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Lessons of Financial Collapse Can’t Be Ignored |
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If the nation ignores the history of what caused the collapse of the financial system, says Phil Angelides,
“We will be doomed to bail it out again.”
Angelides is chairman of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission charged with finding the causes and culprits behind the nation’s economic disaster. Speaking at panel discussion this afternoon at the America’s Future Now conference, Angelides said he dubbed the meltdown, “the immaculate financial crisis” because no one on Wall Street, the Big Banks or the deregulating policy makers that controlled the reins of the system, will take responsibility.
There has been almost no reflection by Wall Street over the crisis because the American taxpayers gave them $1 trillion. Wall Street reform is a start, not an end. We have to commit to changes in our financial system so it works for the many, not the few. Read the rest of this entry »
Bold Action Needed to End Unemployment Crisis |
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America’s economy is not working for everybody and progressives must demand our elected leaders fight for economic justice—and economic justice begins with good jobs, said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. This afternoon, Trumka spoke at a press conference and later on a panel at the America’s Future Now conference here in Washington, D.C.
Americans of all political persuasions are angry, and rightly so. We need political leaders to speak to that anger, to harness it to attack the plutocracy that has run our country into the ground, to build an economy that works for all. But instead our politics seems to be about a choice between apostles of hate masquerading as populists, and voices of complacency masquerading as progressivism.
In an emotional presentation, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert said he was “infuriated at the attitude” of the media and political leaders that the unemployed are suffering, “but that’s just too bad.” The nation is wasting its most valuable resource—its people, he said.
There is no real sense of urgency. The media and the government are clueless as to the scope of the problem.
Pelosi Says Job Creation Is Economically and Ethically Right |
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Creating jobs and forging an economy that breaks out of the boom-and-bust cycle that always leaves working families busted is both good policy and morally right, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told the hundreds of progressive activists at the America’s Future Now conference this morning.
“We have an ethical responsibility to create good jobs and economic necessity to create good jobs.”
She said it is imperative that lawmakers, policymakers and especially voters work to “achieve an economic prosperity that not only puts people back to work,” but opens the doors of economic opportunity that have been shut for the millions of people at the bottom of the economic ladder.
We need to create a new prosperity….Let’s build a future—America’s Future now based on job creation—jobs, jobs, jobs.
Big Pix Solution Needed to Rebuild Manufacturing |
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As important as a Buy America policy is, it is not enough to rebuild the nation’s manufacturing base. We must have a comprehensive industrial policy that supports manufacturing, promotes research and development, emphasizes worker training and rebuilds our infrastructure. Otherwise, the United States will no longer be the world’s top economy, participants at the America’s Future Now conference were warned today.
During a forum on “Making It in America: A Progressive Global Strategy,” Kate Gordon of the Center for American Progress said our competitors, like China and Germany, have strategies in place that are geared to increasing their economic development while the United States does not. Clyde Prestowitz, author of “Betrayal of the American Prosperity,” said when it comes to trade, we are playing an entirely different game than our competitors. While we admonish them to consume more and export less, they are figuring out ways to increase exports and consume less.
Jobs, Economic Fears—Not Love of Right—Fuel Workers’ Anger |
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The nation’s working families “are understandably frustrated, anxious and angry,” says AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker.
“They are angry at Wall Street and the government…they don’t see anybody out there fighting with passion for good jobs…the forces of the right are at work to turn that anger in a dangerous direction.”
Holt Baker moderated a panel discussion—Working Class Anger: Does it Go Left or Right?—this afternoon at the America’s Future Now conference examining the roots of the anger that the mainstream media often portrays as the fuel that feeds the right-wing Tea Party movement.
Pollster Celinda Lake of Lake Research Partners says people’s distrust of government is at an all-time high. That distrust stems from their economic concerns and fears that the government hasn’t been able to sooth, but is not an endorsement of the radical anti-government stance of the extreme right, she says.
Wall Street Reform a First Step to Taking Back America |
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Even though Congress is poised to pass the strongest Wall Street reform in recent history, the current bill is just the beginning of the broad reforms we need to take back the country from the Big Banks, a panel of experts said today at the America’s Future Now! conference in Washington, D.C.
The conference is sponsored by the Campaign for America’s Future (CAF). (If you haven’t signed up and are in the Washington, D.C., area, up you can register onsite at the Omni Shoreham Hotel [2500 Calvert Street, N.W.]. Click here for more information.)
For the first time in decades, Main Street has a chance to rein in the Big Banks, said Heather Booth, director of Americans for Financial Reform.
Workers Mourn APALA President John Delloro |
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John Delloro, president of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA), died unexpectedly Saturday after suffering a heart attack.
Delloro, a member of AFT, was elected as APALA’s president in 2009. During his tenure at APALA, the AFL-CIO convened the first National Asian Pacific American Workers’ Rights Hearing in Washington D.C., in November 2009. Following the hearing, Delloro was a principal author of “Breaking Ground, Breaking Silence,” a report from the hearing. Prior to his election, he served as president of the Los Angeles chapter of APALA and was an organizer for HERE, AFSCME and SEIU.
APALA First Vice President Luisa Blue said:
We are all saddened by the sudden passing of John Delloro, a brilliant young labor leader, who made incredible contributions to APALA and to the U.S. labor movement.
Got Health Care Reform and Medicare Questions? Ask President Obama! |
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Are you a Medicare recipient with questions about the new health care reform law, or do you know someone who is? Tomorrow, you’ll have a chance to get those questions answered by President Obama and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.
They are hosting an hour-long, live tele-town hall meeting Tuesday, starting at 11:15 a.m. EDT. Health care advocates and senior activists will discuss the key provisions and expanded benefits that the new health care law provides for Medicare participants. The meeting will focus on the $250 “donut hole” rebate checks that will soon be in the mail and the efforts to combat some of the commercial scams and schemes aimed at seniors.
Trust, But Verify on Emissions |
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AFL-CIO Union Industries Director Bob Baugh is a member of a global union delegation attending the next round of the United Nations climate change negotiations in Bonn, Germany. This is the second of a series of blogs on the talks. Be sure to check out part 1.
Here in Bonn, U.S. climate change negotiators are hard at work negotiating the process to ensure that nations are abiding by the commitments on targets for emissions and taking the actions they agree to in any final deal.
11,000 CWA Members Ratify Pact with AT&T—and More Bargaining News |
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Some 11,000 CWA members ratify pact with AT&T, and more bargaining news from the “Bargaining Digest Weekly.” The AFL-CIO Collective Bargaining Department delivers daily, bargaining-related news and research resources to more than 1,200 subscribers. Union leaders may register for this service through our website, Bargaining@Work.
SETTLEMENTS
CWA, AT&T Mobility: Members of Communications Workers of America (CWA) District 3 ratified a four-year contract with AT&T Mobility. The agreement covers more than 11,000 workers in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.
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