Kentucky River decision: a blow to workers everywhere

The long-awaited Kentucky River decision has come down, and blogger David Goldstein sums up what happened at Huffington Post:

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued its much anticipated "Kentucky River Decision" today, and it pretty much went exactly as expected. Voting along party lines, the Republican dominated NLRB gutted long-time federal labor laws by allowing employers to reclassify up to 8 million workers as "supervisors," thus prohibiting them from forming unions.

The decision comes at a precarious time for labor, when the offensive against unions and other worker associations has intensified. We've covered some of the leading cases in the South, from the Smithfield hot processessing giant to North Carolina state workers denied the right to bargain.

Citing a recent Human Rigths Watch report, Goldsteing notes that these individual cases, put together, amount to a full-scale assault on the organizations designed to give workers a voice -- especially in the South:

Each year thousands of workers in the United States are spied on, harassed, pressured, threatened, suspended, fired, deported or otherwise victimized by employers in reprisal for their exercise of the right to freedom of association. In the 1950's, victims numbered in the hundreds each year. In 1969, the number was more than 6,000. By the 1990's, more than 20,000 workers each year were dismissed or otherwise victims of discrimination serious enough for the government-appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to issue a reinstatement and "back-pay" or other remedial order...

Loophole-ridden laws, paralyzing delays, and feeble enforcement have created a culture of impunity in many areas of U.S. labor law and practice. Employers intent on resisting workers' self-organization can drag out legal proceedings for years, fearing little more than an order to post a written notice in the workplace promising not to repeat unlawful conduct.

UPDATE: Apparently the demonstration at Smithfield headquarters last week was a big success. The incomparable Lindsay Beyerstein (aka Majikthise) sent a few pictures, here's one: