Mr. President, Who are the True Hostage Takers?

The Verizon Wireless union workers are engaged in the second week of strike with no end in sight.

Strikes are not a new creation, as union workers often strike to demand a better contract. The current strike of over 45,000 Verizon union workers, though, is not your typical picketing strike. Striking workers have blocked employees and managers from entering or leaving buildings and cars, heckled employees on the job,sabotaged Verizon property, and staged a funeral in front of the Verizon Chairman Ivan Seidenberg’s private residency in West Nyack, New York.

Here's a video of a striker who endangered his teenage daughter by placing her in the path of a Verizon vehicle to prevent it from driving away, while unloading a mouth full of trash at the driver's hapless head. These are only a small sampling of dozens of reports regarding the strike that has barely begun.

Don't think that these are a minority of strikers that are acting out of line on their own. Instructions have come from the very top via an email from Jon Remington, Unit 44 President of CWA Local 13000 which covers much of Pennsylvania. He instructed his members to overwhelm Verizon repair lines with phony complaints advising them to first dial *67 to prevent their numbers from being tracked. Remington also demanded strikers to protest in front of Verizon stores and prevent customers from entering, reminding the strikers that although Verizon portrays them as greedy, the union members pay enough towards their health care; an entire 7%!

In a recording (already removed) yesterday on the CWA hotline a voice told strikers that,

“It is open season. Follow them safely, but when you get to a location, torture them, torture them with chants and noise. Be so loud that they can’t concentrate and wish they never got out of bed.”

Indeed, Verizon strikers are exemplary followers of Obama’s command issued during the 2008 campaign, demanding his supporters to argue with neighbors and to “get in their face”. Strikers have repeatedly blocked managers and employees from entering their vehicles, and barred the exits and entrances of Verizon buildings. Obama has called the GOP “hostage takers” recently, with the American people the hostages. Obama has not commented at the true hostage takers, since the union’s agenda is his agenda, as he’d proudly proclaimed in 2008.

Contrasting Obama, Palin has fought union bosses in Alaska, and has written on her Facebook before the 2010 elections a direct message to union workers, highlighting the corruptness of today’s union leaders/thugs and reminding union members that they’ve got an alternative.

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In the past there were many great union leaders who courageously defended the rights of workers. Unions were founded for all the right reasons! They were to give working men and women the clout to negotiate fairly with their employers and to fight for decent pay and working conditions. The unions of old would often end up fighting big government on behalf of the little guy. Today’s unions seem to be big government’s most enthusiastic supporters. It’s turned into some nonsense when union bosses back the government takeover of the car industry, and the mortgage industry, and the entire health care sector. And with the help of big government they aim to push through card check legislation that some characterize as being unfair to workers, and even un-American, because of its insistence on stripping workers of their right to privacy with a secret ballot. And that’s not just me voicing concern over card check – ask current union members how comfortable they are with what some of their leaders are saying about the legislation.

To my hardworking, patriotic brothers and sisters in the labor movement: you don’t have to put up with the scare tactics and the big government agenda of the union bosses. There is a different home for you: the commonsense conservative movement. It cares about the same things you and I care about: a government that doesn’t spend beyond its means, an economy focused on creating good jobs with good wages, and a leadership that is proud of America’s achievements and doesn’t go around apologizing to everyone for who we are.

In February, during the demonstrations in Madison, Wisconsin, Palin once again addressed her Union Brothers and Sisters on her Facebook page, pleading with them to open their eyes to the truth.

Hard working, patriotic, and selfless union brothers and sisters: please don’t be taken in by the union bosses. At the end of the day, they’re not fighting for your pension or health care plan or even for the sustainability of Wisconsin’s education budget (or anything else not directly benefiting them.). They’re fighting to protect their own powerful privileges and their own political clout. The agenda for too many union bosses is a big government agenda that only serves the union bosses themselves – not union members, not union families, and certainly not the larger community. Everybody else is just there to foot the bill; and if that bill eventually takes the form of thousands of … workers losing their jobs because the state of Wisconsin (the company Verizon) can no longer afford to keep them on the payroll, that’s a risk the union bosses are willing to take as long as their