Labor & Employment Law

Workers Don?t Fit into Rand Paul?s World

By Berry Craig

Kentucky State AFL-CIO President Bill Londrigan doesn’t pull punches when he talks about the Bluegrass State’s Tea Party-backed Republican U.S. Senate candidate. Speaking to a sun-baked crowd at Paducah’s 35th annual Labor Day picnic Monday, he warned:

A vote for Rand Paul is a vote for the continuation of the economic nightmare now facing workers across Kentucky. Vote like your job depends on it?because it does.

The state AFL-CIO unanimously endorsed Democrat Jack Conway over Paul, whose anti-union views earned him a $2,500 donation from the National Right to Work Committee.

Conway is the state’s attorney general. An ophthalmologist, Paul is the son of Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas). Dr. Paul is bad medicine for Kentucky’s working families, according to Londrigan.

He supports privatizing Social Security and increasing the retirement age for Social Security eligibility. He supports so-called free trade agreements like NAFTA, which are responsible for shipping millions of good-paying American jobs overseas.

When it comes to jobs safety, a vital issue for state?s coal miners and other workers, Londrigan said Paul?s response to catastrophic mine accidents and oil rig explosions is:

“‘accidents happen.” In Rand Paul’s world, corporations should be completely unregulated so they can cook the books and undermine our economy.

Londrigan went on to highlight the differences between Rand Paul?s world and the world in which most  Kentucky workers live.

In Rand Paul’s world, Social Security is a burden and not a reward for a lifetime of hard work and sacrifice and something to be handed over to Wall Street.

In Rand Paul’s world, the budget deficit is a monstrous problem, but tax cuts for the rich are still a priority.

In Rand Paul’s world, teachers and the Department of Education are a hindrance to learning. In Rand Paul’s world, farm subsidies are a handout. In Rand Paul’s world, lowering workers’ wages is the way out of a recession.

And in Rand Paul’s world, property rights trump civil rights. If you’re an ordinary American, a hard-working Kentuckian, you can’t afford to live in Rand Paul’s world.

Jeff Wiggins, a United Steelworkers (USW) members and president of the Paducah-based Western Kentucky Area Council, said Kentucky union families are a vital element in the fight to send Conway to the Senate and Paul back to his practice.

But Wiggins, the Labor 2010 coordinator for western Kentucky, also says working families must be mobilized. He  doubts Paul will win many union votes, but says the Republican is hoping for the next best thing: a slew of union card-carrying Kentuckians will forget that the GOP’s gospel of greed caused the recession, will blame hangover hard times on the Democrats and will show their disdain by not voting.

Wiggins has a message for potential non-voting union members:

If you stay home on Nov. 2, you’ll be helping the same sort of people who tried to push labor off the cliff under Bush. Democrats like Jack Conway want to throw us a rope and pull us away from the edge. But Republicans like McConnell and Paul still want to push us off.

For the latest on Labor 2010 in Kentucky, click here.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on September 10, 2010 (boomark / email).