Right to Work scenario--

[nightscanner59]

Working at a hospital in a right to work state was a wake up call for how bad things can get. Keep in mind the CEO of the parent organization got an exorbitant BONUS for trimming the care staff!!!
Now I'm going to paint this scenario from the perspective of you as the patient. This is real! This happened! now guess why...

You've decided to take that long deserved vacation. Wow what a deal on this casino town, flight, room for 7 nights, a free buffet and casino chips!!! Can't wait to dig into that buffet and soak away all your troubles in the jacuzzi.
Arrived. Nice weather, was a smooth flight, cab to take you to casino hotel waiting. So far, so good! Check in staff was nice at hotel desk, casino machines dinging winnings all around. Valet takes bag, tip him and time to relax.
Hungry after nap, time to dig into that buffet array. Okay, that was acceptable... staff seemed kind of rude and it was a long wait. That long haired kitchen staffer looks like he was up all night smoking meth. Ick. Oh, well, tastes good.
What you didn't know was meth-boy hadn't bothered to wash his hands before handling your food.
Now you feel kinda sick. Well, a good soak at the jacuzzi will fix that all up. Ahhh. Ohh. Ugh. CRAMPS!! Oh, god!! Run to the bathroom and suddenly it's all coming out both ends. Oh, god you're sick as a dog. Try going to bed, and feel better after a nap.
After a half dozen bathroom runs, sweat pouring down your face, damn... It's 1 a.m. and haven't slept a wink. Dial hotel operator.
"I'm sick, can you send an ambulance?"
Arrived at hospital. Waiting forever for the doctor you use the potty provided. Ack. Ringing the call light to remove stink from room. After a half hour a disheveled looking nurse arrives and does her duty. Another hour passes. Ring call light again. Some voice crackles and explains there was a bad accident and doctor will be with you shortly. Yeah, shortly, two and a half hours and feeling like death, doctor walks in. "Diarrhea, vomiting, feel like death, doctor!" "You do look pretty bad and we have a dozen more like you here tonight. We'll start you on an IV that will help you feel better soon, and admit you for observation." Doc disappears. Jesus, 2 and a half hour wait for a 15 second consultation.
Another hour later, nurse dishevel arrives. She sticks and sticks and finally gets your vein. She has bags under her eyes. You ask, and sorry you did... "I've been working a double, after the layoffs, we have one nurse per dozen patients here."
It's morning, sunlight is beaming through windows as you are finally taken upstairs and put to bed.
Problem is, gut so sore can't even get up. Have to go.... bad!!! Bedrails up and can't reach the lever to lower them. IV pulled out in attempt. Blood everywhere. More futile attempts at pushing the call light. No one answers. Toss call light across room, and voice crackles out: "Sir your nurse has 35 patients on this ward, she will get to you as soon as she can"
Guy arrives with xray machine. Sees you are in a predicament, but can only defer your problem to the nurse because he has to do 20 other patients before morning without accruing any overtime!!!
Laying in your own blood and feces feeling like crap, you turn on the teevee. FOX NEWS. Channel changer dysfunctional. It won't turn off either. You are truly in hell.

The above scenario was real. I was the xray guy. There was a rash of patients through the emergency room who'd eaten at the buffet that evening. The "right to work" staffers there are paid so poorly, treated so badly they don't give a damn about anything, and meth use is rampant. The nurses are so overloaded with patients they can't take proper care of them. They are reminded, as were we, on every meeting that we must be more productive, do more with less, never have any overtime... AND--- ACT like you care but do nothing but your job!!! YES!!!! We were regularly told to do that!!! Then told how lucky we are to have a job at all, and how easily you can be replaced. Oh, and report any staff member who even breathes anything about UNION. They will be immediately fired.
I've never been treated as badly as that place did, nor have I seen a more uncaring, all about the profits-hospital in all my career. No I won't tell you where, there would be retribution. But I'll give you a clue. Jan Brewer is the governor. She has made so many cuts to any programs that help anyone in these situations, the state EOC office and any consumer complaint organization are basically closed for business.
I was denied any state victims of crime compensation after being horribly injured and disfigured in a mugging. I was fired on drummed-up charges right after my MRI showed I would need surgery. The insurance company COBRA letter, which came from the same building address as my PINK SLIP (!!!???!!!) stated 3800 dollars a month to continue my coverage. I had to sink myself deep in debt to repair my disfigured face, took me over 5 years to pay it off.

This is what right-to-work produces.

[lgordonwi]

1. labor rights and reproductive rights

What just happened in Michigan should be a message that anti-labor and anti-abortion legislation are part of the same right-wing agenda. So progressives should respond likewise—as part of the same agenda.

For far too long, the supporters of labor have ignored reproductive rights. Consider what was wrong with this picture: On February 26, 2011, there were two demonstrations in New York City, carefully organized so as to be near each other --one in City Hall Park, the other in Foley Square--and to fit together, one at 11 a. m. and the other at 1 p.m. The first was called by labor unions and other progressive organizations to support the struggle against Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s attack on public unions; the second supported Planned Parenthood against the Republican-controlled House’s effort to defund it. At the Planned Parenthood event, many speakers condemned tax breaks for the rich, corporate welfare, the elimination of social and public services, the closing of public schools, and union-busting. At the union demonstration, although many of the demonstrators were Hispanic and black women, not one speaker mentioned the attacks on Planned Parenthood.

That was foolish, because the “war on women” is not just targeting women, any more than the war on labor is targeting only men. All middle- and working-class people, and especially the poor, benefit from a strong labor movement –it’s our best bulwark against a race to the wage bottom. In parallel, being able to control how many children to have and when to have them is something men as well as women need.

As to abortion, of course contraception is better. But accidents happen; contraception is not 100 percent flawless. And sex is an unruly force. We know from study after study that abstinence doesn’t work. Just ask your favorite high school student. One might ask, aren’t those who don’t use contraceptives carefully precisely those least well prepared to be parents at the time? Men are no more interested than women in having unwanted children they’re financially responsible for. There was an anti-abortion sign on the NYC subways that read, “Abortion changes your life forever.” Below it someone scrawled, “But not as much as having a baby.”

Making it harder to get abortions is also class legislation. The prosperous will be able to get safe abortions; what’s at issue is access for the poor, the young, the sexually innocent, the victims of assault.

Access to birth control is a requirement of modern citizenship, assuming that true citizenship means not only a set of documents but also the ability to participate in democracy, to defend and expand it. Doing that requires not having to spend 16 hours a day working two jobs to keep oneself and one’s family afloat. It means being able to raise children well, through having the leisure to spend with them and being confident that they will be safe, well nourished, and well educated. While we work toward that end, we need to be able to make choices about reproduction and to have personal privacy in doing it.

[hrmjustin]

2. Welcome to DU and I hope you enjoy the site.

[Manoverde84]

3. right to work = right to work less

plain and simple

[Vic Vinegar]

4. Michigan Fascism

Right to Work is the greatest abomination ever after all the New Deal accomplished! I cannot believe that fascism has come to America again; especially in Michigan. In Benton Harbour there was an austerity dictatorship just last year and the governor is trying to bring it back with more totalitarian powers. Google Rev. Pinckney Benton Harbour.