The progressives have over the past few years taken to blaming Koch Industries who own Georgia Pacific, for financing the Tea Party Grassroots Movement. As a member of the Tea Party, I can truthfully say that I know of no such funding, wish I did. I could use some financial help in trying to save my country from Communism, Socialism, and Muslim sympathizers. Now if Koch Industries were financing such groups or groups like the Tea Party – I would have no problem with that at all. As long as they did not tell the groups what to say and what to do.
The progressives do have a problem with the idea of Koch funding anything Conservative and have good reason to. The Koch family has, starting with the founder of Koch Industries, Fred C. Koch. Koch worked on projects in the Soviet Union in the 1930s, and he is quoted as saying that virtually every engineer he had worked with was purged, under Stalin’s regime. From this experience, he developed a deep seeded hatred of the communism he had seen in action, first hand. If you hate communism you hate progressives.
Because of Koch Industries spoken support for Gov. Walker of Wisconsin, concerning his recent efforts to rein in union costs to the State of Wisconsin, the progressives are attempting to ruin Koch industries. They are doing this by attempting to smear the reputations of the company and any who do business with Koch Industries. However, Jon Greenen, International Vice President, United Steele Workers has a little problem with that, it is his union members that would suffer.
The problem with this is that Koch Industries has 80% of its Mills under contract with one or more labor unions. These jobs constitute some of the best paid manufacturing jobs in America. Most of Georgia Pacific’s products are made right here in the United States. Now those union workers are calling fowl on the progressives trying to destroy Koch over politics.
GP makes most of its products here in America. The company’s workforce is highly unionized. In fact, 80 percent of its mills are under contract with one or more labor union. It is not inaccurate to say that these are among the best-paid manufacturing jobs in America.
This presents a dilemma and a paradox. While the Koch brothers are credited with advocating an agenda and groups that are clearly hostile to labor and labor’s agenda, the brothers’ company in practice and in general has positive and productive collective bargaining relationships with its unions.
While some companies are running from investment in American jobs, The Koch brothers’ Georgia Pacific just reached agreements with its primary union in the paper industry to invest more than a half a billion dollars in capital to essentially create two state-of-the-art machines that conserve fiber and energy at two separate union mills.
While certainly there are disagreements from time to time on what the right pension program is, or right wage increases and incentives, or the right formula for health care cost sharing, ultimately we end up with negotiated solutions.
So the problem for the advocates of a boycott against Koch is that it can only marginally hurt Koch, and the workers who are the epitome of what advanced manufacturing jobs in the United States ought to look like, would be the first casualties of a boycott. Of course, this will eventually drive a wedge between groups that are otherwise in political alignment.
Joh Greenen, International Vice President, United Steelworkers
With a long history of destroying Capitalism in the United States, the progressives have often bitten the hand that feeds them. They have destroyed whole industries here in the United States. Many they were unable to destroy simple took their toys and played elsewhere, causing the manufacturing base in the United States to decline. This also has caused the unions to decline. That was until the Democratic Party made a deal, vote for us, and we will make laws that allow and mandate that public workers are to unionize.
The unions are going to lose these current battles for several reasons, in my opinion.
1. While most Americans support the right for workers to unionize, they do not support union thuggery.
2. People don’t take well to having their own jobs jeopardized to support unions.
3. People believe that unions should be about workers and workers rights – not about the DNC and voting for Democrats.
4. The Tea Party is not a far right movement. The Tea Party is the majority of Americans who have had enough of the spending and radicalism in Washington. They support the Constitution of this country and unionization is not a constitutional right.
5. People do not believe that public union workers merit higher pay and benefits than their private sector counterparts and that the unions need to take a hit, in this economy, just like everyone else in this largely progressive induced crisis.
