Diatribune

For those of you reading this diary hoping for some dirt on Senator Specter, I'm sorry to disappoint you.  The only thing Senator Specter is hiding is where he stands on important issues.  Specifically, on the issue of working families and the right of men and women in America to organize at the workplace?  Does he support it?  Is he against it?  I don't know, and that's part of the problem.

I just got off the phone with Senator Specter's office and spoke with a very nice gentleman who had to put me on hold when I first called, but was very nice to me about it and genuinely seemed interested in why I was calling.  It was a simple question really.  How is Senator Specter planning to vote on S. 1041, the Employee Free Choice Act.  (Click here and type S. 1041 into the search box to read the text.)  It was apparently a difficult question.  It was difficult because the poor aide who was on phone duty at the time stumbled, hemmed, and hawed his way through a long, drawn-out answer which basically boiled down to "the Senator's feelings on the bill will not be made known until he makes a public comment or he votes."

I see this as a problem for two reasons.  One, he works for me.  Sure, I voted for Hoeffel instead of Specter, but he still represents the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and so long as I still live in the Commonwealth, he works for me.  As such, he'd better tell me what he's plannning to do if I ask.  And it wasn't a difficult question.  And it didn't involve anything classified.  I just wanted to know if he was going to vote yes or no on the Employee Free Choice Act when it came up for a vote this week.

Two, it's not a hard choice.  If it was something that was complex and involved a wide variety of emotional, ethical, and moral considerations, I could understand why he wouldn't say until the vote happened.  But that's not this bill.  This bill is designed to protect working Americans, the middle class that politicians love to extol while slowly eroding their rights.  I asked Senator Specter whether or not he wanted to protect working men and women, and his aide essentially said he'd get back to me.  So now you see the problem.

But is it really that important?  Will the Employee Free Choice Act really help working Americans?  Or is this just an easy way to look like you're helping people while really just paying lip service to their problems?  Well, let me put it this way.  Corporate America is doing everything they can to stop this bill, and if they're scared, then the Employee Free Choice Act must be a good way of changing the status quo.  I'll give you the highlights, but for a summary of the bill click here.

First, it allows workers to freely sign a card saying they want to join a union, and when a majority of workers do that, a union is formed.  Many of you may be saying, "isn't that how it works now?"  No, it isn't.  After workers sign these cards now, employers can go to the National Labor Relations Board to demand a union election, and an election date is set for a few months down the road.  During that time, the employer can force employees to sit down for anti-union presentations, put anti-union literature in handouts for workers, and even have one-on-one meeetings with employees where they spread all sorts of lies about those crazy people who helped make weekends off and a forty-hour workweek the standard in America.  And the pro-union forces?  They can stand outside the workplace and try to get their fellow workers to take their handouts as they rush to their cars to get home to their families.

In addition, they can even try some illegal tactics as well.  Changing shifts for pro-union workers, threatening employees with shutting down the workplace if a union is formed, or even just firing union organizers.  Illegal?  You bet.  Do corporations care?  Not typically, because the penalties are so miniscule and so rarely enforced, that it doesn't even reach the power of a slap on the wrist.  Thankfully, the Employee Free Choice Act will take care of that as well.

Now, if the employer does anything wrong, there will be fines of $20,000 per infraction, per employee.  In addition, employees will be entitled to treble back pay awards if they are fired or harassed for favoring the union.  (Just so you know, treble back pay is the fancy lawyer term for triple back pay.)  And, if there is any indication that the employer is doing something wrong, the National Labor Relations Board will be required to seek an injunction against the employer.

Finally, once the union is formed, the Employee Free Choice Act won't let the employer slow the process down to a crawl while negotiations for the first contract go on.  Right now, the process can go on for years, to the point where enough pro-union workers leave and the employer can force another election to get rid of the union.  Under the Employee Free Choice Act, if no contract is agreed upon within 90 days, either side can request mediation.  If mediation doesn't work after 30 days, it will be submitted to an arbitrator who will decide with the arbitrator's decision being binding for two years.

So as you can see, the Employee Free Choice Act does a lot of good things.  It makes it easier for workers to exercise their rights.  It makes it harder for employers to break the law.  And it makes certain that unions get the respect they deserve.  So I guess it comes back to my original question.  What is Arlen Specter hiding?  Is he hiding the fact that he doesn't want to help working people?  Or is he hiding the fact that he's too scared of the corporate interests running the Republican Party to stand up for what's right?

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