Progressives are apparently feeling quite emboldened after the 3 million vote win by Barack Obama because they’re really trying to distort history now. Case in point – the new school curriculum that turns the Boston Tea Party on it’s head and labels the revolutionaries as terrorists.
They are teaching students, contrary to their parents wishes, that the Boston Tea Party was an act of terrorism and that those who did it were terrorists. Before we go further, let me state clearly that I fully understand the sentiments of those who engaged the Boston Tea Party. I understand their desire to make a statement. It wasn’t right for them to take what belonged to someone else and destroy it, but I did get the sentiment and would never call it terrorism. No one was killed. No one was threatened. It was a statement that they were not going to be taxed by England without being represented.
This December 16 will mark the 239th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. The protest has been historically recognized as the event that sparked the Revolutionary War. However, this is how it is being taught via the Texas public school system’s World History/ Social Studies lesson plan (Unit 12: Lesson: 07):
News Report: New Act of Terrorism
A local militia, believed to be a terrorist organization, attacked the property of private citizens today at our nation’s busiest port. Although no one was injured in the attack, a large quantity of merchandise, considered to be valuable to its owners and loathsome to the perpetrators, was destroyed. The terrorists, dressed in disguise and apparently intoxicated, were able to escape into the night with the help of local citizens who harbor these fugitives and conceal their identities from the authorities. It is believed that the terrorist attack was a response to the policies enacted by the occupying country’s government. Even stronger policies are anticipated by the local citizens.
In fact, much of the curriculum seems to suggest that anyone who opposes or does not agree with what government is doing is somehow labeled a “terrorist.”
http://freedomoutpost.com/2012/11/texas-schools-now-teaching-boston-tea-party-was-act-of-terrorism-and-more/
Agenda 21: The U.N. plan to take control of individual and American Freedom
Agenda 21, is a grand plan for global “sustainable development,” which President George H.W. Bush (and 177 other world leaders) agreed to in 1992. In July 1993, President Bill Clinton brought the global scheme directly into the U.S. government when he signed an executive order creating the President’s Council on Sustainable Development, which avoided any review or discussion by Congress or the American people.
“Sustainable development” sounds like a nice idea—that is, until you scratch the surface and find that Agenda 21 and sustainable development are actually cloaked plans to impose the tenets of social justice and socialism on the world.
The Agenda 21 plan openly targets private property—which should surprise no one. For more than 35 years, the United Nations has made their stance very clear on the issue of individuals owning land. A report from a 1976 U.N. conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, on human settlements contains lays out the position:
“Land … cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market.
“Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes.
“The provision of decent dwellings and healthy conditions for the people can only be achieved if land is used in the interest of society as a whole.”
http://www.glennbeck.com/2012/11/19/agenda-21-the-u-n-plan-to-take-control-of-individual-and-american-freedom/
More Big Labor-induced misery: The looming port strike
I’ve been reporting since September on the potentially catastrophic port strike in the works, and have been tracking the Occupy-supported and manufactured chaos at our ports for the past year.
Things are about to come to a head.
On the West Coast:
The Port of Portland (Oregon) is bracing for a strike by longshore workers on Nov. 25 “that would tie up millions of dollars worth of freight at three terminals.”
Representatives of the Port and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union say the strike could still be averted. But Port officials believe cargo ships may begin bypassing Portland because of the uncertainty created by the failure of last-ditch contract talks Friday.
Separately, owners of Northwest terminals handling a quarter of the nation’s grain exports said Friday they’d presented a final offer to the longshore union. Failure of those talks could lead to a strike or lockout at six grain terminals in Portland, Vancouver and the Puget Sound.
The simultaneous actions are the most extreme developments in months of labor turmoil at the Port, where yet another dispute involving the same union led ships to bypass Portland last summer, clogging cargo and slowing Oregon’s economy. Closure of the three Port terminals, let alone a crisis at the grain elevators, would wreak far greater economic havoc and could cause container shipping lines to pull out for good…
Coincidental breakdown of the security officer talks and the grain negotiations could close a total of seven Portland-area terminals, although the grain elevator owners plan to hire substitute workers — or scabs, in union parlance. In addition, last summer’s separate container terminal dispute is boiling over in the courtroom, as a federal judge ponders whether to find the union in contempt and stop it from allegedly coercing shipping lines.
