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Governor and Speaker Were For Workers' Privacy Before They Etc. Etc. Etc.

News   April 9, 2009 at 3:16 pm Josh Feit

chopp

“LaborGoon” down in the comments threads just brought this video to PubliCola’s attention: Speaker of the House Rep. Frank Chopp and Gov. Chris Gregoire saying they support the workers’ privacy bill … last year on the campaign trail in front of the Washington State Labor Council. 

As has been widely reported, Gov. Gregoire and Speaker Chopp tabled the bill this year in what many legislators regarded as a ruse.


  • Trevor

    Wow! And they want organized labor to keep giving them money after lying about their support for the WPA and stabbing labor in the back? Really? These people have no shame.

  • Trevor

    Wow! And they want organized labor to keep giving them money after lying about their support for the WPA and stabbing labor in the back? Really? These people have no shame.

  • Dave

    Josh, Publicola is great stuff but this video was out weeks ago on the Washington State Labor Council daily news report, to which you should subscribe: http://www.wslc.org/reports/latest.htm

  • Rod

    There we several legislators, including some with extensive civil rights experience who thought that the worker’s privacy bill as written could have undermined employer’s ability to require employees to take training. According to one legislator an anti-gay, fundamentalist employee could sue her employer under the statute if they required her to attend a training on how to work with gay customers and/or coworkers. Labor leaders refused to allow any modification of the bill as written. I suspect the caucus as a whole wasn’t all that upset when the brew-ha-ha over labor’s strong-armed occurred. It avoided what was likely to be a serious fight within the caucus between free-speech and labor. Chopp and Brown would be smart for letting this one sit on the sidelines for a while. Labor would be smart to consider modifications of the bill to allow for free speech protections, at least when it comes to diversity training.

  • Rod

    There we several legislators, including some with extensive civil rights experience who thought that the worker’s privacy bill as written could have undermined employer’s ability to require employees to take training. According to one legislator an anti-gay, fundamentalist employee could sue her employer under the statute if they required her to attend a training on how to work with gay customers and/or coworkers. Labor leaders refused to allow any modification of the bill as written. I suspect the caucus as a whole wasn’t all that upset when the brew-ha-ha over labor’s strong-armed occurred. It avoided what was likely to be a serious fight within the caucus between free-speech and labor. Chopp and Brown would be smart for letting this one sit on the sidelines for a while. Labor would be smart to consider modifications of the bill to allow for free speech protections, at least when it comes to diversity training.

  • Ian

    Rod, do you really think that’s why they engaged in misinformation and blatantly false accusations of illegal actions? Because they didn’t have the guts to stand up and say “this bill needs to be modified before we pass it and here is why”?

  • Ian

    Rod, do you really think that’s why they engaged in misinformation and blatantly false accusations of illegal actions? Because they didn’t have the guts to stand up and say “this bill needs to be modified before we pass it and here is why”?

  • E. F. BENNETT

    THE THREE STOODGES, LARRY CURLEY MOE, BETTER KNOW AS GREGOIRE, CHOP AND BROWN BACKED BY LABOR AND THEN GIVE THEM A KICK IN THE REAR. NO BILL WILL GET A VOTE UNLESS BOEING APPROVES ie. WORKER PRIVACY ACT. WILL THE WORKING MEN AND WOMEN OF WASHINGTON GET THE DIRTY END OF THE STICK AGAIN IN THE UNEMPLOYMENT BLLL, AND WILL AWB RULE AGAIN. WE HAVE ELECTED WHAT SEEMS TO BE A DICTATORIAL TRIO OF STOOGES IN OLYMPIA. LARRY, CURLY AND MOE.

  • http://erniebennett@verizon.net E. F. BENNETT

    THE THREE STOODGES, LARRY CURLEY MOE, BETTER KNOW AS GREGOIRE, CHOP AND BROWN BACKED BY LABOR AND THEN GIVE THEM A KICK IN THE REAR. NO BILL WILL GET A VOTE UNLESS BOEING APPROVES ie. WORKER PRIVACY ACT. WILL THE WORKING MEN AND WOMEN OF WASHINGTON GET THE DIRTY END OF THE STICK AGAIN IN THE UNEMPLOYMENT BLLL, AND WILL AWB RULE AGAIN. WE HAVE ELECTED WHAT SEEMS TO BE A DICTATORIAL TRIO OF STOOGES IN OLYMPIA. LARRY, CURLY AND MOE.

  • Dave

    Josh, Publicola is great stuff but this video was out weeks ago on the Washington State Labor Council daily news report, to which you should subscribe: http://www.wslc.org/reports/latest.htm