Whatever political ilk you come from, it’s happening. It’s the systematic takeover of personal freedom in the United States. The latest Supreme Court decision has put a retail price on speech, and control in the media. In other words the corporations win. The decision to give corporations rights as a human entity will mean the end of human rights. Our Supreme Court has just sold us out, lock stock and barrel, to the Chinese, and the Japanese, and the German corporations. They will be allowed, without restriction to interject themselves into the politics of the United States.
Look at the Teabag revolution, which is totally funded by Corporate Interests. These people have the right idea to stand up for the American way of life. They have the right idea to take on a government they disagree with. They know something is dreadfully wrong with our government. The trouble is, they are being led to believe that their plight will be improved by supporting the corporatist’s in our society. Right on to them for standing up. Sad they are so easily led down a road by big money.
Where are the decisions that will support small business, or start up business, or the little guy on main street. Those people are forgotten. Take a walk down mainstreet in Mid-America if you don’t believe it. Why? Because our government is about the corporations of today, not the “people” of America.
Health care reform will never happen because of the billionaire business of the multi-national corporations. They own our politicians, right, or left.
Small business tax breaks will never happen because our politicians are owned by the large multi-national corporations, both right and left.
Home ownership support will never happen, because it is not in the interest of the multi-national corporations.
Legal representation for the indvidual will never happen because the corporations will control the courts. Any law judge or lawyer can be driven out of law practice because the Multi-national corporations will control all of the judge appointments in the country. Your freedoms as an American individual will be lost forever.
Our media will never keep us informed with the truth, because it is controlled by multi-national corporations, and spouts only the agenda that benefits them. Now with the supreme court decision, only the multi-national corporations will be able to afford to pick a candidate for any office in the land. Only multi-national corporations will be able to afford “free speech”.
You will see the return of corporate emanate domain. Your land can be taken from you by private entities simply because they want it for their own. They own the politicians, and they own the courts. You lose.
Your jobs and benefit packages will disappear simply because the multi-national corporations have no interest in improving the health, and well being of the American citizen.
Our legislators will cease to pass laws to improve the rights of individuals because individual rights are not in the interests of multi-national corporations.
Hitler would be proud of the America he sees today.
The answer is simple. Don’t be led down the hole, like lemmings, of todays politicians. Demand your media spread the truth. Turn off the mouthy idiot, racist, jackasses, perpetuating the lies of the multi-national corporations. None of them have your interests at heart. None of them care about your rights, or your freedoms.
Be demanding about what you expect from your representatives. Write them. Call them. Stand before them, and demand the rights of the individual, and the real return to the American way of “We the people”.
The cartoons are showing the re-writing of the constitution to “We the Corporations”.
Believe it!
Understand the Teabag Backers
All posts by George
Remind You of Anyone You Know?
Boise Man Awarded Almost $1.5 Million
A federal jury in Boise on Thursday awarded a Boise man almost $1.5 million award after he claimed United Parcel Service, Inc. fired him in retaliation for reporting federal violations.
In 2007, Darel Hardenbrook filed suit, claiming the company violated state policy by terminating him for reporting federal transportation rule violations. Hardenbrook, a supervisor, said the company required employees to drive trucks after working too many hours.
The jury deliberated less than two hours before returning its verdict. U.S. District Judge Edward J. Lodge presided over the weeklong trial.
IdahoStatesman.com
What UPS Drivers Have to Carry
Lazy Supervisor’s Success Guide
My manager Tim called me over to his desk one day. He was designing the layout of his swimming pool in Visio, and he wanted my opinion on the design. Tim had sold all his UPS stock to have the pool built, which at UPS, puts you in a promotion purgatory. UPS expects their managers to maintain a sizable portion of company stock, and if you don’t, your chances of being promoted in a timely fashion are nil. I suggested to Tim that he go with the dark blue pool walls – I’ve always preferred dark blue walls for that tropical look. We discussed the position of decorative rocks, the BBQ grill, and the diving board. I never realized what such a great landscaping tool Visio was until that moment.
Eventually, I got bored and went back to my desk. I performed my hourly check of the online conference room reservation system, hoping to find a meeting that was ending. I was a food shark, swimming in after the meetings were over to pick up stale donuts, before the food service people removed them. I tended to stay away from the larger conference rooms – they had the larger coffee pots heated by Bunsen burners that tended to burn the coffee. The smaller conference rooms featured non-heated carafes which didn’t burn the coffee. Unfortunately, there were no meetings going on. It was looking as if I might actually have to work.
