Blagojevich and "Change to Win"

The Smoking Gun has the criminal complaint filed against Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.

On page 68, paragraph 107, reproduced here, it is reported that an advisor to the governor, “Advisor B,” told the Governor that the “president-elect” would prefer the “Change to Win” option because there would be “fewer fingerprints on it” to which Obama might later be linked. Advisor B is reported to be a “Washington, DC-based consultant” who had had discussions with a representative from the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

Change to Win is a coalition of American labor unions originally formed in 2005 as an alternative to the AFL-CIO. Of several union affiliates, the SEIU and the Teamsters are the most prominent.

It seems that Gov. Blagojevich, his chief-of-staff John Harris, Advisor B and a high-ranking SEIU representative all considered the appointment of Blagojevich to head Change to Win a conceivable pay-back from Obama for appointing the president-elect’s first choice to his vacated senate seat.

This arrangement was seen as a win-win for all. Blago gets a cushy union job, Obama gets support from Change to Win for his political initiatives as well as a Senator that he hand-picks for the job. And, there would be little if any paper trail to implicate the new president in the deal.

My question, is how did these very powerful, politically astute people get so far in this scheme and make the assumptions about Obama that they did without some communication with either Obama directly or, at least, someone very close to him? The discussions in the FBI tapes give one the impression that this has all been hashed out at the highest levels and all that remains is to seal the deal.

Rahm Emanuel, a long-time Illinois politico and former Blago campaign strategist, was identified as the likely tipster that informed the feds about Blago's attempts to profit from the senate appointment. If true, that could help negate any suggestion that Obama was directly involved, but alas, a source close to Emanuel refutes the story.

Parker: We fail to learn from history

BY STAR PARKER
FOUNDER & PRESIDENT
COALITION ON URBAN RENEWAL & EDUCATION

How can you not feel that emptiness in the pit of your stomach as you watch our financial markets spin downward? The broad stock market indices are down well over 40 percent since the beginning of the year. Losses are somewhere in the neighborhood of $9 trillion.

The real economic realities behind these numbers are starting to show up. The only question at this point is how severe the recession we are now entering will be.

Maybe, when everyone is depressed I am supposed to write cheery things to encourage folks. But I can't, because I care about our country and what I see is not encouraging.

We just had a presidential election that in some circles produced a lot of euphoria. But I believe that at some point -- I hope sooner rather than later -- many Americans are going to wake up and realize that this election was not a cure for our problems but a symptom of the disease.

I think this is what our crashing financial markets are telling us.

There is a well-known quote from a less well-known philosopher -- George Santayana -- that those who don't remember history will repeat it.

The failure of communism and socialism is not that far behind us. Yet Americans cannot seem to recall that it happened -- and why it happened.

What characterizes these systems? Government control. Central planning. And Godlessness.

Let's consider the sad and pathetic state of our American automobile companies.

As the chairmen of GM, Ford, and Chrysler sat in Washington begging for public money to survive, Honda was celebrating the opening of a new non-union plant in Greensburg, Ind., which will produce 200,000 vehicles annually.

The starting hourly wage at this plant will be $18.41 per hour -- about $10 less than at the American companies. There were 33,000 applicants for 900 job openings.

Americans want to work, can work, and can compete with anyone. They just need to be free to do it.

In 1970, GM had 50 percent of the U.S. auto market. Today it has 20 percent. What happened?

The world changed in 1973. We were hit with the oil shock. The oil producing countries' cartel, OPEC, discovered its power, and drove up energy prices.

The power of a free country and free markets is that people, when left alone, will adjust to change and do what they need to do. In fact, that's what happened in businesses that were left alone. Changes and adjustments were made and overall the country is about twice as energy efficient today as it was in 1970.

But in our high profile auto industry that's not what happened. Our politicians, with cooperation from our auto industry executives, decided that the auto companies could not be left to their own resources to adjust to new realities.

First, we enacted import quotas on Japanese cars. Second, we enacted fuel standards to dictate to our car companies what kind of cars to make. And, of course, third, the power of the union was left intact.

Now look where we are. We have a destroyed industry that is the product not of Americans not being able to compete, but of allowing itself to become dependent on government.

This is why our auto companies have failed. This is why communist and socialist countries have failed.

A few days ago Rahm Emanuel, who Barack Obama has picked to be his chief of staff, spoke to a gathering of CEOs at a Wall Street Journal conference in Washington.

He went through the agenda to expect from the Obama administration. He sounded like a commissar from the Soviet Union. Government control and planning in health care, energy, the economy, and financial markets.

Why are our financial markets so pessimistic? They are bracing. The market sees the sad news that Americans have not learned from history. And it looks like we are about to relive its hard lessons.

Star Parker is president of the Coalition on Urban Renewal & Education and author of the new book White Ghetto: How Middle Class America Reflects Inner City Decay.

Prior to her involvement in social activism, Star Parker was a single welfare mother in Los Angeles, California. After receiving Christ, Star returned to college, received a BS degree in marketing and launched an urban Christian magazine. The 1992 Los Angeles riots destroyed her business, yet served as a springboard for her focus on faith and market-based alternatives to empower the lives of the poor.

South Dakota Measure 10 Concedes Defeat to Unions

SIOUX FALLS -- The campaign committee supporting Initiated Measure 10 Tuesday conceded defeat, saying it could not compete with a nearly $1 million television advertising campaign paid for by the National Education Association in Washington, D.C..

