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THE
PATRIOT
RETURNS

Vol. 29, No.4                                                      March 11, 2006

 

POLITICAL "STRENGTH," PSC-STYLE

During the last six years, PSC president "Battlin' Barb" Bowen and her incompetent ideologues have come up with a new definition of "success." A union's job is not to negotiate good contracts---something well beyond the competence of the current leadership. Nor, according to PSC bosses, should the union focus on competently managing its assets. As we have come to know all too well, the failure of New Caucus negotiators to even ASK for an increase in moneys for the Welfare Fund in the previous round of contract negotiations set the stage for the current Welfare Fund crisis.

No, according to the endless stream of agit-prop emanating from union HQ at West 43rd Street, the Dear Leader has achieved success because her PSC has become a "political force." A glossy New Caucus pamphlet boasted that the group "became respected and effective political players."

How, exactly, does the PSC define political "effectiveness"? LaGuardia Community College professor "Loopy Loraine" Cohen, nominated for university-wide officer on the New Caucus slate, recently penned an analysis of the subject:

The Loopy Fantasy: "The top four officers along with rank and file members travel to Albany more times than I can count."

     The Reality: These trips might help the Dear Leader accumulate miles in Amtrak's "Guest Rewards Program," but what matters is Battlin' Barb's actual accomplishments in Albany. And, by her own admission, she can't accomplish much. The Dear Leader's Feb. 2nd e-mail stated that CUNY management had sole responsibility to lobby Albany and City Hall to ensure funding for the draft conceptual framework. We wonder what Battlin' Barb actually does on all those trips to the capital.

The Loopy Fantasy: "This leadership has taken the issue of endorsement and candidacies seriously going thorugh [sic] elaborate processes of vetting candidates on issues that relate to CUNY faculty and students."

     The Reality: If the PSC's endorsement policies constitute "seriously" vetting candidates, what would a cavalier policy entail? Union endorsements must be pragmatic---as Local 1199 has demonstrated. What did CUNY faculty gain when the PSC endorsed a sure loser, Norman Siegel, in the 2005 primary against the city's top Democratic officeholder, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum? What did CUNY faculty gain when the PSC cast its lot with the doomed candidacy of Peter Vallone, in the 2002 race against Governor Pataki? A basic lesson of politics: if union-endorsed candidates consistently lose, the union won't have much influence with the candidates who actually win.

The Loopy Fantasy: Because of the "incredibly hard work" the Dear Leader has "done on fighting for the best contract, the membership will be forced to acknowledge that the leadership has done its best for this round."  

     The Reality: The faculty is not the PSC Delegate Assembly: the Dear Leader can't "force" us to do anything. As much as the incompetent ideologues want to believe it is so, there's no evidence that such childish pranks as picketing the Chancellor's apartment or disrupting Board of Trustees meetings have done anything except needlessly alienate management. The Patriot Returns has no problem with PSC bosses living in their fantasy world---as long as their fantasies don't affect our realities. Unfortunately, the PSC's fantasies about what makes a politically strong union have had a disastrous effect on the well-being of CUNY faculty.

YOUR UNION DUES AT WORK:
PSC FIDDLES WHILE THE CONTRACT BURNS

The "International Committee" (the PSC's very own mini-State Department) has already attracted attention for using union dues to send PSC activists to Latin American tourist hot spots. The announcement below shows how the PSC is still wasting our dues money---and wasting our time.

NEW YORK CITY IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC, POLITICAL AND MILITARY ATTACK ON LABOR

Proposed Fall 2006 Conference

The PSC's International Committee (IC) is inviting a few activists from other unions to join a brainstorming session to plan a cross-union conference for the Fall on the attacks on labor, situating what is hitting us here in NYC in an international context. We are concerned about such things as the abuse of contingent labor, the use of anti-strike and anti-labor laws like the Taylor Law, and the effects of imperialist war on labor both at home and in regions like Iraq . We want to connect the dots, seeing how economic attacks like those we face in contract bargaining (wages, workload, discipline, health benefits, pensions) are connected to political attacks on labor (Taylor Law, mayor & governor and media's vilifying the TWU, NYU's use of NLRB anti-labor rulings), and to wars like Iraq (or threats to Iran, Syria, and Venezuela, and massive military aid to the Israeli and Egyptian regimes and the Uribe regime in Colombia). Our goal is to consider joint union action on the international dimension of labor struggles.

The last time we looked, people---lots of people---were dying in Iraq. The only "killings" in the "imperialist war on labor at home" targeting the bunker at West 43rd Street are the killings that Battlin' Barb and her cronies make in released time from teaching. We know that the Dear Leader has blamed everyone but herself for the PSC's contract woes. But "massive military aid" to the Israeli "regime" as a rationale for the "economic attacks like those we face in contract bargaining"? Such a claim insults our intelligence. With New Caucus activists wasting union dues on this type of activity, and operating under such bizarre premises, is it any wonder it's taken nearly four years to negotiate a contract?

 

Sharad Karkhanis, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus

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