Luckily, Larry Jaworski the networking guy stopped by. Larry’s job consisted of creating network accounts for new users – good job if you can get it. Most of the time, he walked from cube to cube talking to people. He carried a piece of paper as a prop to make the management think he was doing something important like hand-delivering an important fax. He also maintained a map in Excel of the UPS hotties; it was like Google Maps, except you used it to locate the cubicles of attractive women. Larry and I sat around for 20 minutes, discussing what was new since his last visit earlier in the morning.
At 11:00, the lunch group started the daily email thread to decide where we were going to eat. I had intended to automate the “pick a lunch venue” process by creating an internal website, but never got around to it. Getting the group to agree on a lunch destination was like getting Halliburton out of Iraq – a very slow process. After about a 20-minute email exchange, we settled on a place. To avoid unwanted managers from tagging along [it’s amazing how an irritating manager can dampen a good lunch], we had a silent departure procedure, practiced to the point of perfection. At exactly 11:30, we all stood up in our cubes, looked around like prairie dogs, and then took off in separate directions. I took the back stairs down to the fifth floor, crossed the Oz Nelson memorial garden to building three, then met the others at our secret rendezvous location at the Wachovia ATM.
During lunch, we complained about management, complained about our jobs, and complained about the low pay. You’d think that all the complaining would be cathartic, but since we complained each day, I guess it wasn’t. After lunch, we stopped by Starbucks on the way back to the orifice. Fred the Lebanese chemist was there as always, sitting out front, blowing cigar smoke in the customers’ faces. His son worked for FedEx, and he reminded of this daily. When I get old and crotchety, I think I’ll relocate to a Starbucks.
After lunch, it was back to the grindstone. My co-workers and I spent thirty minutes recapping lunch conversation at my desk – a debriefing if you will. It gave us time to enjoy the coffee. Eventually, Larry stopped by again, and we discussed what was new in the world of technology since his mid-morning visit. Soon, I ran out of triple venti vanilla 2-percent extra-foam latte, so I looked at the conference room reservation system again for potential coffee targets.
There was the three o’clock break to look forward to. We were entitled to two fifteen-minute breaks. The actual rule was lost in translation at corporate, because everyone typically took a 45-minute breakfast and a 45-minute afternoon break; I always arrived late to work, so I missed breakfast. Break consisted of more complaining, leering at attractive women, and discussing the relevance of various random employees. It would work something like this: an unfamiliar employee would walk by, and someone at the table would ask “Who’s that?” Someone else would reply “That’s Dick Zimmerman. He’s a manager with a cleft palate from the Georgia district. He was then transferred to China on special assignment. He’s here today to attend the bell ringing ceremony. I used to report to him. He’s a good guy.” Employee trivia was an important part of UPS culture.
Alternatively, an attractive secretary would walk by and one of us would motion to the others with our eyes to look in her particular direction; “She’s hot,” BradBrown.com would say. “Yeah,” replied Beavis. Larry Flynt would be proud. I suppose I should have reported myself to HR, but I figured the line would be too long.
4:45 came early that day. I sent a couple of “I’ll get to it tomorrow” emails out to my important customers, threw on my sports coat [from 100 yards, you’d swear it was a suit], hit the elevator, walked past the United Way progress penis, and sneaked out to the parking desk. Supervising…it ain’t easy! That’s why they paid me the big bucks.
Life After Layoff
The Lord and Master Lives
The company is headed for management from afar. I have predicted for years, that most dispatch, and management functions, will occur in one centralized location, with local managers, or supervisors, on-site just to crack the whip, manage driver issues, and to make sure everyone shows up.
Jobs they haven’t learned to replace with technology, “yet”.
My understanding is, most of these jobs are division level jobs, and that most of these managers are on the “buy out, or get out” bubble.
Many of these management people are the major players in the “soul selling” this company has done in the last decade. These are the people that have done away with the “James E. Casey” form of management, and gone strictly to the “bottom line” philosophy of corporate management.
Sometimes you reap what you sew.
Telematics is the major reason the company no longer needs these managers. The company will be able to keep one guy, with a whip, to run 50 to 60 people.
The company, as always, is in a technological transition. The last 5 years have seen incredible changes. Who knows what the next 5 years will bring.
Management is overhead!
Have You Seen a Telematics Printout?
Have you seen a UPS Telematics printout yet?
Do you know what’s coming?
Are you prepared?
There is a website called The Truckingboards where one person had the balls to post up a Telematics Printout. Good going!!
I heartily encourage you go to the site and take a cold hard look at what’s there. You have to scroll down about a third of the way on the page before the pictures start. You’ll know it when you see it.
It shows all the stuff Telematics records and reports on. It’s an actual Telematics printout. It’s sobering that they can gather this much information without ever leaving their warm little offices.
I would never copy and knowingly distribute UPS documents like this.
I almost got fired and dragged into court by UPS for doing that once.
But that’s another story.
The Supreme Court Gets into Corporate Elections
The Supreme Court is about to make decisions that would give Corporations all of the power in upcoming elections.
Read how Corporate money will pick your President
Teamsters Vote Themselves Out of Existence
The last living member of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters died today. Obviously it hasn’t been a Brotherhood for some time since Neil Downe was the only surviving Teamster for the last 6 years. In my estimation it takes at least 2 people to make a Brotherhood.
The Teamsters were too successful at what they did, they created a group of people so independent, that the members didn’t feel they needed to support the Teamster cause. The Teamsters led their people to believe they were so powerful that no one could take them out. What the Teamster members didn’t see was the anti-union under current running within their government. The cheap goods created by the free trade/free market mentality wooed the Teamster members into believing that they were better off by voting the free trade/free market politics, and they voted themselves into oblivion.
The powerbrokers in Washington used outside, secondary issues to suck the Teamsters into voting for them. Issues such as gun rights, and abortion, and welfare, and social security became the lure to Teamster members. These issues became the platform for the anti-union group to draw the union voters away from voting for their livelihood. The major corporations grew to astronomical size, while the Teamsters ranks diminished.
Once the Teamsters became too small to be of any importance, their function and effectiveness ceased. The corporations that had been Teamster companies laughed all the way to the bank. They reduced wages down to barely livable wages and dropped any hint of benefits. It should be noted here that Mr. Downe was also the last surviving member of the once healthy middle class.
It must be noted that the Teamsters were so successful in the 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s at building membership, and giving their members quality contracts, that the members of the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s, began to believe that they, and their children, would always have good union jobs. They were wrong.
Wal-Mart has offered to place a plaque honoring Neil Downe in all their stores. A side note to the passing of Mr. Downe is Wal-Mart’s announcement that they will be creating company towns surrounding their stores. They will pay their employees with vouchers for goods and services available at their stores only. Additionally these vouchers will be good for company owned housing only available to Wal-Mart employees. All overtime will be compensated with time off at the company’s discretion. Former Teamsters need not apply, as Wal-Mart will not hire people Un-American enough to have belonged to a union.
All Teamster and UPS retirees have lost their pensions. There is no longer anyone to pay into the pension plan, so there are no funds to be paid out. The Corporatists said that was OK, since the pension plans were just a form of welfare anyway.
Neil Downe was often heard to say, “I always voted as a Teamster, I always voted for labor. I always voted for my job first, then I could take on the secondary issues with my Congressmen. Without a job, the secondary issues were moot. Union members who didn’t bother to vote were what killed us. By not voting at all or voting the secondary issues, they let the wealthy make the rules.”
Bob Newhouse
Working At UPS
I’ve been wanting to write about my experience at UPS for a while now. I just haven’t gotten around to it. Why? Because I’m dog tired exhausted that’s why.
Seriously, UPS is the hardest physical job I’ve ever done. It’s probably not as hard as many other jobs, or even as hard as some people in third world countries work, but for me, and many others I work with, UPS is very hard work.
I work as a sorter at UPS. Basically, it’s a job where I have packages of all sizes, and up to 70 pounds, coming at me at a rate of 1200 or more packages an hour. As such, I’m supposed to sort these packages at at least 1200 an hour. The average weight of a package is probably somewhere around 25 lbs. Now that probably doesn’t seem like much, but when you’re there for 4 or more hours a day, and you’re on your 4800th package, even the light packages can start to seem like they’re heavier than what they ought to be.
