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Bricklayer's Union Endorses Hillary, Prison Guards Endorse Obama

The 100,000 member International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers today endorsed Hillary Clinton for President.

Why? They say she has the best chance to win.

This is the fifth major labor union endorsement for Hillary. She leads the other candidates in overall union endorsements.

Obama got his first union endorsement today -- from a prison guards' union. Thanking the 9,000 member New York City's Correction Officers' Benevolent Association, Obama said:

"It's an honor to have the endorsement of these men and women who put themselves at risk everyday to serve on the front lines of our nation's criminal justice system." he said.

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  • Display: Sort:
    Obama and John Anderson (5.00 / 2) (#12)
    by diogenes on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 10:15:32 PM EST
    When I supported John Anderson I remember a newspaper article that said that "If the best candidate has no chance to win then America deserves what it gets."

    Why am I not surprised (1.00 / 1) (#2)
    by aahpat on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 04:03:32 PM EST
    That representatives of the prison industrial complex would endorse Barack Obama. This fits perfectly with everything I have seen about him. Jim Crow thug!

    Anyone interested in the prison industrial complex and its empowerment of Jim Crow in America might like to visit my blog entry, "U.S. Congress Jim Crow Economics Hearing October 4, 2007" based on a story today in the Boston Globe titled "Life Sentence" enumerating the social inequities imposed by the prohibition economy and its Jim Crow prison industrial complex.

    Surprises me, from the perspective of (none / 0) (#3)
    by oculus on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 04:06:38 PM EST
    a Californian, anyhow.  Corrrectional officers union her is very strong, quite conservative, and amazingly effective come contract negotiations time.

    Parent
    Obama's solutions (5.00 / 1) (#4)
    by aahpat on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 04:49:07 PM EST
    are all pro-drug war and that gets him big support within the prison industrial complex.

    In New Orleans last month he promised to enlarge the DEA office as a solution to post-Katrina high crime rates.

    On his official senate web page he promotes the fact that he cosponsored the 2005 Meth Act and even the government admits has caused highly organized Mexican cartels to take over the meth business in America and grow throughout the nation as never before.

    Obama is a fool who thinks that the bigger government drug war solution is the only solution.

    It pisses me off because there is nothing I would like more than to vote for the first Black president of the United States of America. But his Jim Crow pandering pro drug war policies make it impossible for me to vote for Obama.

    Hillary is worse than her husband and that makes her a non-starter for me.

    The Democrats are forcing me to vote third party or Independent if I am to stay true to my constitutional social values of opposing the Jim Crow, terrorist funding and crime fostering drug war.

    Parent

    Was Obama ever a prosecutor? (none / 0) (#5)
    by oculus on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 04:57:49 PM EST
    Pretty hard to get past that on drug issues and crime.

    Parent
    Surprisingly not (none / 0) (#8)
    by aahpat on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 06:50:29 PM EST
    He was a "civil rights" lawyer.

    Parent
    What part of UNION did you not understand? (none / 0) (#7)
    by Geekesque on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 06:47:08 PM EST
    Oh wait:
    Jim Crow thug!

    You're just a troll.

    Parent

    I posted facts (none / 0) (#9)
    by aahpat on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 06:52:31 PM EST
    Your respond with insults and marginalization.

    I won't call you a troll but I will say that your rhetorical tactics are those used by right-wing drug war demagogues. No facts just attack.

    Parent

    Calling Barack Obama a (5.00 / 1) (#10)
    by Geekesque on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 06:58:46 PM EST
    "Jim Crow thug" is not a statement of fact.

    Moreover, I again refer you to the fact that UNIONS represent workers, not captains of industry.

    Your argument is the same as arguing that the UAW represents General Motors.

    Parent

    Obama supports the drug war (none / 0) (#11)
    by aahpat on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 08:01:13 PM EST
    The drug war is a Jim Crow policy. That makes Obama a Jim Crow thug.

