All posts by carldavidson
What Happens When You Have the Best State Officials Money Can Buy
Marcellus Skeptics Form Own Shale Commission
By Anya Litvak
Pittsburgh Business Times
Aug 29, 2011 – Disappointed with the work of Gov. Tom Corbett’s Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission, a group of organizations that have aimed to temper natural gas development in the state, has formed its own panel: The Citizens Marcellus Shale Commission.
And they’re taking it on the road, with the first public hearing scheduled for Wednesday evening at South Fayette Middle School, which lies smack in the center a lawsuit filed by Range Resources (NYSE: RRC). Range is claiming the township effectively zoned natural gas drilling out of its borders.
The other four commission meetings scheduled to take place in the next three weeks will be in central and northeastern Pennsylvania, with a concluding report to follow in early October.
The commission is made up of:
- Thomas Au, Conservation Chair, Pennsylvania Chapter, Sierra Club
- Lynda Farrell, Pipeline Safety Coalition
- Greg Grabowitz, Environmental Chair, Pennsylvania Council of Trout Unlimited
- Barb Jarmoska, Responsible Drilling Alliance
- Anne Leisure, PA Providers Assocition
- Rebecca McNichol, CLEAR Coalition
- Roy Newsome Jr., Housing Alliance of Pennsylvania
- James Schmid, Environmental Engineer
- John Stolz, Duquesne University
- Marybeth Sweeney/Roberta Winters: League of Women Voters
- Ritchie Tabachnick, Equipment and Controls Africa
- John Anthony Trallo, Residents United for Pennsylvania/Sullivan County Chapter
- Maya van Rossum, Delaware Riverkeeper
- Ray Werts: President of the Western Clinton County Sportsman
Continue reading What Happens When You Have the Best State Officials Money Can Buy
‘There’s Always Been Class War In This Country. So Far, Only One Side’s Been Winning’
THE TRUE IMPACTS OF FRACKING TO OUR COMMUNITY
A COMMUNITY PRESENTATION
WEDNESDAY AUGUST 17TH at 7:00 PM
CHIPPEWA EVANGELICAL FREE CHURCH
239 BRAUN ROAD, BEAVER FALLS, PA 15010
Carolyn Knapp and Carol French own working dairy farms in Bradford County, PA. Both have signed gas leases for their property and have experienced the impacts of heavy drilling activity in their community. They have devoted large amounts of time learning about the hydraulic fracturing process and the overall impact it has on the community. They will provide a perspective on fracking that is not being provided by the gas companies. Questions will be taken after their presentation.
Visit www.southbeaverfracking.com for more information or contact Rich Barger - barger105@comcast.net
Chippewa Evangelical Free Church is not a sponsor and does not endorse the speakers for this event. Chippewa Evangelical Free Church maintains neutrality on the issue of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling. CEFC is only providing a meeting place and is neither for nor against gas drilling.
Tension Growing Between Labor and Top Dems
Some Unions to Skip 2012 Democratic Convention
By SAM HANANEL
Associated Press
Aug 12, 2011 – WASHINGTON (AP) — About a dozen trade unions plan to sit out the 2012 Democratic convention because they’re angry that it’s being held in a right-to-work state and frustrated that Democrats haven’t done enough to create jobs.
The move could pose a larger problem for President Barack Obama next year if an increasingly dispirited base of labor activists becomes so discouraged that it doesn’t get the rank-and-file to the polls in the usual strong numbers.
The unions — all part of the AFL-CIO’s building and construction trades unit — told party officials this week they are gravely disappointed that labor was not consulted before Democrats settled on Charlotte, N.C., where there are no unionized hotels.
"We find it troubling that the party so closely associated with basic human rights would choose a state with the lowest unionization rate in the country due to regressive policies aimed at diluting the power of workers," Mark Ayers, president of the building trades unit, wrote in a letter to Democratic Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
‘My City of Ruins’ from Bruce Springsteen, Telling It Like It Is…Pass it on!
It’s time for a Main Street Contract for the American People. National Nurses United has embarked on a campaign to reverse national priorities and policies that have placed the interests of Wall Street over the crisis facing American families today. The goal is to chart a new contract for the American people — for a better life today and a more secure future for our children and future generations. www.mainstreetcontract.org
Solidarity with the CWA/IBEW Strikers!
Local CWA Union Rep Angered by Verizon Claims
By Megan J. Miller
Timesonline.com
August 8, 2011 – BEAVER — A local representative of the Communication Workers of America union said Verizon workers were forced to go on strike after the communications giant “put outrageous demands” on them in contract negotiations.
Thousands of Verizon landline employees across several states were striking Monday after talks broke down between the company and the workers’ unions, the CWA and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
Michael Rossi, president of the CWA chapter that includes about 250 workers in Beaver County, as well as the Sewickley area and parts of Lawrence and Mercer counties, told The Times that he was angered by a statement released by the company that accused the unions of walking away from the table “instead of continuing to work through the issues.”
The company’s demands include freezing pensions and requiring workers to contribute more to their health insurance premiums, above the 7 percent that Rossi said they now pay.
The proposed changes in benefits over time and holiday pay would cost union members approximately $20,000 per year, he estimated.
