Slidin' into Slidell

Slidell, LA (10/4/07) - Nothing like trying out new material on the road, is there?

As I was driving from Birmingham to New Orleans, I was thinking of ways the government can protect the American worker and clamp down on corporate greed.

I got to thinking of the fact that, up until 60 years ago, organized labor had more freedom. In the good ol' U.S.A., it used to be illegal for states to pass unconstitutional work-for-less laws. But nowadays, work-for-less is pandemic in the South and West. This shame was made possible by the foul Taft-Hartley Act. For years after is passage, Democratic campaigns wanted to repeal this law - but attention to this matter dwindled to nothing when the DLC (the Republican wing of the Democratic Party) started flapping its gizzard.

What Congress should do is repeal Taft-Hartley. Unfortunately, I expect toilets to chew bubble gum before that happens.

(Uproariously, I'm writing this article in one of the most anti-worker parishes - counties - in a work-for-less state. I'd love to see the look on the Far Right's face!)

Congress should also peg the minimum wage to (whoosh...whoosh) inflation. In other words, when prices rise, the minimum wage should automatically go up to keep pace with prices. So far the only presidential candidate I know of to publicly support this idea is John Edwards. Congress gives itself a huge pay raise every year (despite this being unconstitutional under the amendment that forbids Congress from varying its pay in the middle of a term). If Congress raises its own pay, it can at least raise average workers' pay.

In recent years, America has replaced fair trade with "free trade." Under so-called "free trade", human rights take a back seat to corporate profit. The United States should end all trade with countries that suppress workers' rights to organize. If America did this, however, it would have to end trade with itself - unless (among other things) it halts the work-for-less laws that plague so many states.

Since Congress ain't gonna rein in the scab states, the rest of the states should shore up this absence by doing their best to enact trade barriers against repressive nations. Some states have selective purchasing laws to prohibit their own governments from buying from companies that do business with bad regimes. Activist federal courts have bowed to the globalists by trying to nix these laws, but the states need to stand up and be counted.

I've started putting my money where my mouth is by buying as little as possible when I pass through work-for-less states - thereby depriving their rulers of sales taxes. Comical, huh? I've become too accustomed to the gouging of us working people in my own area, but at least it's not a state law there.