Maine Event

From the Sun Journal:

AUGUSTA — 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.

Worker advocates described the move as a “mean-spirited” provocation amid the administration’s high-tension standoff with unions.

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Not-So-Super Tuesday for Some People

From THE HILL:

It was a bittersweet night for Democrats as they won a House special election but saw one senator fall and another incumbent go to a runoff.

Meanwhile Republicans saw their favored Senate candidate lose in Kentucky to a darling of the Tea Party movement.

Most of all, Tuesday’s primaries were another sign of the anti-incumbent mood that has swept the nation and has lawmakers worried about their futures.

Bittersweet? Seriously?

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Welcome to BlancheMart!

From Arkansas Business:

Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., told a Monday meeting of the Little Rock Political Animals Club that she will oppose the Employee Free Choice Act.

“While I may not have been clear about my position in the past, I am stating today that I cannot support Employee Free Choice Act in its current form and I can’t support efforts to bring it to Senate consideration in its current form,” Lincoln said in a statement late Monday afternoon.

“I will consider alternatives that have the support of both business and labor but my pledge today is to focus my full attention on the priorities I have mentioned that affect every working family in Arkansas.”

Hmmmmm….I wonder why Blanche would be against EFCA…….

Well, I’m stumped, kids. Let’s go on.

Joe the Plumber’s Popularity Plunges Yet Again

From The Patriot News:

Joe Wurzelbacher would not say who paid for him to come to Harrisburg to speak out against the proposed Employee Free Choice Act. Neither would organizers of the rally, Americans for Prosperity, a nonprofit that takes donations from conservative donors.

But that doesn’t mean “Joe the Plumber” — who drove his own pickup from Toledo, Ohio, to Harrisburg and was eager to drive home again — didn’t earn his money on Tuesday.

Before he could utter his first words, Wurzelbacher was jeered and heckled by dozens of central Pennsylvania union members who flocked to the Capitol steps to give a rowdy voice of support for the legislation better known as “card check.”

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In Order to Form a More Perfect Union…or Not

From The Washington Post:

As business and labor gird for battle over legislation that would make it easier for workers to organize, the debate could be transformed by a “third way” proposed by three companies that like to project a progressive image: Costco, Starbucks and Whole Foods.

Like other businesses, the three companies are opposed to two of the Employee Free Choice Act’s components — a provision that would allow workers to form a union if a majority sign pro-union cards, without having to hold a secret-ballot election, and one that would impose binding arbitration when employers and unions fail to reach a contract after 120 days.

But the companies’ chief executive officers say they also recognize that just opposing the legislation, commonly called “card check,” is not enough because of the widespread perception in Democrat-dominated Washington that there is not a level playing field between labor and business. So the CEOs have come up with ideas they hope will form the basis of new legislation.

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