Wall Street Firms Funnel Millions to Bush

Great Debates
41

We have already cited examples of union coercion. No examples of investment firms using coercion have been produced. We have had several accusations of this, but no reason to believe in those accusations. As I mentioned, my experience with Wall Street firms is that no coercion is used. xtisme has done a good job of demonstrating why the OP does not show coercion either.

Therefore your assertion that the donations of the OP are “coerced” is unsupported by any facts. If you would care to produce some, we could discuss it, but the burden of proof remains squarely with those making the accusations.

Got any?

Regards,
Shodan

42

Well, see here’s the thing.

My brother isn’t really free not to join his union. He could assert his Beck rights, but it would create a massive headache for him. The steelworkers aren’t known for being an easygoing kind of union.

It’s a union shop where he works. All employees are enrolled in the union upon hire, unless they’re corporate management. It’s the default situation.

His dues are routinely deducted from his paycheck. It’s essentially a tax on his wages - the more he makes, the more he pays. The rate is 1.3% of his wage.

This situation is the same for all members of the United Steelworkers Union, which claims more than 500,000 dues-paying members in the United States and Canada. They paid, in 2002, more than $160 million in dues.

http://union-reports.dol.gov/olmsWeb/docs/pdf/LM2_000094_20021231_0.pdf

It’s a pretty safe bet that, among this huge group of people, there are lots and lots of Republicans and Bush supporters. Yet their dues are being used for anti-Bush activity, as seen in the following link.

USW President campaigns with John Kerry.

The entire site, BTW, is rabidly anti-Bush and anti-Republican. Which I think is perfectly fine. I just don’t think these activities should be forceably funded, as a condition of employment, by people who disagree with them.

This is for one union only. The activities of others is pretty much the same, though. It all adds up to massive amounts extorted from people who are supposed to be paying for collective bargaining.

Harry Beck, after he won his Supreme Court case, was refunded all dues not directly tied to collective bargaining costs. It amounted to 80% of his original dues. This is the real reason unions aren’t letting workers easily opt out of their political activities.

I’d love for anyone to show me similar numbers for corporations shaking employees down for donations. I don’t think you can, in a million years.

43

Balderdash. If you want to debate union influence in politics, open a new thread. What you and the other conservatives are doing is nothing more than pointing over the OP’s shoulder and saying, “Look over there!!”. You have studied at the knee of the Great Misleader™ well, grasshopper; when the line of questioning makes you uncomfortable, derail the topic and refuse to answer the original question.

But since you insist on hijacking this thread, do you really mean to say that the captains of industry are no better than the labor bosses? I should think that you would hold yourselves up to a higher standard, but apparently not.

44

Or perhaps they’re merely pointing out the selective anger from folks like you, Sensei. Maybe you should read manhattan’s posts for a pretty definitive answer as to why nothing is amiss here.

But I see where your responsive philosophy comes from: “When the answer makes you uncomfortable, ignore it and accuse the other side of evil motives.”

45

Well, they don’t have to, now do they? Republicans tend to have considerable reverence for the civic virtues of businessmen and corporations, and are firmly committed to protecting their civil rights.

But this whole argument is little more than what shade of lipstick for the pig. The challenge is how to remove the influence of money on politics. Honest conservatives, of which John McCain seems the most prominent exemplar, are willing, even eager, to sacrifice partisan advantage in pursuit of a more inclusive and representative democracy. Partisan Republicans, of course, tend to regard their monetary advantage as direct proof of Divine favor.

At the risk of oversimplification: recent events clearly show that America is almost evenly divided, politically. If this is the case, why then do we tolerate a political system that permits one of the partisans a two-to-one advantage in money? What possible justification - legal, political or ethical - would support such a system?

46

Freedom of speech.

47

  1. I think that the fact, as you quoted in your previous post, that members who do not agree with the political party or politician that a union chooses to support can get refunds, addresses this problem on the union side.

  2. In the OP article I posted, it said nothing about anyone wanting to clean this up. It was my idea to call for penalties and a ban on letters of support from bosses - and I wasn’t only referring to letters that came from the Republican side. It’s coercion, no matter who does it.

48

For the benefit of those persons who are actually interested in fighting ignorance, it should be noted that this is an exactly backward interpretation of the most recent campaign finance reforms. In fact, Democrats were outscoring Republicans mightily on the kind of soft-money donations which were banned in the most recent legislation. In what I consider to be a rare event, many people on both sides of the aisle voted against their own fundraising interests for what they thought was right[sup]1[/sup]. I also believe that persons such as Sen. McCain, who voted for the new restrictions which benefited his party more than the opposition, also voted in good faith on what they thought was right without regard to the short-term outcome.

