The California State University Employees Union is encouraging its members to intimidate people who are gathering signatures for a so-called “Paycheck Protection Initiative” that would limit the ability of unions to use automatic payroll deductions to gain political contributions from their members. Whatever one’s views of this specific initiative, the tactics CSUEU is employing are...

Pension wars: Take retirement benefits off bargaining table? By Teri Sforza, September 27, 2011, Orange County Register Some 30 states allow collective bargaining by public workers, but only a handful allow retirement benefits to be a chip on the bargaining table —  and California is one of them. “Last week the auditor general of Rhode...

Useless teacher “professional development” classes cost California taxpayers billions in increased salaries and pensions. On June 14th, my blog, “You Don’t Need a Weatherman to Know Which Way the Union Wind Blows,” addressed the “Teacher Quality Roadmap: Improving Policies and Practices in LAUSD,” a 58 page report commissioned by United Way and several civil rights’...

The tide is definitely turning in the way the public, and perhaps even district attorneys, view police officers who kill and abuse civilians and abuse their power. Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas has filed serious charges against two Fullerton police officers who were part of a gang of six officers who beat to death...

Sodexo, a major player in the food service and janitorial industries, filed a RICO lawsuit against the SEIU in March of this year, because of the SEIU’s use of corporate campaign tactics to enforce “Card Check” on unprotected employees. Evidently, the SEIU’s failed attempt to have Sodexo’s suit dismissed and Sodexo’s intent to move to...

If you need evidence on how corrupt self-serving unions and union officials can be, then please consider Ex-labor chief’s 1-day rehire nets $158,000 city pension A retired Chicago labor leader secured a $158,000 public pension — roughly five times greater than what a typical retired public-service worker in the Windy City receives — after being...

Obama’s sellout to unions staggers the economy By Michael Barone, September 20, 2011, Boston Herald Barack Obama has been at pains to convince voters that he cares about jobs. It seems to be a hard sell. But he certainly can demonstrate that he cares about certain jobs — the 7 percent of private-sector jobs and...

Teacher union boss cherry picks from a biased poll and ends up with the pits. Cherry picking is a phrase that has become quite popular these days. The term simply refers to advancing a certain point of view by using only data which supports that POV and omitting any contradictory or mitigating information. A recent...

Breathe a deep sigh of relief now that state legislators have headed home. As Judge Gideon Tucker (and also attributed to Mark Twain) exclaimed, “No man’s life, liberty or property is safe while the legislature is in session.” You are safer now than you were a little over a week ago. The real issues of...

As part of his ongoing campaign to raise taxes, last week Jerry Brown made a pilgrimage to a major labor confab in Las Vegas. There he delivered a fiery speech to thousands of union delegates, touting his labor credentials and lashing out at Republicans and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, blaming the minority party and...