When In Doubt, Vandilize - Part Deux

The SEIU Thug approach to organizing has evidently caught on down Fresno way, as we have now a second report of NUHW signage being stolen and replaced with UHW trash...

In two separate incidents this week, workers for the Service Employees International Union have been accused of acts of vandalism toward opposing union supporters.

Home care workers in Clovis and Kerman who support the National Union of Healthcare Workers say people have come to their door, torn down signs in support of NUHW and replaced them with flyers in support of SEIU.

Today marked the day when 10,000 workers in the Fresno area would begin receiving ballots in the mail. The election is to determine if workers want to remain members of SEIU or join NUHW.

“I was extremely upset,” said Silbenia Conley of Kerman. She said she witnessed a heavyset African-American male come to her door, allegedly tear down a red NUHW support sign, replace it with a SEIU magnetized sign, then speed off in a newer silver-gray Chevy Malibu. “I was cussing. That (sign) was given to me,” Conley said.

Conley and her husband are both in-home care workers, and she said she doesn’t know how SEIU received their home address.

Conley made a police report following the incident, and said Kerman police told her that it was considered theft since the man took her sign.

In a separate incident, Lesalie Kyle of Clovis said she witnessed a man wearing a purple SEIU t-shirt allegedly kick in the screen on her front door, then place several SEIU flyers in front of her NUHW support poster.

“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing,” Kyle said.

Pete Janhunen, a spokesperson for SEIU, said that workers that help with the campaign are told clearly to conduct themselves in a professional manner.

“We are very confident that our people are conducting themselves in the most professional manner possible,” Janhunen said. He went on to say that any allegations of inappropriate or criminal behavior would be looked into by SEIU and the organization would take the proper actions against the offender.

However, Janhunen also said that any chance NUHW has had to launch a claim against SEIU, it has done so.

“To claim that we have people that would have come here to intimidate is nothing short of outrageous,” Janhunen said.

Oh, I dunno, Pete, maybe we should listen again to the words of the man whom Our Glorious Maximum Leader has put in charge of the Zombie UHW Fresno campaign...



In any event, it beggars belief that this organizer (with physical description and vehicle description provided in the story above, and assuredly many more details in the possession of the police in Kerman) thinks that by stealing someone's property that they can get them to change their mind to his way of thinking.

That type of "thought" process comes from the top - from Dave Regan - and as such, considering Regan's proven track record, as well as with now proof of multiple incidents, Pete Janhunen's claims of UHW innocence ring quite hollow indeed.

Another History of the NUHW-SEIU Battle Royal...

Dan Clawson at Z Magazine has penned a lengthy piece which really puts the whole NUHW-SEIU battle into perspective, and also contrasts nicely with the two approaches now being taken by the two sides when it comes to the Fresno IHSS battle...

SEIU, headed by Andy Stern, is the nation's fastest growing, most visible, most politically potent labor union. Almost every story about SEIU is about some new way that it is on the offensive, launching one or another surprising new initiative, demonstrating its power and creativity. But this is a story about how SEIU is on the receiving end, seemingly outflanked by a new breakaway union, the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW), which appears to be winning unprecedented support from workers and leaving SEIU flat-footed—although SEIU's power and resources may yet enable it to win.

Talking to leaders of the two sides in this dispute is a window into two different visions of the labor movement. When NUHW leaders talk, it is all about the workers and what the workers want; when SEIU leaders talk, it is about the need for labor to be powerful. If a union is about power and raising wages "for" workers, SEIU can make a compelling case. If a union is about building a better world and developing people's ability to control their own lives, not once every four years, but day-to-day at the workplace—NUHW is far more appealing. The remarkable fact is that in California workers are choosing to try to build something more democratic and responsive, rather than stick with the security and power of the national SEIU.

Check the rest - it's a worthy read. Thug Regan once again gloriously shoves his foot down his throat, telling the author to "Don't get fixated on the (signature) cards; I can't understand why people are so fixated on the cards."

Gaming The System, Chowd Nation Edition

Much was made about a month ago of the election held in SEIU 888, in which the Stern- supported incumbent slate was tossed out on their butts by a 58-41 voting margin at the hands of a reform slate. Alas, as we all know, this is not allowed in AndyWorld, and the defeated slate of candidates decided to appeal.

