Most Americans have heard of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) through its ill-conceived scheme to prevent Boeing from building a new plant in South Carolina because the Palmetto State has a right-to-work law. The board’s actions have created a huge backlash against the Obama Administration and its pro-Big Labor policies.

But how much do most Americans know about Obama’s other labor board?

Most Americans haven’t heard of President Obama’s other labor board, the National Mediation Board (NMB). This board is specifically focused on labor relations between the railroad and airline industries. And just like the NLRB, the NMB is aggressively pushing Big Labor’s agenda.

Last July, the NMB overturned nearly a century of precedent and issued a new pro-union rule regarding union elections. Instead of requiring the traditional democratic practice of a simple majority of members to unionize, now the rules only require a majority of votes cast for unionization.

If a company has 2,000 workers and only 400 people vote but 201 of them are pro-union, the entire workforce of 2,000 people are forced to unionize. Couple that with the fact that it is nearly impossible to decertify a union, and those 201 votes in effect mandate unionization for good. (more…)

Despite a small glimmer of hope from last Friday’s unemployment rate drop to 9.1%, business leaders know nearly all other economic figures continue to point to an anemic recovery or worse, a double-dip recession.

In reaction to the jobs numbers, Home Depot co-founder, Bernie Marcus had this to say on Politico:

While some may be relieved at today’s jobs numbers, the reality is that our economy is struggling to recover. And a big reason for that is the federal government. The impediments that the government imposes are impossible to deal with. Every day you see rules and regulations from a group of Washington bureaucrats who know nothing about running a business. And I mean every day. It’s become stifling.

And this is a theme that business leaders continue to make: over-burdensome regulations from Washington are stifling the economy and preventing serious job growth while the Obama administration only continues to make the problem worse.

Lets take a look at the cold hard numbers. In the past few weeks, major American companies had to announce more layoffs:

- Borders – 400 stores will close, costing almost 11,000 jobs.

- Boston Scientific – Announced restructuring that will cost up to 1,400 jobs.

- Goldman Sachs – Will let go 1,000 employees, or nearly 3 percent of their workforce.

- Merck – Will layoff 13,000 workers to cut costs.

- State Street – Announced it will cut 850 jobs, in a second round of layoffs within a year.

With all of this going on, President Barack Obama is promising (yet another) renewed focus on job creation. But what is his administration doing? Contrary to Obama’s promised regulatory reform from earlier this year, the administration continues to say one thing and do another.

(more…)

Las Vegas CEO Steve Wynn drew attention for a boardroom rant denouncing the intolerable business climate fostered by the White House. He’s hardly the first. What’s happening is emblematic of a bigger problem.

On a Monday conference call, the casino magnate credited with revitalizing Las Vegas slammed President Obama, declaring him “[T]he greatest wet blanket to business, progress and job creation in my lifetime.”

Wynn’s statement was remarkable for two reasons: First, the hotelier has been a staunch supporter of the Obama administration from the beginning and still considers himself a Democrat. Even more remarkable, it’s historically out of character for CEOs such as Wynn to express their views in such blunt terms on political matters.

“A lot of people don’t want to say that. They’ll say, ‘Oh God, don’t be attacking Obama.’ Well, this is Obama’s deal, and it’s Obama that’s responsible for this fear in America,” said Wynn, “The guy keeps making speeches about redistribution, and maybe ‘we ought to do something to businesses that don’t invest or (are) holding too much money.’ We haven’t heard that kind of talk except from pure socialists.”

Business is being hammered, he said. “I’m telling you that the business community in this country is frightened to death of the weird political philosophy of the president of the United States.”

Let’s cut to the chase, shall we? Within the next several months (perhaps sooner), the odds are President Obama’s National Mediation Board will find that Delta Air committed unforgivable sins during multiple union election campaigns last fall, causing the unions to lose the elections.  As a result, employees at Delta will be subjected to more union elections until they—in the minds of union bosses—vote the right way (to unionize). It doesn’t matter what the facts are—Delta’s conduct could have been as pure as virgin snow—the NMB will rule that (at least several) of the elections must be rerun.