“(Verizon) made over $20 billion over the last 4 years,” Rossi said, categorizing the company’s demands as “another attack on the middle class.”
Verizon, for its part, pointed out that its landline business has significantly declined as wireless usage grows and said in a news release that its contract terms reflect “today’s economic realities in our wireline business.”
‘City of Steel’ by Jasiri X, Our Own Rapper
By Jasiri X and Paradise Gray
According to the New Pittsburgh Courier, “The average homicide victim in 2010 was a 33–year-old Black male with four prior arrests, most likely shot on the North Side, in the Hill District or the East End with a 9mm semi-automatic pistol in the early morning hours of a Saturday in July. The average shooter was a 29-year-old Black male with four prior arrests. The motive was likely retaliation. And according to the clearance-rate data, there is a 46 percent chance that he is still at large.”
This is why we decided to dedicate our latest video to the problem of violence in our community.
“City of Steel” was filmed on Pittsburgh’s Northside at, Northview Heights housing project, Allegheny County General Hospital, Zone No.1 Police Station, Union Dale Cemetery, and the newly reopened state prison, SCI Pittsburgh.
“City of Steel” was produced by Rel!g!on and directed by Paradise Gray.
This is the third video, in the four video series entitled “The Pittsburgh Press”, which was made possible by a generous Seed Award from the Sprout Fund.
LYRICS
Continue reading ‘City of Steel’ by Jasiri X, Our Own Rapper
Beaver Bus Drivers Remain on the Job after Strike Vote
By Moriah Balingit
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Aug 8, 2011 – Drivers, mechanics and service workers with the Beaver County Transit Authority voted to strike Sunday shortly after overwhelmingly rejecting a proposed contract that they felt did not sufficiently address their issues with forced overtime.
The 50 or so workers, represented by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1743, will not walk out on the job until they get authorization from the union’s international heads and then will face a waiting period, said Local 1743 President Diane Stambaugh.
Ms. Stambaugh said the Beaver Authority forces drivers to stay on beyond their scheduled shifts regularly and disciplines them if they refuse. Under the proposed contract, employees would be allowed to refuse two forced overtime shifts, a quarter and would have disciplinary marks removed from their records after 33 months instead of 36 months.
Drivers, she said, "have no life."
"They can’t make plans to do anything," she said.
Employees want more flexibility to refuse overtime and want less stringent penalties when they do, Ms. Stambaugh said, adding that she believes the authority relies too much on forced overtime when it needs to hire more drivers.
"If they would hire more people, we wouldn’t have this [overtime] problem," she said.
The union’s contract expired Dec. 31.
Officials with the Beaver County Transit Authority could not be reached for comment.
Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11220/1166024-100.stm?cmpid=news.xml#ixzz1UTNhxBNJ
Jobs and GOP ‘Dialectics’: Turning Things Into Their Opposites
By Carl Davidson
People sometimes either groan or laugh when they hear the term ‘dialectics,’ a word which some people use to bamboozle others into thinking they know something when they don’t.
But here’s a great ‘laughing out loud’ example inspired by a few lines for Mike Hall’s current post on the AFL-CIO blog today, Aug. 2:
“The 4,000 furloughed Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) workers and 90,000 workers on airport construction projects stalled by the Republican shutdown of the FAA are worrying about how they will pay their bills in the coming weeks.
“But the only worry House Republicans have is how they are going to spend their six-week summer vacation. House Republicans leaders adjourned the House last night until Sept. 7 without taking action on reauthorizing an FAA bill so the agency—shutdown since July 22—could reopen and construction funds move down the pipeline again.”
So here’s a great example of Republican ‘dialectics’, their ‘Jobs Plan’ of turning real jobs into their opposites, non-jobs. It’s easy to laugh at, if it didn’t mean so much suffering for so many working-class families. I suppose we could say there’s a ‘unity of opposite’ there, too.
One thing that burns me up more than GOP nonsense, though, are many of the mainstream media pundits who don’t have any idea on how to ask a decent follow-up question. When our right wing lawmakers (and their White House allies) go on at length about cutting this and slashing that, taking money from low-income and middle-income workers and giving it to the super-rich, there always comes a point where they assert, ‘and this will create jobs!.’
Back in my youth I taught logic for a year at the University of Nebraska. Full disclosure here: I actually appreciate real dialectics, and other rules of argument. But one point I often made to my students: An assertion is not an argument.
Now why can’t our media pundits say, ‘Wait a minute here, Congressman (or other policy wonk). You’re cutting both spending and jobs, reducing overall demand. Then you assert this creates jobs? Can you tell us exactly how that works? Especially when it’s mainly demand that creates jobs? An assertion is not an argument.”
If I heard it just once on CNN, it would make my day.
My logic course back in 1965 was for incoming freshman. Wouldn’t it be great if news anchors could at least reach that level, even if it’s too much to expect of Congress and the White House? All the more reason we have to rely on our own labor-oriented blogs and news services. We know how to make use of decent dialectics, and put a spotlight on the foolish versions of our adversaries.
Beaver County Blue: Voice of the 17th CD of Progressive Democrats of America 