Southern politicians fight for cheap labor

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/article/20081228/OPINION01/812280330

By Joe Atkins • December 28, 2008

Cheap labor. Even more than race, it's the thread that connects all of Southern history - from the ante-bellum South of John C. Calhoun and Jefferson Davis to Tennessee's Bob Corker, Alabama's Richard Shelby and the other anti-union Southerners in today's U.S. Senate.

It's at the epicenter of a sad class divide between a desperate, poorly educated work force and a demagogic oligarchy, and it has been a demarcation line stronger than the Mason-Dixon in separating the region from the rest of the nation.

The recent spectacle of Corker, Shelby, and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky leading the GOP attack on the proposed $14 billion loan to the domestic auto industry - with Mississippi senators Thad Cochran and Roger Wicker marching dutifully behind - made it crystal clear. The heart of Southern conservatism is the preservation of a status quo that serves elite interests.

"Dinosaurs," Shelby of Alabama called General Motors, Ford and Chrysler as he maneuvered to bolster the nonunion Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai and other foreign-owned plants in his home state by sabotaging as many as 3 million jobs nationwide.

Corker, a multi-millionaire who won his seat in a mud-slinging, race-tinged election in 2006, was fairly transparent in his goal to expunge what he considers the real evil in the Big Three and U.S. industry in general: unions. When the concession-weary United Auto Workers balked at GOP demands for a near-immediate reduction in worker wages and benefits, Corker urged President Bush to force-feed wage cuts to UAW workers in any White House-sponsored bailout.

If Shelby, Corker, and McConnell figured they were helping the Japanese, German and Korean-owned plants in their home states, they were seriously misguided.

FULL story at link.

[muntrv]

1. The posters in response to the article are real kool aid drinkers. How's the

Bush economy working for them?

[47of74]

2. And if Chuck Grassley thinks this will be forgotten by 2010...

He's sorely mistaken. I will remember that he sided against the people of Iowa and the country in 2010 and I wouldn't vote for him even if Jesus Christ walked up and asked me to as a personal favor. And I hope if that SOB doesn't retire that the Democrats put more than a token effort into unseating him in 2010.