Obama has once again shown favor to labor unions with his appointment of three union reps on the National Mediation Board of the National Labor Relations Board. Yesterday, the board changed the rules for railroad and airline workers to unionize. Whether you agree with government control of transportation or not, you should pay attention to the favors Obama is repaying.

According to a Fox News report: "What's changed is a 75-year-old rule that required a "yes" vote from the majority of an airline or railroad's entire work force within a "class" or "craft" (such as pilots or flight attendants) in order to unionize. On Monday, the National Mediation Board announced new rules that would only require "yes" votes from the majority of employees who actually cast ballots.

"This rule change... is arguably the most controversial change that the National Mediation Board has ever undertaken, at least in my 30 years of watching the industry," said William "Bill" Swelbar, a research engineer with the International Center for Air Transportation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "It appears quite driven by an administration's policy to promote unionization and collective bargaining."

"Supporters say the new union voting procedures for airlines and railroads are no different from those long in place at other industries and, for that matter, democratic elections in general."


Just last month, Obama's executive order encouraging project labor agreements for federal construction projects over $25 million went into law.

In the Wall Street Journal: "The federal rule, which went live yesterday (April 13, 2010), implements an executive order President Obama signed within weeks of taking office. It encourages federal agencies to require 'project labor agreements' for all construction projects larger than $25 million. This means that only contractors that agree to union representation are eligible for work financed by the U.S. taxpayer.

"Only 15% of the nation's construction workers are unionized, so from now on the other 85% will have to forgo federal work for having exercised their right to not join a union. This is a raw display of political favoritism, and at the expense of an industry experiencing 27% unemployment. "This is nothing but a sop to the White House's big donors," says Brett McMahon, vice president at Miller & Long Concrete Construction, a nonunion contractor. "We've seen this so many times now, and how many times does it have the union label? Every time."


http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2...est=latestnews

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...Tabs%3Darticle