Cooperation vs. confrontation
Wednesday, Jun 3, 2015 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Sun-Times…
Four years after a strident confrontation with organized labor he later regretted laid the groundwork for a more cooperative relationship, Mayor Rahm Emanuel will strike a dramatically different tone on Wednesday.
The mayor has summoned leaders of virtually every union representing city workers—with the exception of the Fraternal Order of Police—to an unprecedented meeting at the plumbers’ union hall.
The conversation is certain to include the $30 billion pension crisis that has dropped the bond rating of the city, Chicago Public Schools and Chicago Park District to junk status and threatens the on-time opening of schools this fall. […]
Asked about the meeting with Emanuel, [Chicago Federation of Labor President Jorge Ramirez] compared it to the highly strained relationship between organized labor and rookie Gov. Bruce Rauner.
“Sitting down and having a constructive and collaborative dialogue stands in stark contrast to what’s happening at the state level, with the governor,” Ramirez said.
Rahm learned the hard way. But the governor most likely just figures that his old pal has sold out.
* Meanwhile, the Effingham City Council heard from dozens of union members Tuesday evening about “right to work,” even though it doesn’t appear the governor’s resolution was up for formal council debate…
Dexter Sloan spoke about what his life was like before he joined a union four years ago. “I started from the bottom,” he told the council. “I started at $5 an hour. I busted my butt every day — eight to 10 hours a day — and getting nowhere.”
Sloan was working two jobs just to get by. And getting by, he said, was all he could do. “Almost five years ago, my firstborn son had a brain aneurysm and died in my arms — because I didn’t have insurance,” Sloan said. “That’s when I left and went union.”
Since joining, he’s gotten better wages, better training, and benefits he never had before. “I can provide for my family now,” Sloan said.
Upon finishing his address to the council, a thunderous applause came from other union workers at the meeting. A handful of others would also officially address the council.
- Levois - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:29 pm:
He might want to learn from his old buddy. I understand the need to antagonize unions, but they’ll have to talk sooner or later. Perhaps some cooperation is better than just all out conflict.
- Frenchie Mendoza - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:33 pm:
All out conflict is the only way Rauner will get the national stage. Anything else and he remains in Illinois.
- Wordslinger - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:35 pm:
Meh, those people in Effingham were bused in from out of state. Everyone knows the “real reforms” of the governor’s agenda enjoys universal support in Illinois.
- Norseman - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:38 pm:
Rauner likes to have his cake and eat it too. He likes to publicly confront his adversaries and then he expects them to cooperate behind closed doors. That’s why his method of working with Dems on his agenda consisted of super secret work group meetings.
- A guy - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:41 pm:
Not going to participate in this one. Wouldn’t argue one way or the other with anyone who’s lost a child. Simply wish him peace.
- Rahm`s Missin` Finger - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:53 pm:
Rahm`s gonna kill `em with kindness till the city unions see things his way after a 10 year contact thanks to Sluggo`s pipe dream of landing the Olympics the trade unions are gonna take it right in the neck exactly they`re gonna take it a little lower in the anatomy Rahm will seem like the adult in the room after the unions scream bloody murder about Rahm`s suggested [demanded] give backs layoffs are inevitable and the unions strength in this NONE no strike clause and the biggest employer of union trade people OPPS the City of Chicago so as someone once said Never let a crisis go to waste
- Arsenal - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 2:54 pm:
One thing Dems should thank Rauner for is this tremendous opportunity to reset their relationship with unions. They’re certainly jumping on it.
- horse w/ no name - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:14 pm:
I’m sure we’ll hear an equally compelling human story about someone who lived in financial ruin and couldn’t afford to care for their children because of a union. Nothing? Not a one? Ok, nevermind.
- anon - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:15 pm:
I don’t care how nicey nicey Rahm acts. I still want every penny of the pension I earned.
- Emily Booth - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:19 pm:
We need to hear from more Dexter Sloans.
- walker - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:21 pm:
==One thing Dems should thank Rauner for is this tremendous opportunity to reset their relationship with unions.==
Right on Arsenal.
For some years now my relationship with unions was mostly rational and economic support. Now it’s getting more to my gut and heart — where it was in my youth.
My grandfather fought the gun-wielding Pinkertons with a pickaxe, in the mines in Pennsylvania, for God’s sake. Now I am feeling it again.
- Arizona Bob - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:33 pm:
I sympathize with the father’s loss, but I’m not buying that the medical community let his child die in his arms because he didn’t have insurance. Isn’t there a law in Illinois about hospitals being required to provide life saving services in emergency situations?