Why? Because that is the goal and has been the goal all along (at least since 2009). In other words, the NMB “investigations” into Delta’s conduct is nothing more than a show—a sham—a kangaroo court in the vein of Fidel Castro’s trials of political opponents before the firing squads.

Following last November’s defeat of the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA) attempt at unionizing Delta’s flight attendants (the third union failure in ten years), the AFA-CWA filed “interference” charges against the airline, alleging the carrier improperly influenced flight attendants decision. The Machinists union (which is currently in a pitched battle against the AFA-CWA at United) also alleged interference in the elections it lost at Delta.  In all, unions lost at least nine known elections at Delta in 2009. (more…)

It’s been established that when the Obama administration can’t get part of its agenda legislated; they simply turn around and push it through the web-like bureaucracy at their disposal. Last year’s failed pro-union legislation was no exception; when ‘card check’ met a dead end in Congress, obscure government agencies like the National Mediation Board (NMB) put rules in place to ensure that unionizing elections swung in the unions’ favor anyway.

The NMB was created by that union-hating, capitalist pig Franklin Delano Roosevelt to oversee union elections in the air and rail industries. Under Obama, the board made its first pro-active rule in over 75 years of existence, changing the way union votes are counted to enable an entire workforce to be forced to unionize by a minority of votes.

The House has an opportunity to pass legislation that will turn back the clock on the administration’s overstepping of its boundaries, and send a strong “game over” message to the union bosses counting on the Democrats to line their pockets. Namely, the FAA Reauthorization and Reform Act, which includes a provision to overturn the NMB’s new rule and re-instate the system that has worked for decades.

The airline workers want this, and with a Republican majority in the House it should be a sure thing, right? Well, it’s not that easy. A handful of House Republicans, largely in union-heavy districts, are clearly more concerned with their re-election than with the mandate of fiscal responsibility and smaller government that put them in power in the first place.

(more…)

Ever since Obama was sworn in, obscure federal agencies have been churning out pro-labor, anti-worker rulemakings in an attempt to reverse declining unionization numbers. Indicative of this unionization through regulation strategy is the National Mediation Board’s (NMB) minority rule decision promulgated in 2009.

The NMB is a three-member board comprised of one Bush holdover and two Obama appointees—both of which are former union officials—tasked with overseeing union-employer relations in the transportation industry. The makeup of the board effectively gives the pro-union board members fiat to enact whatever policies or regulations they see fit. Unsurprisingly, the NMB’s first major decision was a move to facilitate unionization in the transportation industry.

Overturning seventy-five years of precedent and two Supreme Court rulings, the NMB ruled that a majority of voting members were required to certify a union, not a majority of all members of a workforce. For two years now, conservative activists and Members of Congress have written letters and introduced legislation attempting to annul this blatant federal overreach. These efforts have finally culminated in tangible legislation, Title IX of the FAA Reauthorization bill, which would overturn the NMB’s minority rule decision.

Barely making it out of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Democrats, at the behest of organized labor, offered an amendment to remove Title IX from the FAA reauthorization bill. Republicans managed to quash this amendment by the razor thin margin of 30-29, losing three Republicans in the process.

(more…)

Just keep voting until you get the desired results and we will change the rules along the way to help advance policy changes that could not pass through Congress.

This is the message the National Mediation Board (NMB) has transmitted on behalf of Team Obama to union bosses who lost ground in the private sector. Only 11.9 percent of all wage and salary workers, public and private, are union members, and the percentage of union members in the private sector is a mere 6.9 percent. Unions lost over 612,000 members in 2010, most of them in private sector unions.

Although they helped to elect a Democratic president and Democratic Congress in 2008, organized labor failed to secure its top legislative priorities. This would include replacing the secret ballot in unionization elections with a card check system and binding arbitration that would allow federal mediators to impose guidelines on business. The strategy now is to reshape public policy through unelected agencies that typically elude media scrutiny.

