A BIG IDEA
By John Hightower

What if the White House and Congress were to do something sensible,
positive, visionary, and good for everyone, instead of ... well, you
know, the opposite of all of the above, as they've been doing?

Here's one big idea that would definitely be a plus for our people and
for future generations: Launch a 10-year, $300 billion, crash program to
provide energy independence for America. This would be a nationwide
effort involving millions of us grassroots people to develop, build, and
run a high-speed rail network, a distribution system for
hydrogen-powered cars, energy-efficient buildings and appliances, solar-
and wind-power systems, and other means to kick our nation's costly oil
addiction.

It's called the Apollo Project, and it's a proposal that has been put
together by 10 unions, including steelworkers, auto workers, mine
workers, service employees, machinists, and electrical workers unions.
Among other good results, their bold plan can restore America's
manufacturing jobs, link blue-collar America with the environmental
movement, eliminate the need for more oil wars, build a sound energy
infrastructure for the future, spur a national construction boom,
stimulate the economy from the ground up, excite and unite workaday
Americans in a shared mission, and provide a positive model for the rest
of the world.

Now that's sensible, positive, visionary, and good for everyone!

Froodle-doodle, cry the naysayers in the White House, Congress, and oil
corporations -- where are you going to get $300 billion to finance this?
I say we should get it from where it went. Washington just doled out
$350 billion from our public treasury to enrich elites who were already
super-rich. Let's put $300 billion of that back in the treasury to
finance this Apollo program for the good of all, instead of watching the
privileged stick it in foreign bank accounts or buy more mansions in France.

To see the Apollo proposal for yourself, check out

www.apolloalliance.org.

--
__________________________________________________ __________
Email sent to will never reach me.

Oh SAVE us Unions, save us.

LOL

The unions have already done quite a bit to
"save" you.

Do you enjoy weekends off?
Paid vacation?
Health insurance?
Reasonable access to address on-the-job grievances or some avenue of appeal for

unfair personnel decisions by your employer?
Do you enjoy a company retirement plan?
Is there on-the-job training available to you to help you advance in your
career and improve your skills?

Here's a flash for you: None of these things, taken for granted by most
American workers, were awarded as a result of the overwhelming generosity and
human kindness of the business community.

Why are conservatives so eager to see unions disbanded? So the take backs can
begin and we'll all wind up working for crap wages, no benefits, and expected
to put in a few hours here and there "off the clock" like at the Walton
Foundation's retail front.
:-(

As long as you are sure you're going to be one of the "haves," who gives a
Schlitz about the growing chasm between the
workers and management, right? Getting the unions out of the way is the best
way to see that the workers "get what they've really had coming all along."

One of the problems with the British capital economic model that the
conservatives are clamoring for is that a *ferocious* division between classes
would
develop here, just as it has in countries where the British capital economic
model prevails.

A hard working individual should be able to get ahead in life, not constantly
cut off at the pass because of his pedigree.

On 24 Oct 2003 04:34:27 GMT, (Gould 0738) wrote:

Oh SAVE us Unions, save us.

LOL

The unions have already done quite a bit to
"save" you.

Do you enjoy weekends off?
Paid vacation?
Health insurance?
Reasonable access to address on-the-job grievances or some avenue of appeal for

unfair personnel decisions by your employer?
Do you enjoy a company retirement plan?
Is there on-the-job training available to you to help you advance in your
career and improve your skills?


Spare me Hoffa. I enjoy all of these things. I'm not in a union. My
employer provides them for me because i'm worth it (at least right now
i am). If they didn't, they know i'd go somewhere else.

Unions nowadays are just as corrupt as the corporations they were
formed against. The sad thing is that in the end, the hardworking
American is going to one who ultimately pays.

Spare me Hoffa. I enjoy all of these things. I'm not in a union.

And so do millions of Americans who do not belong to unions.