A possibly interesting subject for another thread, as this one is fully resolved, factually, against the OP. Though of course one would have to un-oversimplify to account for in-kind contributions such as phone banks from the unions and for the 527 groups which are collecting unprecedented sums from such noted non-Democrats as George Soros before one came up with the purported advantage if one wanted to debate it in good faith. I’ll give a hint where I stand: I find it outrageous that the Republican party can buy a television ad advocating President Bush’s re-election but that I, a private citizen in a free country, can not.

Except that it’s not coercion in the case you cited. Do you seriously believe that Mr. O’Neal couldn’t find 200 or so willing donors among all the various Vice Presidents (or whatever defines a “senior executive” in the article – it’s unclear) who wish to see President Bush reelected? Do you seriously believe that the participation rate would be so low if there were any coercion involved at all?

[sup]1[/sup]: If one were a conspiracy theorist, one might make the argument that the Democrats correctly foresaw that the legislation would merely shift donations to 527 groups. One would have a pretty strong burden of proof if one wanted to make that case, IMO. I honestly do believe that just about everyone did what they thought was right here, regardless of their own personal interest. Of non-members of congress who supported the legislation and then became 527 kingpins I have a slightly more biased view, though I still believe the burden of proof would be on the asserter.

49

I believe that if you were to run through all the names of all Merrill employees, you would find that the number would be much higher than 157 or whatever. While this letter was not an example of direct coercion, one would have to be very naïve to not believe that this letter had SOME influence on what SOME people did, especially given the reputation of O’Neil that was mentioned in the article.

50

I’m really not sure what your point is. Both unions and groups like the NRA and AARP have members who consistently toe the line even if they might vote differently on other issues (I know plenty of union folks who are solidly Republican in belief who have never, ever voted for a Republican candidate). As a result, their needs are carefully considered by legislators who wish to remain in office.

Yes, elections are won and lost by voters in the middle, voters who likely aren’t affiliated with political groups. But that’s only true if you’re competitve in the first instance, and you can’t be competitive by ignoring groups who can mobilize large blocs of people to go to the polls. Real political power for advocacy groups comes not from campaign fundraising, but from an ability to put bodies in front of a ballot box.

As Barney Frank (D-MA) puts it, "“People on the left make the mistake of saying the NRA’s power is big money. Votes beat money any day, and the NRA has votes. I tell gay and lesbian groups that the NRA is the model that all advocacy groups should use.”

Investment banks have money. Unions have votes. Ergo, unions are more politically powerful.

51

Which is, of course, precisely as it should be, no? Seeing as how unions are made up of, like, people. Seems to me investment banks should have no more political power than they have people to embody that power. Money has no first amendment rights, and I oppose activist judges interpreting the Constitution in order to create such. Strict constructionist that I am, and all.

52

What you think is not so, iamme99. George Gally tried to assert his Beck rights, and his union held up more than $30,000 worth of his pay, for his efforts.

Union members who actually try to assert their Beck rights run into problems like this all the time. Again, I can cite cases like Gally’s all day.

Please show me some equally horrible examples from the corporate side. Otherwise, I can only conclude that you’re not interested in basic fairness and civil rights. You’re interested in partisan political gain.

I don’t think corporations should shake employees down for donations. But nobody in this thread has found a genuine example of this.

53

  1. If you are going to extract and comment on one part of a post, then you should stick to only the part you chose to extract, instead of wandering off on another tangent. My whole post addressed both sides of the question AND if you hadn’t eliminated part of that post, you might recall that it also said that both sides should be treated the same (with respect to coercive (overt or otherwise)) political actions.

  2. When you join a union, you know the rules. The fact that you CAN make a choice, whether or not it is easy to do, is all that can realistically be asked for. But when the boss sends you a personal letter and asks for you to support his favorite candidate or political party, you don’t have the same opportunity to bow out, at least if you are a realist.

  3. The article quoted in the OP would qualify for a boss and corporation shaking down employees. You can play semantics and disagree all you want. But I think you will still be wrong.

