In Wake Of GM Ouster, Unions Demand Obama Fire Bank Of America CEO
The major unions are grabbing on to the ouster of General Motors chief Rick Wagoner to launch a campaign to pressure the Obama administration to engineer a similar axing of Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis.
The game plan: To capitalize on the odd disparity in treatment of the two industries to intensify populist rage at major corporations. The idea is to make the political environment much tougher for wavering Senators who might want to side with corporations against labor on the Employee Free Choice Act — and, tacitly, to keep up public pressure on the White House to aggressively side with workers in the fight.
Later this morning, Change to Win and SEIU — headed by Andy Stern — will publicly call for Tim Geithner to fire Lewis in an email to its membership:
I have a story for you.
Two CEOs lead two large public companies that start sinking, putting thousands out of work and toppling the American economy. Both CEOs accepted billions in taxpayer dollars to sustain their companies, but both failed to stop their companies’ downward spirals.
One CEO — GM’s Rick Wagoner — got his pink slip from President Obama this morning. The other — Bank of America’s Ken Lewis — accepted bailout funds while continuing to fleece consumers and taxpayers.
It’s time for the Obama Administration to show the door to CEO Ken Lewis in order for real reform to take hold at Bank of America.
The unions think the firing of Wagoner, and the growing sense that Bank of America has been given a pass, have given them an opening to intensify efforts to shift the political environment their way and make it politically toxic for Senators to side with Wall Street corporations. Says one labor official: “The message to Senators is, `Are you with us, or are you with them?’”
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Rush will say: “I told you it was coming, my friends, my fellow Americans who I will soon be forced to refer to as ‘my comrades’…I told you it was coming and it’s here. Under the Obama commie/fascist/capitalism-hating welfare state the unions are now even telling Obama who they want in charge of America’s great…no, once great but no more, my friends…sorry, my Leninist comrades…the jackboots are already on their way because I mis-spoke…I’m so sorry Dear Leader…NO, NO I’m not sorry…the unions are now…today…telling Obama who he’ll put in charge of our corporations and financial institutions. “
It’s gonna be a tough row to hoe when it appears we a right-center Dem in the WH.
wow, bernie, you’re good. you ever do ventriloquism?
This isn’t going to end well. Ugh.
The unions are getting some bad advice or they are just tone deaf. Them calling for someone to be fired is basically going to feed into the meme that they are just a bunch of thugs who wield too much influence. Yes the situation is a double standard, but this move by them doesn’t help them AT ALL. A lot of people are already saying President Obama wasn’t treating the two situations equally but they also disagree with him firing Wagoner on principle. And if anything its going to make the Blue Dogs even more wary of the govt saying who should be fired.
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A much better point they could and SHOULD be making is that if wall street had union representation then they could have negotiated in good faith over the bonuses for the good of the country and their members just like they did for the Big 3. THAT’S their selling point if you ask me and they are totally ******** the pooch with this line of attack. Basically you are putting President Obama, who has supported EFCA, on the hot seat to fire someone that he has no intention of firing and subjecting him to more calls of socialism. Dumb. A$$. Move.
good job!!! time to put the screws to obama and make him make good on all his promises to the working class in this country. if we dont do it, nobody will. our time is now…….tell your friends and family to call their reps and force them to do the right thing (otherwise……money talks).
LOL thanks for the laugh Bernie!
This info is why the government should not be in business. They are obligated to others who don’t have have the business best interest in mind.
It was interesting to watch yesterday how Wall Street reacted to the news of Wagner’s government led extortion force out. I was watching gold to with the widget http://www.learcapital.com/exactprice and even it’s bumped up in what I figured was fear of what this new government control meant.
I think the next shoe to drop is going to be the commercial real estate market. Banks are in a big way in that market so, I’m looking for that to be the next big crisis.
Tell the unions to take a flying leap. The banking industry is a total different animal than the auto industry. Economically as well as business model. Obama did the right thing with GM and Chrysler, now the unions want to swell up their chest at this time? If they keep this up, I hope Obama pulls the funding, causing the union workers to lose their jobs thus making unions allmost obsolete in their drakonian thinking. We’re in a position where everybody is going to hurt a little and this *** for tat isn’t going to benefit the auto industry, on the contrary, it will hurt them and rightfully so if they decide to carry this further.
I wanted to comment on a step that needs to added to solve the economic crises. Its obvious that the people with money are not spending because of the uncertainty of tomorrow’s economy, and the middle class or poor people are not spending because they don’t have the money. So that puts us to the stimulus package for building the infrastructure. Comparing the rebuilding of F.D.R. to the present, during that time about 75 percent of the workers, worked with their hands, today that would be compared to 25 percent, so the additional step would be creating service jobs or not allowing companies to lay off any more workers., so basically the creation infrastructure jobs does not go far enough.
The unions have a point.
Bernie: Please get your “isms” right. Not Bernie
Bernie, it was great to read your take on fatboy’s opinion.
It’s time for that finely-chiseled Anglo twerp Ken Lewis to go to the Bastille!
Where is the outrage at the Golden Parachute Wagoner got? Is that a double standard? Where is the MSM fanning those flames? $23M in severance for a job poorly done.