In 2009, the NMB radically reworked a long-standing workplace rule at the behest of the AFL-CIO that governed the way airline and railroad workers unionized. Prior to making the change, a majority of a company’s workforce was necessary to vote in favor of representation. But now that the rule has been modified only a majority of votes received as opposed to the majority of entire workforce is sufficient to force unionization on an entire company. This reverses 75 years of labor policy upheld under both Democratic and Republican administrations. Moreover, there is no realistic or attainable option for decertification meaning employees are permanently stuck with a union even if they no longer want it.

(more…)

Today, the national flight attendants’ union released its latest attack on Delta airlines, filing a lawsuit on behalf of a group of disgruntled former Northwest Airlines flight attendants now working for Delta after the two airlines merged. The Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) claims that the air giant did not include the former Northwest employees fully in its profit-sharing plan because they were unionized before the merger.

Of the charges, AFA President Veda Shook says, “Delta is punishing Northwest Flight Attendants for their long history of collective bargaining. Delta management’s actions are shameful and undemocratic.”

This frivolous lawsuit is only the latest AFA attack on Delta. After the merger with Northwest all Delta flight attendants – including those formerly unionized under Northwest – held an election to decide whether to join the union, and voted to remain non-unionized. The AFA immediately launched multiple election interference charges, which have not been found valid.

Apparently, the AFA only cares about preserving democracy when the election goes their way.

(more…)

With public sentiment turning against organized labor, unions have enlisted obscure federal bureaucrats to help bolster their ranks. The Department of Labor has been busy rolling back transparency initiatives put in place during the last decade; the National Labor Relations Board is considering rules which would guarantee union organizers access to private property; the National Mediation Board (NMB) is easing union election rules for unions.

Of the three agencies charged with administering different facets of labor-employer relations, none has been more blatantly pro-union than the NMB over the past two years. Founded in 1934, the National Mediation Board is charged with overseeing labor-management disputes in the railroad and airline industries. The three member board—currently comprised of two former union officials and a Bush holdover—showed its true colors soon after its members were assembled. In its first major decision, the NMB ruled that transportation unions only needed to receive a majority of votes cast as oppose to a majority of all workers votes for the union to be certified.

From the union’s perspective, transportation workers are ideal union members. Workers are required to pay union dues if they want to keep their job—right to work laws are not applicable to this industry. Compounding workers’ problems, once a transportation union is elected it is virtually impossible to get rid of union representation. It is so difficult under the NMB’s rules that it has never been done in a group with more than 1000 employees. Coupled together, these policies make transportation workers a golden goose for unions—workers have to pony up hard earned cash, indefinitely.

This NMB’s move to facilitate union organizing was thought to have huge implications in looming union elections. One such showdown is between Delta’s flight attendants and the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA).

(more…)

Transport Workers Union boss John Conley says that he will deny airline employees the opportunity to vote on their own destiny.

Sandra Baker of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram wrote:

“We are now at an impasse with AMR [American Airlines],” said John Conley, director of the union’s Air Transport Division. “We no longer have a tentative agreement, and no ballots will be presented to members for a ratification vote.”

The union asked the mediation board to declare an impasse in March, but the board told the parties to keep talking.

A few weeks ago, the union and American said they had reached a tentative agreement. But the proposal never went to a vote by the nearly 11,000 baggage handlers and other ground workers that clean aircraft, fuel planes and move freight.

Should the board declare an impasse and release the union from mediation, under the Railway Labor Act a 30-day cooling-off period would start, after which the union could call a strike or the company could enforce a lockout. [Emphasis added]

Unfortunately, employees are often left out of the union contract process because contracts virtually always grant union officials a monopoly voice and decision making powers over all workers whether they wanted it or not. This is just another example, among many, of how forced monopoly unionism is undemocratic and takes away the rights of individual workers.

(more…)