Card Check vs Trade Union Check

Back in the good old days when unions were like families and were bent on winning strikes to better our society, working men and women called them up and asked to join.

My favorite organizing story is about a soda-jerk kid calling up the UAW-CIO and saying, "OK, we're all sitting down. What do we do next?" There was that sort of excitement about the CIO and its ability to make the boss say "yes" when he wanted to say "no".

That was before the day the CIO turned away from Solidarity, to power consolidation, merged with the AFL and ending what should have been an everlasting drive for the betterment of everyone who works for an honest living.

Now the Big Labor Porkchoppers can't organize anyone. Why? No one wants to join a union that's in bed with the boss. No one gets excited about a union that identifies the enemy as the guy on the other shift or the other Local or state. No one is interested in trading in Friendship and Solidarity for dog-eat-dog "competiveness".

Most of us working stiffs want unions that can win a fight to lift up working folks, to better our families, neighborhoods and country. But these phony unions today are not about that at all. The modern unions should not even be called unions because they don't unite anyone in The Good Fight. Modern corporate unionism is not about community at all. It is all about individualism, selfishness, corporatism and the acceptance of a permanent underclass.

And now, since they can't organize through good work anymore, the corporate unions want "Card Check".

How about we first get "Union Check"? If we want to join a union, how would we know if a particular union is a True Trade Union? For instance, all modern unions claim a Solidarity philosophy and promise to fight for their members. How would we know if the union sales people are telling us the truth about this? In the old days, the family focus in the Solidarity philosophy and the union's ability to win The Good fight was self-evident. But today, it is just the opposite. Today, it is evident to any conscious person that unions accept - even promote - speedup, quality-cutting, skill-cutting, downsizing, outsourcing, wage-cutting and plant closings. It is also apparent that they have accepted metric tons of Global Baloney and attacked, and defeated, the strikes of their own members all across our country.

These are not True Trade Unions folks!

So before the Democrats hand out the Card Check to these bozos, how about laws regulating unions by Solidarity qualifications?

Of course, when we get True Trade Unions - and they WILL rise again - they won't need "Card Check". Solidarity will again attract good working people everywhere.

And this time, let us continue towards high-quality, democatic, Guild-like, big production systems like Mondragon; and family-owned, small businesses devoted to the community.