Workers rights

On considerable reflection after many decades in the trenches, I’ve concluded that the basic right of the most menial worker in the most unpleasant of occupations is the right to live a life of dignity.

That’s a life where you know you’ve got a job tomorrow and you know you’ll have a roof over your head.

That’s a life where you can provide for your family from your paycheque without resorting to handouts. A life where you know your kids can get whatever education they have the aptitude for without getting a lifetime burden of student loans.

A life where you’re NOT expected to root through the sales bin for the dented cans of tuna and then haggle with the manager over the price.

Unfortunately, worker’s rights have succumbed to “the right to work.” That’s an Orwellian bit of nomenclature designed to draw your eye away from what’s really happening. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that “right to work” legislation first found traction in the slave states. It has by now infected even once #unionstrong states like Wisconsin.

“Right to Work” means you have the absolute right to work for an employer who won’t let pesky union troublemakers on the premises. After all, those commies are just after your union dues! That’s right! They collect millions from American dupes in the unions and then they send all the money to Russia, after they’ve skimmed off their percentage, of course.

At least that’s the message the Koch boys and their myriad ciphers in the press like to present.

And the sad truth of the matter is that our unions have really let us down over the last fifty years or so.

Bring back the Wobblies!