The appeal was heard, and granted, by a "board" who were all appointed to their position by the defeated incumbent president, Susana Segat. Not surprisingly, this scrupulously independent board of election judges (/sarc) have granted all of Ms. Segat's wishes, and have overturned the election and have reinstated her and her compatriots on the 888 E-Board.

If you feel like inducing some serious vomiting, then click here to the SEIU 888 site and read just how low Andy and his Acolytes will go in order to hold onto power.

And oh by the way - the reform slate does have the opportunity to appeal this decision. That appeal would go directly to Our Glorioius Maximum Leader himself, who has in his power the right under the SEIU C&B document to render the final decision, without vote or input from anyone else.

Legitimacy evidently is no longer even a consideration at SEIU.

When In Doubt, Vandalize...

It has to be tough for the SEIU scab patrol to go out into the field and run into people who just don't think the way that they do. Heck, when you run into something like that less than 48 hours after having been told by Thug Regan how to play by "old school" rules, and you are confronted with someone showing NUHW support on their door, what's a scab to do?

Lesalie Kyle, a homecare provider in North Clovis, was shocked yesterday to see a man wearing a purple SEIU t-shirt kick in her door's screen and shove a handful of SEIU literature in front of the sign she had posted showing her support for the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW).

“I was driving away when I saw a man in purple walking up to my door, so I stopped to see what he was doing,” said Ms. Kyle. “I had an NUHW sign behind my locked screen door because I didn’t want SEIU harassing me at home. He rang the bell, and when no one answered he kicked my screen in and put a bunch of SEIU flyers in front of the sign. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. SEIU kicked in my screen and vandalized my door.”

On Monday, SEIU-UHW Trustee Dave Regan encouraged hundreds of SEIU staff to "administer an old-school ass-whipping" to NUHW supporters. (YouTube: http://is.gd/LVV6) "We gotta put them in the ground and bury them,” he said. (http://is.gd/LVWu)

SEIU-UHW Trustee Dave Regan has a history of using violence in conflicts with other unions. Last April, Regan led 300 SEIU staff in storming a peaceful union conference in Michigan, injuring several workers and prompting AFL-CIO President John Sweeney to condemn the assault. "There is no justification—none—for the violent attack orchestrated by SEIU at the Labor Notes conference,” Sweeney said.

Regan has brought more than 900 SEIU staff to Fresno to fight his latest war against homecare providers who earn $10.25 caring for seniors and people with disabilities. SEIU is in Fresno this week to try to stop a movement of nearly 100,000 SEIU members in California who are dumping the scandal-plagued union to join the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW). Monday was the first day of an election for Fresno’s 10,000 homecare providers to join NUHW.

“We knew SEIU-UHW was desperate to hang onto our dues money, but I can’t believe they would resort to this,” said Flo Furlow, an elected leader of NUHW and Fresno homecare worker. “This disrespect is exactly why we’re joining NUHW instead. We demand that SEIU release the name of the staff member who was assigned to visit Ms. Kyle’s home yesterday.”

I would not hope that anyone would hold their breath waiting for The Plague to supply us with the name/number of the vandal who broke down Ms. Kyle's door. Besides, all they will do is turn around and claim that it was actually a NUHW supporter posing as a SEIU supporter doing this in order to discredit SEIU and make people mad at them. After all, when it comes to "posing", nobody does it better than The Plague...

Local homecare providers have also reported seeing SEIU staff swapping their purple SEIU t-shirts for red t-shirts—NUHW’s trademark color—in an attempt to gain access to the homes of NUHW supporters. (Photo: http://is.gd/LVXw)

Thug Regan In His Own Words

Courtesy of Paul Delahanty on his dKos diary...







Again, a link to the entire speech is provided below.

Let's see, now:

Vulgar? Check.
Arrogant? Check.
Dismissive of his opponents? Check.
Unhappy to be where he is right now? Check.
No earthly clue of what this fight is truly all about? You damn well betcha.

Shaw: UFW Alums Battle Over Labor's Future

Randy Shaw of BeyondChron.org is one of the most informed people in journalism when it comes to what is going on in the labor movement on the West Coast, and he once again hits it out of the park in his most recent piece, regarding the battle of late between SEIU and NUHW for the "right" to carry the imprimatur of the late Cesar Chavez...

