www.goiam.org
Thursday,
December 19, 2002
A Season of Light, A Season of Hope
This is the season of lights. In almost every faith and spreading to
virtually every corner of this globe, the darkness is shattered by the
twinkle of candles or light bulbs. And those lights warm our hearts and
renew our hopes.
As we pause in our labors to celebrate and rejoice in this holiday season,
let us reflect on the challenges we face and our history of meeting them
forcefully. And, in this season of lights, let us re-dedicate ourselves to
join in solidarity with all the peoples of our world and in so doing,
bring Peace on Earth and let Freedom ring.
Clearly we face challenges from the global economy at a time when our
political leaders are consumed with petty policies that reward the rich
and ignore working families. We see them promising bold leadership, but
proposing trite policies from a discredited past—policies that caused
soaring budget deficits, rising unemployment and domestic despair.
We see a callous disregard for jobless workers teetering on the brink of
financial ruin, and the shabby spectacle of an ambitious Senator so blind
to the hurtful, hateful misguided mistakes of history that his political
fate hangs by a thread.
And yet, even with the cascading darkness, there is hope. Our undying
commitment to bring social
justice and economic dignity to all is a light that shines brightly this
year, every year.
Grand Lodge Closed For Holiday Week
The IAM's headquarters in Upper Marlboro, Maryland will be closed
for the holidays beginning December 23, 2002. The building will reopen
Thursday, January 2, 2003.
A ‘Not So Sweet Deal’ From Sugar Firm
A Texas sugar refinery boasts of its 150-year
history as a Sugarland employer, but its relationship with its workers
took a sour turn recently. More than 300 IAM-represented workers at the
Imperial Sugar Co. facility faced a bitter choice when the firm demanded
huge concessions and withheld severance pay from laid-off workers.
“Unless we give in to their demands, they promise
they will close the plant,” reported Todd Rogers, District 37 directing
representative. “How can they do this a week before Christmas? Have they
no shame? This is blackmail pure and simple.”
Imperial Sugar earlier said they were closing the
refinery and laying off more than 200 of the IAM members at the
facility. The packaging and distribution functions would remain. “That’s
about 105 jobs,” Rogers said. “Working people need to know what’s
happening here. This will hurt other businesses in our area and the
people living here. A corporation should not be able to blackmail an
entire community.”
Congressional Grinch
Haunts Jobless
Hundreds of thousands of jobless workers lose their unemployment
benefits Dec. 28 because the Republican House leaders, aided by
President George Bush’s silence on the issue, sent members home last
month without extending the emergency unemployment measure. Their
failure to act means that more than 800,000 jobless workers will stop
getting weekly benefits just a few days after Christmas.
Shortly after Congress left town, Bush belatedly said Congress should
extend the benefits.
In addition, another 95,000 jobless workers will lose state unemployment
benefits each week and be left without jobs or temporary federal
assistance, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a
nonpartisan think tank. By the end of March, more than 2 million jobless
workers who would have received temporary benefits under a Senate bill
the House refused to debate will be without aid.
AFL-CIO Offers New Look
The AFL-CIO redesigned its website,
www.aflcio.org, using a new system for content management. This
enabled the federation to implement more interactive features and get
news to readers more quickly. The website has a new look and a revised
site architecture with added tools—an improved search engine, a site
index called “quick find,” website reader guides and more—designed to
help users find their way through more than 6,500 site pages.
Also, every page is integrated with the AFL-CIO’s e-mail activist
network. Through the network, tens of thousands of people all over the
country and around the globe take online action with an offline impact
A True Tale of Crocodile Tears
Here’s one for the books. Seems the nation’s 14 largest pharmaceutical
firms are crying the blues because their profits have tumbled.
Apparently, they’re spending too much on marketing. They’re just not
getting the bang from the buck they’ve grown accustomed to. Company
statistics show they’re generating a mere $17 in sales for each dollar
spent on marketing in 2001.
That’s down from $22.50 for each dollar spent in 1998, according to
Datamonitor, a market analysis company. Their study also finds that
these drug firms increased their promotional spending an average 32.4
percent from 1998 to 2001. In 2001, that amounted to $9 billion spent
peddling their pharmaceuticals to primary care physicians and consumers.
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