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Dea Certe
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PTO,
Since you asked, I'll give you my thoughts. Frankly, I think what you are doing is disgusting. You aren't helping NWA survive. Just take a look at how well the executives at NWA have rewarded themselves while crying "bankruptcy." Is there anything remotely noble about that?
Unions are not the reason our once-great nation is becoming a second class economy. Corporate Greed is. You are simply helping the rich get richer. The distribution of wealth in this country is out of wack and you are directly responsible for this injustice.
Many of today's "elite" create nothing, contribute nothing to the well-being of society. You are being used. You are a pawn. Remember, once this strike is over, the "elite" will still be safe in their gated communities. You will return to the "plebelands" you helped established. You are destroying any chance that your children will have for the opportunity for a good education, decent housing and a living wage.
You are also cheating the nation, OUR country out of taxes. When 90% of the population are making and paying taxes on their minium wage paychecks, who's going to pay for the military to protect our country, for the infrastructure that keeps America the best place to live?
PTO, there's no rational excuse for you to do what you are doing. You are a problem, not just for the brave men and women who took a stand, but for the entire economy.
Chickens do come home to roost, and they will roost in your front yard. Sadly, the rest of us will have to live with the chicken droppings you spread.
Obviously, you find some perverse delight in harming others. I don't understand it. From reading your posts, I'm reminded of Tokoyo Rose. But, you are undermining your own self in the long run. I find you just plain tragic.
Dea
Since you asked, I'll give you my thoughts. Frankly, I think what you are doing is disgusting. You aren't helping NWA survive. Just take a look at how well the executives at NWA have rewarded themselves while crying "bankruptcy." Is there anything remotely noble about that?
Unions are not the reason our once-great nation is becoming a second class economy. Corporate Greed is. You are simply helping the rich get richer. The distribution of wealth in this country is out of wack and you are directly responsible for this injustice.
Many of today's "elite" create nothing, contribute nothing to the well-being of society. You are being used. You are a pawn. Remember, once this strike is over, the "elite" will still be safe in their gated communities. You will return to the "plebelands" you helped established. You are destroying any chance that your children will have for the opportunity for a good education, decent housing and a living wage.
You are also cheating the nation, OUR country out of taxes. When 90% of the population are making and paying taxes on their minium wage paychecks, who's going to pay for the military to protect our country, for the infrastructure that keeps America the best place to live?
PTO, there's no rational excuse for you to do what you are doing. You are a problem, not just for the brave men and women who took a stand, but for the entire economy.
Chickens do come home to roost, and they will roost in your front yard. Sadly, the rest of us will have to live with the chicken droppings you spread.
Obviously, you find some perverse delight in harming others. I don't understand it. From reading your posts, I'm reminded of Tokoyo Rose. But, you are undermining your own self in the long run. I find you just plain tragic.
Dea
PlayTheOdds
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Dea, If the majority of union members had your couth and mentality I just might change my mind. From what I have seen they are just a bunch of bums trying to get something for nothing.
FYI: I live in a gated community and my kids go to a private school.
FYI: I live in a gated community and my kids go to a private school.
KCFlyer
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PlayTheOdds said:
I used to live in a "gated community"...the apartment complex (that also housed Section 8 housing) had a gate at the entrance. Means nothing really.
I used to be pretty much an anti-union guy, but as I watched good paying jobs be sent across the border, and "white collar" jobs be "offshored" or offered to H1B visa holders, who will work for a lot less than the people they replace. Over time, we'll become a nation of the low paid - unable to afford the goods produced overseas because they still price it as though top dollar American labor was used in it's production.
That's a very good point, KC, but I'm still unconvinced that continued strong union activity will bring us to the point to reverse the trend you are describing. By no means do I agree with what PTO is doing, in fact I do agree that it causes harm to the greater good of what we as a nation, and the airlines as an industry are trying to accomplish. The question is... how can we regulate and tame the corporate executive belief that their right to skyrocket salaries and golden parachutes is as innate as their right to life? And at the same time, keep unions from abusing their power and bankrupting the American companies that can still afford to have laborers in the United States? I don't think the answer begins with killing this or any picket-line crosser... but I'm curious to know your thoughts.
KCFlyer
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I don't really know. It's easy to say "vote for a Democrat", but the fact is that the Democrats are just as beholden to big business as the Republicans are. It can only change when a truly "progressive" administration...and Congress...comes into power. At the risk of sounding like a raving Socialist - is there any CEO or upper managment that truly "deserves" the salary they are being paid? If it wasn't for the "peons" working under him, in the case of an airline those peons include pilots, mechanics, FA's rampers customer service agents, then he wouldn't have a company to pay him that salary.USAir757 said:
What sickens me is that all these obscenely paid CEO's who are caught up in scandal fall back on the "I didn't know that" excuse. If he "didn't know" about certain aspects of the business, why the hell was he paid so much? After all, if a grunt on the line "didn't know" something he should have known, odds are good his butt would be fired.
I guess in the "good old days", loyalty to a company was respected and rewarded. Now, everything is for Wall Street - lay off thousands of employees to improve the bottom line? Wall Street loves it, but the average community might think differently. Offshore maintenance? Wall street says "Way to go"...more Americans earning what used to be a good salary and paying a decent amoount in taxes now earn a lot less...and contribute a lot less to tax revenues. Scabs who cross picket lines? Wall Street loves them because it "allows the company to keep flying" while they plan on dumping everything except the executive perks...Wall street loves that so much that most execs get retention bonuses to keep them on board so that their "valuable leadership skills" can see them thru the bankruptcy process.
