Despite fierce opposition from major transit unions, the Senate yesterday gave final approval to the FAA Authorization bill, a five-year extension that removes uncertainty from the FAA, approves a next-generation air traffic monitoring system and, in Harry Reid’s telling, creates hundreds of thousands of jobs. But unions were unhappy about changes to labor law insisted upon by House Republicans, and they expressed betrayal at the hands of Senate Democrats.

The Senate will vote as early as today on whether to punish transportation unions in a bid to get Federal Aviation Administration authorization through 2015. The House already passed its version of a “bipartisan compromise.” and unions can’t seem to get the Senate to stop it.

Arizona Republicans are proposing a bill to strip public unions of collective bargaining rights and impose limits even more egregious than those adopted in Wisconsin. Even though it’s been strongly opposed elsewhere, it’s a strategy to defang unions and undermine political funding for the Democratic Party.

collection of 18 transportation unions have demanded that Congress reject a compromise measure on the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Authorization bill which they say will hurt unions. Unions like the United Auto Workers, United Steelworkers, Teamsters, the International Association of Machinists, the Association of Flight Attendants (CWA) and more object to several hidden provisions in the authorization bill apparently agreed to by Dem leaders.

The John Doe investigation swirling around Scott Walker in Wisconsin has begun to become a factor in his recall election. The labor-backed progressive group We Are Wisconsin has called for the resignations of two current Walker staffers, who exhibited some of the same behavior that drew indictments for former aides.

We’re not seeing in the numbers a return to the union valhalla of the 1950s and 1960s. But if unions could increase their membership despite a series of assaults, imagine what could happen with friends of labor in policymaking positions and with new rules designed to help collective bargaining rather than harm it.

Remember during the debate over the Colombian trade deal when the Administration swore up and down that they would, as a condition of putting the free trade agreement forward, insist on an “action plan” that would end the murder of trade unionists in Colombia and bring about justice for those already killed? Yeah, so, we’re several months beyond the passage of those trade deals – Obama highlighted them in the State of the Union on Tuesday. So how’s that action plan going?

Despite the vulnerabilities of Scott Walker in the upcoming recall election, he also has plenty of advantages. It’s very difficult to recall a governor, it’s only been done twice in American history. Because of the rules governing the recall, Walker can continue to raise unlimited campaign funds until the date is set for the recall. And because the Dems haven’t settled on an opponent, Walker has an early lead over potential Dem rivals.

Indiana Democrats in the State House walked out again to deny a quorum, as Republicans attempted to pass their right-to-work bill and clear the last hurdle before moving the bill to Mitch Daniels for his signature. The problem now is they’re now subject to GOP adopted $1,000/day fines for not showing up.

One day in August 2007, Daniel Coleman, an administrator in the Maryland court system, decided he should stay home to recover from an illness, as his doctor had ordered. But the day after he requested time off, he suddenly had more to worry about than his health; he was unemployed, too.