After electing the most pro-union President in decades, organized labor is being torn by internal fights. And at the heart of these conflicts are veterans of the United Farmworkers of America (UFW), whose strategic innovations have shaped today’s labor movement and whose “Si Se Puede” (“Yes We Can”) rallying cry became the hallmark of Barack Obama’s campaign. One dispute, now occurring the California Central Valley city of Fresno, pits Eliseo Medina, a former UFW Executive Board member and now Executive Vice-President of SEIU, against his former UFW Executive Board colleague, Dolores Huerta. The backdrop: an election among Fresno’s 10,000 home health care workers who are currently represented by SEIU, but who are now being urged by Huerta and others to join the National Union of Health Workers (NUHW). The other ongoing conflict finds SEIU and UNITE HERE -- the two unions most shaped by the UFW’s legacy--battling over SEIU’s raids on UNITE HERE’s jurisdiction and membership. This fight has put longtime UFW allies on opposite sides, and has even led UFW veteran Fred Ross, Jr. to leave SEIU after ten years so that he could help UNITE HERE resist SEIU’s attacks.

How did this conflict emerge? As recently as April 2006, UFW alums Stephen Lerner and Eliseo Medina asked Huerta and the prominent UFW veteran Reverend Wayne “Chris” Hartmire to come to the University of Miami to help SEIU win a “Justice for Janitors” organizing campaign. While Huerta pressed the janitors' cause with University of Miami President Donna Shalala, Hartmire provided strategic advice to religious supporters. Similarly, SEIU worked closely with UNITE HERE on the massive immigration marches of spring 2006, and on the national campaign to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

But since 2006, two developments have raised questions whether SEIU President Andy Stern is leading his union down the same path that resulted in Medina and other key leaders leaving the UFW, and that caused the farmworker movement’s decline.

First, SEIU moved to consolidate its local chapters throughout the nation. In addition to reducing administrative overhead and freeing up organizing dollars, the plan also gave Stern the right to select the leadership of the newly consolidated locals. This prevented workers from electing their own leadership for three years.

As a result, Stern appointees, not representatives elected by the membership, soon dominated SEIU’s governing Executive Board. When the Board then made controversial decisions -- such as breaking up its third largest local, whose former leadership then started NUHW -- opponents argued that this was Stern’s decision, not that of a truly democratic process.

Nearly thirty years ago, it was Cesar Chavez’s decision to deny farmworker representation on the UFW’s Executive Board at its 1981 convention that represented the final blow to his union’s growth. In the years leading up to that event, Chavez’s critics were often fired or forced out, raising the same questions about union democracy that have now emerged under Stern.

The second development dividing UFW alumni was Stern’s decision to encourage Bruce Raynor and the former UNITE to secede from UNITE HERE and join SEIU. On March 23, Raynor’s faction affiliated with SEIU as “Workers United,” and SEIU has been raiding UNITE HERE’s hotel, gaming and food service workers on the grounds that they are now part of its jurisdiction. Stern engineered this major policy shift with little or no public debate within SEIU. Workers were shifted from UNITE HERE to SEIU through little-noticed, small turnout elections -- such as fewer than 100 voting in a bargaining unit of over 2000 -- that make a mockery of union democracy.

The UFW precedent is clearly on many minds. Medina responded to Huerta’s urging Fresno’s home care workers to vote for NUHW by noting that in the UFW she “led the campaign to fire and expel” rank and file workers “because they were independent of the UFW leadership and accountable directly to the members.” Huerta responded that Medina had left the UFW in 1977 “when Cesar most needed him.” While the two have privately debated over the UFW’s legacy, the SEIU-NUHW battle has brought this dispute between two giants of the UFW and labor movement out in the open.

NUHW’s appeal to Fresno home-care workers directly challenges SEIU’s commitment to union democracy, and could prove the defining issue as balloting begins this week. But the election's end will leave wounds between the many UFW veterans on both sides of this conflict that will not be soon healed, weakening if not ending the bonds between those working side by side for social justice for over three decades.

Isn't it interesting that in the two major blowouts that SEIU has had of late, first with NUHW and then with UNITE/HERE, it has been Scab Medina who has tried to use his name and former position in UFW to claim the legacy of Cesar Chavez, while closer confidants of Chavez from back in the day have come out publicly against Scab Medina, basically calling him a sellout to all that he used to stand for.

Eventually the folks at SEIU are going to have to realize that not everyone who opposes them are liars, cheats and thieves. Perhaps it is then that they will remember who it is that they are really supposed to work for - and it ain't Andy Stern.

Fresno Updates

Click over to Perez' place for Fresno updates from the ground.

