You are hereFeed aggregator / Sources / United Steelworker Blog
United Steelworker Blog
Super Wealthy Deathly Afraid Death Tax Would Reduce Deficit
Wed, 03/10/2010 - 09:00Bill Scher By Bill Scher Executive editor of LiberalOasis.com One of the conservative goals former President George W. Bush was unable to get through the Senate was “making the tax cuts permanent.” He only got them passed — using Senate budget reconciliation rules — by employing a budget gimmick to mask the 10-year cost. Simply make all the tax [...]
Tale of Two CEOs: One of Them Needs to Do Better
Tue, 03/09/2010 - 14:25Leo Hindery Jr. By Leo Hindery Jr. Chairman, U.S. Economy/Smart Globalization Initiative at the New America Foundation The Financial Times just devoted a special section of the paper to “individuals and companies who have displayed courage and vision in the aftermath of the most wrenching financial crisis since the Great Depression.” This piece of journalism — and [...]
Robert Rubin: Why Won’t He Go Away?
Tue, 03/09/2010 - 09:30By Dean Baker Co-Director, Center for Economic and Policy Research As Treasury Secretary, Robert Rubin put in place all the pieces that set up the economy for the disaster that we are now living through. He pushed legislation that weakened regulation of the financial sector; he cheered on a stock bubble that eventually grew to $10 trillion [...]
The Jobless Rate Makes Health Care Reform Both Harder and More Important
Mon, 03/08/2010 - 09:00By Robert Reich Former U.S. Secretary of Labor, Professor at Berkeley The loss of 36,000 jobs in February is better than expected but it’s still miserable. 26,000 were lost in January, according to the government’s revised figures. And the “underemployment” rate — including jobless workers who have given up looking for work and part-time workers who want [...]
A Tire Plant Closes, A Community Withers
Sun, 03/07/2010 - 09:57By Berry Craig Author of “True Tales of Old-Time Kentucky Politics: Bombast, Bourbon and Burgoo” The snow-softened rubble of the Continental General Tire plant at Mayfield, Ky., reminds me of a scene in “New in Town.” We rented the movie from a video store the other night. Lucy Hill, played by Renee Zellweger, is a high-powered corporate executive [...]
California Factory Closing — HUGE Impact — Steps You Can Take
Sat, 03/06/2010 - 10:01By Dave Johnson Fellow with Campaign for America’s Future This post originally appeared at Campaign for America’s Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture as part of the Making It In America project. I am a Fellow with CAF. Toyota is planning on closing the New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. NUMMI auto-manufacturing plant in Fremont, CA on March [...]
Why Are We Afraid to Create the Jobs We Need?
Fri, 03/05/2010 - 13:05By Les Leopold Author, “The Looting of America” The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that as of February 2010, the unemployment rate stands at 9.7 percent, and the official jobless rate is 16.7 percent, which also counts those who have stopped looking for work and those who have been forced into part-time work. See Bureau of Labor [...]
Time for Unions to Put “Democrats” Like Blanche Lincoln on Notice
Fri, 03/05/2010 - 12:14I would like to congratulate you on your entry into Blanche Lincoln’s Arkansas primary race. I read about it in this morning’s blog on Firedoglake.” After reading Jane Hamsher’s article entitled, “Bill Halter Crosses the $5 Million Mark,” I emailed the White House to suggest they remain on the sidelines instead of supporting Ms. Lincoln, along [...]
Bunning Put a Face on Obstructionist, Mean-Spirited Republican Party
Wed, 03/03/2010 - 20:02By Leo W. Gerard USW International President Sen. Jim Bunning, the Kentucky Republican who single-handedly delayed unemployment benefits for 400,000 desperate Americans and forced an unnecessary furlough of another 2,000, should be a figure regarded with wonderment. The awesome power he held in his hands! The utter disregard for vulnerable Americans he exhibited while wielding it! Bunning is a [...]
Pushing the Foreign Menace Line to Cut Social Security
Wed, 03/03/2010 - 11:17By Dean Baker Co-Director, Center for Economic and Policy Research The Wall Street-financed crew that is pushing to gut Social Security and Medicare is used to playing fast and loose with facts and logic to advance their agenda. Unfortunately, many of the reporters who cover these issues have little knowledge of economics, so they are often suckered. One [...]
