Friday, October 28, 2005

Important Meeting coming up

We need to get to the next meeting, if at all possible. Details are in the mail, but there is another change being proposed to collecting Local Dues. We are discussing it at the Forum, you can get there by going to www.ibew412.org and clicking on the Forum link. You will have to get an account to be able to see the private discussion on the bulletin board, but you can see the public one without getting an account.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

New Forum

I found and installed a new forum, which is password protected. Please look at the website www.ibew412.org and click the forum link. Create a user and password and suggest topics for the discussion board. Please use your kcpl email address for now, so that I can quickly validate you as a user. Just as soon as you are validated, you may change your profile and email address to a private address, though I dont really see a problem with leaving it alone. The only email you will get from the forum is your validation email. I will be getting a seniority list from the Local so that in the future I wont need to use our work emails to validate.

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

It's a good thing we don't live near the coast, or on the gulf. According to this article, the warming of the oceans is going to cause harsher and harsher weather as the world's oceans warm.

According to the article:

Under this scenario, which assumes the amount of carbon dioxide in the air
will roughly double over the next 100 years, the coldest days of the year in the
Northeast will be as much as 18 degrees Fahrenheit warmer, and the temperatures
currently experienced on the 18 hottest days of the year in the Washington area
will prevail for two months.
The Southwest will become drier and hotter, the paper predicts, while the Gulf Coast will become warmer and experience less frequent, but more intense, rains.


You can debate all you want to about whether or not human activity is the cause, but why not debate whether or not there is anything at all we can do to not make it worse, even if it is natural?

Labor in retreat...

I just read a long article on the wage concessions that Delphi, a GM auto parts supplier is requesting from it's employees. This is becoming very common. From the article...(read here)

Four years into an economic recovery, workers across America should be
riding high. Instead, they're facing new demands to surrender hard-won
benefits and agree to wage concessions. Companies say these cutbacks are
essential to stay competitive in an increasingly globalized economy.

The problem here is that it is getting easier and easier to see this as a problem for the 'high paid' auto industry workers, or the 'high paid' airline workers, when it is nothing of the sort. Industries moving overseas is a problem of government. They do it because we allow it, as a nation. If you want to know how this will turn out, look at how the people taking our jobs live in India or China. That is how we will all be living if we dont force our government to protect us from our employers.



Look again at the quote above. "Companies say these cutbacks are essential..." Is that true? Do we believe them without forcing them to prove it? Obviously the employees are helpless to demand proof, but what about our government?

Saturday, October 15, 2005

Local 412 website is ONLINE

The first version of the local website is now on the internet! Look for it at www.ibew412.org. I would sure appreciate any constructive criticism from the membership. In the future, there will be a PHP bulletin board, for now we have the free one that comes with Earthlink webspace.

I need comments from the BA and local president to acutally put on the webpage. None of the login stuff works until I figure out MySQL databases. Before long we will be able to log in and see private local 412 files, like meeting minutes, and stuff like that.

Thursday, October 13, 2005

Wal Mart Hiring Undocumented Workers

Finally, a really big employer is finding out what it costs to hire undocumented workers for below minimum wage (read--slave laborers). Walmart is going to face big fines and adverse publicity for "contracting" the work out to a company that hired illegal aliens and then locked them in the store and paid them for less hours than they worked.

You can read the newest news here.

For the record, my opinion of illegals is that they are hard-working people that find themselves in a situation where their employer can take advantage of them. By taking advantage of them, the employer saves money on labor. The illegal is still better off that in his home country, so he doesn't mind enough to go back home. The only injured party is the native workforce, who are forced to lower their standard of living to compete with illegally low paid workers. We can't work for that low an amount, by law. What do we do about it? We spend time and energy exposing the employers that are practicing this kind of illegal work. You can't really blame the victims, us or the illegals, the ones that are truly benefitting are the walmarts, meat-packers, housing contractors and every other employer that 'looks the other way' and laughs all the way to the bank.

Friday, October 07, 2005

Let's help make WalMart more labor friendly

I am sure that you all know that WalMart is one of the largest non union employers on the planet. The Service Employees International Union is trying to change all of that and this is one of their efforts we can help with. Details can be found at this website: http://walmartwatch.com/november

I will be hosting a house party to view the film that they mention and discuss the issues. Attend if you can, or host your own event.

First Post

My vision for this weblog is to create content that is relevant to the members of Local 412 of the IBEW. This web log will be accessible through our website, located at IBEW412.org.

You will be able to look to here for analysis of news affecting organized labor and the power production industry. There will also be political analysis for my fellow political junkies.

I encourage you to leave comments to my views and about the stories and articles that I point out in this weblog. Leaving comments will encourage discussion among the weblog readers. I hope to get members of the Local 412 leadership to be able to post weblogs along with me.

Enjoy this tool and help me make it a worthwhile effort.

Dan Carmack--
Local 412 Instrument Tech
IBEW 412 Steward