Bottom line, I think we're screwed until the American people rise up in revolt.
local 12 proud
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I think most Americans are in debt up to their eyeballs even with two income families and are so consumed with just trying to hold it all together that most are complacent or just dont care as long as they personally are'nt affected. I have to agree with KCFlyer, short of a revolt things look pretty bleak, and it will probably take a major depression unlike this country has ever seen before the majority awaken.
So what are you suggesting? That there is no way out except for a national labor strike? A kind of scenario that would ostensibly require more than half of our nation's workers to stop working... stop getting even the small paychecks they are getting now... middle class people would stop making their mortgage and car payments, companies would immediately lose their shirts.... etc. etc.... Even if that is a plausible, if not enormously consequential solution, wouldn't that lead right to what local12 is suggesting? An unprecedented economic depression like we've never seen since our inception? One that will change this country's economic landscape forever?
I hope that we as a productive and industrialized nation can do some thinking outside the box on this one, because that would be the bitter end for just about everybody.
I hope that we as a productive and industrialized nation can do some thinking outside the box on this one, because that would be the bitter end for just about everybody.
Dea Certe
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I don't know how to tame Corporate Greed. To be sure, social change comes slowly. If I had to pin point a time when Corporate thievery became acceptable, I'd have to say the mid-eighties. Junk bonds were quite the vogue back then. Steal the life savings of millions, do a few years in Club Fed and then hit the talk show circuit.
Honesty, ethics and accountability seems to have fallen by the wayside in the insane drive to amass far more wealth than they could ever hope to spend in ten lifetimes.
I suppose those Corporate-types are hoping to insulate themselves from the fallout that's sure to come when Americans can no longer afford to buy goods.
If you happened to miss Lou Dobbs today, I highly recommend you catch his show on the replay tonight. You might want to take a few doses of Tylenol and Mylanta first.
I'm sure our founding fathers are spinning in their graves.
Dea
Honesty, ethics and accountability seems to have fallen by the wayside in the insane drive to amass far more wealth than they could ever hope to spend in ten lifetimes.
I suppose those Corporate-types are hoping to insulate themselves from the fallout that's sure to come when Americans can no longer afford to buy goods.
If you happened to miss Lou Dobbs today, I highly recommend you catch his show on the replay tonight. You might want to take a few doses of Tylenol and Mylanta first.
I'm sure our founding fathers are spinning in their graves.
Dea
PlayTheOdds
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KC and local you have the right idea about it taking a revolt to make drastic changes for the working class of America, but USAIR is right you can't just shut down the country. The problem is not with wages though, the problem we have is inflation and that is brought on by corporate greed and Americans complacency of "That is just the way it is." If labor pay increases inflation increases at the same rate if not higher so the working man is still lagging behind.
I will use the automobile industry to explain my point.
Americans are content with paying between twenty and sixty thousand dollars for a new vehicle. These are way over inflated prices and all the inflation goes to corporate America while none goes to the man on the assembly line. Yet every day there is some poor sap getting screwed by the auto industry. What do you think would happen if every American refused to buy a new vehicle for a month or even two? Prices would drop drastically thus increasing the buying power of your income.
This scenario can be played out for any industry at any time without a huge impact on the Nation as a whole. The problem is organizing every American to do it. Unions are too small to have any impact on to days global economy If GM goes on strike the industry it-self continues on, business as usual. You guys need to quit attacking companies on the labor end and start hitting them where it really hurts and that would be the consumer end.
I will use the automobile industry to explain my point.
Americans are content with paying between twenty and sixty thousand dollars for a new vehicle. These are way over inflated prices and all the inflation goes to corporate America while none goes to the man on the assembly line. Yet every day there is some poor sap getting screwed by the auto industry. What do you think would happen if every American refused to buy a new vehicle for a month or even two? Prices would drop drastically thus increasing the buying power of your income.
This scenario can be played out for any industry at any time without a huge impact on the Nation as a whole. The problem is organizing every American to do it. Unions are too small to have any impact on to days global economy If GM goes on strike the industry it-self continues on, business as usual. You guys need to quit attacking companies on the labor end and start hitting them where it really hurts and that would be the consumer end.
Why not do both?
Dea Certe
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PTO,
I drive a 12 year old American made car. I am lucky enough to have relavtives to help me keep it road worthy. I grew up being taught that mechanics were one of the most honorable fields to enter, right behind doctors and accountants. Times have certainly changed. Doctors now scrabble with HMO's to get a fair wage. Accountants must find a way to find loopholes to feed corporate pie holes. Sad. Very sad. And yet, there's people like you. Worse than out-sourcing to third-world counties who are starving for a loaf of bread. You could feed your family in an honorable way, if you chose to do so.
I've tried to find an excuse, philosophically or morally for what you are doing, and just can't. I'd rather flip burgers. "Paper or Plastic?" is not an insult in my world.
Dea
I drive a 12 year old American made car. I am lucky enough to have relavtives to help me keep it road worthy. I grew up being taught that mechanics were one of the most honorable fields to enter, right behind doctors and accountants. Times have certainly changed. Doctors now scrabble with HMO's to get a fair wage. Accountants must find a way to find loopholes to feed corporate pie holes. Sad. Very sad. And yet, there's people like you. Worse than out-sourcing to third-world counties who are starving for a loaf of bread. You could feed your family in an honorable way, if you chose to do so.
I've tried to find an excuse, philosophically or morally for what you are doing, and just can't. I'd rather flip burgers. "Paper or Plastic?" is not an insult in my world.
Dea