54

Er, the Beck decision is part of the rules. In fact, it is the law of the land. So refusing to abide by it is both illegal and unethical. So it is hardly unrealistic to expect the unions to refrain from doing what is illegal and unethical

And what is unrealistic about encountering intimidation from union bosses when you ask them to abide by the law?

As I mentioned, I consult for a Wall Street firm. No instances of adverse consequence have been documented in this thread for refusing to make a political contribution. Some instances have been documented from unions for the same actions. So the adverse consequences are all coming from the unions, and none at all from the investment firms. In other words, the facts are against you.

No, not in the least. No one has produced any evidence of a boss shaking down his employees. There are instances of union bosses shaking down their members. This is not semantics, and Mr. Moto is not the one who is wrong.

Regards,
Shodan

55

What can be realistically asked for, iamme99, is that unions and corporate officers obey the law.

In George Gally’s case, the union did not properly notify him of his Beck rights when he asked about them. That was in clear violation of the law. I agree that politicking on the job crosses the line of bad taste. However, without any implied quid pro quo, there was no lawbreaking involved in the case you mentioned.

Show me a case where there was such a quid pro quo, and we can discuss the horrible illegalities of that instance. But I can give you case after case where unions violate employees rights under the Beck decision.

You’re trying to minimize what unions do routinely to violate the civil rights of employees, while conjuring up imagined abuses by one corporate official. Forgive me for saying, but that explanation reeks of hypocrisy.

56

Gee 'luce, hijack much? My point was that votes trump money. Thus even if i-banks make large contributions, their actual political power pales in comparison to advocacy groups (including unions) who can deliver people to the ballot box. Even in the complete absence of any campaign finance legislation that equation remains true.

As to the first amendment question you raise – don’t be silly. If the government prohibits me from, say, purchasing advertising to disseminate my message, it is effectively curtailing my free speech rights. The government can’t do an end run around the constitution in that fashion. It isn’t “money” that has constitutional rights, it’s the people spending that money – they are spending it in order to promulgate a constitutionally-protected message.

And your attempt to link your position with strict constructionism is absurd. In the same way that using infrared cameras from a helicopter can constitute a “search,” so too does restricting spending on speech amount to an actual abridgement of speech. I know that you are aware of this, so I can only conclude you’re trying to deliberately mislead the uninformed reader. Shame on you.

57

Balderdash, sir! Tommyrot! Your irony detection apparatus is malfunctioning, or you hope to undermine a rhetorical and political opponent by impugning my motives. Which ought to be beneath you. Endeavor to make that so. My labeling of myself a “strict constructionist” didn’t tip you off? Or is it that you preferred to believe my motives were mendacious rather than humorous? And this “uninformed reader” that I am “deliberately trying to mislead”? That would be a reader who disagrees with you, would it not? Since, clearly, you imply that an informed reader would be immune to such base blandishments. What rot!

Your appeal to “free speech” is as flaccid as it is shallow. The doctrine of free speech is intended to equalize the political opportunity of citizens. To pervert its intention in order to permit the speaker with the most money the most political power is repulsive. The fact that this unequal empowerment benefits the political philosophy you find appealing does not render it any less corrupt.

58

Permit the speaker? Is it the government which “permits” us to speech? I thought it was supposed to “protect” speech. Must have been a Freudian slip… And how would the government **equalize ** this benefit without **suppressing ** the speech of those with more money than average?

59

Missed this one in preview. Should have been:

Is it the government which “permits” us to speak?

60

A helpful hint for newer SDMB readers: whenever elucidator begins a post with “balderdash” and “tommyrot,” you can be fairly certain that he’s about to pile manure even higher than usual.

You’re saying that strict constructionists aren’t really strict constructionists – that if they were really strict constructionists, they’d think campaign finance laws were really just constitutionally hunky-dory. You’re essentially leveling an accusation of hypocrisy, and you’re doing so ignorantly, because as I’ve noted strict constructionists also take a dim view of the government end-running the constitutional text.

No, that would be a reader who is reasonably well-versed in strict constructionist thought. Such a reader need not actually be a strict constructionist; he only need understand the arguments for strict constructionism. Certainly there are any number of living constitutionalists right here on the SDMB (minty, Polycarp, even you in your less-disingenuous moments) who would not make the same foolish assertion about strict constructionism that you just made.

Funny, I thought it was to prevent the government from gagging individual citizens.

If anything is a “perversion” of it’s intention, it’s claiming that a government restriction on the ability to speak is an enhancement of free speech rights. But whatever you say, dude. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.