Got your attention?
Good. Because it seems that unless a story has negative implications for the tea party no one (even Fox News) is going to make a stink about it.
On Thursday morning, over 500 members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (an AFL-CIO union) did something that should have been the top news story on every major news network in the country.
Hundreds of Longshoremen stormed the Port of Longview early Thursday, overpowered and held security guards, damaged railroad cars, and dumped grain that is the center of a labor dispute, said Longview Police Chief Jim Duscha.
Let us change that around a little and conduct a thought experiment. What if the event were described like this?
Hundreds of Tea Party protesters stormed City Hall in Longview early Thursday, overpowered and held security guards, damaged office furniture, and dumped files out of the Hall’s archives, said Longview Police Chief Jim Duscha.
How would MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, and even Fox News handle the story? Do you think there would be wall to wall coverage of this criminal activity being done by a battalion-sized crowd of tea partiers? How many talking heads and other assorted pundits would be weighing in about heated political rhetoric and how opponents of Obama’s presidency are directly or indirectly responsible for a “toxic climate” that resulted in this behavior?
Five hundred people.
Six guards were held hostage for a couple of hours after 500 or more Longshoremen broke down gates about 4:30 a.m. and smashed windows in the guard shack, he said.
No one was hurt, and nobody has been arrested. Most of the protesters returned to their union hall after cutting brake lines and spilling grain from car at the EGT terminal, Duscha said.
Five hundred people stormed a shipyard, held hostages – HOSTAGES – for a couple of hours, smashed windows and then calmly returned to their union hall after cutting brake lines on trains and spilling grain (aka destroying property). And NO ONE was arrested? Are you kidding me?
What are we supposed to learn from this? Is it now okay to destroy property and literally take hostages as long as you roll 500 strong and belong to a union? Would anyone else get away with that without someone being sent to jail? What is going on in this country? Where is the outrage? This is not acceptable behavior if done by ONE person. This is 500 times worse!
Police from several agencies in southwest Washington, the Washington State Patrol and Burlington Northern Santa Fe responded to the violence to secure the scene that followed a demonstration Wednesday.
“We’re not surprised,” Duscha said. “A lot of the protesters were telling us this in only the start.”
OH! It gets even better! This is only the start! What are they going to do next? Shoot the security guards instead? Or maybe simply beat them with the baseball bats and crowbars they brought this time? Guns will come later, I guess. We can’t rush these things.
Again, if one lone tea partier had done something remotely close to what these union thugs did on Thursday, there would not only be wall to wall coverage of it, the Left would use this one individual to prove that the Tea Party are nothing more than anti-government terrorists. They tried, and failed, to do just that with the Tucson shootings – too bad Loughner turned out to be more Leftist than tea party.
This action by the ILWU is an outrage. It also isn’t some rogue group of thugs.
The train was the first grain shipment to arrive at Longview. It arrived Wednesday night after police arrested 19 demonstrators who tried to block the tracks. They were led by ILWU International President Robert McEllrath, who said they would return.
See that? The night before, Wednesday, some thugs – accompanied by the president of the union – were arrested for blocking the tracks. The next day they returned just like the president of the union said they would. This time they came 500 deep.
Just imagine if the head of a tea party group made a threat like that and the next day 500+ tea partiers showed up and committed an act of domestic terrorism like the union goons did on Thursday. We’d never hear the end of it.
We shouldn’t hear the end of this, either. But it seems many people don’t even want to talk about it. For nearly three years we’ve been told that the tea party are violent extremists who are stoking … er, exactly the kind of thing the ILWU did on Thursday. This union actually did what the Left has been accusing the tea party of trying to do.
What on earth is going on here?
Cross-posted at TheRightSphere.com
In all of this madness let’s not forget the Hero’s of 9/11/01. Nothing matters without our health, family and friends. Life is too short to worry about the small stuff. Do something nice for someone today. People can say what they want and at the end of the day what really matters. Love your children and be thankful for what you have. G-D BLESS this country. Have a safe day.
Thank you. I have never forgotten. G-d Bless all those who lost their lives and their families, and G-d Bless America!
Stef, thank you for shedding light on this matter. These unions have lost the sympathy of many when they behave ridiculous. I have seen Mike Pons the IUPA president of NMB police accusing George Vallejo (NMB mayor) of being a Tea Party activist and calling him other flowery names in the corridor after the last budget hearing. What is the problem living within our means? Our city generates more than $30 million in revenue and this cannot do? Unbelievable. Our reserves from the general fund and the water plant were pilfered to meet unbelievable obligations. These reserves are now down to zero.
Kazan, thanks. I didn’t post this in the NMB category, and I wasn’t trying to be partisan. My point was (as I mentioned in a previous column) that the union thugs seem to have gotten away with heinous acts, such as destroying property, holding people hostage (isn’t that called kidnapping?), and encouraging a crowd to be hostile and threatening. It is ironic that this incident didn’t get reported by the national news media, including the so-called “right wing” Fox News, as the article states. Yet, the tea party groups have received such negative publicity when they haven’t been violent whatsoever. Anyway, I thought it was ironic, so when I came across this particular column I decided to post it since I had already mentioned it in a previous blog. As I said, it really has nothing to do with our city at all. It’s just infuriating me that unions get away with this type of thuggery.
I agree, thanks for letting us know. Good thing public safety unions (police & fire) are civil about these matters.
Absolutely! I’ve never seen police or fire unions do anything like this. This type of behavior is limited to SEIU and obviously the logging union. In fact, these protestors were attacking the cops with baseball bats. Nice, huh? I just don’t know how they got away with this crap and didn’t get themselves arrested. That’s the mystery to me.
Stef, check the tapes of August 23rd. As per resident’s comment on Sept. 6th at a public comment session, he stated, “the unions viciously attacked our mayor and council and city manager.”
I personally have witnessed some union members while being very respectful to our elected officials while addressing them from the podium, others have chosen to be rude and disrespectful.
Kazan, I’m not going to watch the entire August 23 meeting. If you tell me the time the comment was made, I’ll go check it out. If you tell me who said it, that’s even better so I’ll know who to look for.
Most of the union members have been very respectful to mayor and council. A couple of them have not. Same with residents, too – some are also rude to people. Everyone should be respectful of everyone else, which I think is the best point to make. Giving dirty looks counts as disrespect.
At 1 hour 15 min 15 sec. an officer/union member approached the podium, addressed the mayor, council and staff as “you guys” more than 20 times. Told them they can retrain the Crossing guards to catch thieves among other things. His character was out of place, rude and disrespectful throughout his speech. If this is the way the individual performed in front of the cameras, what would he do when the camera is not rolling? We can do without this kind of behavior and individual employed in this city.