Do as we say ... Congress passes, then ignores, workplace laws

ProPublica, which produces some of the finest journalism on the web, has a report out that specifies which federal laws Congress ignores. In other words, those laws that apply to the private sector but don’t apply to the legislative branch’s approximately 30,000 employees.

The list includes: Whistleblower Protections; Subpoenas for Health and Safety Probes; Keeping Workplace Records; Prosecution for Retaliating Against Employees; Posting Notices of Workers’ Rights; and the Freedom of Information Act.

The ProPublica story adds this:
"In addition to sparing itself from complying with measures it has made mandatory for others, Congress is violating of some of the laws that do apply to it, according to a recent report from the Office of Compliance. (The pint-sized agency, created by Congress in 1995, is responsible for enforcing a number of workplace-rights laws in the legislative branch.) The sidewalks surrounding the three House office buildings, the report noted, don’t comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Neither do the restrooms in the House and Senate office buildings and the Library of Congress’ James Madison Building.
“'... People are very loath to burn bridges by filing a complaint or going to the Office of Compliance,” said the agency's director. 'They don’t want to go forward with bringing a claim, even when it’s covered under the law.'”

With Big 3 thriving, still waiting for Southern Senators' apologies

So, we have more good news from the auto industry and more evidence that the Southern senators who opposed the auto bridge loans in 2008-09 would have destroyed an industry that is now leading the nation’s economic recovery.

The Dixie Dumbbells (as I like to call them) who adhered to rigid ideology and refused to give the industry a helping hand must be utterly amazed at the success of the Big Three. Surely, these senators and House members realize how wrong they were and how disastrous their wrong-headed beliefs would have been, if followed by Congress and the administration.

So, once again, I ask: Where are the apologies? Can any of these guys say sorry for cavalierly attempting to destroy the economy of our state and our county?

Chrysler, which paid off its federal bailout loans far in advance, made $1.7 billion last year and expects to make more than $2 billion this year. For Chrysler workers, they will reap $2,300 profit-sharing checks – a 50 percent increase over the profit-based bonuses handed out a year ago.

Can you imagine those stubborn senators – the laissez faire loons who screamed, socialism is on the way? Imagine how stunned the "let them go bankrupt" crowd is by the big profit-sharing checks at Chrysler. In 2009, they would have “bet the ranch” that such an occurrence just three years later was impossible.

In retrospect, the congressional critics who said the rescue loans (which began under George W. Bush) represented President Obama’s “war on capitalism” must feel rather foolish. Based on the record corporate profits across the nation and the huge surge on Wall Street over the past two years, I’d say Obama is getting his butt kicked in that “war.”

The story is the same at General Motors – billions of dollars in profits, millions of cars sold, and big bonuses for the blue- and white-collar workers.

And at Ford, which would have suffered heavy collateral damage without the GM/Chrysler rescue, a whopping 10.4 percent profit margin was posted for 2012 North American operations. The profit-sharing checks for the workers will average $8,300.

Thanks to UAW contracts, we have one domestic industry where “trickle down” really does exist.

So, let’s take one more look back at what those confederates said in 2008-09 and just how far off the mark these Southern GOP purists were. Here’s a sampling:

* Then-Sen. Jim DeMint, South Carolina – the bailout plan was being pieced together “without any plausible plan for profitability.”

* Sen. Richard Shelby, Alabama --“It’s basically going to be a government-owned, government-run company. … It’s the road toward socialism.”

And he added this about the automakers: “They're a dinosaur in a sense. I hate to see this because I would like to see them become lean and hungry and innovative. And if they did and put out the right products they could survive. But I don't believe that the $25 billion they're talking about will make them survive. It's just postponing the inevitable."

* Sen. Bob Corker, Tennessee – “The problem is they have no one coming in to buy cars. Regardless of what happens … the legislation, if passed, is not going to move people to buy cars.”

* And, lastly, we have a senator from the Southwest, not the South, but still a sarcastic Sunbelt kind of guy, Sen. John McCain, Arizona – “Anybody (who) believes that Chrysler is going to survive, I’d like to meet them.”

Hopefully, he will regret saying that for the rest of his life.

The cost of Super Bowl ads should sound familiar to taxpayers

On Monday morning, you can bet that a lot of the chatter in your workplace will be about the Super Bowl commercials from the night before. One political group has cleverly figured out a way to intertwine those super-expensive Super Bowl ads with their pet issue – cutting the debt and deficit.

At bankruptingamerica.org, they discerned that the cost of this year’s ads for the big game is very similar to the price tag for our overall federal government, 30 seconds at a time.

