« Rice: No delay in peace talks |
Blog Home Page
| After reading this, you may actually feel sorry for New Yorkers »
May 6, 2009
Obama trying to stop union financial disclosure
Ed Lasky
The Obama administration is seeking to change rules that protect workers from malfeasance by union officials by requiring strict financial disclosure.
This was a concern I previously highlighted . As unions take over more of our industry and as that industry receives our taxpayer dollars , those dollars will feed union coffers. In turn, those unions will continue to spend tens of millions of dollars to support Barack Obama and Democratic candidates across America. Truly, public financing of campaigns - but partisan funding .
Elaine Chow, former Secretary of Labor, has an article in the Wall Street Journal that explains the changes:
Within days of the inauguration, the new leadership at the Labor Department moved to delay implementing a regulation finalized in January that would have shed much needed light on how union managers compensate themselves with union dues. The regulation required disclosure of receipts for expenditures and for the purchase and sale of union assets -- disclosures that would help deter embezzlement. The administration has since moved even more aggressively, initiating proceedings to rescind this rule and others promulgated when I was secretary of labor.
The Labor Department's Office of Labor Management Standards (OLMS), created to enforce the 1959 law, also recently announced that it would not enforce compliance with the conflict-of-interest disclosure form (the "LM-30" form) that was revised in 2007. Labor's Web site states that "it would not be a good use of resources."
Instead, union managers will be able to file decades-old, less enlightening disclosure forms while the department considers whether to "revise" (i.e., gut) the current disclosure requirements. But what could be a better use of department resources than enforcing the laws under its jurisdiction?
The unions played a big role in the demise of the auto industry but in one area they score high in return on investment: their backing of Barack Obama. One more example that Chicago's culture of pay-to-play has been transported to Washington.
|
|
|
Share
