9 in 10 Favor Protections for Secret Ballots

Guest Editorial | Poll Shows Voters Demand State Constitutional Protection of Secret Ballot Elections; Highest Support Among Union Households

Salt Lake City, UT – 9 out of 10 Utah voters want the state constitution to be amended to protect secret ballots, concluded a poll conducted by Wilson Research Strategies.  This poll surveyed likely voters to assess attitudes toward the issue of voting by secret ballot and found that overwhelming support for secret ballots was strongest (up to 89%) among Union households.

Chris Wilson of Wilson Research Strategies noted that, “Voters in Utah strongly support any action confirming the right of secret ballot, indicating a firmly held belief by Utahans that democracy through secret ballot should extend from elections for public office to the workplace elections for employee representation.  Union members offer even stronger support for the amendment than non-union members.  This support demonstrates a deep-rooted favorability for the democratic process among Utahans of all backgrounds.”

“With support above 80%, Utahans take a unified and non-partisan approach as a strong majority of both Republicans and Democrats endorse the amendment.  The amendment to guarantee secret ballot rights earns majority support from voters of both genders, all ages, Republicans, Democrats and Independents.  Support this universal is rare and demands the attention of elected officials,” Wilson concluded.

“We knew that support for the secret ballot was high and that securing the right to a secret ballot in the UT state constitution had widespread support.  89% confirms what we’ve been telling legislators: attempting to take this right away from voters is political suicide.  The unions have very clearly misread their membership and their continued for support for eliminating the secret ballot is seen as a crude, transparent power grab.  Utah voters, especially union members, see right through it,” said Troy Walker, SOS Ballot’s UT coordinator.

SOS Ballot is a 501c4 organization dedicated to educating the American public on the continued need for a secret ballot wherever state or federal law requires elections.  seeks to protect voters from intimidation and harassment by empowering them to vote whether they wish to have the right to a secret ballot guaranteed in their state constitution.  SOS Ballot is currently conducting initiative or legislative campaigns in Arizona, Arkansas Georgia, Missouri, Nevada, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota and Utah.

The secret ballot was used locally as an act of post-Civil war southern reconstruction, first as a way to impose a literacy requirement on newly freed slaves.  The secret ballot also protected mostly black voters who faced physical intimidation, even lynching depending on how their vote was cast.  Secret ballots were first used statewide in the Massachusetts governor’s race 1888 and nationally in 1892 to elect President Grover Cleveland.

Contact:  Audrey Mullen or Dave Mohel at 703-548-1160

Union’s Expect Obama Payback – Seek to End Secret Ballots

Updated Guest Editorial | On Tuesday’s Glenn Beck Show, a discouraging statistic was shown. In 1999, all government spending as a portion of our national GNP was 33%. In 2009, that number stands at 39%.

An astonishing number when you consider that the United States produces over $14 trillion in goods and services annually.  If that number frightens you and raises red flags about the growth of government, then something is on the horizon which will make that number worse. And that is why we need your leadership today.

Big Labor is expecting a pay back from President Obama.  For the hundreds of millions they spent on his election, they expect him to sign an innocent sounding, yet deceptive bill called Employee Free Choice Act – better known as “Card Check.”

Card Check is a cunning device that will make unionizing companies less democratic in the process of union organizing and more prone to intimidation and harassment.  Currently, unions must have at least 30% of the employees sign cards voicing their support for a union.  In the vast majority of cases the employer will then require a secret ballot election to determine if a union will be formed.  If the new “Card Check” federal legislation is passed, unions may contact employees directly, and when they get 51% of the employees to sign a card, the right of the employees to vote by secret ballot is abolished and the workplace is automatically unionized.

Card check will dramatically speed up the unionization of America by harassment and intimidation. As a result, government will grow bigger and mandatory union dues – the main objective to Card Check – will increase Big Labor political donations to Democrats and left wing causes.  In 2008 alone, 91% of all union contributions went to Democrats.  A staggering number when you realize that Big Labor can simply take dues out of union employees’ paychecks. This is one of the biggest power grabs in recent memory.

It is inconceivable to believe government will not grow bigger and more confiscatory with a larger union presence. Government’s 39% total of our GNP will soon grow to the mid-to-high 40s if card check passes. Do we want that? Will that help or impede innovation, freedom and entrepreneurship?

Big Labor and their allies hope to accomplish this power grab by taking away a working man and woman’s right to a secret ballot.  Can you imagine if your elected officials knew how everyone voted in their districts? How many more votes do you think they would receive on Election Day?  The same logic applies to union voting. Without the privacy of the secret ballot, people become more acutely aware of the need of their jobs and their unwillingness to go against the pressure of union leaders. That is why Save Our Secret Ballot (www.sosballot.org) was organized – to protect the right of the secret ballot for all Americans.