Here’s a portion of what they wrote:

“We will be watching the game, the half-time show and subsequent ‘wardrobe malfunctions’ and, of course, those really expensive ads, which cost an average of $3.8 million per 30 seconds this year. Some ads are funny, a few have you scratching your head, while others leave you thinking, ‘They just flushed their money down the drain.’

“But what if you saw a 30-second ad touting the successes of Washington and the federal government?  Maybe it wouldn’t be so shocking. Consider this: Every 30 seconds the government spends almost as much as a 30-second Super Bowl spot costs -- about $3.4 million -- just to keep our country running.

“If you think about it, that means the entire fiscal year is just one big, expensive but not-very-funny Super Bowl ad bought by the American government and paid for by you, the American taxpayer. Washington buys a Super Bowl ad every 30 seconds of every day of the year, and we have to pay the bill.”

Turnover in Congress not so bad, after all

Perhaps all the talk in Washington about prominent members of Congress quitting due to hyper-partisanship – and many others fearing a primary challenge if they don’t please the true-believers in their party’s base – is, well, off base.

Over at The Washington Post’s “The Fix,” they crunched the numbers and found that even as a significant number of seats have changed partisan hands, overall turnover in Congress (due to retirements, deaths and primary losses) has actually been rather unremarkable, from a historical perspective.

Even the amount of new blood after the 2006 and 2008 elections, in which Democrats picked up a combined 54 House seats, ranked low historically, according to the author of the piece, Aaron Blake.

The charts below, from the Congressional Research Service, tell the story of turnover in the House and the Senate:

Blake’s conclusion: “The fact is that members used to retire and lose primaries a lot more than they do today. For the vast majority of members, merely running for reelection at all assures that they will return for the next Congress. So why not stick around?

“Which means that the Congresses of today include about the same amount of new blood as they used to — even as people claim to hate everything about the institution.”

Law would imprison raped women who get an abortion

(Rep. Brown)

A bill introduced in the New Mexico Legislature last week would imprison women who have been raped if they have an abortion.

The reason? The abortion amounts to tampering with evidence.

Forbes.com is reporting that Republican Rep. Cathrynn Brown, author of the legislation, proposes a penalty of up to three years in prison for violators.

The legislation is fairly assured not to become law, according to Forbes’ Rick Ungar, because New Mexico’s state House and Senate are controlled by Democrats. Yet, the myriad of issues such a bill presents is truly extraordinary -- starting with the very notion of an unborn fetus being classified as ‘evidence’.

UPDATE: After a big public backlash, including hate mail, Brown now says that she is "horrified" by the implications of her legislation. A lawyer and a lawmaker, Brown changed the language in the bill:

“A person who commits sexual penetration or incest and who procures an abortion of a fetus resulting from the crime with the intent to destroy evidence of the crime is guilty of tampering with evidence, prohibiting prosecution of the mother of the fetus … In no circumstance shall the mother of the fetus be charged.”

Lorraine Devon Wilke  of addictinginfo.org offers this counterpoint:
"So, in other words, if the rapist sticks around to convince the rape victim to get an abortion, that’s the crime: “tampering with evidence.” But if that’s the case, despite Brown’s insistence that “the mother of the fetus would never be charged,” if the rapee agrees to said abortion (and clearly she’d have to be involved), wouldn’t she be a colluder? An accomplice? Dear God, can you see how complicated this could get?"

Time to create a second GOP?

David Brooks, the moderate Republican columnist for the New York Times, has created quite a buzz online by suggesting in today’s columnthat the more centrist elements of the Republican Party should break away and essentially create a second GOP.

Brooks argues that the current GOP is essentially a Southern and Western party that still hasn’t learned the lessons of the November election and shows few signs of changing. The rural Republicans are set in their ways, with anti-government sentiments down to their core, and a “pick yourself up by your own bootstraps” mentality that cannot be shaken.

The GOP is floundering, according to Brooks, because they haven’t proposed plans that deal with globalization and technology and growing income disparities.

“While losing the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections, the flaws of this mentality have become apparent,” Brooks wrote. “First, if opposing government is your primary objective, it’s hard to have a positive governing program.”

The columnist views the GOP divide in geographical terms:

“It’s probably futile to try to change current Republicans. It’s smarter to build a new wing of the Republican Party, one that can compete in the Northeast, the mid-Atlantic states, in the upper Midwest and along the West Coast. It’s smarter to build a new division that is different the way the Westin is different than the Sheraton.

“The second G.O.P. would tackle both problems at once. It would be filled with people who recoiled at President Obama’s second Inaugural Address because of its excessive faith in centralized power, but who don’t share the absolute anti-government story of the current GOP.”