Employers provide benefits so that they can offer a competitive employment
package and avoid losing good help to competitors with paid vacation, sick
leave, medical benefits, overtime after 40, etc.

My
employer provides them for me because i'm worth it (at least right now
i am). If they didn't, they know i'd go somewhere else.



EXACTLY! :-)

Slambram wrote:
On 24 Oct 2003 04:34:27 GMT, (Gould 0738) wrote:


Oh SAVE us Unions, save us.

LOL

The unions have already done quite a bit to
"save" you.

Do you enjoy weekends off?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over the
weekend if I choose. It's about control so "I"have to conform to "their"
wishes I mean they're about stopping any competition in any manner.

Paid vacation?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over them
if I choose. It's about control see above.

Health insurance?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to take care of my own if
I choose & be paid the gross amount I'm entitled to. I don't need
somebody else making decisions about how or where I spend the money I've
earnt, honestly are you so simple you do??? We don't need everything
dumbed down to the lowest common denominator but that's how it's become.

Reasonable access to address on-the-job grievances or some avenue of appeal for

unfair personnel decisions by your employer?

No not really, lots of potential "employers" are funny people so they
don't employ these days because they can't run their business the way
they want to. So sorry if they can hire they can fire, if you don't want
to work there fine ..... don't. The only thing is we must protect people
from predators like Harry, he's admitted stalking & harassing one female
NG member already & he boasted of it here, this is unacceptable &
illegal such that he should have been prosecuted, in any forum it's well
out of order; including work.

Do you enjoy a company retirement plan?

Mine?? well yes mine is how I want it but again, I want choice pure &
simple & I want the gross amount of money that I have earnt with my
efforts. I don't want anyone telling me how I should live my life nor
plan for my retirement. This compulsory super crap has just lost the
community billions because people were effectively gambling with other
peoples money & the unions have their sticky dishonest fingers on it as
much as the dishonest corps who stole employees money via manipulation
of your socialistic ways.

Is there on-the-job training available to you to help you advance in your
career and improve your skills?

These are crap courses run by simpleton Harry types teaching
gobbledygook nonsense which doesn't benefit anyone but the provider,
certainly not the course taker nor their employer. Typical of what
happens in your socialist world.




Spare me Hoffa. I enjoy all of these things. I'm not in a union. My
employer provides them for me because i'm worth it (at least right now
i am). If they didn't, they know i'd go somewhere else.

Because you would get a better job if they weren't??? & that's my
point!!! just let open free choice & competition have it's way & don't
interfere. The words for today are Milton's "free to choose"

Unions nowadays are just as corrupt as the corporations they were
formed against. The sad thing is that in the end, the hardworking
American is going to one who ultimately pays.

Well we agree then but the unions are run by simpletons & don't let any
lying Harry tell you otherwise, after all he's one of 'em.

K

Do you enjoy weekends off?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over the
weekend if I choose.

You missed the point by a mile: How about the right *not* to work on the
weekends if you don't care to? How about getting paid extra per hour when your
employer insists that you work more hours during a week than he or she told you
the job schedule involved when you were hired on?

It's about control so "I"have to conform to "their"
wishes I mean they're about stopping any competition in any manner.

At first I thought you must have speaking about your employer. :-)

Is competition good? Most of us think so.
Collective bargaining allows a wage earner to compete with his employer's
claims to the fruits of his or her labor. When you do an hour's work, some
portion of the wealth you produce is set aside for you, and the rest belongs to
your employer. Naturally, you and your employer both want the larger portion.
Dividing the fruits of you labor is what bargaining with an employer is all
about.

Paid vacation?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over them
if I choose. It's about control see above.

Whoosh! The point flies overhead again.
You think anybody got a paid vacation before workers organized and bargained
for it? The very *choice* that you're looking for is only available because you
get a vacation in the first place. And it should be your choice, not your
employers. Imagine the hearing the following conversation:

"Oh, by the way, Smith, we'll need you to come in three hours early next
Monday."

