Wal-Mart: Government Stops Union Election

[Nambe]

LOS ANGELES (Reuters)

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said on Monday a regional director of the National Labor Relations Board has ruled to not allow a union election by a group of workers in Clinton, Maryland.

The director ruled that the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, or UFCW, could not move forward with a union election by a group of about 50 workers related to merchandise receiving functions, said Wal- Mart.

Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart is the nation's largest private sector employer and world's biggest company by revenue.

The ruling confirmed that the employees in question were not an appropriate separate bargaining unit within the store, Wal-Mart said. The Clinton store employs about 400 associates. UFCW Local 400 filed the union election petition in July seeking to represent only the small group of selected associates. ---

[Enraged_Ape]

1. Welcome to the 1870s

How far we've come.

If I'm doing my math correctly, I'm pretty sure the neocons will have us back in the Middle Ages within 20 years.

[benfranklin1776]

2. Fascism is more properly the merger of state and corporate power.

Exhibit 1,567,439 as provided by yet another BUSHCO action reinforcing corporate power over that of workers attempting to better their lot in life .

Yesssirree Benito would have loved to see his political philosophy come to fruition as the dominant political system of the planet.

[Don_G]

3. And How Much Did Wal-Mart Contribute To The GOP?

Same story; they have an "enriching" sense of value(s) for their own fortune.

[denverbill]

7. Well, soft money wise, $1 million to R, $50K to Dems from 95-2002.

God only knows on hard money.

[Nottingham]

4. The More Opression you place on a population

the more rebellion springs up

:bounce:

[oneighty]

5. Yup

The decline and fall of Hitler proves that, as did El Duce's decline.

180

[Enraged_Ape]

6. Those who don't remember history are condemned...

to repeat it.

And Shrub was a history major you know.

[Prodemsouth]

11. Yeah it took a war and other nations as I recall

n/t

[Trek234]

12. Hitler doesn't prove it at all

Let's assume he stopped at all nations he conquered up to France, and then the war ended. England/US forces left and the war was over.

His oppression would have continued and it would likely have been decades before a successful internal resistance would have overthrown the nazi government.

I agree it would have happened, but it would have taken an ungodly long time. We could easily end up being oppressed here for decades if the republican machine keeps moving like it has been for another couple years.

The more internal oppression one places on people the longer it's going to take to get rid of it unless you have a stronger 3rd party intervene.

[oneighty]

13. Of course you are correct.

I would say right, but somehow it does not fit. However you will recall the attempted assassination of Hitler by his military commanders. They plainly saw where Hitler was leading. That was sort of a citizen's revolt.

Who knows what the future will bring?

180

[inthecorneroverhere]

25. Stauff was too late....

Stauffenberg's actions came too late for the people of Germany and the occupied countries. Stauffenberg was injured in April 1943 and became disillusioned with the Nazis during his convalescence. A heavy map table saved Hitler's life on July 20, 1944.

All of these events were too late. The Holocaust can be said to have begun either on Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938, or with the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942. Ironically, the Wannsee conference was originally scheduled for December 8, 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor.

By July 20, 1944, millions of people had already perished in the Holocaust and on the Eastern and Western fronts.

Had action from within Germany been taken prior to 1940, millions of lives would have been saved.

By the way, to get back to the topic of the thread, labor unions were outlawed in Germany in 1934, four years before Kristallnacht and six years before the attacks on Poland and France.

[Occulus]

22. The comparison applies here in the US

all the more, then.

Think about it: we've been dealing with the steady gain of power of conservatives- real, hard-right conservatives- for over thirty years now.

A major backlash is long overdue.

[BiggJawn]

19. But the Germans and the Italians didn't have DISHNetwork or DSL Porn...

So don't look for the Murkan Consumer to rise up anytime soon.
Unless he can't get his 379 channels of SPORTS! and 34 shopping channels and "Barely-Legal Teens CUMMING in your IN-Box" anymore. Then he might quiff a little

[tom_paine]

9. The More You Tighten Your Grip, Emperor Tiberius*

The more Free Americans will slip through your fingers...

(kudos to Princess Leia, hey at least the Totalitarian Scum of Star Wars came right out with their "Family Values"--if only reality worked that way)

[ikojo]

14. I disagree....I think many Americans have had the fight sucked right

out of them. Just today one of my co-workers and 17 others in the company were given pink slips. Did he get mad or express any type of anger? NO. He said a business must do what it needs to do in order to survive. He said perhaps his time was up and it was time to pursue new things (like unemployment?).

Oh yeah and this guy is a Bush loving, Rush listening, Clinton despising REPUBLICAN.

I think that as long as the corporate powers that be IN BOTH PARTIES are able to keep people diverted with such non stories as Ben and Jen and anything Michael Jackson then people will not pay attention to what those above are doing....

I think what will happen is what happened in Germany following the Weimar era of the 1920s...there will be a convenient scapegoat (well there is already...blacks and Muslims).

[Lefty48197]

16. I feel sorry for the other 17

but the dildohead got his just desserts. Remind him to pick himself up by the bootstraps if money gets tight at home.

[htuttle]

8. F*CK the NLRB!

We didn't all have 'permission' to unionize in the early 1900's either. We just went and did it (and yes, I am aware that it was far from easy).

They don't like it? You strike.
They hire scabs? You stop the scabs.

When the NLRB starts PREVENTING union elections, it's time to view them as just another bunch of goons working for the company.

[CBHagman]

10. Disgusting development

And very indicative of the type of administration we have now. Bush puts in his little photo opportunities at various company events, but when the time comes to kick workers in the teeth...he does.

[whathappened]

15. wtf is this

i thought the gov. protected the rights of employees to join a union , now they have no rights to join a union , me thinks jr. is changing the game half way thru and making this up as he goes

[Lefty48197]

17. Jr. is too stupid to think this stuff up by himself

it was all scripted by the federalist society.

[pfitz59]

18. "The Clinton store employs about 400 associates."

Associates is buzzword for 'disposable workers'. Employees need things like living wages and health insurance. Associates don't!

[scottxyz]

20. "Cheap Labor" Republicans at it again

n/t

[ignoranceisstrength]

21. join a union is now a violation of the Patriot Act

double plus ungood

[Art_from_Ark]

23. This shows once again that working people voting for Republicans =

Chickens voting for Colonel Sanders
Cows voting for Ronald McDonald
Oysters voting for the walrus and the carpenter

[Chomskyite]

24. Of course the next step

. . . is to campaign to unionize all 400 workers. And the step after that is to unionize all Walmart workers in the region. And after that . . . workers at Walmart may be able to make a living.

The David Glass types may not be able to buy the Kansas City Royals anymore, but . . . waaaaaaaaaah.