One interesting piece came to me from Sadie at NUHW, tho...

Workers fear SEIU’s violent “shock and awe” tactics on Day One of union election

SEIU has been condemned by the AFL-CIO for using violence against other unions—SEIU Trustee with record of violence tells staff, "We gotta put them in the ground and bury them"

Fresno, Calif.—Today is the first day of a highly contested union election for 10,000 homecare workers in Fresno County who are trying to leave the Washington, D.C.-based SEIU, a union that has been condemned by the AFL-CIO for using violence in inter-union conflicts. The stakes have never been higher for SEIU officials, who are desperately trying to stop a movement of nearly 100,000 healthcare workers in California who are organizing to quit SEIU and join the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW).

Current and former SEIU organizers have reported SEIU’s use of so-called “shock and awe” teams to incite violence, including stalking, threatening and intimidating supporters of opposing unions. With 900 paid SEIU staff from across the country in Fresno County today, workers are worried about a repeat of recent violent attacks.

At an SEIU meeting yesterday, SEIU-UHW Trustee Dave Regan encouraged hundreds of SEIU staff to "administer an old-school ass-whipping" to NUHW supporters. "In other words, what we gotta do here, my old-school friends, is we have to administer an old-school ass-whipping over the next two weeks," he said. "I know everybody knows what means. We gotta give a butt-whipping they will never forget," he added. "We gotta put them in the ground and bury them."

Last April, Regan led 300 SEIU staff in storming a peaceful union conference in Michigan, injuring several workers and prompting AFL-CIO President John Sweeney to condemn the assault. "There is no justification—none—for the violent attack orchestrated by SEIU at the Labor Notes conference,” he said.

During the same conflict, an SEIU organizer reported being assigned with a team to mob CNA supporters at California hospitals and scream insults at them to provoke a physical response. SEIU organizers then called police and the media, accusing the victim of assaulting them.

Several Fresno homecare providers have recently reported being harassed with calls to their homes in the middle of the night by callers fraudulently claiming to be with NUHW in an apparent effort to incite false anger at NUHW in the days before the election. Homecare workers are concerned that SEIU staff may also impersonate NUHW supporters to harass workers in person at their homes.

Homecare providers have also reported being threatened by SEIU staff that they will lose their jobs or have their pay or hours cut if they vote to join NUHW, a threat that is illegal under federal labor law.

Of course, it can't be said often enough that Thug Regan, the individual quoted above as wanting to give NUHW a "butt whipping they will never forget", and who wishes to "put (NUHW) in the ground and bury them" is one of the individuals who was responsible for the infamous disruption of the Labor Notes conference in Dearborn, MI, in April of 2008. Regan even bragged on it about a month later. One passage of Regan's "explanation" caught my eye, though:

Union-busting is union-busting and, yes, it is disgusting. If Labor Notes and their apologists want to convince themselves otherwise, through tortured rationalizations about "democracy" or fabricated claims of "violence," so be it. We are having none of it. The votes, which were set to take place in March, would have been the largest set of private sector healthcare elections in the history of the state of Ohio. If the labor movement is to survive we need more, not less, of these sorts of breakthroughs.

Considering the scale at which Kaiser and CHW were going to have elections for their workers to determine their own futures, he really needs to take a look at the NUHW/SEIU dustup and figure out which side is interested in democracy and more democratic breakthroughs, and which side is currently "union-busting."

But it is the height of arrogance for someone of Regan's background, with his proven propensity for instigating violence, to come into a community from outside and start talking to other outsiders about butt-whippings and burying people, when the purpose of what this election is determining who can provide the best representation for a group of people who provide care to one of the most vulnerable segments of our society.

The upcoming two weeks in Fresno is about those workers, and their best interests, and not about SEIU pride.

Dave Regan should be ashamed of himself. But that, of course, would require that he had any kind of sense of shame to begin with.

A link to the unedited Regan speech can be found here.

It probably sounded better in the original German, but you can get the idea.

Flo Furlow, In Her Own Words...

Flo Furlow knows first-hand what is at stake down at Fresno in the IHSS representation battle. She is one of the people whose lives will be directly affected by the outcome of the upcoming ballot.

Not only is she a homecare worker in Fresno County, she was also one of the leaders that initially got representation for herself and her colleagues back in 2002, and perhaps it is because of that she was given some space in the Fresno Bee to lay out for everyone what she thinks they should know...