Jim Anderson, Sioux Falls, thanked the campaign's supporters.

"We appreciate those who stood with us in the face of a barrage of negative advertising paid for by out-of-state union officials in Washington," Anderson said. "We're looking at this first time around as a learning experience, and we remain committed to pursuing these needed ethics reforms. We'll make the necessary changes this experience suggests are needed, and we'll be able to prepare accordingly next time knowing that the real opposition to ethics reform in South Dakota is NEA union officials back east."

Which is Really the Party of the Rich?

GUEST COLUMN

BY ANTON KAISER

For some time now, Democrats have perpetuated the myth that Republicans are in the pockets of big business and therefore the party of the rich. It’s a great political tactic because, of course, we are all against the rich; that is, those who pay the majority of our taxes in this country. But what is the truth?

OpenSecrets.org is a bipartisan website specifically designed to track the varied sources of political money and where it goes. Among one of its many useful purposes, it lists the top one hundred individual and organizational donors to national politics. So where does all that political money come from and where does it go?

Not surprising, at least to me, is the fact that the number one political donor organization in America is the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, whose primary interest is to keep government jobs out of the private sector. In other words, these are the employees of big government who naturally want to keep their jobs in big government. Not only does this union (whose money comes from employee income derived from our taxes) donate the most political money in America, but it also gives 99% of its donations to the Democrat party. (Which makes me wonder how that influences their federal job performances during Republican administrations.)

By fact, five of the top ten organizational donors to politics in America are unions (their percent contributions to the Democrat party in 2008 are in parenthesis), including: the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (98%); the Laborers Union (92%); the Service Employees International Union (94%), and the Carpenters and Joiners Union (87%). The Teamsters Union ranks 11th (92%). (In fact, five of the second top ten organizational donors are also unions who give 92% to 99% of their donations to Democrats.)

Now consider if it is reasonable to believe that 90+% of union members are democrats.

Others in the top ten are the National Association of Realtors who donate 58% of their money to Democrats, the National Education Association who donate 85% to Democrats, and the American Association for Justice, whose idea of justice is to donate 96% of their money to Democrats.

Only two big businesses are represented in the top ten and they are AT&T and Goldman Sachs, an investment bank. Although AT&T donates 59% to Republicans, Goldman Sachs donates 73% of their money to Democrats.

In summary, the Democrat's allegation that Republicans are in the pockets of big business comes from a single thorn in their side, AT&T, which is the only organization in the top ten who gives more to Republicans than to Democrats and by a significantly smaller margin than the other nine top ten organizational donors who overwhelmingly support the Democrat party.

So who is really the party of the rich? And, if big money runs the country, who really has injected that money into American politics? Seems to me the Democrats are in the pockets of big unions who are clearly the rich in this country where it concerns political donations. Check it out.

Anton Kaiser was born in Aberdeen, South Dakota, and retired in Rapid City after serving twenty-seven years as a U.S. Army infantry officer. He is a graduate of the United States Military Academy, West Point, and holds Masters Degrees in Business and in Public Administration from Webster College, St. Louis, MO. He is also a veteran of Vietnam, Berlin, Operation Just Cause (Panama) and an honor graduate of the Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS.

The NEA Taxpayer and Membership Shakedown

You may remember from my piece on Wal-Mart a few days ago that I'm not a big fan of unions, especially those which engage in political activities with the dues paid by union members.

A couple of days ago, the Wall Street Journal had an update on the "Extracurricular Politics" of the National Education Association (NEA).

You get some crazy stuff coming out of the education establishment these days. You would expect a segment of society that is (ostensibly) dedicated to increasing knowledge and understanding to always do the smartest thing possible.

Instead, it seems the education establishment does some of the dumbest things possible, like this lawsuit in South Dakota where you have education groups--and even the schools themselves--trying to sue the state government for more taxpayer money. In other words, you have government using taxpayer money to sue government for more taxpayer money.

Can you say, "Duh"? I knew you could.

But maybe it's not about doing the smart thing; maybe it's about doing the self-interested thing. That's something the NEA knows a lot about.

If you don't already know about the NEA's tactics, it can be an education to find out what this group, ostensibly there to better your child's education, does that may run counter to your own values.

The Wall Street Journal piece points out that the NEA spent $2.3 million in the 2007-08 fiscal year to fight a voucher referendum in Utah. Not only did this educational group fight democracy itself, they did so on an issue that could have improved educational quality and opportunity for the children of Utah. In other words, the NEA isn't interested in the quality of your child's education, just keeping their nest feathered.

The piece says the NEA also spent $20,000 to conduct polling on a state constitutional convention in Hawaii. And $60,000 to oppose a state income tax repeal in Massachusetts (how is taking sides in an income tax issue supposed to improve your child's education?). Or $200,000 to oppose property tax cuts in Florida.

These are just a handful of examples.

Can you say, "The NEA is about feathering its nest at taxpayer expense"? I knew you could.

How could it possibly be summed up better than the way the piece ends:

It's a shame the NEA doesn't spend as much money and effort trying to improve lousy schools as it does trying to keep taxes high.

UTU Union Bribe Caught on Tape

Actual undercover footage of a United Transportation Union (UTU) bagman accepting a cash bribe for the union's president.



Forcing someone to join a union to work a job, and forcing employers to negotiate with unions, is un-American.