The designated moderate in the Republican presidential field, Chris Christie, will have to run on a little more than his famous bellicosity. There is the matter of his record as governor of New Jersey and his success in dealing with that famously Republican constituency: organized labor. In that regard, Christie may have a problem.
Gov. Chris Christie has warned potential investors there is no guarantee the state will make its required pension payments in future years, an admission that underscores a looming financial crisis he and future governors face as retirement costs are expected to explode before the decade ends.
The problem of large, unfunded pension obligations has not gone away and numbers do not respond to bluster.
The Presidential Inaugural Committee announced today that "it will use Amalgamated Bank’s cash management services to handle most of its day-to-day banking needs for the 2013 Inaugural activities," according to a press release.
New Jersey governor Chris Christie has accepted the endorsement of the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA), according to an announcement from the Republican's reelection campaign. The organization "is one of the largest unions in the state, representing over 20,000 laborers across New Jersey primarily within the construction and manufacturing trades."
Senator Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat from Michigan, encouraged folks to "keep fighting!" after her side lost the labor dispute that will now give union members the right-to-work.
The Florida chapter of the AFL-CIO appears to be encouraging folks to break the law. In a message on the homepage of their website, the union writes, "There is a mantra that we --at the Florida AFL-CIO-- like to live by, 'Vote Early, Vote Often'."
The Chicago Tribune has refused to print an anti-teachers union ad, according to the Center for Union Facts, the group whose ad was rejected by the paper. The Tribune rejected the ad by saying it had "racial undertones."
Philadelphia Speaking at the Workers Stand for America union rally in Philadelphia today, Democratic National Committee chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz wasted no time attacking newly announced Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan.
The United Auto Workers union is sending out a letter from its legislative director, Josh Nassar, urging senators to vote against several budgets pending in the Senate. One of the budgets UAW apparently opposes is President Obama's own budget.
A final get out the vote call from Mitt Romney's campaign in Wisconsin suggests an unholy alliance of the Santorum campaign, "union bosses," Democrats, and Santorum's "cronies" might be conspiring to extend the GOP contest, and urges Wisconsin voters to stop those efforts by voting for Romney. The call seeks to align Romney with Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, whose challenge of public employee unions has made him immensely popular among the state's Republicans.
It’s the year for revisiting the Civil War, and also, alas, for “revisioning”—according to current sensibilities—how the war should be remembered. A recent casualty of the blogosphere skirmishes is the famous letter from Union major Sullivan Ballou to his wife Sarah, written a week before his death in the first battle of Bull Run. (The full text of the letter is available here.)
Left-wing groups convened the “One Nation Working Together” rally on the National Mall on Saturday, October 2, hoping to counter Glenn Beck’s well-attended “Restoring Honor” gathering in August. They also wanted to energize their base before the November elections, hoping to counter Tea Party enthusiasm.
Over the weekend, which kicked off Congress's Easter recess, President Obama appointed Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board, bypassing the Senate. This appointment happened immediately after all 41 Senate Republicans sent a letter to the president that asked specifically for Becker not to be appointed in this manner. (Indeed, Massachusetts senator Scott Brown asked to be seated early after his election in order, among other reasons, to be able to thwart Becker's appointment.)
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