- facts are stubborn things - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:44 pm:
The dance is on and both sides need each other. The key is how to maneuver so both sides are ok with the revenue increase that everyone knows we need. Rauner must extract something in order to agree to revenue and MJM must be sure he can do revenue and keep a majority by protecting his members.
- facts are stubborn things - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 3:54 pm:
I think with Rauner and the Dems we will eventually see the old axiom of “politics makes strange bed fellows” come to life. They need each other in so many ways.
- Excesseively Rabid - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 4:00 pm:
== the old axiom of “politics makes strange bed fellows” come to life. They need each other in so many ways. ==
….
….
They argued all night
Over who had the right
To do what, and with which, and to whom.
- Anonymous - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 4:50 pm:
- life saving services in emergency situations? -
Can you try to imagine in that brain of yours that perhaps with insurance the child could have had better early screening and early prevention?
Or do you just enjoy naysaying people that have lost a child because you don’t agree with them?
Pathetic.
- Honeybear - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 4:56 pm:
Arizona Bob, what I imagine happened is that the man didn’t have access to preventive care which might have caught the warning signs (headaches etc) for the aneurysm that killed his son because he didn’t have health insurance. I don’t know about you but nearly the first thing they ask me when I go into the pediatrician with my girls is “has anything changed with your insurance”. About that same time, I had to go without insurance for my family for a short period. We had catastrophic insurance but couldn’t afford normal issurance. I hated when my daughters would come home with permission slips for field trips. The back page was always insurance information etc. I had to leave it blank. I always felt shame when it would come back the next day with a note from the teacher. “You forgot to fill out the insurance information”. Don’t judge unless you’ve been there folks.
- X-prof - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 5:22 pm:
Bob, it’s not only preventative care that might be at issue, as others pointed out. Emergency rooms deliver emergency care — they do not provide life-saving chemotherapies, specialized surgeries, etc. that can cost 10s or 100s of thousands of $$. If you don’t have adequate insurance, can’t otherwise pay and there is no charitable intervention, the US system will sometimes let you die. That is a national disgrace that Obamacare still only partially addresses.
Do you recall that debate in the last GOP presidential primary where one of the more moderate candidates raised this issue and asked, should we let the (uninsured) patient die? A handful of audience members — not all — responded with a gleeful, Yeah!!
- Weltschmerz - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 6:07 pm:
“If Your Mother Says She Loves You, Check It Out.” - City News Bureau.
- Grandson of Man - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 6:38 pm:
Mr. Sloan’s address to the Effingham City Council is one of the most powerful and moving testimonials as to the value of unions and universal health insurance that I’ve ever encountered.
“That is a national disgrace that Obamacare still only partially addresses.”
It is shameful that we don’t yet have a universal health insurance system. Even with Obamacare, we don’t have it, in large part because states with Republican control are not expanding Medicaid.
Florida reportedly has an estimated 850,000 people without health insurance, because Medicaid is not expanded.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article18726207.html
Texas won’t expand Medicaid, and there’s very bad news in that also.
Florida and Texas are supposed to be right wing paradises of no state income tax. Please. In some ways those states are in terrible shape, among the worst in the country.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/dont-mess-medicaid-expansion-texas-193855402.html;_ylt=A0LEVvOojG9VZkMAAY0PxQt.;_ylu=X3oDMTByOHZyb21tBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzcg–
There are plenty of horror stories and tragedies because people can’t get health insurance.
We can start super-costly wars based on lies and build expensive military equipment. We can give rich corporations tax breaks, but we can’t give subsidies to our people to buy health insurance, or work to find ways to insure our poorer residents? Disgraceful and pathetic.
- Lester Holt's Mustache - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 6:41 pm:
==I sympathize with the father’s loss, but I’m not buying that==
You know, of all the commenters on Cap Fax that I would have suspected of not understanding the plight of those who face the consequences of our insurance nightmare, I never would have expected it to be Arizona Bob…..
- Oswego Willy - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 7:07 pm:
The Union rhetoric and Rauner’s failures to all this RTW, was the first ding in the armor.
I miss “ck” too…
- Lester Holt's Mustache - Wednesday, Jun 3, 15 @ 7:32 pm:
Grandson -
Kind of off topic, but did you see the story of the guy in South Carolina who was raising money on GoFundme? Man was vehemently against Obamacare for years, then was upset that he couldn’t immediately sign up for Obamacare when he started to go blind. Instead of blaming the conservative legislature in SC for not expanding Medicare, his wife blamed - well, I’m sure you can guess.