The Enthusiasm Gap
Mon, 03/01/2010 - 15:05By Robert Reich Former U.S. Secretary of Labor, Professor at Berkeley I had dinner the other night with a Democratic pollster who told me Democrats are heading toward next fall’s mid-term elections with a serious enthusiasm gap: The Republican base is fired up. The Democratic base is packing up. The Democratic base is lethargic because congressional Democrats continue [...]
The House is on Fire
Mon, 03/01/2010 - 08:53By Jack Metzgar Emeritus Professor of Humanities at Roosevelt University in Chicago A few weeks ago, Charlie Rose facilitated a discussion about the perils of the U.S. national debt among a thoughtful, articulate group of one politician, two businessmen, and two economists. Except for a brief discussion of the bond market, I was able to understand the [...]
Both Sides Agree: Address Jobs Now and Deficits Later
Sun, 02/28/2010 - 08:16By Lawrence Mishel President, Economic Policy Institute Earlier this week I testified before Congressman Barney Frank’s committee on the need to do more — much more — to create jobs. The unfortunate but unavoidable fact, I told the Committee, is that the private sector won’t create jobs in sufficient numbers anytime soon to put a dent in [...]
Bi-partisan Blight 4: The Shrinking Jobs Bill
Sat, 02/27/2010 - 10:15Robert Borosage By Robert L. Borosage Co-Director of the Campaign for America’s Future “Yesterday, we took a step, a strong first step toward putting Americans back to work, but … it’s a first step. This is the beginning, not the end,” Senate Majority Leaded Harry Reid said, hailing the pending passage of a $15 billion jobs bill, [...]
Bipartisan Blight 4: The Shrinking Jobs Bill
Sat, 02/27/2010 - 09:10By Robert L. Borosage Co-Director of the Campaign for America’s Future “Yesterday, we took a step, a strong first step toward putting Americans back to work, but … it’s a first step. This is the beginning, not the end,” Senate Majority Leaded Harry Reid said, hailing the pending passage of a $15 billion jobs bill, as five [...]
Glenn Beck Auditions for Joe McCarthy’s Job
Fri, 02/26/2010 - 16:29By Les Leopold Author, “The Looting of America” “They are frequently led by political neophytes who prize independence and tell strikingly similar stories of having been awakened by the recession. Their families upended by lost jobs, foreclosed homes and depleted retirement funds, they said they wanted to know why it happened and whom to blame.” ~ David [...]
Industry Essential to US Economy
Fri, 02/26/2010 - 15:33If the USA could re-industrialize, make the things that we consume, and export some of the things that we manufacture, then the USA would not have to borrow from industrialized nations to pay for U.S. government expenses. Instead, if the USA re-industrialized, it would have the resources to expand government to provide healthcare benefits, unemployment benefits, [...]
Q&A with Manufacturing Business Expert Richard McCormack
Fri, 02/26/2010 - 11:01Richard McCormack Q&A Leo W. Gerard: Richard, when you appeared recently at Youngstown State University as a guest of the Center for Working-Class Lecture Series, you talked about how essential manufacturing is to the U.S. economy and how politicians seem clueless about that. In fact, you said, “Politicians don’t get it.” When did that happen because clearly [...]
Sign These Liberal Petitions!
Thu, 02/25/2010 - 13:26I have developed several boycott petitions at http://www.facebook.com/l/be685;www.democratz.org. People interested in liberal causes can sign these, and an e-mail goes out right away. The petitions demand action on important issues, such as a strong public option, EFCA, ending Republican filibusters, stopping Republican holds on Presidential appointments and a $10 an hour minimum wage. Since companies have [...]
Now Whirlpool Threatens Workers Who Protest Plant Closing
Thu, 02/25/2010 - 10:32Dave Johnson By Dave Johnson Fellow with Campaign for America’s Future The other day I posted Whirlpool Bites Hands Of American Taxpayers That Feed It saying, in summary, • Whirlpool closes a plant in Evansville • Taxpayers will shoulder the unemployment and other costs. • All the local supplier, transportation and other third-party jobs are destroyed. • Even more home foreclosures in [...]