I am a home-care worker in Fresno County and an elected leader of the National Union of Healthcare Workers. Over the years, I've been proud to have helped make it possible for many people to live in their own homes, which is exactly where they have wanted to be -- living in their homes, and not in nursing homes.

Right now, I work for two clients who, I know in my heart, are living longer and happier lives because of Fresno County's In Home Supportive Services Program.

I suppose I came to this work through the civil rights movement. I was just a kid when I got arrested for sitting at a Woolworths lunch counter in Little Rock, Arkansas. When the manager came over to say that they didn't serve our kind, I remember telling him, "Oh, don't worry. We're not planning on ordering anything." I had some explaining to do to my parents when they picked me up from the police station.

The home-care movement for me has been part of the history of the civil rights movement. Years ago seniors and people with disabilities began organizing under the slogan, "Our homes, not nursing homes." They said that the sad history of locking people away in institutions, where they would be out of sight and out of mind, had to end.

Home-care workers agreed. And in 2002, 10,000 of us formed a union of home-care workers here in Fresno. We wanted to work with home-care consumers to make "Our homes, not nursing homes" a reality.

We also did it to win dignity and a living wage for ourselves and our families. We knew that the work we did was important for our communities, and that it was worth more than poverty wages.

The thing that made me most proud of the union we built was that it was based on a fundamental value we learned from our friends in the disability rights movement: "Make no decision about us without us." In our union, we elected our own representatives from neighborhoods all over Fresno County, and we made the decisions about our own futures. The era of dignity and respect for home-care workers had begun. We won our current wage of $10.25 an hour and lifted thousands out of poverty.

But by 2009, some of our union's Washington, D.C., leaders had lost their way. The leaders of the SEIU, our parent union, came to believe that they were smarter than their own members, and that only they should have the right to make decisions for us. It all came to a head when they took over our local union and replaced all our elected local leaders with their appointed bosses flown in from other parts of the country.

The aftermath of that takeover has been heartbreaking. Before the takeover, we had a strong voice in our union. We were able to stop wage cuts and protect services year after year for the Fresno's most vulnerable residents.

Today we have no voice at all. Instead the only voice is that of out-of-touch SEIU officials we never elected, who this April locked us out of an arbitration over our own wages.

The workers who bargained our contract with the county were shut out, and as a result, we are now watching our wages fall and our families' sense of security collapse while we have no voice to change it.

But if there's one thing I learned from the civil rights movement, it's that you don't have to just accept injustice. So we didn't. Thousands of us signed petitions to keep our own elected leadership, under a new name, the National Union of Healthcare Workers. The leaders of NUHW are the health care workers and leaders we elected, who we trust and who respect our voices.

We are voting in an election next week to take our union back, and to return it to the principle we founded it on: "No decision about us without us."

I am excited to be voting for NUHW to put our union back on track to serving home-care workers and the people who depend on us.

She's been there. She's done that. She's been a leader, and she is leading once again. There really is no one that SEIU can stand up against this lady, is there?

The Parellel Press

One of the more interesting aspects of the Intertubes is that stories will be reported upon in English as well as in Spanish here in California. The appearance of Dolores Huerta in Fresno on Wednesday afternoon was no different, as it caught the attention of one of the LA Metro Area's Spanish online newspapers - and may well have made it into print as well. The original Spanish will appear in green, while the Google translation will appear in red. Any parts that have been altered by me (because Google translate couldn't find the word) will also appear in red but italicized...

Huerta contra SEIU

Avala formación de nuevo sindicato de trabajadores sanitarios, en nueva fase de contradicciones y escisiones intestinas en movimiento sindical

• Róger Lindo |
• 2009-05-29
• | La Opinión

Dolores Huerta decidió entrar a la reyerta entre la dirección nacional del Sindicato de Trabajadores de la Industria de los Servicio (SEIU) y una fracción del disuelto Sindicato de Trabajadores Sanitarios (UHW), que ha dado pasos para crear su propio sindicato en abierto desafío a su antigua dirigencia.

Huerta against SEIU

Supports formation of new health workers' union in new phase of internal contradictions and divisions in labor movement

Dolores Huerta decided to enter the brawl between the National Union of Workers in the service industry (SEIU) and a fraction of the dissolved union of health workers (UHW), which has taken steps to establish their own union in open defiance of its former leadership.