"Monday? Mr. Smith and I are leaving for Hawaii on Friday night! It's my annual
vacation! It's been on the schedule for six months or more!"

"Sorry, Smith. We pay you to produce widgets, not sit on the beach in Hawaii.
Looks like you'll have to cancel the vacation, or if you prefer I'll just hire
somebody else to take your job."

When an employer has *all* the horsepower in a relationship, it's not possible
to negotiate anything.

Health insurance?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to take care of my own if

I choose & be paid the gross amount I'm entitled to.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! You sincerely believe that if an employer wasn't
required to fund health insurance for his or her employees that the employer
would pass all of the corresponding savings on to the employees? "Let's see
here- cancelling the company health insurance improved the company bottom line
$275k per year.
What shall I do with that? Invest it in offshore oil drilling futures and hope
for a 90% return, or pass it along to the line workers? Hmmm. Such a dilemna
for most folks!"

I don't need
somebody else making decisions about how or where I spend the money I've
earnt, honestly are you so simple you do???

??? I'm self employed, and don't belong to a union. As far as being simple and
needing decisions made for me....my wife seems to think that'w her role a lot
of times. :-)

Reasonable access to address on-the-job grievances or some avenue of appeal
for

unfair personnel decisions by your employer?

No not really, lots of potential "employers" are funny people so they
don't employ these days because they can't run their business the way
they want to. So sorry if they can hire they can fire, if you don't want
to work there fine ..... don't.

So, two weeks before you've earned your pension (oops, sorry- no union job
probably no pension either) the boss' 21 year old son who gets to play
"manager" in Daddy's plant calls you into his office and says your work is no
longer acceptable. He's hired another person to do your job.
(The other person works for several dollars per hour less, and isn't about to
cost the company big $$$ by becoming fully vested in the retirement fund)
"Smith, I'm really sorry, but since we hired you we have the right to fire you,
and I'm afraid we'll have to let you go."

Since the boss's son represents the employer, whatever he says has to go,
right?

..............(from this point on, most of Karen's post centers around her feud
with Harry. Won't bother to respond).......

Gould 0738 wrote:
Do you enjoy weekends off?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over the
weekend if I choose.


You missed the point by a mile: How about the right *not* to work on the
weekends if you don't care to?

The only way you lefties can get this to happen is by compulsion on
everyone, heavy uneconomic penalties or even worse shut the business
outright for 2 days. What you're against is competition between
employees Chuck?? & well that about sums the monopolist unions to a tee.

How about getting paid extra per hour when your
employer insists that you work more hours during a week than he or she told you
the job schedule involved when you were hired on?

Chuck you can leave if you're not happy. Here's the news Chuck little
places get going by being flexible in all manner of ways, the big blokes
fear this because they know as they get huge so too their overheads. So
the big blokes always give in to the union bullies just so long as they
know the union thugs will make sure there's never any competition big or
small in the market place over labour. The end result is people who want
extra money, are cleverer or even just harder workers are discouraged &
slackers like Harry get protected from them.

End result is less GDP & well if you want proof have a look at any big
US unionised operations, they're all suffering from the hangerson, the
endless imposts from the lefty bureaucrats, the union "demands" the
infinitely rising costs of their inputs because their suppliers are on
the same mouse wheel. Don't blame the imports your reaction is just more
monopoly for your vested interests.


It's about control so "I"have to conform to "their"
wishes I mean they're about stopping any competition in any manner.


At first I thought you must have speaking about your employer. :-)

But nice:-)


Is competition good? Most of us think so.
Collective bargaining allows a wage earner to compete with his employer's
claims to the fruits of his or her labor.

Gees louise do you really believe this!! The employee has no rights
whatsoever to the "fruits". The employee took no risk, invested nothing
& ongoing never is exposed to loosing everything, even if they do
something totally off the wall. The employee is entitled to sell their
labour for as much as they can get for it on what that individual is
worth. Sometimes ostensibly the exact same persons are worth totally
different amounts for their efforts just because one has a better more
productive attitude & the employer should have the right to recognise &
reward or not that fact.


