-ME), Yea
Dole (R-NC), Yea
Domenici (R-NM), Yea
Lugar (R-IN), Yea
Snowe (R-ME), Yea
Specter (R-PA), Yea
Voinovich (R-OH), Yea
Warner (R-VA), Yea

…

Democrats had the votes, just not enough to provide political cover. So they offered a dishonest spin: that they simply didn’t have the votes.

And the L.A. Times was happy to repeat this false spin to readers.

Al Franken’s next book: Lies and the Lying Newspapers That Tell Them.

Can we all agree that the discussed bailout of Big Auto is actually anything but? A failing business model will continue to fail, no matter how much money you cram into it.

But the United Auto Workers could use the money. The state of Michigan could use the money. Reliable voters who reliably vote Democratic.

Tens and twenties okay, fellas?

GOP bailout stooge to Cavuto: “It’s not your money”

Behold the hubris of an entrenched Republican congressman shilling for the auto bailout. His name is Rep. Joe Knollenberg (R-Michigan) and you’ll be happy to know that he lost his re-election bid.

Attention, Republicans obsessed with “re-branding” the party and crafting appealing messages to win back voters. Here’s your textbook example of how not to act and what not to say if you want to restore credibility to conservatism.

The phrase “tipping point” is overused, but I fear we have reached a literal tipping point. The mass of people who now expect the government to do for them outweighs the mass of people who wish the government would do without them. Even hitherto conservatives now elbow aside the rest of the swarming pack at the public teat.

Where’d my country go?

The automobile industry still thrives in America. Just not in Detroit. Make of that what you will.

PS: At least someone is thinking straight.