Save Our Secret Ballot is doing this by placing on the ballot in 15-20 states a state constitutional amendment (not federal) to protect the right to a secret ballot (for exact language go to www.sosballot.org).  We want voters to know exactly what is at stake and what unions want to accomplish. Holding a public debate is the last thing unions want.  House Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Harry Reid are ready to take away your right to a secret ballot and President Obama is ready to sign it. All that stands in its way is you!

Where you and I want public discourse and debate like the famous Lincoln – Douglas debates over 150 years ago, unions want to treat this issue like a Venezuelan policy debate – the less discussion the better.

Unions want to pass this without the American public knowing about it. Like a thief, they want to do this in the darkness of night without the glare of daylight. Unlike a thief who steals material goods which can be replaced, they want to steal freedoms that cannot be replaced.

We need your help today – not tomorrow.  Today, Monday, this freedom protecting legislation will be up for a vote in the Utah House of Representatives.  We have some Republicans still frightened of the unions.  Please help today by getting your family, friends, business associates and YOU to call your Utah State Legislator and State Senator and ask them to vote YES for HJR-8 (Save Our Secret Ballot).

You can call them at the Capitol Hill

Utah State Senate 801-538-1035
Utah House of Representatives 801-538-1029

Without your help and leadership, unions will take away a fundamental freedom. For more information, go to www.sosballot.org and help stop this power grab today!

Chuck Warren is a partner at Silver Bullet, LLC (www.silverbulletllc.org).

Clinton: Communist China & USA will “Rise or Fall Together”

Breitbart.com | US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Sunday urged China to keep buying US debt as she wrapped up her first overseas trip, during which she agreed to work closely with Beijing on the financial crisis. Clinton made the plea shortly before leaving China, the final stop on a four-nation Asian tour that also took her to Japan, Indonesia and South Korea, where she worked the crowds to try to restore America’s standing abroad. In Beijing, she called on authorities in Beijing to continue buying US Treasuries, saying it would help jumpstart the flagging US economy and stimulate imports of Chinese goods.

“By continuing to support American Treasury instruments the Chinese are recognising our interconnection. We are truly going to rise or fall together,” Clinton said at the US embassy here.

Clinton had sought to focus on economic and environmental issues in Beijing, saying Washington’s concerns about the human rights situation in China should not be a distraction from those vital matters.  Beijing’s human rights record emerged nonetheless as an issue, as Chinese activists on Saturday reported being harassed or intimidated by Chinese authorities in a bid to stop them speaking out or meeting Clinton while she was here.

“Plainclothes police blocked me from leaving my home. They were afraid I would try to meet with Hillary Clinton or others in her delegation,” democracy campaigner Jiang Qisheng told AFP by phone on Sunday.

Clinton and Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi largely agreed to disagree on human rights as they pledged future joint action on the economy and climate change.The goodwill, also on display in her talks with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, could raise hope for a new era of cooperation between the two largest greenhouse gas emitters and two of the world’s top three economies.

“Now it is more important than any time in the past to deepen and develop China-US relations amid the spreading financial crisis and increasing global challenges,” Hu told Clinton, according to state media.

Clinton began her day Sunday by attending a Protestant church service in western Beijing at which an AFP journalist saw plainclothes police taking away some visitors who attempted to enter the church.Their identities could not be confirmed. Later, Clinton met Chinese women’s rights advocates at the US embassy but continued to steer clear of speaking on contentious human rights issues.Instead, while taping an interview on a Chinese talk show, she focused on the need for China to help finance the massive 787-billion-dollar US economic stimulus plan by continuing to buy US Treasuries.

“Because our economies are so intertwined the Chinese know that in order to…” <<<Read Full Story>>>

Was Ayn Rand Right, 52 Years Ago?

By Stephen Moore (Wall Street Journal) | Some years ago when I worked at the libertarian Cato Institute, we used to label any new hire who had not yet read “Atlas Shrugged” a “virgin.” Being conversant in Ayn Rand’s classic novel about the economic carnage caused by big government run amok was practically a job requirement. If only “Atlas” were required reading for every member of Congress and political appointee in the Obama administration. I’m confident that we’d get out of the current financial mess a lot faster.

Many of us who know Rand’s work have noticed that with each passing week, and with each successive bailout plan and economic-stimulus scheme out of Washington, our current politicians are committing the very acts of economic lunacy that “Atlas Shrugged” parodied in 1957, when this 1,000-page novel was first published and became an instant hit.