When you do an hour's work, some
portion of the wealth you produce is set aside for you, and the rest belongs to
your employer. Naturally, you and your employer both want the larger portion.
Dividing the fruits of you labor is what bargaining with an employer is all
about.

No way Chuck you're glossing over the fact that the union wants
everybody paid the same for the same job & this is asking for exactly
what manufacturing has got.


Paid vacation?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to work & earn over them
if I choose. It's about control see above.


Whoosh! The point flies overhead again.
You think anybody got a paid vacation before workers organized and bargained
for it? The very *choice* that you're looking for is only available because you
get a vacation in the first place.

Gee you believe your own propaganda you really do. What we need is for
people to be hungry not just for the weekly wage but to gather up enough
to compete with the employer, most industries even seemingly big ones
(marine engines??), this is actually possible but people find it easier
to just sit back & hide behind the union thugs like Harry.

And it should be your choice, not your
employers. Imagine the hearing the following conversation:

"Oh, by the way, Smith, we'll need you to come in three hours early next
Monday."

"Monday? Mr. Smith and I are leaving for Hawaii on Friday night! It's my annual
vacation! It's been on the schedule for six months or more!"

"Sorry, Smith. We pay you to produce widgets, not sit on the beach in Hawaii.
Looks like you'll have to cancel the vacation, or if you prefer I'll just hire
somebody else to take your job."

Come on Chuck who do you think you're talking to; Harry?? I'll be
sitting on a beach sipping diet coke on Monday morning & you'll be still
here struggling to try & get some productivity from that lying dope
Harry. You do as you please regards my job, but fair warning I'm just an
employee & a totally free agent with my labour, so I will take that job
offer from competitor X & I will be as loyal & hard working for them as
I was for you including giving them the benefits of my experience &
inside knowledge built up here.

employer: You're a smartarse Karen:-) but have a nice time & see you
when you get back.

See it's only the dead weight hangerson that they don't really want
anyway that get treated as you fantasise Chuck; good employees are very
hard to find, are valued & usually paid extra & never ever allowed to
leave over trivia. A unionist is usually a slacker who needs the union
thug Harry types for protection from their own behaviour.

When an employer has *all* the horsepower in a relationship, it's not possible
to negotiate anything.


Health insurance?

Yep absolutely but I want to retain the right to take care of my own if


I choose & be paid the gross amount I'm entitled to.


Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! You sincerely believe that if an employer wasn't
required to fund health insurance for his or her employees that the employer
would pass all of the corresponding savings on to the employees?

The employer doesn't "fund" health insurance nor super you the employee
do, it's money spent as a part of your employment contract just as
income tax is. Given recent history it's money you've earnt then had
others **** against the wall for you, it's gone done the drain in huge
amounts much worse than any private investment ever could have. Besides
some people actually need that money & would have better lives for it,
but no no you socialists know what's best & how others should live their
lives, so instead of being ashamed of yourselves you gather together &
pretend you're "good people".


"Let's see
here- cancelling the company health insurance improved the company bottom line
$275k per year.
What shall I do with that? Invest it in offshore oil drilling futures and hope
for a 90% return, or pass it along to the line workers? Hmmm. Such a dilemna
for most folks!"

You have absolutely no concept of competition for labour do you Chuck??
none. Corps don't exist Chuck they're manufactured by the law (bits of
paper) to encourage people to take risks, invest & hopefully employ,
once anyone sees someone else making money for jam, this again hopefully
leads to others setting up Co's in competition & that's what keeps the
whole system honest & going; competition, not union monopolies &
uneducated thugs like Harry.


I don't need
somebody else making decisions about how or where I spend the money I've
earnt, honestly are you so simple you do???


