Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire WTF re: unions?

Okay, I understand how the Teacher's Unions and such back Ds; they are all a bunch of socialist and petty dictators anyway. I understand how SEIU backs Ds; it's all about leaching off taxpayer dollars.

But, how the Hell can the Teamsters, the Steelworkers, cops and firefighters, electrical workers, carpenters... how do THEY end up backing Ds? In order to get paid, they need stuff to get built and with steelworkers, there's nothing better than pipelines and military spending (and firearms) to drive their employment; all things the Ds actively oppose. Electrical workers and carpenters need construction jobs; Ds oppose those through regulations, taxes, and red tape. Teamsters haul and unload schit that goes around those others unions; same things apply. Cops and firefighters should be the toughest on crime; and the Ds are the softest. All of those unions are threatened by illegal immigration, and the Ds back that to the hilt. Most of those guys will swear that they are pro-2A, anti-abortion, anti-illegal immigrant, pro-national defense, pro-jobs - and yet, they vote D.

W.T.F.?

They cannot think past their next paycheck. Gimme, gimme, gimme, now!

They are looking out for themselves.

Everything is peachy until like carrier, your job goes to Mexico.

going through college i was a member of the laborer's union, on high rise construction. After college, i spent the next 40years in/on/around wall street.
I remember those laborer days, sometimes 12hours a day in 115degree heat, in a pit where temp's often were way over 100.
It was brutal work, paid well, but brutal. I remember a guy slipping and spearchucking his calf with a piece of rebar. He was back to work the next day, needed the money and no disability.
The work rules were stupid to protect the trades, and a real hierarchy. I could break concrete pans apart with a hammer, but was not allowed to hit a nail, wrong union.
But i understood real quick why trade unions developed. The people i worked with represented the normal mismash you run into, all shades of the political spectrum.
I have constant pack problems today, i think that got started during those construction days working like a mule. I am 100% certain the guys i worked with then are either dead now, or crippled.

they developed so you couldn't hit the nail.....

Just an anecdote. Not meant to speak for all levels of Uniondome, but here goes:


My dad did some nuclear plant work in Ohio years ago, inspecting welds and making repairs. He was contract labor, hired by independent inspectors and fell outside the union scope.

One day, he had to take off a cover from a panel to inspect a weld. The panel also covered electrical conduits so it fell under the electricians area of influence.

Hence, removing the panel was a union job.

He waited 2 days for the tech, that worked at the plant, to come and remove 4 screws.

The panel was in the electrical tech's "office".

When the grift supports that level of dumbphuckery, in any venue, its not hard to see that they would support D's or that they simply don't GAF.

one of my other memories was a black labor forum, he hated us college boys. He made good money and had a black caddie with a white interior, and a white caddie with a black interior.
He use to really fowl mouth us. After graduation i went to work at the bank home office we had worked on. As an employee of the bank. I was standing picking my teeth after lunch watching my former crew sweating on some of that construction. Saw my former labor foreman, who had made my life tough, he at that point seeing me in my suit called me "sir".
I still think that's funny.
It also took me a number of years after graduation to meet the income level i was making at that construction job.

The chairman of the bank got me into the union and that job.
He said i would make a lot of money, which would allow me to finish college, but i wouldn't want to keep that job, i would dream every day about being back in college, he was right.
But that union job allowed me to pay for that college and a way out.

1. Early Retirement on the backs of the Taxpayers

2. Free or low contribution to heath care in early retirement

3. Pension Pie, 60-70 % of what they take out in payments will come from the Taxpayer. Public Safety Pensions will take out over 90% from the Taxpayers.

Local Police Chief, retired at age 53. Paid $105,000 into his pension. His pension is $115,000 per year. If he lives to 82 he collects close to 3.5 Million, just one guy.

Also free heath care until death, another half mil or so.

And they are ALL closeted blue lever pullers no matter what they try and tell you.

The question wasn't about public employee unions specifically, though I should have guessed you'd take time away from trying to get a government grant in order to spout off again.

Laffin'.....liar.

At this point I'd say its because Republicans rail on Unions whenever they get the chance


its clear to them that Republicans aren't interested in the Union vote.

So, they sell out their own best interests because supposedly someone talked bad about them?

JFC, no wonder OH, PA, and MI are so f'ked up.

Come on, they HAVE to make a more intelligent decision than that, right?

and yet they'll decide who your president is

you'd think Republicans would have a little more forethought on that

Oh, it's the Republicans fault that unions sell out their own best interests and vote D, thereby screwing themselves and everyone else.

Good Lord, that's like an Obama excuse - "it's Bush's fault/the Republicans fault/they made me do it/we're not responsible".

The union members can't honestly be that stupid, can they?

I know A lot of union construction guys who all hunt,shoot,etc..
but will vote Dem.because it keeps them working.

Republican politicians will give away our tax dollars to foreign countries, illegal aliens, kiss all minorities butts, and all types of welfare, but don't want the citizens in a labor unions vote.

Okay - HOW does it keep them working? The Ds, especially in NYS, are the most opposed to job creation in that area of any. The fracking ban alone keeps them out of work. Explain HOW they justify voting D, please.

I don't know - I'm not a union member.

But they aren't going to vote Republican as long as Republican actively work to support right to work states and anti-union related laws.

seems pretty straight forward to understand

but that's just me

I'd call it the Scott Walker School of Vote Earning.

Unions are like mini gov'ts. I don't agree with many things they do, just like our US senators and congress critters. But I still pay my taxes.