    Unions represent the workers in context with the industry they are the workers for. Prison guard unions have as much of an interests in keeping prisons full as does Prison Corp of America or any prison industry pandering bottom feeding Jim Crow politician like Obama. Unions always want more workers in the union. that means growing the industry they work for.

    Here are my recent blog essays on Obama.

    Sen. Obama's solution for post-Katrina poverty; police oppression

    Barack Obama: A Stereotype of Conventional Wisdom

    Parent

    More on prison unions (none / 0) (#14)
    by aahpat on Tue Sep 25, 2007 at 02:27:08 PM EST
    This is a post that I found at Stop The Drug War and that is specific to the issue of unions as supporters of and advocates for their industries.

    The prison guard unions have become so politically powerful in America that candidates for office risk losing elections if they don't back the corrections guards and their unions. These people, as a group, make up some of the largest campaign donors in state elections.

    Big money is involved. In California, prison guards' starting wages are about $60K per year, which is more than the prison staff psychologists with their PhDs make. On top of that, the guards pull in a lot of overtime pay. For corrections personnel who marry each other, their combined incomes are in the six-figures. If you ever find yourself in California near a corrections center, check out the parking lot. There you will see acres of Mercedes, BMWs, Lexus, and honkin' huge pickup trucks and sport-utes, all owned by the people who work in the prison system.

    Both the guards and the guards' union know the number of prison jobs, and thus the union's own income, relies on party politics in state capitols and in Washington, D.C. They also know how to flex their muscle. If a state politician fails to perform the way they want, arranged prison riots can break out all over the state, along with demands that the prison system needs more money to better control the situation. Even California Governor Arnold "the Terminator" Schwarzenegger has been unable to correct the corrections situation, even though he has made some valiant efforts to do so.

    The union, the California Correctional Peace Officers' Association (CCPOA), is not shy about imposing its political survival onto society at large, and at everyone else's expense. When California's Proposition 36, which mandated treatment instead of jail for first time drug offenders, was up for voter approval, the CCPOA lobbied and campaigned against it. Prior to that, the CCPOA spent $101,000 to get Prop. 184, California's infamous `three strikes initiative,' on the ballot. That's the kind of people they are.

    Perhaps someday someone will be elected with the guts to drive a stake through the CCPOA's vampire heart, but I don't see anyone with that kind of guts who is running for president in 2008.
    Giordano

    http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle_blog/2007/sep/24/obama_is_so_bad_on_drug_policy_h

    Parent

    sad (none / 0) (#1)
    by mindfulmission on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 01:17:11 PM EST
    A union should not be endorsing someone because "the best chance to win."  A union should be endorsing someone who will do what they can for workers.  

    It is sad that unions are not willing to endorse who they believe in instead of who they believe can win.

    And how unions can endorse someone who clearly has union busters in high positions on her staff is beyond me.  

    Obama is merely being smart to pander (none / 0) (#6)
    by Yes2Truth on Mon Sep 24, 2007 at 06:37:23 PM EST

    to large, organized groups - many of whose members actually vote in (some) elections.

    As to Clinton (none / 0) (#13)
    by aahpat on Tue Sep 25, 2007 at 10:41:51 AM EST
    Hillary Clinton is also endorsed by Rupert Murdoch. that endorsement goes over like a lead brick with me.

    Rupert Murdoch Loves Hillary Clinton
    Conservative Media Mogul To Host Fundraiser For Liberal N.Y. Senator
    NEW YORK, May 9, 2006

    Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., April 29, 2006, left and News Corporation Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch, June 18, 2003. (AP)

    (CBS) To call them a political odd couple would be a rash understatement.

    Conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch will host a fundraiser for liberal New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, the Financial Times reports.
    http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/09/politics/main1600694.shtml

    Hillary claims to be a champion of an independent judiciary but she takes support from this thug Murdoch who's Fox News Network has done more to attack America independent judiciary than any other organization in the country.

    The Democratic front runners are a pathologically pathetic bunch of right-wing slugs. I will again vote Independent or third party bacuse I want my pluralistic social justice values reflected in the candidate who I give my vote to. The Democratic front runners do not reflect my values.