La legendaria acompañante de César Chávez y una de las pioneras del movimiento sindical campesino se pronunció en Fresno a favor del sindicato en formación, la Union Nacional de Trabajadores Sanitarios (NUHW).

"Estos trabajadores están luchando por recuperar su sinidicato y sus salarios", dijo Huerta, y agregó que el NUHW va a conferirles la voz y la representación que necesitan para defender sus intereses.

The legendary companion of César Chávez and a pioneer of the UFW in Fresno pronounced her support of the union in formation, the National Union of Health Workers (NUHW).

"These workers are struggling to regain their union and their wages," Huerta said, adding that the NUHW will give the voice and representation that they need to defend their interests.

La próxima semana, diez mil asistentes sanitarios a domicilio que estaban afiliados a la UHW votarán en Fresno para decidir si se incorporan al nuevo sindicato.

El UHW, una organización con 135 mil miembros, fue intervenida por la jefatura nacional de la SEIU a principios del año por supuestas violaciones a los estatutos de la SEIU cometidas por sus dirigentes. Éstos, incluyendo el presidente de la seccional, Sal Roselli, fueron desplazados por la SEIU y reemplazados por un junta de fideicomisarios nombrada por la dirección nacional de la SEIU.

Next week, ten thousand home care workers who are affiliated with UHW in Fresno will vote to decide whether to join the new union.

The UHW, an organization with 135 thousand members, was taken over by the national SEIU earlier this year for alleged violations of the statutes of the SEIU by their leaders.These, including the president of the local, Sal Roselli, were displaced by the SEIU and replaced by a board of trustees appointed by the national leadership of SEIU.

En respuesta a esa acción, los sindicalistas desplazados empezarzon a dar los primeros pasos para la formación de la NUHW.

Eliseo Medina, uno de los fideicomisarios nombrados por la SEIU para manejar la UHW, y antiguo compañero de luchas de Huerta, criticó el aval .

"He conocido a Dolores por más de 45 años y siempre la he respetado, pero en este caso está del todo equivocada. Esta abogando por algo que sería extremamente riesgoso para los trabajadores sanitarios de Fresno", dijo por teléfono.

In response to that action, the displaced union leaders commenced to take the first steps for the formation of the NUHW.

Eliseo Medina, one of the trustees appointed by the SEIU to manage UHW, and a former companion in past struggles with Huerta, criticized the endorsement.

"I have known Dolores for more than 45 years and I have always respected her, but in this case she is entirely mistaken. She is advocating something that would be extremely risky for health workers in Fresno," he said by telephone.

Señaló que si alguien debe entender lo que es la unidad entre trabajadores es la ex cofundadora del Sindicato de Campesinos, y aseguró que los sanitarios de Fresno que voten por NUHW se arriesgan a perder sus salarios y beneficios que ya tienen, pues estarían alineándose con líderes "que fueron incapaces de protegerlos" en el pasado.

"Estamos en un momento difícil y lo que menos necesitan es estar aislados del resto de sus compañeros en la lucha que se avecina con el Gobernador", dijo Medina, un nombre tan respetado como el de Huerta en el terreno sindical.

He said that if anyone should understand what is unity among workers it is the former co-founder of the UFW, and said that health care workers of Fresno who vote for NUHW risk losing their wages and benefits they already have, since they would be aligning themselves with leaders "which were unable to protect them" in the past.

"We are in a difficult moment and what we need is less isolation from the rest of our comrades in the struggle that lies ahead with the Governor," said Medina, a respected name such as that of Huerta in the field of unions.

It is unfortunate that I have to say this, but this piece was so absolutely biased in favor of The Purple Plague that it almost hurts my eyes just to read it. Note that there is no actual question-and-answer pull quote from Sra. Huerta - the material from which she is quoted came from her speech at Eaton Plaza. It is also worthy to note that Sra. Huerta had some choice things to say about Scab Medina in Spanish at the Eaton Plaza speech, but none of that was mentioned in the reportage seen above.

On the other hand, this "journalist" took better than one-third of this story on Dolores Huerta to actually have some interview time with Scab Medina, even going so far as to suggest that Scab Medina's name is on par in the union field as that of Dolores Huerta.

I am willing to believe that there may be some "translation" issues here, but I don't think so.