??? I'm self employed, and don't belong to a union. As far as being simple and
needing decisions made for me....my wife seems to think that'w her role a lot
of times. :-)


Reasonable access to address on-the-job grievances or some avenue of appeal

for

unfair personnel decisions by your employer?


No not really, lots of potential "employers" are funny people so they
don't employ these days because they can't run their business the way
they want to. So sorry if they can hire they can fire, if you don't want
to work there fine ..... don't.


So, two weeks before you've earned your pension (oops, sorry- no union job
probably no pension either)

Earned your pension?? this is akin to slavery Chuck, you should & do
have your pension arranged regardless. If you're a little lazy or slow
your pension can go into a union "recommended" fund week by week or a
Company fund but as I said I'd prefer to take care of my own planning
just as you do yes???

the boss' 21 year old son who gets to play
"manager" in Daddy's plant calls you into his office and says your work is no
longer acceptable. He's hired another person to do your job.
(The other person works for several dollars per hour less, and isn't about to
cost the company big $$$ by becoming fully vested in the retirement fund)
"Smith, I'm really sorry, but since we hired you we have the right to fire you,
and I'm afraid we'll have to let you go."

Chuck this is fanciful but possible however that Co will suffer if that
is the wrong decision & will have trouble hiring longer term employees
plus the rest will be grumbly & less productive.

I have to add for your consideration though; you assume the near
retiree was any good because have you ever heard the union tell the
truth about one of these stories?? Like for the last 2 yrs maybe this
person has effectively retired at work, they're just clock watching till
retirement day, the rest of the staff see us tolerating this out of
kindness but now they're slacking off also & hooly dooly they might take
the same attitude as they near retirement???. The 21 yo bosses son??
well it's a measure of the father that he's not really much good if he
just hands it over without making the kid work his way up through the
ranks so it's no surprise I guess the father has let your near retiree
get away with murder, because after all these years he's part of the
furniture & even maybe a golf buddy. Be careful Chuck rotten apples are
rotten apples but they all started as fresh rosy nice apples once.

The son might be exactly right & the Co might be much better off very
publicly getting rid of your example along with a few others of his
union malcontent click.


Since the boss's son represents the employer, whatever he says has to go,
right?

.............(from this point on, most of Karen's post centers around her feud
with Harry. Won't bother to respond).......

Thanks Chuck it's good to see at least you can try to justify your
team's behaviour.

Do you get dragnet there?? the gay bloke tells the cop "I play for the
other team" cop says; "you're from Canada??" :-)

K

I like it. Can't tell you how many times I've said to people that I wish
some
politician would put up a challange for alternative energy / energy
independence
along the same lines as JFK did for the space race. ~ I haven't read
through
the details of that site yet, but thanks for posting it.

Another idea: Have a tax on gallons of oil. That is, say 5 cents per
gallon
of CRUDE used. That tax slowly inceases over the years. All revenu goes
toward alternative energy research, development, and implementation. That
way ALL users of crude help get us off the crude. The impact from such
a tax would seem to hit all sectors equally and in proportion to their use
of oil...so is about as fair as a tax can be.

Gary

Harry Krause wrote:

A BIG IDEA
By John Hightower

What if the White House and Congress were to do something sensible,
positive, visionary, and good for everyone, instead of ... well, you
know, the opposite of all of the above, as they've been doing?

Here's one big idea that would definitely be a plus for our people and
for future generations: Launch a 10-year, $300 billion, crash program to
provide energy independence for America. This would be a nationwide
effort involving millions of us grassroots people to develop, build, and
run a high-speed rail network, a distribution system for
hydrogen-powered cars, energy-efficient buildings and appliances, solar-
and wind-power systems, and other means to kick our nation's costly oil
addiction.

