If Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer, Would You Press Charges?

Over 3/4 of respondents said they wouldn’t or that they weren’t sure. No wonder it seems such an uphill battle to try and save Medicare.

Sounds like they were polling a FOX “News” audience who was taking a break from O’Reilly by watching Miracle on 34th Street.

They were on CNN, where I just heard the reporter on the scene in Lansing explain that ‘Right to Work’ means some one can have a job without paying union dues.
I believe in the War on Workers. That’s real.

Clearly that’s not what “right to work” is all about but I need to tell a story here that happened to me back in the 1970s. Back then I was doing pipeline work and there was a union that represented those workers. I use “represented” very loosely though because it was next to impossible to join. One needed a sponsor who was already in the union and that sponsor had to put up a huge bond, (no idea why), so unless you knew somebody who was willing to spend lavishly on you, forget it. This had the effect of being exclusive to the point of ludicrousness. The union was also very strict about non union labor. There was more than one occasion in which a three person crew would arrive at a job and being as I and the other helper weren’t in the union, we would be forced to sit in the truck all day while the operator did the work by himself. This had the effect of pissing off a union member at the union. I one case I was involved in, a union steward showed up and shut us down a critical time and demanded a union card from the operator, who explained he couldn’t stop. The steward forced him to stop by turning off the machine. After showing him his card, the operator started to pull the pipe again and the cable broke. As the contractor had said it was a non union job but the steward acted differently, the contractor was stuck open cutting the pipeline, which meant expensive permits, traffic cops and etc., AND he was responsible for the cost of our work too. All because Mr. steward couldn’t wait two minutes. That had the effect of pissing contractors off at the union. So while I’m ideologically in favor of unions, I can see why some people are all too eager to get rid of some of them.

52% of the respondents said they believe in Santa, yet for whatever reason PPP took their OTHER answers to be valid. Ooooookkkkkkaaaayyyyy.

Acorn stole the election from beyond the grave. These folks have been taking Walking Dead too seriously.

Boxturtle (Yet when a GOPer finances a primary opponent for a Dem, crickets)

Good morning, pups. Today we’ve got Brooks, Cohen, Nocera and Bruni. Oh, lawdy… Bobo has found a new blog to read (the only link in this thing) and has picked up all sorts of disconnected bits and pieces of conversation starters (what he calls the “data” he presents) that he can use in his vast spaces for entertaining this holiday season. In “Social Science Palooza III” he gurgles that social science continues to remind us of the power of social context, and the thousands of variables that shape our unconscious. He tosses out a smattering of recent research. Of course, not one link to any of the 12 (see what he did there?) studies he cites, but he did have the grace to link to the blog he stole them from. In “Time to Tune Out” Mr. Cohen says to share, that once beautiful verb, has become an awful emotional splurge. There is merit to disconnection. Ain’t that the truth… Mr. Nocera says “Show Me the Money,” and that when college sports executives get together, it’s not the athletes or their educations that they talk about. Mr. Bruni addresses “The God Glut” and says a West Point cadet’s experience suggests our lax observance of the line between church and state.

Here they are.

The coffee, tea and hot chocolate are ready, and I’ve got a variety of bagels with cream cheese this morning. Why do people conduct polls on such stupidity? Given that the question is framed correctly I’m willing to bet that you could find a significant percentage of people who’d say that Ebola was good for you… I’ve got to go feed the kittehs — Boots and Bucky seem to be trying to tear each other’s heads off, which is one of they ways they amuse themselves when I’m slow with breakfast. Have a great day.

Like all protective orgs, unions can be insane, for sure. Putting in place safety controls has been one thing they’ve accomplished. American Airlines nearly shut down when the pilots went to enforcing them all, just recently.

Thanks, Marion, Bobo reminds us of the candidate Rmoney insisting he had studies proving that black is white, turns out they were dimwit financed to prove that very thing. Nothing like studies to prove whatever you wanted to. Bobo finds out that villagers are right!

Oh, I’m still very much pro union. Just anti that union. Unions can hurt themselves when they are too exclusive and when they refuse to put a leash on their local stewards who love being big turds in tiny bowls. That union killed itself and as it was my sole experience with unions, it set me against them in general until I found out they weren’t all like that.

Gotta go to work!

My bad Union story:

Bad in 1978 or so, I was a UAW member, local 1717. I worked at NCR testing banking terminals.

After being left on for 24-48 hours (burn in, we called it) the neww terminals came to my testing station. Anything that failed during my testing or from burn-in, I fixed. Anything that failed AFTER my testing station was the Senior Tech’s job.

Well, the senior tech went on a well deserved vacation. Terminals that failed after testing started to pile up. There was really nothing to these terminals, 1-2 circuit boards, a printer, a keyboard, a display and in my job I had fixed or repaired all of them. So >>I<< went to the boss and siad i could clear most of the backlog in a couple hours and there was nothing coming out of burn-in for at least that long. He told me to go ahead.

So I was cheerfully repairing terminals when the shop steward walked by. I got wrote up for doing someone elses job and the boss got a grievance filed for letting me do it. While the person in question was on vacation.

Boxturtle (I just wanted to work while being paid)

Yep. Local stewards: Too much leash, too much power. No flexibility.

The usual complaint about unions is about having to pay dues, from members who are incapable of seeing their advantages, the sort who would never have the ability to stand up for themselves if there were no union.
But yes, sometimes the regulations are going to be a nuisance.

Something grievous doesn’t have to happen for someone to grieve and then give someone else grief by issuing a grievance.

Haley Barbour on MoJoe brings nothing to the table except Frank Luntz’s buzzwords.

And Dancin’ Dave was spreading Santorum last Sunday. Guess they didn’t get the memo last month. Have to send ‘em another in 2014.

Just watching Jeff Sessions insist that it’s not hunger, it’s fraud and theft to give food stamps – his state has 61% on them – to Those People

Time for a big turnover in the worst Congress ever.