Rand, who had come to America from Soviet Russia with striking insights into totalitarianism and the destructiveness of socialism, was already a celebrity <<<Read the Full Story>>>

UT Ranked Among Most Corrupt

A recent survey published in the New York Times as part of its article “Which is the Most Corrupt State?” where researchers asked state house reporters to assess their subjects and ranked responses on a scale of 1 (clean) to 7 (crooked).  Utah’s State Officials ranked #15, among the most corrupt in the nation.

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Where is officialdom most crooked? Last week, many guessed it must be Illinois, after news that Gov. Rod Blagojevich was taped making brazen personal demands in exchange for his selection of a Senate successor to President-elect Barack Obama. <<<Read the Full Story >>>

Israel War Channel on YouTube

From (The Jerusalem Post) |In the midst of its Gaza operations, the IDF is entering yet another conflict zone: the Internet. The Israeli army announced yesterday the creation of its own YouTube channel, through which it will disseminate footage of precision bombing operations in the Gaza Strip, as well as aid distribution and other

“The blogosphere and new media are another war zone,” said IDF Foreign Press Branch head Maj. Avital Leibovich. “We have to be relevant there.”

Her sentiment reflects a growing awareness in the Israeli government that part of the failure of the 2006 Second Lebanon War was Israel’s lack of readiness for the intense media debate surrounding its operations.  <<Read the Full Story>>>

RNC Speaking Out Against Socialism? Wow.

By Ralph Z. Hallow (Washington Times) |In what would amount to a slap in the face to a sitting Republican president and the party’s Senate and House leaders, national GOP officials, including the vice chairman of the Republican National Committee, are sponsoring a resolution opposing the resort to “socialist” means to save capitalism.

“We can’t be a party of small government, free markets and low taxes while supporting bailouts and nationalizing industries, which lead to big government, socialism and high taxes at the expense of individual liberty and freedoms,” said Solomon Yue, a cosponsor of a resolution that would put the RNC — the party’s national governing body <<<Read the Full Story>>>

Bush Stops Gravity: Abandons Free Market to Save it?

Can principles be suspended or sacrificed?

AFP (Breitbard.com) | US President George W. Bush said in an interview Tuesday he was forced to sacrifice free market principles to save the economy from “collapse.”

“I’ve abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system,” Bush told CNN television, saying he had made the decision “to make sure the economy doesn’t collapse.”

Bush’s comments reflect an extraordinary departure from his longtime advocacy for an unfettered free market, as his administration has orchestrated unprecedented government intervention in the face of a dire financial crisis.

“I am sorry we’re having to do it,” Bush said. Bush said….<<<Read the Full Story>>>

Mystery? SEC Not Effective at Stopping Fraud

By Stephen Labaton (International Herald Tribune) |  WASHINGTON: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, a once-proud agency with an impressive history as the top cop on Wall Street, finds itself increasingly conducting autopsies of leading financial institutions after failing, in the first instance, to perform adequate biopsies.
The latest black eye for the commission came when it was disclosed that inspectors and agency lawyers had missed a series of warning signs at Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities. If it had checked out the warnings, the commission might well have discovered years ago that the firm was concealing its losses by using billions of dollars from some investors to pay others.  The firm was the subject of several inquiries over the years, including one last year that was closed by the agency’s New York office after it had received a referral of potentially significant problems from the Boston office.  Similarly, the SEC chairman, Christopher Cox, assured investors nine months ago that all was well…<<<Read the Full Story>>>.

Britain: joining Euro?

AFP (BREITBART.COM) | Britain is considering joining the eurozone as a direct consequence of global financial turmoil, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said Sunday.

“We are now closer than ever before. I’m not going to break the confidentiality of certain conversations, but some British politicians have already told me: ‘If we had the euro, we would have been better off’,” Barroso told a weekly French news programme, referring to the fall in the pound’s value since markets and liquidity meltdown earlier this year.

“The British have an enormous quality, one of many, that is they are pragmatic,” he said on the panel of a joint RTL-LCI radio and television broadcast. “This crisis has emphasised the importance of the euro, and also of Britain,” he added.

“I don’t mean this will happen tomorrow, I know that the majority (of British people) are still opposed, but there is a period of consideration underway and the people which matter in Britain are currently thinking about it,” the former Portuguese prime minister said.

Barroso pointed to the case of Denmark, another EU state which has so far refused to accept the euro but is now planning another referendum on the single currency. The Danish voted against joining in 2000.>>>>Read the Full Article

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