**********
Augusta, Maine — Gov. Paul LePage has ordered the removal of a 36-foot mural depicting Maine's labor history from the lobby of the Department of Labor. The 11-panel piece depicts several moments, including the 1937 shoe mill strike in Auburn and Lewiston, "Rosie the Riveter" at Bath Iron Works, and the paper mill workers' strike of 1986.
Acting labor chief Laura Boyett emailed staff Tuesday about the mural's pending removal, as well as another administration directive to rename several department conference rooms that carry the names of pro-labor icons such as Cesar Chavez.
From Digby, at Hullabaloo: "... a spokeswoman for Gov. Paul LePage released a faxed complaint comparing the art to North Korean propaganda.
"In this mural I observed a figure which closely resembles the former commissioner of labor," an anonymous fax given to the Portland Press Herald reads. "In studying the mural I also observed that this mural is nothing but propaganda to further the agenda of the Union movement. I felt for a moment that I was in communist North Korea where they use these murals to brainwash the masses."
"So obviously, they must be airbrushed. Can we see the little problem here? I knew that you could.
"Here are some panels from the offensive brainwashing propaganda:
"It's almost impossible to tell the difference between that and this:
[Governor LePage also wants to roll back child labor laws in Maine. Here's Stephen Colbert:]
"According to [Maine Governor Paul LePage's] spokesman, the [pro-labor] mural 'sparked complaints from some business owners' and was removed because 'the message from state agencies needs to be balanced.' … But Governor LePage is not anti-art. He's asking the public to send in 'artwork that depicts the cooperative relationship that exists between Maine's job creators and the workers who power Maine's economy.' Well said! There's a wonderfully cooperative relationship between management and labor right now, much like the historic partnership between oranges and a juicer."
---Stephen Colbert
**********
Lindsay Graham, from senate.gov: "If he [Obama] does not act decisively in Libya, I believe history will show that the Obama Administration owned the results of the Gaddafi regime from 2011 forward. Their refusal to act will go down as one of the great mistakes in American foreign policy history, and will have dire consequences for our own national security in the years to come. I truly fear the decisions they are making today will come back to haunt us."
[Emphasis added. This from one of the cheerleaders for the invasion of Iraq. Maybe just a tad overheated, Lindsey?]
**********
Presidential nominee contender Newt Gingrich on Greta Van Susteren, on March 7, before establishment of the no-fly zone in Libya:
"Exercise a no-fly zone this evening .... This is a moment to get rid of him. Do it. Get it over with.... We don’t need to have the United Nations. All we have to say is that we think that slaughtering your own citizens is unacceptable and that we’re intervening."And on Today with Matt Lauer on March 22, after military action:
"I would not have intervened. I think there were a lot of other ways to affect Qaddafi. I think there are a lot of other allies in the region we could have worked with. I would not have used American and European forces."
UPDATE: Gingrich is taking a lot of flak for his flip-flop. Here's a link to a Jason Linkins article on HuffPo. And check out his link to Salon's article in which Alex Pareene previews/reveals all of the policy statements Newt Gingrich will offer in the forthcoming fortnight.
**********
The Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have proposed a law denying food-stamp assistance to family members of a striking worker:
Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no member of a family unit shall participate in the food stamp program at any time that any able-bodied work-eligible adult member of such household is on strike as defined by the Labor Management Relations Act 1947, because of a labor dispute.**********
A new poll by (Republican-affiliated) We Ask America has Ohio Governor John Kasich at 35% support, 58% opposed.
**********
A Republican congressman from Alaska, who also is on the board of directors of the National Rifle Association, now is attempting to distance himself from a Fairbanks militia leader, Francis Schaeffer Cox, accused in a high-profile firearms, murder and kidnapping plot.
In April 2009, with a video camera rolling, Rep. Don Young signed a “Letter of Declaration” being circulated by the Second Amendment Task Force/Alaska Peacemakers Militia, led by Cox. The “declaration” called on “sovereign Americans” to “alter or abolish” any government that tries to “further tax, restrict or register firearms” or prevents individuals from exercising their “God-given right to self-defense [that] precedes all human legislation.”
**********
Janice Eisen, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Scott Walker's union-busting isn't about the budget. It is an attempt to de-fund the Democratic Party and to make corporations the only viable source of political power.
When the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its Citizens United decision, which removed limits on corporate spending in election campaigns, liberals decried the increase in corporate influence this would bring. One common retort was that labor unions also would be allowed unlimited spending. But a year later, the GOP is going after the unions, not just in Wisconsin but in other states, with the apparent aim of giving Republicans a fundraising monopoly.
**********
Physicist Frank N. von Hippel says in the New York Times:
Nuclear power is a textbook example of the problem of "regulatory capture" — in which an industry gains control of an agency meant to regulate it. Regulatory capture can be countered only by vigorous public scrutiny and Congressional oversight, but in the 32 years since Three Mile Island, interest in nuclear regulation has declined precipitously.
**********
Thomas Friedman on tribalism in the Middle East:
... there are two kinds of states in the Middle East: "real countries" with long histories in their territory and strong national identities (Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Iran); and those that might be called “tribes with flags,” or more artificial states with boundaries drawn in sharp straight lines by pens of colonial powers... They have no real “citizens” in the modern sense. Democratic rotations in power are impossible because each tribe lives by the motto “rule or die” — either my tribe or sect is in power or we’re dead.
**********
Justice Clarence Thomas hasn't spoken in the Supreme Court in over five years. In his defence, Stephen Colbert said that Thomas is a rock -- in that there may as well be a rock sitting there. There's long been speculation that his legal opinions are drafted by his clerks; now he's apparently not even going that far.
Linda Greenhouse writes about the current Supreme Court term in the New York Times:
... every justice, including Justice Kagan, has written more than one majority opinion, with one glaring exception: Justice Thomas, who has yet to write for the majority in any case this term. ... Assuming that Justice Thomas has received the same number of opinion-writing assignments as his colleagues — one or two cases from each of the court’s monthly argument sittings — the absence of majority opinions in his name is striking.
**********
Harold Myerson (unsourced, from Daily Kos) discusses The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City on March 25, 1911, the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of the city of New York. 146 garment workers died, either from the fire or from jumping to their deaths from the eighth, ninth, and tenth floors. Many of the workers could not escape the burning building because the managers had locked the doors to the stairwells and exits.
Businesses reacted [to regulations requiring sprinklers and fire doors] as if the revolution had arrived. The changes to the fire code, said a spokesman for the Associated Industries of New York, would lead to "the wiping out of industry in this state." The regulations, wrote George Olvany, special counsel to the Real Estate Board of New York City, would force expenditures on precautions that were "absolutely needless and useless." ... Such complaints, of course, are with us still. We hear them from mine operators after fatal explosions, from bankers after they’ve crashed the economy, from energy moguls after their rig explodes or their plant starts leaking radiation.Mark Sumner at Daily Kos comments: "But of course, there already were fire regulations at the time -- ones that protected the buildings and equipment. By corporate standards, then and now, protecting machinery makes sense, and protecting people... not so much."
**********
0 comments:
Post a Comment