Letters To The Editor

BUSINESS AND LABOR

Kaiser plan to bust union will fail

Kaiser Aluminum - the fountain of misinformation and mismanagement.

Our sincere thanks to our union leaders and the negotiating teams for their leadership, respect, knowledge, support and power in dealing with such a group of company cronies.

The reality of why the current strike has lasted this long is the record volume and quality of finished product the striking Steelworkers produced in 1997 and 1998, of which the company stockpiled the surplus to leverage against the United Steelworkers of America, in its attempt to bust the union. Also, there’s Kaiser’s disdain for the work force and its pretense of bargaining in good faith.

To all the replacement workers (scabs) and midmanagement people who continue to aid and support the unfair labor practices against the Steelworkers, your minuscule contributions will be compensated with a pink slip, unemployment claims and possibly medical claims. You being the “prototypes,’; knowing firsthand that management’s plan to eliminate jobs, combine jobs and still maintain current productivity is merely company idealistic goals.

Kaiser president Ray Milchovich’s grandiloquent doubletalk for the media, stating all is well - but invisible to state and local legislators, union negotiators and his own puppet managers - is more Kaiser hype.

Better resolve your rhetoric, because the rank and file won’t buy the lie. You honestly think if I was making $62,000 a year that I would be standing on a picket line? Parity is our goal. United we win. One day longer, we will prevail. Randy W. Bowers Spokane

Strike economics are against union

I am always amazed at the logic of union members. So far, the Kaiser strike has gone on for 14 weeks-plus. If the average union worker makes $20 per hour, the average worker has lost $11,200. If the union is successful in increasing the hourly rate by $1 over and above the offer by Kaiser, it will take five years to break even. Is this strike really worth it? Many of the union members may be retired by then and never recuperate the lost salary!

We keep hearing that the “union gave during the ‘80s” and now Kaiser owes the union. Incredible logic! If the union had not reduced its demands in the ‘80s, then Kaiser wouldn’t be here. The company would be broke or would’ve moved to another location. Either way, the current union members would not be working at Kaiser.

The longer this strike goes on, the more likely Kaiser is to hire permanent replacement workers - and the union will be out. If what we hear is true and Kaiser can operate its plants with half the workers, why would Kaiser want to settle?

We also keep hearing that all the union wants is parity with other aluminum workers. I’ll accept that, but is the cost of producing the product at parity with other aluminum manufacturers? From what I hear, the cost at Kaiser is the highest in the industry. If true, what does the union intend to do about that? Wayne Lythgoe Colbert

Consider the stakes carefully

After all the rhetoric on both sides of the Kaiser strike has been peeled away, there are really just a few points of fact. These are what all of us in the Spokane area should consider:

The strikers had good-paying, long-term jobs. They had issues they wanted resolved. The strikers have families to support. The strikers were not shoved out of the door - they chose to walk out. The strikers may have their jobs back if they really want them. If the conditions at the Kaiser plants were as bad as the strikers describe, why didn’t they quit long ago?

Kaiser had a good, loyal work force. Kaiser had issues they wanted resolved. Kaiser has to show reasonable profit to keep and attract shareholders. Kaiser has a right, by law, to hire replacement workers. The replacement workers have a right to work for whomever hires them without fear of intimidation, threats or violence.

We all make choices in life. We must live with the results of those choices and should not blame others if those choices do not achieve the results we intended.

The side that has the most to lose will capitulate first. Edward Schafer Veradale

THE ENVIRONMENT

Many salmon are lost in the Pacific

In response to staff writer Dan Hansen’s article “Breaching would sink barging” (Jan. 3), several points should be clarified.

It isn’t true that breaching dams is the most certain way to restore fish runs. The panel of independent scientists did not consider the extreme amount of ocean harvest and gillnets on the Lower Columbia River in their study. The best way to restore fish runs in the river is to limit the harvest.

The truth is that new bypass technology at the dams is highly successful in allowing immature salmon to go downstream to the ocean and allowing mature salmon to go upstream to spawn.

Much of the information still being repeated in the media is outdated and does not reflect new technology at the dams and the recent studies.

We can do all we want to develop habitat in the river, but the fish can’t use it when the majority of them are harvested in the ocean. It doesn’t make sense to list fish as endangered species and yet continue to overharvest them in the ocean. David R. Roseleip Spokane

Facts endangered species, too

Thanks to the Internet, I’ve been reading many newspapers. Editors everywhere are commenting on reauthorizing the Endangered Species Act (ESA), but Opinion editor John Webster’s editorial, “A blueprint for endless bickering” (Jan. 1), distinguished itself.

Name calling, known in rhetoric as the ad hominem fallacy, is rife in Webster’s work generally and in this editorial. Supporters of the ESA are “business-bashers” who “scrounge” for scientific evidence to prop up their pet cause. Such language makes ESA advocates sound like violent vagabonds. That’s not me.

What do we “scrounge” for? Not for noble animals but “rare weeds, flies and rodents.” No one should mind if such scourges of the Earth were snuffed out, Webster implies, thus pandering to base tastes and low humor.

Lawyers, too, who defend the species law, are lowly “lifeforms” we’d be better off without.

Most egregious is Webster’s innocence of his own reporters’ stories. He claims many species proposed for ESA listing were actually de-listed “because analysis showed listing wasn’t justified.” Compare Rich Landers’ article the same week (“A year of recovery,” Dec. 27), which catalogued the regional species protected in 1998 alone: In Washington, fisher, a rare forest carnivore (endangered); sage grouse, sharp-tailed grouse (threatened); bull trout (threatened in United States); steelhead (threatened in the Lower Columbia River). And all signs point to the westslope cutthroat trout as the next candidate for listing under the ESA.

Business-bashers! Naysayers! Nattering nabobs of negativity! I invest in local businesses and I support reauthorizing the ESA. Paul J. Lindholdt Spokane

IN THE PUBLIC EYE

Truman spinning in his grave

It is too bad most of President Clinton’s supporters weren’t alive when Harry Truman was president. Then they would have some idea what a presidential class act should look like.

Seventy-plus percent approval rate. Poor Harry, he must be spinning in his grave! Robert C. Sprint Spokane

No morals means anarchy

In reference to Allan deLaubenfels letter of Jan. 6, concerning the terrible moralists:

Apparently deLaubenfels seems to believe we should be a society without morals, absolutes, rules or laws.

Spare me from such a society - the price of anarchy would be too high. Linda J. Reed Spokane

Baldwin has gone too far

On Dec. 11, actor Alec Baldwin stated on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” that Americans should “drag Henry Hyde into the street and stone him to death.” When the New York City crowd responded with cheers, Baldwin stated, “His wife and children should then be killed.”

Calls to NBC resulted in the excuse that Baldwin was “joking.” I have observed Baldwin on television over the years and have never heard him say anything humorous. I have, however, found him to be a strong political supporter of President Clinton. From these facts, I conclude that Baldwin has committed, by definition, a hate crime in Idaho.

Therefore, I would urge all human rights activists and other Idaho citizens to call KHQ-TV in Spokane and demand an immediate apology to Hyde and his family. I would further suggest calling all of the advertisers on KHQ-TV to voice your opinion. If Baldwin wants to be the socialists’ answer to Timothy McVeigh, maybe his wife, Kim Basinger, should dye her hair black and they can be the real-life Boris and Natasha. Richard Le Francis, Jr. Coeur d’Alene