Say "Ciao" to Chao

[Earth Bound Misfit]

Dear XXXX,
You and Elaine Chao go way back. So many memories...

Like the time your "Shame on Elaine" emails and phone calls emboldened whistleblowers within the Department of Labor. Or, who can forget Elaine's questionable handling of mine safety and her gutting of workplace safety regulations?

Remember Elaine's birthday? When her palace guards wouldn't let us drop off stacks of petitions 25,000 of you signed urging her to protect workers' rights, because we were supposedly a security threat?

Elaine certainly hasn't forgotten your efforts. In yesterday's USA Today she offers a (weak) "'thank you,' to critics for exercising their constitutional right to speak out."¹ In fact, the article mentions American Rights at Work as holding her to task for her support of corporate interests over workers' rights. But now it's time to say goodbye, because, on January 20, Elaine Chao will no longer be the Secretary of Labor (sniff, sniff).

Take a moment to send a retirement card that lets Elaine know how you really feel.Link: http://action.americanrightsatwork.org/campaign/Chao_retirement

Leave it to the Bush administration to retain one of its absolute worst Cabinet members till the bitter end. Elaine is still trying to defend her tenure, even boasting about "her record in improving health and safety."¹ But you know Secretary Chao has set back decades of progress at the Department of Labor by stonewalling investigations, embracing corporate special interests, and showing general contempt for working families.

We can't undo Elaine's damage overnight – it will take long enough just to remove all the pictures of Elaine hung throughout the Department of Labor interiors! But thankfully we can all have hope that, under incoming Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, we will raise the minimum wage, protect workers' rights, safety, and economic security, and pass the Employee Free Choice Act.

But it would be a shame to give the outgoing Secretary anything but a ‘proper sendoff.'

Take action now to make sure your note gets to her before she leaves office on January 20.

And since we want the departing Secretary's mailbox to be overflowing, don't forget to pass this message along to friends and family – ask them to send their best retirement wishes to Elaine as well.

Thanks for keeping Elaine in your thoughts. I know how much the Secretary will appreciate hearing from you one last time!

Sincerely,

Liz Cattaneo
American Rights at Work
www.AmericanRightsatWork.org


Love the picture:

On Edit: And do us a favor: take your husband with you!

[rurallib]

1. wish her fucking husband was gone also.

[Earth Bound Misfit]

3. I'll take collaborating couples with blatant anti-worker political agendas...

for $1000, Alex...
:toast:

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

2. What I wish for, futilely, no doubt

Is for some arm of the new administration to publish REAL statistics about about happened to employment/unemployment/underemployment and wages and taxes and healthcare as a benefit under Bush, Chao and the whole sorry lot of them. And then to publish it from the rooftops so that average Americans can realize how lied to and exploited they have been.

[Earth Bound Misfit]

4. "so that average Americans can realize how lied to and exploited they have been"

:banghead: :shrug: