Mr. Block lives! - Joe the wannabe Scab Plumber in Madison
Submitted on Fri, 02/25/2011 - 7:10pm
By Arthur J Miller, IWW
I was watching the TV news about the protests in Madison last Saturday, they conveniently did not not mention there were far more pro-union protesters than they were anti-union protesters. I guess that fact was not news worthy to them. The news showed a short clip of Joe the scab plumper speaking and the damn fool said "We owe the unions nothing!" Looking at his bald head I had to think the man had more hair upon his head than he had brains.
First off Joe is not a real plumper, at best he is a plumber's helper. By union standards he did not go through a plumber's apprenticeship nor is he a licensed plumper, so he is not qualified to work as a plumber.
Yes, there are little plumping shops that under bid union shops and for less money you get less quality work. And even someone like Joe doing the work that he was never trained to do. I hope he is a better plumber than he is a politician.
Well Joe, the wannabe plumper, meet me, Arthur the pipefitter. I am rated by the union as a journeyman and I have over 30 years in the pipe trades. Yea, the media likes a fool like who they play up as a worker and kisses the bosses backside. But you sure the hell don't speak for me, a real pipe trades worker.
I call you a scab because you are standing against your fellow workers. Your comments were the words of a dirty rotten scab.
I would expect bosses to say we owe unions nothing because their greed is such that they want everything and want to share nothing with the rest of the people of the world. If they could get away with it they would pay us workers not one red cent. All that we workers have came from the struggle of the labor movement and the unions. Even non-union workers benefit from the labor movement because when you raise the standard of living of some it does raise it for all. I should also point out that it is the labor movement that pushed for a minimum wage. So if you hate unions so much then go to your boss and request that your wages be that which you would have been paid before the unions. How does 16 cents a day sound?
How about having to work 10 to 16 hours a day with no time and a half for over time, sound to you? It was the labor movement that won the reduction of hours worked and time and a half for overtime. I guess you would really like that, right? How about no holidays? No vacation time?
How about job safety? Though we still have a ways to go on that one, but before the labor movement there was no thought of job safety.
When ever there is a financial down turn, Joe, it is we working people who must sacrifice. We lose our jobs, our medical benefits and if we are not among those that are out of work, we are asked to take cuts in pay and benefits. Why don't the politicians start with cuts in their pay and benefits?
Today the target is public workers. Not only are they being asked to take cuts in pay and benefits, the GOP and you anti-union Tea Baggers are trying to bust their unions. Let us think about that for a moment. The employers have their organizations of self-interest, are you trying to bust those organizations? No. The politicians have their organizations of self-interest, are you trying to bust those organizations? No. Heck the politicians are allowed to vote for their own raises and benefits, but you want to strip working people the right to have any input in their wages and benefits. There are some who want all public workers to have to get approval of a vote of the public for their wage increases, are politicians willing to do the same?
Who is it that is responsible for these financial down turns? This current one, was it the banks or was it working people? Even you know the answer to that one. Why is it that companies are recovering while unemployment is still high? Whereas fewer than a million new jobs have opened up in the U.S., U.S. companies have hired 1.4 million workers outside of the U.S. In other words U.S. companies that enjoyed being bailed out and tax cuts are using the financial crisis to move even more jobs to places where they can pay workers far less money.
There has been a long line of deceptive efforts against us workers. All those so-called free trade agreements, that us workers were told would lead to more jobs. Where are those jobs? How did any of that benefit us workers?
Here is something to think about Joe. When you lower the wages of workers and many of them lose their jobs, who is going to buy all the junk that keeps other workers employed? As for the public sector. If many good paying jobs are lost and those who do not lose their jobs must take pay cuts, then you have lost a lot of tax money that those workers would be paying and that, in part is the problem that state the governments are having. And your answer to that problem is to make it worse by cutting even more wages and benefits to public workers. Makes a lot of sense Joe. Do you think the rich is going to make up the difference? No, because people like you want tax cuts for the rich.
While the rich are basking in their greed, working people are taking cuts, losing their jobs, the politicians are going after their pension funds, workers compensation, education, and programs for the poor. In others words those that are responsible for the financial crisis are making out like bandits and those that had no part in that are suffering. And you and your Tea Baggers have become the mouth pieces for this con game.
Do you Joe have the mental capacity to examine a bit of reality? Where would we be without the public workers? How about this, all public workers stop working for one week and then the next week all politicians stop what ever it is they do for a week. In the first day of public workers not working people would be complaining and demanding that they go back to work. As for the politicians taking a week off, next to no one would even notice it. So who is the most important in all of this? Those that do the work that people depend upon or politicians just passing gas? So you Joe side with the politicians against working people. But who feeds you Joe? Who produces all your needs and services? Go ask them GOP politicians for something to eat when you are hungry, they will tel to to get lost bum.
Joe I call you a scab because you claim to be a worker, but you openly side against working people and are a tool, a fool, for the greedy rich. We use to call people like you Mr. Block. So Joe the wannabe scab plumper, can you answer me, Arthur the pipefitter?