DAILY NEWS
Seattle Seawards, AFL-CIO rift, next town down, mind the pay gap…
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
LOCAL
► From Full Frontal with Samantha Bee — Meet the Seattle Seawards! — In a send up of the sexist response that the five female members of the Seattle city council got this month for being the five votes against the SoDo arena, TBS political comedy show Full Frontal with Samantha Bee broadcast a segment on — “those seaport loving ladies… the sweethearts of stevedores…the savers of shipping jobs…the Seattle Seawards…”
► In today’s Yakima H-R — Settlement agreement clears way for farm workers to receive full damages in Lower Valley lawsuit — Farm workers on Friday reached a settlement agreement in a class action lawsuit against Lower Valley orchard owners, so all that remains now is to distribute the $1 million in damages among members of the class.
► In today’s Seattle Times — Group trying to buy KPLU told to change how it collects donations — An attorney for Pacific Lutheran University has told a community group trying to raise money to buy Tacoma-based public radio station KPLU that the group must alter how it collects donations on the station’s website and stop using the KPLU trademark and logo.
ALSO at The Stand — Help save KPLU, the state’s only unionized NPR station
BOEING
► In the Chicago Tribune — Southwest pilots sue carrier to block flying of Boeing’s Max — The pilots’ union at Southwest Airlines asked a federal court to block the carrier from flying Boeing’s newest 737 until the plane is negotiated into a new contract for the 8,300 aviators. The union also wants the court to order Southwest to stop “delaying and frustrating bargaining” and fulfill its legal duty to make every effort to reach a contract if the airline wants to fly the 737 Max when it’s delivered next year.
AFL-CIO
► In today’s NY Times — Rift between labor, environmentalists threatens Democratic turnout plan — Two of the Democratic Party’s most loyal constituencies, labor and environmentalists, are clashing over an effort to raise tens of millions of dollars for an ambitious voter turnout operation aimed at defeating Donald J. Trump in the November election.
CAMPAIGN 2016
► From The Hill — Trump closing gap with Clinton, poll shows — The NBC News/SurveyMonkey online tracking poll found that Clinton holds a 3-point lead over the presumptive GOP nominee. Last week, the same poll had Clinton ahead by 5 points.
► In today’s Washington Post — The rank nihilism driving the GOP’s acceptance of Trump (editorial) — Rudimentary adherence to the truth and respect for openness matter. RNC Chairman Reince Priebus and his confederates in amorality dismiss or excuse Trump’s mockery of these precious political values because they believe politics matters more than principle. Trump’s campaign will end, one way or another, in November. The disgrace of the Republicans who have supported him will not.
EDITOR’S NOTE — Same goes for Republicans in Washington who are supporting Trump.
► In today’s L.A. Times — A Trump presidency would threaten programs like Social Security. Here’s how we know. — Among Trump’s top advisors are two men who have campaigned for years in favor of privatizing or otherwise cutting Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and disability benefits. They’ve often done so while showing a lack of understanding about these programs or the consequences of their proposals.
EDITOR’S NOTE — As Richard Trumka writes above, Trump talks a good game on trade policy, but has personally made himself rich by outsourcing jobs overseas. Here’s what happens when people like Donald Trump make that “business decision”…
TODAY’S MUST-READ
All around him an ideological crisis was spreading across Middle America as it continued its long fall into dependency: median wages down across the country, average income down, total wealth down in the past decade by 28 percent. For the first time ever, the vaunted middle class was not the country’s base but a disenfranchised minority, down from 61 percent of the population in the 1970s to just 49 percent as of last year. As a result of that decline, confusion was turning into fear. Fear was giving way to resentment. Resentment was hardening into a sense of outrage that was unhinging the country’s politics and upending a presidential election.
ALSO at The Stand — Murdering manufacturing ‘strictly business’ under NAFTA (by Leo W. Gerard)
SUPREME COURT
HEALTH CARE
► From AP — Health insurance companies seek double-digit rate hikes in Washington — Health insurance companies that sell individual policies in Washington want to increase their rates by an average of 13.5 percent in 2017, the state insurance commissioner’s office said Monday. Those rate requests announced Monday are under review by the office, which has historically set final rates below the company requests.
► From The Hill — Uninsured rate hits record low under ACA — Only 9.1 percent were uninsured in 2015, down from 14.4 percent in 2013.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
► In today’s USA Today — Rule to make more workers eligible for overtime — Millions of additional Americans are expected to become eligible for overtime pay under a new rule expected to be released by the Labor Department as early as this week.
► From The Hill — House begins work on spending bills despite budget impasse — House Republicans are plowing ahead with their first spending bill of the year despite the lack of a budget resolution to guide them.
NATIONAL
TAKE A STAND — The Paycheck Fairness Act would help end wage discrimination by closing loopholes in the Equal Pay Act. It would make it harder for employers to pay women less for the same work, prohibit retaliation against employees who talk about their pay, and require that employers who break the law fairly compensate the women they’ve discriminated against. Click here to send a message to Congress, urging them to co-sponsor, support, and pass the Paycheck Fairness Act now!
► From TPM — Wisconsin lawmakers who cheered impact of Voter ID law revealed in court — The former staffer to a Wisconsin state Republican senator who went public last month with accusations that the state’s voter ID law was passed by GOPers looking for a political advantage elaborated on the claims in federal court Monday and identified the previously unnamed legislators he said were gleeful over the law.
► From PRI — Workers may unionize — but not farmworkers. A lawsuit in New York seeks to change that. — After 15 years of grassroots organizing by farmworkers and labor advocates in New York, the right to collective bargaining may be on the horizon for the state’s approximately 60,000 farmworkers. The New York Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit last week against the state and the governor. The advocacy group says denying farmworkers these protections violates the state constitution.
► In today’s NY Times — Hiring hurdle: Finding workers who can pass a drug test — All over the country, employers say they see a disturbing downside of tighter labor markets as they try to rebuild from the worst recession since the Depression: They are struggling to find workers who can pass a pre-employment drug test.
The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.