So the people in the unload, unload semi trailers – some long, some short – as fast as they possibly can (Because at UPS, it’s all about speed and money, not about the person or their safety as much as they’d like to claim it is. One observation I made, was that what you learned in the “classroom” didn’t seem to apply all that much out on the floor, especially during peak season. Also, the supervisors seem inconsistent in what rules and regulations they apply.). These packages get placed on an “extendo,” which is just an extendable conveyor belt that goes the length of the trailer (most of the time), and then they travel to us sorters where we are waiting at a belt that is perpendicular to the extendo belt. So as a sorter, things look like an upside down T. These packages then hit a diverter so that they come to you and not to the next guy down the line, you pick up the packages, and place them on one of 6 belts with a total of 12 colors on them (meaning if you don’t get a certain package all the way up against the side of belt on the “side pan” it’s not going to go to the right place. If this happens, it’s a mis-sort and it’ll most likely come back to your sort aisle making more work for everybody. It’s not a big deal though, it happens so often because everything is so fast paced that if you have a mis-sort or 9, you just deal with it later). These belts are perpendicular to you, so you always have to pivot to put the packages on the belts. 3 belts are about waist level with you and flat, and 3 belts are above those. I’m about 5’7″ tall, and the three upper belts (called transverses) are at about eye level with me. Those upper belts have a steep incline too. If the belt is worn down, packages will slide off. If you place a package on the belt a little bit the wrong way, it may roll, and roll fast, and roll hard. People could get seriously injured by a “roller.” Just last week I got conked in the head with about a 10 lb. box from the upper belt. It made me dizzy and gave me a headache for the rest of the day.
This picture, found on a google image search (belongs to Matt Crowell) is similar to what the aisle that I work on looks like. We don’t have a big yellow bar on the left though, ours is all open and the belts that do run are higher up, and on the right, where the whitish-grayish bar is, that is about where our “upper transverses (belts)” are. Someone must have snuck in a cell-phone to take this picture, because except for supervisors, hourly employees (for the most part) aren’t allowed cell phones in the building.
So anyway, there’s the description of the the work area, so why is it so bad to work there? Mostly, because it is so fast paced, the labor can often be described as “brutal,” and it takes a toll on your body. There are other reasons as well, but I’ll just mention some. The sorters often have to handle the boxes two or three times, unlike the unloaders or the loaders. Often times, our belts will shut off and we have to “stack down” our boxes, all the while trying to keep pace with the unloaders who quite often go way faster than the 1200 per hour. At UPS, getting those trucks unloaded is the most important thing it seems. Once the packages are in the building, we can deal with them how we need to, but they need to get off the truck first. So the supervisors are constantly pushing the unloaders to unload as fast as they can (often without regard to the safe work methods we were taught in the classroom), and they hammer the sorters if we have to stop the unloaders because we can’t keep up. Most of the time we can as long as we can see the labels on the boxes and the belts are running, but no matter how fast the unloaders unload, I can only sort as fast as the belts move. So when we stack down, at some point, we have to pick those boxes back up (now from feet level instead of waist level) and put them on the belts. When this gets really bad (and it does; everyday) we just say that we’re building our igloo (because quite literally, you place boxes all around you to the point that you box yourself in until the flow starts going again).
Sometimes, we get “straight shots.” These are the same type of packages in a large quantity. Boxes of paper are the worst. Usually, they’re 35-40 lbs, they go the upper belts, and there are just enough of them right in a row to make your arms and shoulders feel like they’re going to fall off. The repetitive nature of straight shots, really no matter how much they weigh, is rough on your body.
This brings me to another reason working at UPS stinks. The wear and tear on your body. I have never worked a job where I am this sore ALL the time. With the up, down, pivot, lift, etc., the amount of calories you burn, the repetitive nature of the job, I am always sore. My neck hurts, my shoulders hurt, my biceps hurt, my forearms and wrists hurts, my thighs ache, my hamstrings hurt, I got blisters on my toes (only in my first two weeks though), the joints of my fingers hurt (from grabbing boxes all day), I get headaches more often (from working like a dog and only getting a 10 minute break to try to cram down as much food as you can), my back is sore, and I’m simply exhausted after I’m done there. Some of my co-workers say the same thing, so I’m just not whining because I’m a wimp. There are people who have been working there for years and they still say that they’re sore.