It's called the Apollo Project, and it's a proposal that has been put
together by 10 unions, including steelworkers, auto workers, mine
workers, service employees, machinists, and electrical workers unions.
Among other good results, their bold plan can restore America's
manufacturing jobs, link blue-collar America with the environmental
movement, eliminate the need for more oil wars, build a sound energy
infrastructure for the future, spur a national construction boom,
stimulate the economy from the ground up, excite and unite workaday
Americans in a shared mission, and provide a positive model for the rest
of the world.

Now that's sensible, positive, visionary, and good for everyone!

Froodle-doodle, cry the naysayers in the White House, Congress, and oil
corporations -- where are you going to get $300 billion to finance this?
I say we should get it from where it went. Washington just doled out
$350 billion from our public treasury to enrich elites who were already
super-rich. Let's put $300 billion of that back in the treasury to
finance this Apollo program for the good of all, instead of watching the
privileged stick it in foreign bank accounts or buy more mansions in France.

To see the Apollo proposal for yourself, check out

www.apolloalliance.org.


You simpleton it's you & your union thug mates that have caused most of
the problems, to suggest they could in any manner be a part of any
solution is gall even for you!!!...



K

Sure blame everything on the unions. Keep shopping at Wal-Mart so the
illegal aliens will keep their jobs. Wal-Mart promotes BUY, MADE IN AMERICA.
That's the biggest joke of them all. Take a look at where their merchandise
comes from. Cheap foreign labor! Cheap foreign labor produces cheap crap.

Cleaning up the environment will lead to millions of jobs. When I look at a
land fill. I see a natural resources not just the garbage you toss out.

This country is moving towards a society that will one day have a country
cleaner than American Indians did. A society that has a 35 hour work week
with more paid vacations and full health benefits. Just as soon as people
like you, ask not what you can do for your county ask what the hell is my
country spending my tax dollars on.

You have the audacity to call others who think differently than your moral
low IQ simpletons. When in fact it's people like you that where afraid of
the industrial revolution and the computer. Have another Martini and swallow
a few more Valiums. It's only going to get better once the money grabbing
political hypocrites in Washington are strung up by their thumbs. I know
exactly where you stand. Sure give congress a pay raise. They deserve it,
now that $750,000.00 is considered poverty.

Jack
"K Smith" wrote in message
...
Harry Krause wrote:

A BIG IDEA
By John Hightower

What if the White House and Congress were to do something sensible,
positive, visionary, and good for everyone, instead of ... well, you
know, the opposite of all of the above, as they've been doing?

Here's one big idea that would definitely be a plus for our people and
for future generations: Launch a 10-year, $300 billion, crash program to
provide energy independence for America. This would be a nationwide
effort involving millions of us grassroots people to develop, build, and
run a high-speed rail network, a distribution system for
hydrogen-powered cars, energy-efficient buildings and appliances, solar-
and wind-power systems, and other means to kick our nation's costly oil
addiction.

It's called the Apollo Project, and it's a proposal that has been put
together by 10 unions, including steelworkers, auto workers, mine
workers, service employees, machinists, and electrical workers unions.
Among other good results, their bold plan can restore America's
manufacturing jobs, link blue-collar America with the environmental
movement, eliminate the need for more oil wars, build a sound energy
infrastructure for the future, spur a national construction boom,
stimulate the economy from the ground up, excite and unite workaday
Americans in a shared mission, and provide a positive model for the rest
of the world.

Now that's sensible, positive, visionary, and good for everyone!

Froodle-doodle, cry the naysayers in the White House, Congress, and oil
corporations -- where are you going to get $300 billion to finance this?
I say we should get it from where it went. Washington just doled out
$350 billion from our public treasury to enrich elites who were already
super-rich. Let's put $300 billion of that back in the treasury to
finance this Apollo program for the good of all, instead of watching the
privileged stick it in foreign bank accounts or buy more mansions in
France.

To see the Apollo proposal for yourself, check out

www.apolloalliance.org.


You simpleton it's you & your union thug mates that have caused most of
the problems, to suggest they could in any manner be a part of any
solution is gall even for you!!!...



K