In any event, for Scab Medina to get the last word in any story in regards to Dolores Huerta's support for NUHW is an indication in my mind that this particular news outlet, through this particular reporter, is showing just how biased they are in favor of the SEIU status quo, and just how necessary it is, and how necessary it will be going forward, for NUHW to break through the media logjam - and not just in English.

If Kaiser Thinks NUHW Has Forgotten About Them...

...they're WRONG. Here's the lowdown on Wednesday afternoon's protest against the Kaiser facility in Stockton...

More than 100 Kaiser Permanente employees took to the hot sidewalks surrounding the health care provider's massive West Lane complex Wednesday afternoon to protest what they say are Kaiser's unfair attempts to stop them from organizing and joining a new union.

The red T-shirt-clad demonstrators - medical assistants, licensed vocational nurses, radiology technicians, member services employees and others - want to leave their existing union - SEIU-UHW, the Oakland-based local of the Service Employees International Union - and vote to join a new group, the National Union of Healthcare Workers, or NUHW.

Kaiser, in a statement handed out to some of its 165,000 county members who visited its campus Wednesday, said it "is not a party in this dispute. We have not, and cannot, take sides in this matter, or any disagreement between unions."

Kaiser spokesman Rob Veneski said, "NUHW does not represent any Kaiser Permanente employees, and it appears that the activity (Wednesday in Stockton) is part of a dispute between NUHW and SEIU-UHW, a union that represents more than 50,000 KP employees in California."

Memo to Kaiser spokesflack Rob Veneski: When you make it almost impossible for people to stop their automatic dues deductions, you are taking a side in the matter. When you have HR reps escorting people in NUHW colors to their appointments even though they are on the campus in their own time and not Kaiser time, you are taking a side in the matter. When you deny the right to vote on union membership to an absolute majority of your union covered employees, and force those employees to sit and wait for an arbitrary deadline - and then meet with SEIU bargainers without approval or vote of the people they are supposed to represent, you are taking a side in the matter.

NUHW supporters such as Robert Nevarez and Tamika Edwards, both longtime Stockton Kaiser employees, expressed sadness in the way they say Kaiser has treated them since they started standing up for the new union and said they no longer want to be represented by SEIU-UHW. They disputed Kaiser's statement.

"We strongly disagree that Kaiser is neutral in this. We are forced to pay dues - $72.90 a month - to SEIU, a union that is not working in the best interest of the worker. We're here to make sure everybody knows about it," said Nevarez, a medical assistant for 10 years. He said Kaiser has not allowed him to withhold his automatic dues payment to SEIU-UHW from his paycheck, despite several attempts to do so, citing federal rules.

"We used to take pride in the labor management partnership between Kaiser and the union, but that has gone away," said Edwards, who has worked in member services for nine years.

This is an aspect to the Kaiser story that is going very much unreported, in that a lot of goodwill was built up between the rank-and-file and management through the Labor Management Partnership, but the LMP was unilaterally tossed on the ash heap the second that Zombie UHW took over, because the Zombies cannot be bothered with such fripperies, and management was evidently jonesing on a way to get out of the LMP - and true to their nature, the Zombies made it easy on management.

"They do pride themselves on being the best place to work, the best place for care. They should have stayed neutral, because now that's no longer true. The patient ultimately suffers," Edwards said.

NUHW activist Jeff Taylor, a five-year Kaiser employee, said the Kaiser Stockton workplace has become "very chaotic. Kaiser is mistreating its workers and not protecting their rights. It is favoring SEIU, because SEIU won't fight for better wages and worker rights. We just want Kaiser to back off workers and let us organize. They should not be breathing down our backs."

Taylor said the NUHW has the support of more than 80 percent of Stockton's 800-plus union workers.

It remains to be seen whether Kaiser's short-term gains will involve long-term pains.

SEIU-UHW spokesman Pete Janhunen said the relationship between his union and Kaiser is healthy and very effective, and the NUHW has yet to prove it has any support beyond those who came out Wednesday afternoon to demonstrate.

Tell ya what, Pete: Give those folks down in Stockton the chance to vote the matter, and you will see just how much support NUHW is proven to have.

I'll let Mr. Pete Janhunen in on a little secret, though - when you have to use parliamentary tricks in order to prevent a vote, then you can pretty much bet that it is your side that hasn't proven its level of support.

Dolores Huerta's Fresno Speech

"Every worker is an Organizer."

Absolutely.

Video Report From Today's Rally...

Courtesy of KGPE/47, the CBS affiliate for Fresno...

More tomorrow...