It just snowed in New York. Seriously. Wild flurries. Nothing will stick but, hey, it was amazing–first time this winter and it’s January 10th. I thought Mark McGwire would be in the Hall of Fame before it snowed. I gather this will be the reaction of future generations unless we get this global warming thing under control. But, I digress…on to other topics.
This escaped my notice and thanks to a reader who slapped me upside the head and woke me up. Slipped into the House bill that adopted the 9/11 Commission recommendations was a provision that granted union bargaining rights to the 43,000 security screeners who work for the Transportation Department. Actually, the extension of the rights came through a very modest change, relatively speaking–the bill repealed a footnote in the Aviation and Transportation Security Act (ATSA), which allowed the TSA Administrator to deny screeners colÂlective bargaining, civil service, and whistleblower protections. In fact, the TSA Administrator at the time, James Loy, exercised that authority in 2003, and banned bargaining rights for the screeners, claiming that their jobs were a matter of national security and, therefore, should be exempted from collective bargaining.
Not that you cared about the details but it’s fascinating to me (get a life you might say) how such obscure legislative language can be used to screw thousands of people. I guess Congressional Republicans have made a science out of that process.
Congrats to the American Federation of Government Employees for sticking with this campaign for more than five years. The bill still has to pass the Senate to become law–and that’s not a foregone conclusion. According to GovExec.com, Sen, Joe Lieberman, the chair of the Senate
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, supports granting
the screeners collective bargaining rights. And the guy in the White House, who is more interested in sending more men and women to a pointless slaughter, will oppose the provision–but it’s not clear if he will veto the bill over it.
And, then, comes the hard work–organizing the workers.
