Strike!

What does God want us to do? 

It's quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor,
 be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don't take yourself too seriously—
 take God seriously.  Micah 6:8 The Message

When I think about the strike tomorrow and start resenting that I have to drive an hour to work just to work an hour and then go walk a picket line, I think of the verse from Micah and I know that if I am to live my faith I have to go out, and I can’t succumb to the urge to condemn those who don’t.  

I’m what some call a “Red Diaper Baby”, my mom was a socialist and a militant union supporter, even though she wasn’t able to bring the union to her job. I learned about unions and the civil rights movement before I was in school.  I told my 20 year old daughter that story for the millionth time when I told her that I told my manager that if I didn’t go out my mother would haunt me...her response..  “I know remember you wouldn’t let me shop at the huge Forever 21 in Seattle because they were picketing for “unfair labor practices”  

The RNs who work for Kaiser, Northern California are going on strike in sympathy for those represented by NUHW.  The Social Workers and Optical workers are facing cuts to their health care benefits and cuts to their pensions while senior executives, who have nothing to do with patient care make over a million a year and each have 8 yes EIGHT pension plans...and they want to cut the benefits of 4,000... Really?  (There is a back story to this, a feud between SEIU and NUHW and a judgement against kaiser by the board of labor relations.  I don’t know enough about it to address it here, there is a “labor management partnership” that is well Sleeping with the Enemy...)

I’m a Kaiser Nurse so I’m very familiar with our issues but the Sutter nurses and the nurses at Children’s Hospital Oakland are striking as well.  They are addressing patient care issues.  The Sutter nurses are being asked to give up sick days...WTF... with the economy the way it is many nurses are the only wage earners in their families so I guess they are expected to go to work sick and take care of patients who have suppressed immune systems.  Who is responsible when someone dies because a nurse comes to work sick?  I couldn’t live with myself ... the Sutter RNs are being locked out for 5 days if they strike... They are heros!  I’m just losing one shift I have nothing to complain about or be resentful about

So I commented on a post by a woman who is flying in to cross the picket line.  She wrote something like “LMAO I’m making big bucks while you are making nothing”  I told her she is making way less as a scab then we make every day and that the company that hired her is making all the money.  If she had a union she would make the money, have the benefits and have the support of her sisters and brothers..

I am grateful for my union brothers and sisters, for NUHW, for CNA for the Operating Engineers who are honoring the picket line and for the SEIU members who are brave enough to honor the strike.

For me it is a moral issue...I’ll be in Vallejo tomorrow morning. I’ll have my red shirt on (with great accessories of course)

Oh and we are collecting food for the local food banks...

“for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’

So between my socialist mother and my christian faith is there really a choice here and can I really whine about it?

Love to you all