July 30, 2007

2007 IFL Convention:
Preview of Convention Highlights

Presidential Candidates’ Forum

At the Annual Convention of the Iowa Federation of  Labor, AFL-CIO, leading presidential candidates will present their views and answer questions posed by the IFL Executive Board.

Senator Biden

Senator Clinton

Senator Dodd

Senator Edwards

Senator Obama

Governor Richardson

On Wednesday August 15th from 5:30-8:00 p.m., there will be a presidential
candidates’ reception hosted by the candidates and the IFL.  For more highlights see p. 4.

 51st Annual Convention

Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO

When:   August 15—17, 2007

Where:  Ramada Inn, Waterloo

  How Did They Vote? 

 Check the votes of your representatives in the Iowa legislature
on labor’s key issues

Voting records — tracked  and publicized— are a key factor in labor’s political action program.  We want the elected representatives we endorsed and worked for to vote for working people’s best economic interests once they get up on the hill.

The 2007 voting record is now available on the IFL website.  So now we can find out whether they were “fer us or agin us.” 

   2007 IFL Iowa House Voting records.

2007 IFL Iowa Senate Voting records.

Check to see how your reps voted, and make sure they know this: 
    we always “remember in November!”

Now: A Chance to Weigh in on Solutions to Your Members’ Problems with Health Care

Public hearings have been scheduled at 3 locations around the state to give Iowans an opportunity to talk to members of Governor Culver’s new Health Care Commission.  The hearings will be conducted by former Iowa Governors Tom Vilsack and Terry Branstad.  They are ready to listen to the health care issues that affect Iowans.

Do you have solutions to any of these (or other) problems:
 

• Difficulties negotiating health benefits?

• Shifting costs to workers?

• Higher premiums?

• Higher co-pays and deductibles?

• Denial of claims?

• Problems securing health care for retired or laid off workers?

 Hearings are scheduled for:

• Council Bluffs September 4

• Indianola September 26

• Davenport September 27

  Look for details in the next Political Action Update.

MSNBC, XM Radio to Cover Forum Live in Prime Time, Moderated by Keith Olbermann

  On Tuesday, August 7, at 6 p.m., the AFL-CIO will host a presidential forum with the top seven Democratic candidates to be held at Soldier Field in Chicago. Due to overwhelming response among union families interested in attending the forum, the location was changed from McCormick Place West to Soldier Field.

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, host of the network's popular Countdown with Keith Olbermann, will moderate the forum, which will be broadcast live nationally on MSNBC and XM Satellite Radio. 

 More than 10,000 union members and their families from around the country will attend the forum, which will focus on working families' everyday issues.

Candidates who will appear:

• Sen. Joe Biden,

• Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton

• Sen. Christopher Dodd

• Former Sen. John Edwards

• U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich

• Sen. Barack Obama

• Gov. Bill Richardson

He’s Baaaack!!!
Bad Boss (contest) Returns

Working America has launched its second My Bad Boss contest, asking Americans to vent about the **!#*!*'s that sign their paychecks. 

 For six weeks anyone can submit their stories online, and visitors to the web site can vote on the most outrageous tales from the workplace and reward the most abused workers with what many of them need most -
a vacation.

 During last year's contest, nearly

50,000 votes were cast and the site had two million page views.  More than 5,000 stories were submitted online in the contest.

Working America, the 1.6-million member community affiliate of the AFL-CIO, brings together workers who don't have unions on the job and gives them a powerful voice on the issues that matter to them most.  The first Bad Boss contest came about when they began hearing from their members about mistreatment in the workplace.

"We knew there was a problem out there, but we have been really stunned by the extent of it," said Karen Nussbaum, director of Working America. "While many of the stories are funny - at least to the reader - many are painful, even tragic.  They all drive home the point that unless they have a union, working people have virtually no rights on the job." 

Find out more at www.workingamerica.org/badboss/

Bring Back that Good Old Time
Populist Anger

Wouldn’t it be nice if Republican anti-government “starve the beast” rhetoric were replaced by a message like this?

“Well somebody told us Wall Street fell,
But we were so poor that we couldn’t tell.
Cotton was short and the weeds were tall.
But Mr. Roosevelt’s a-gonna save us all.”

Freshman senator Jim Webb of Virginia recently quoted those lyrics from “Song of the South,” by Alabama to David Ignatius of the Washington Post.  Webb was talking about his mother’s dirt poor Arkansas family during the Great Depression: “The Democrats built their party around such people, while the Republicans never cared about them.”

Back to the future?   Webb says that “populist anger” is part of the Democrats’ past, and should be part of the party’s future as well.  He argues that populist anger is the Democrats’ best hope to “reconnect with the American middle class.”

How Dems can win big.  Webb calls upon his fellow Democrats to embrace what he sees as the

greatest issue in America today — “economic fairness.”  He says Democrats will “win big” if they construct a “fairness agenda” that tilts away from corporations and the rich and towards workers.

Fairness = “class war”?  Ignatius concludes his article by saying that Republicans might not get away this time with denouncing Webb’s fairness argument as “class warfare”: “The Democratic candidate who gets the fairness issue right could find a new way to rally the party and the country.”

Pet Insurance: Kids should be so Lucky

Writer Barbara Ehrenreich found she could get a 3-year-old child a "premium" health insurance policy for a mere $33 a month—if she identified the little girl as a dog and applied for pet insurance!

But could a veterinarian handle common children's ills? She cites a case (New York Times June 2007) where a 12-year-old boy died from an abscessed tooth because he had no insurance and his mother could not afford $80 to have the tooth pulled. Could a vet have handled this problem? Yes, absolutely. (http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070813/ehrenreich

Convention Schedule

• The Health Care Crisis, 9:00 a.m.—12:00 noon,
  Tuesday, Aug. 14th, Public Employee Committee.   
  Cost: $15
• Immigration, 1:30 p.m.— 4:00 p.m.,  Tuesday, Aug. 14th, Industrial  Union Council.  Cost: $15

Early Registration, 12:00 noon — 6:00 p.m.

Convention opens, 9:00 a.m.  

Presidential Forum 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Presidential Reception 5:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.

• Educating members and the public on Fair Share.

• Congressional Reception

• 5:00 p.m.

• Political Banquet

Speaker: Senator Tom Harkin

• Dinner 6:00 p.m.

Cost: $20.  Tickets will be available at the convention.  For advance tickets, contact the IFL office.

Convention highlights

Major convention addresses by:

• AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka

• Iowa Governor Chet Culver

• CWA International President Larry Cohen

• Congressman Bruce Braley, 1st District

• Congressman Dave Loebsack, 2nd District

• Congressman Leonard Boswell, 3rd District

Delegates will also hear from:

• Association of Retired Americans: George Kourpias, President

• Working America: Karen Nussbaum, Director

• Working Families Win: Don Kusler, Director

• Iowa Farmers Union: Chris Peterson, President

What Does…

• John Edwards have to  say on health care?

• Barack Obama on the Employee Free Choice Act?

• John McCain on education?

• Hillary Clinton on trade?

• Rudy Giuliani on Social Security privatization?

• (Hint: He's in Favor!)

 Find out where the presidential candidates stand on working family issues at:

www.WorkingFamiliesVote08.org