Port of Portland managers won’t say whether they would bring in workers to replace striking security guards and their fellow longshore union members at terminals 2, 4 and 6. But Port officials are about to contact shipping lines with vessels heading toward Portland and warn them of the problems.In Oakland, Calif., a strike is planned
Port of Oakland workers who say they have gone 16 months without a new contract plan to go on strike Monday and Tuesday in Oakland. The Service Employees International Union Local 1021 has announced plans for a 24-hour strike starting at 9 p.m. Monday.On the East Coast and Gulf Coast, companies are re-routing their shipments in anticipation of a long-threatened walkout.
Negotiators had been silent for the past few months, but the ILA is now flexing its muscle publicly:
Harold Daggett, president of the International Longshoremen’s Association, has broken weeks of silence during contract negotiations to complain that employers “want to grab more money away from the ILA and its members by placing a cap on container royalty.” The union also said its negotiators “would not budge” on their opposition to eliminating the 8-hour guarantee and overtime provisions during negotiations in September with U.S. Maritime Alliance (USMX)…As I explained two months ago, an estimated 14,500 union workers at 14 ports are prepared to tip the economy back into recession over productivity and efficiency rules changes. ILA’s main beef is with container royalty caps to target port corruption:
Via NLPC’s Carl Horowitz:
In 2011 these royalties amounted to $232 million or about $15,500 per worker at Atlantic and Gulf Coast ports. This arrangement was established in 1960 when New York Longshoremen sought to protect themselves against job losses resulting from the introduction of automated cargo container weighing. It’s been a ticket for inefficiency. The USMX web site reads: “The initial reason for implementing container royalties…has long been forgotten. Today, thousands of workers who were not even born in 1960 – or in 1968 when container royalties were first distributed – continue to receive payments.” The employer group wants to cap royalty payments, not roll them back or eliminate them. ILA President Daggett is adamant about maintaining the system. His union is demanding that carriers pay all royalty fees. “I want a scale on every pier,” he said. Daggett also stated that if an ILA local discovers a shipping container exceeds highway weight limits, the union will insist that the trucks be prevented from leaving the port and that the containers should be emptied and reloaded into other containers. “If they want to play games,” he said, “we’ll play games.”
Even if the container royalty system were scrapped, there are still numerous work rules that hamper productivity and invite participation by organized criminals. A special report issued this past March by the Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor to the governors and legislatures of New York and New Jersey shows how these rules have evolved from a deeply ingrained and corrupt patronage system. Based on extensive public hearings conducted during October 14-December 2, 2010, the commission concluded:
Certain hiring practices, achieved primarily through calculated provisions of collective bargaining agreements, illogical interpretations of other provisions, and claims of “customs and practice,” have created with the Port (of New York & New Jersey) no/low-work, no/low-show positions generally characterized by outsized salaries. The privileged few that are given these jobs are overwhelmingly connected to organized crime figures or union leadership.
Among abuses, the report cited policies forcing shipping companies to pay salaries exceeding $400,000 for jobs that “require little or no work.” In addition, dockworkers work in much bigger groups (or “gangs”) than needed. This explains why three dockworkers are paid to operate a crane that only one person can operate at a time. Even more absurd, work rules are structured so that workers can be paid for 24, even 27 hours of work in a given day, even if the actual work they do amounts to only eight hours and sometimes far less.
Think the Mafia no longer casts a shadow upon this union? Think again. The commission revealed the ILA has put a good number of relatives of organized crime figures on the payroll – and has rewarded them generously. The spirit of the late godfather of the Genovese crime family, Vincent “the Chin” Gigante, for one, lives here. One of Gigante’s nephews, Ralph Gigante, is a shop steward for an ILA local, which provides him with an annual income of at least $400,000. And two of Gigante’s sons-in-law, Joseph Colonna and Robert Fyfe Jr., serve as stewards in the same union. Colonna’s predecessor, John Bullaro, was the Chin’s brother-in-law. In all, the late Genovese boss has nine relatives working for the union.
As always, these strikes aren’t about protecting and improving workers’ lives. They are about protecting entrenched Big Labor power.The sum of these archaic rules, to say nothing of mob influence, says USMX’s Capo, has cost port operators billions of dollars.
http://michellemalkin.com/2012/11/19/more-big-labor-induced-misery-the-looming-port-strike/
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