Althouse: Let's talk about the dangerous, lurking issue of "card check."

September 4, 2008

Let's talk about the dangerous, lurking issue of "card check."

22 comments:

Simon said...: Hmm. Card check? You mean that horrific legislation that Obama has said he's going to sign if he's President?; 9/4/08, 10:13 AM
Simon said...: I love Bob, by the way. He's wrong about almost everything, but I love his sense of humor.; 9/4/08, 10:14 AM
paul a'barge said...: What is Wright doing with his tongue? In every picture he's got it visibly wandering around in his mouth.; 9/4/08, 10:25 AM
Anonymous said...: Another GREAT bit from Palin's speech last night:

Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.

And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.

I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a “community organizer,” except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don’t quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren’t listening.

We tend to prefer candidates who don’t talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.; 9/4/08, 10:30 AM
Anonymous said...: Dims depend heavily on union contributions and directed votes. This is the only reason for the Chosen One's position, and he is not alone in the Party by any means.

The question Mickey asked (and Bob sidestepped) that never gets answered by card check advocates is, "What's wrong with a secret ballot"? And the accurate response is, "It allows individuals to vote their conscience without fear of retribution." which, for the left, is undesirable and has always been so. Lacking merit, their classic tactic is to apply intimidation. Ah, the stiring sound of jackboots in the still of early morning...; 9/4/08, 10:41 AM
rhhardin said...: Everybody could vote by separating into two halves of the room, and then the union thugs and management respectively could break the kneecaps of everybody on the wrong side.

Or, more nonviolently, you could have a secret ballot.; 9/4/08, 10:49 AM
former law student said...: "Card check" is the absentee ballot version of union/no union elections.; 9/4/08, 11:12 AM
Anonymous said...: I guess the right to a secret ballot is just another thing they need to take away from us for the common good.

Because obviously, we would never vote the wrong way if were smart enough.; 9/4/08, 11:48 AM
Susan said...: And I love the Orwellian name of this bill: The Employee Free Choice Act.

Let's do away with the secret ballot in our government elections and call it The Voter Free Choice Act.; 9/4/08, 11:50 AM
Crimso said...: "Let's do away with the secret ballot in our government elections and call it The Voter Free Choice Act."

Biden would likely be for this. That way he could prosecute you you for voting the wrong way.; 9/4/08, 12:00 PM
The Drill SGT said...: card check is a terrible, undemocratic idea.; 9/4/08, 12:03 PM
Original Mike said...: Card check will lead to Union intimidation? Nothing to worry about.

Jimmy Hoffa could not be reached for comment.; 9/4/08, 12:28 PM
kimsch said...: There was a brouhaha a while ago because apparently WalMart managers told employees that if a democrat won the election it might not be great for the country.

The left immediately screamed that Walmart was instructing its employees to vote republican and that's not legal.

They said that it was intimidating employees and what would happen if they didn't vote as instructed? Would they lose their job? Were they threatened with loss of job if they didn't vote the way the employer said to?

Employee can vote anyhow he or she pleases. With a secret ballot on election day, the employee can vote the opposite of what the employer "told him to vote" and even tell the employer that he complied. No way to check, now is there?

Yet they want card check and to allow the unions to intimidate employees to vote in a union even if they disagree. And with the non secret ballot, the union can indeed tell how you "voted".; 9/4/08, 12:38 PM
Peter Hoh said...: I have yet to hear an argument for Card Check that seems reasonable.; 9/4/08, 1:21 PM
Peter Hoh said...: McCain can make Card Check a big issue, and having a union member running mate helps him with this issue.

There is nothing about a secret ballot that is scary. Americans like secret ballots. Americans like the freedom to choose.

Run with this, McCain.; 9/4/08, 1:24 PM
rhhardin said...: At some point the idea of a fair trial became one where the guilty party has an even chance of being aquitted.

Union elections are getting the same way now. If there isn't an even chance of getting a union you don't want, it's an unfair labor practice.; 9/4/08, 1:32 PM
MPorcius said...: There is actually a little-known left wing tradition of hostility to the secret ballot. Check out Sean Richey's article "Who Votes Alone?" in the Australian Journal of Political Science.

http://www.pace.edu/emplibrary/WhoVotesAlone.pdf

Richey argues, "The secret ballot is one source of America’s decreasing political participation from the nineteenth to the twentieth century...The change to secret ballots also brought a loss of political discussion and access to information about politics...The secret ballot not only separates the voter from undue influence but conversely the enlightening influence of his peers..."; 9/4/08, 1:55 PM
Original Mike said...: The secret ballot ... separates the voter from ... the enlightening influence of his peers...

WOW!; 9/4/08, 2:01 PM
The Drill SGT said...: As a former Teamster, I'm schocked :)

The left immediately screamed that Walmart was instructing its employees to vote republican and that's not legal.

and when the union took my dues and spent them on the Democrats and gave me a sample ballot on election day that was just voter education and GOTV?; 9/4/08, 2:48 PM
John Stodder said...: The campaign for card check is mostly stealth, and has been going on for 15 years at least. With Obama's ascent, the Democratic takeover of Congress with the prospect of reaching a filibuster-proof majority and the unpopularity of the Iraq war, labor thinks 2009 is the year it finally happens. If they can, they will get it passed and signed in 30 days after Obama takes office. They don't want attention to this idea, and they don't even try to sell it openly.; 9/4/08, 3:59 PM
Unknown said...: As a labor lawyer, I can tell you the idea of removing the secret ballot is just one of at least 4 other equally harmful ideas on the Orwellian bill. Equally harmful and equally unconstitutional is the idea of binding arbitration or fines for ULPs.

Seems to me the dems know they'll never get this passed, so they are just asking for exorbitant measures, in the hopes of getting some. (just like collective bargaining, you see.) And the weak-kneed GOP congressmen just might be stupid enough to allow the dems to do this. Of course, what the GOP should have done when they were in power was push in the other direction, like mandatting right-to-work, or requring by law an election every year, or at least every contract, to see if the union still has majorioty support.

I hope this is comprehensible to non labor-lawyers.; 9/4/08, 4:01 PM
blake said...: David--dunno what an ULP is (non-labor-lawyer here).

Although it gets thrown around too much, this really is Orwellian. How does Bob figure that an open election is a compromise? Because it only allows a fraction of the intimidation?

The fact that the unions are pushng this tells you where the power is now. If it were still with the mythical "management", they'd be pushing it an the unions would be (rightly) decrying it.; 9/4/08, 5:27 PM