Have I gotten used to the work? Yes. I am definitely stronger and have more muscular endurance than when I first started, but the work is still the same everyday, which means that it kicks your butt! I’ve been working there for 3 months now, Monday-Friday, and I’m still sore and in pain every day, including the weekends that I’m not working. UPS is a fast-paced, physical, hard work environment. It’s hot in the summer, freezing in the winter, loud, dirty, and not fun. It’s a paycheck. Literally, that is all it is. UPS will claim benefits will draw people in, but at least under our current union contract, those don’t start until you’ve been there for 1 year. You don’t get any paid vacation time until after 1 year. Basically, you have to be at UPS for at least a year before you can even begin to say that it’s a “good” job. Problem is, most people don’t stay that long. Why? Because the work is brutal, and some of the supervisors are too. Look, bottom line is, UPS cares about their reputation and their money, not you. You are a working, expendable grunt to them. They are hiring nearly every week because the turnover rate is so high. Of course, UPS doesn’t mind. They don’t have to pay benefits to people who don’t
stay.
I came to UPS for the paycheck. I needed to make at least $100 a week to be able to pay for my seminary class. I found out they have tuition assistance and that draws in a lot of students. However, don’t plan on getting it right away. Unless you go to a UPS partner school where they pay the money up front, you have to get reimbursed at the end of the semester and have all the associated paperwork. But, this process can take 2-6 weeks, and you have to be an employee there to get reimbursed. So, unless you plan on staying at UPS more than semester, don’t expect to get reimbursed. I’m not getting reimbursed most likely. Why is that Jeremy? Well, because I have found another, better job. I don’t start this job until January, but if the reimbursement process takes that long, then I won’t get the money anyway. Now granted, I didn’t start working at UPS because tuition assistance was foremost in my mind; the paycheck was, but potentially getting back $1100 would be nice for sure. I thought I’d be at UPS longer than what I am going to be when I started, but after about 3 weeks, I started looking for other jobs. I didn’t look seriously, but one job came up that I just had to apply for. I ended up getting it. Overall, it will be a much better job for me than UPS ever was, but I just think it’s sad that I won’t be getting my tuition reimbursement when that is one thing that draws students to UPS. I think that UPS knows this however. They know that many students will only stay for one semester. They draw them in with a tuition assistance program, and then, at the end of fall, they don’t process the paper work until the middle of January, and by that time, the student has left UPS for whatever reason, and oh, UPS doesn’t have to pay the tuition reimbursement because student is not a current employee anymore.
Seriously, on the outside, UPS may seem like a good company to work for, but having only been there 3 months, I’ve seen and heard how UPS cuts corners and deceives (especially its union employees). They will protect their reputation and their dollar first and foremost, at almost any cost to their employees. However, I suppose if you’re able to stay on for at least a year, get some seniority under your belt, and are able to get the benefits, it may not be that bad of a job, but it will still be brutally hard work. The pay may be decent, but I just don’t think that it compensates for the wear and tear on your body.
So, I am not staying at UPS, and I am SO happy about it. In my new job, the physical work won’t be as brutal, there are some different benefits that are more applicable to me (and I don’t have to wait a year to get them), my boss(es) actually care about me as a person, the environment is much better to work in (both people wise and building wise), and the hours better fit my schedule.
Is UPS really so horrible? Well, yes, it is. I could list some good things to say about UPS, as there are a few, but compared to other jobs that are out there, and especially compared to what dedicating 4 years of your life to a college degree can get you, there are much better life options out there than UPS. UPS, like any other major company, has a great propaganda machine of how great it is to work for them, but the reality is, it is not great and unless you’d be one of the very fortunate few to be lucky enough to have a decent position within the company, UPS is not a great company to work for.
Oh, and one other note too. Whether you’re shipping UPS or some other company, please, please, please pack your items very well. Packages get kicked, thrown, stomped on, and somewhat abused at UPS (though I’d say 90% are just fine), and when UPS employees are working like dogs, it’s like one of my co-workers said, “People have to pack their stuff good because I work too hard with not enough pay to care. Caring is above my pay grade.” Yep, that about sums it up. Another UPS employee put it this way, “UPS employees put 8 hours worth of work into a 4 hour day.” Couldn’t have said it any better myself.
Jeremy Shunk