I think the Unions are 100% correct AND I’d like to see them add [from the above reply] .. they could and SHOULD be making the Point that if wall street had union representation then they could have negotiated in good faith over the bonuses for the good of the country and their members just like they did for the Big 3. THAT’S = A 2 punch selling point!
First, the U.S. Government owes it to the automakers to prop them up. This goes back to WW!! when the government begged them to do whatever necessary to keep the tanks and planes coming. If you really want to help them then pass the health care bill.
Second, If Wagner can be forced out, then so can Lewis and Punjab what’s his face at Citi.
Greg – I sent away for that “learn to throw your voice” kit advertised at the back of my childhood comic books but I just got a sheet of paper that said, “Try to speak without moving your lips.” My cynicism began there and I’ve found scant reason to view things otherwise.
Not Bernie – yes, I knew you were
Where is the House bill that will tax CEO’s Golden Parachutes at 90%?
Tj you sound like a troll for Berman. Union members shouldn’t have to bear the brunt of the mistakes that upper management made. The auto industry just didn’t listen. They kept forcing bigger and bigger gas guzzlers on Americans and of course they bought them. They should have read the climate change tea leaves, which were becoming very clear, and started making more efficient cars. Unions had nothing to do with the choices management made.
Now the financial industry is just rife with corruption. They knew what they were doing was going to reek havoc and they DID IT ON PURPOSE. They didn’t care. They took the money and ran with it. They knew there was not enough money to back them their risky deals and they knew that they made really bad loans that would never be repaid. So what makes them different than GM management? I think everyone of those ********, including Ken Lewis need to be marched out of their offices in handcuffs.
To say that the unions had anything to do with this is a lie. They represent the workers who need them to get a fair shake in this economy. They didn’t make these horrible management decisions
Why not Citibank as well? How deep a stake do we have in that company? Let’s start exercising our ownership rights and fire some of hese Boards of Directors as well.
!!! NUKE THE UNIONS !!!
Cato said: ” !!! NUKE THE UNIONS !!! ”
Yes. And make sure the weapons have exclamation marks all over them because that makes them way better.
The nerve of the unions. The president and a few of his avid supporters are the only ones outside the Auto Industry who want to keep the American Auto Industry alive. I trusted the President’s judgement on this one and backed his support of the Auto Industry until now. I’m with the majority of Americans…if the UAW won’t partner with the president to save their own behinds then why should I support them. They should just protest the president, bring him down and elect Palin/Romney 2012. Then we’ll see how many union jobs and American car companies will be left in this country. You bite the hand the lifts you up, then you get just what you deserve!
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This is a true story:
A guy I know went through a extremely bitter divorce and emerged in tight financial straits. He was forced to use credit cars to get back on his feet, even at the rate of 30% interest. He was surviving month to month. By living frugally, he was able to survive on 1,000 per month for rent, food gas etc. He had 1,000 in Bank of America to live off of for the month of April, by which time he hoped for an increase in his income. Bank of America took the thousand directly from his account to service the debt. The guy is now looking at eviction. Thanks BOA….bank of homelessness !
PS- I guess BOA needed to make my friend homeless to pay Ken Lewis’ 21 million salary. .
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while i have no sympathy for the management of GM – at least they were just incompetent. an even in their incompetence and lack of foresight, they actually made a product. whereas bank of america and the rest of them weren’t just incompetent but ridiculously greedy and created financial instruments that serve little to no useful purpose other than to enrich themselves. the whole investor class in this country needs a clear message sent that they are not entitled to make money without producing anything of value for our society.
Arguments that the finance industry and auto industry are in different positions technically, in a business sense, miss the point – which is their moral standing with the American people. The financial services industry absolutely ran up the housing bubble and leveraged their “innovative” new “instruments” to reap billions, knowing full well what the greater systemic risks were. The auto industry has been making dumb mistakes for a long time, but finance is the perp here, on an enormous scale. They may have already bankrupted the country – we don’t know for sure yet just how much damage has been done. If anyone was going to be publicly deposed, you’d expect some finance heads to be chosen first – yet it’s an auto exec. The auto execs were grilled in Congress, finance heads not so much. Bailing out Detroit is controversial, Wall St got their zillions without a hitch (and with no oversight at first). Morally there is a double standard here and people are right to question it. Personally I suspect 1) union-busting is the motive for dissing Detroit and 2) finance has way too much power and just owns everybody. People are asking for some action that disproves that, but so far they haven’t gotten it. Worries me.
Note to union-haters: Yeah, the unions are the problem! The solution is to deregulate business and let capitalism just do whatever it wants. We’ve been doing that for years now, and look where it’s got us!
X–”The solution is to deregulate business and let capitalism just do whatever it wants.”
You forgot to add “tax cuts for the rich!” lol
Some of you don’t get it. The Gov is artificially propping up businesses that should fail. Let them reoganize and clean their own house. There are plenty of Americans building Honda, Nissan and Toyota vehicles. How come they are doing so well.
As far as the stimulous being spent abroad – OUR “so called leaders” gave our money to these institutions and businesses. OUR “so called leaders” are responsible for gross negligence and incompetence. VOTE EVERY ONE OF THEM OUT OF OFFICE – Dem or Rep – get them out.
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I was current account holder for 5 years and applied for Business Account with Natwest. they gave appointment 2 weeks later to meet some manager for account opening..i asked what documents I should bring as 2 weeks is too long to wait just for opening the account..
The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.