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Maine’s striking Hostess workers say company’s collapse a strong message of union resolve
Bangor Daily News ^

Posted on 11/17/2012 10:28:20 AM PST by matt04

Labor leaders in Maine say the resilience of the Hostess workers on the picket line at the company’s Biddeford plant, which is in the process of being shut down after the company on Friday said it would liquidate the business, gives them inspiration in the face of what they believe have been ongoing efforts — by politicians, including Gov. Paul LePage, and corporate investors — to reduce union influence.

Bakers’ union officials and their supporters say also that the demise of Hostess Brands Inc., which failed to convince striking workers to return to their jobs, is a warning sign for corporate investors seeking to squeeze more profits out of the working class.

“Unions have been losing power for years,” said Ken Rumney, a striking worker outside of the Hostess plant in Biddeford on Friday. “This is an exceptional case. If Hostess had been allowed to get away with what they’d been trying to do, other corporations would have lined up to try the same tactics. Hopefully, this will be an example to other companies not to [try to] break their unions.”

“I think we’re the first ones who have stood up and said, ‘We’re not going to let you get away with it,’” said Sue Tapley, the strike captain on hand Friday morning at the Biddeford plant, which employed nearly 600 people. “You can fight them. You can shut them down.”

(Excerpt) Read more at bangordailynews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Maine
KEYWORDS: hostess; strike; twinkee; union
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To: matt04

Let them eat bread?


81 posted on 11/17/2012 2:44:36 PM PST by NCLaw441
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To: SaxxonWoods

We’ll have to check on them in a couple of years and see how they are doing.

I hope they kept their picket signs, their going to need something to burn to keep warm this winter. As*holes


82 posted on 11/17/2012 2:53:55 PM PST by bikerman (How will Democrats stand up to terrorism when they can’t even face Fox News?”)
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To: NCLaw441
Let them eat bread?

Here in Florida they are closing all the day old bread stores which sold bread and other bakery items from Hostess so its not just the union its allot of other small business suffering because of the greedy unions.

83 posted on 11/17/2012 3:01:07 PM PST by bikerman (What ever happens from now is all OBAMA's fault. Obama lied,economy died)
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To: matt04

Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.


84 posted on 11/17/2012 3:02:33 PM PST by AdaGray
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To: Jedidah

They are just trying to spreading the misery equally to everyone.


85 posted on 11/17/2012 3:09:43 PM PST by Jack Hydrazine (It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine!)
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To: LADY J

Yes, isn’t that amazing? Now they can be “inspired” to find another job....stunning!!


86 posted on 11/17/2012 3:29:43 PM PST by annieokie
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To: bikerman
The Hostess Day Old Bread store in our neighborhood closed three days ago, and the one in the adjacent neighborhood closed yesterday. Some of the clerks were crying as they reflected on the end of the company where they had spent the last seventeen years, and frustrated because their unions had ratified the contract.

Older folks on disability and fixed incomes who depended on day-old bread to stretch their food dollars were wondering where they could go now for low-cost bread. A lot of folks seemed clueless as to how this happened, but there were a few, maybe 20%, some even union members, who were attributing it correctly to union greediness and to the upcoming jolt to business of new employment costs.

We were handing out flyers (selectively -- to those who looked teachable) with links to websites explaining the upcoming costs of Obamacare and the effects they have on the costs of employment. While these 18,500 workers just joined the unemployed, restaurant workers just had their income slashed by 25% as companies like Denny's and Red Lobster and Papa John's cut their 40-hour work week to 30 to avoid the Obamacare tax. Another lie by this administration that millionaires would be the ones feeling the pain, not the poor.

87 posted on 11/17/2012 3:34:57 PM PST by RhoTheta ("We're from the Government, and we're here to help you ... NOT")
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To: matt04

GENIOUS!

THEY HAS IT!

And this coming from a union member!
(In a different trade altogether.)
88 posted on 11/17/2012 4:45:27 PM PST by servo1969
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To: Uncle Chip
Can the 5,000 collect unemployment if the company closes while they are out on strike???
********************************************

It depends on the state. There are some states that won't pay unemployment for workers that went on strike. They consider it the same thing as quiting.

89 posted on 11/17/2012 4:52:44 PM PST by kara37
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To: matt04
"Hopefully, this will be an example to other companies..."

I'm sure it will. It will teach them to move all their facilities to right-to-work states and thereby avoid having to deal with the type of union boneheads Hostess did.

I swear, unions can serve a need but sometimes people start to get the idea that the only reason a business exists is so that it can employ them!
90 posted on 11/17/2012 4:56:08 PM PST by servo1969
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To: matt04
Rumney's quote is striking [no pun intended]:
“Unions have been losing power for years,” said Ken Rumney, a striking worker outside of the Hostess plant in Biddeford on Friday. “This is an exceptional case. If Hostess had been allowed to get away with what they'd been trying to do, other corporations would have lined up to try the same tactics. Hopefully, this will be an example to other companies not to [try to] break their unions.” [emphasis added]
Has Ken let the cat out of the bag? Was this in fact a nationally-orchestrated chess move using Hostess, its employees, and supply chain as pawns in a larger game of union dominance? Where is the breach-of-trust line crossed between the members of the local and the union management chain? For that matter, by "nationalizing" the fight, was the union negotiating with Hostess in good faith? This could be a whole new ambulance to chase!
91 posted on 11/17/2012 6:08:37 PM PST by NonValueAdded ("Our president ... makes big speeches packed full of little ideas" Charles C. W. Cooke)
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To: matt04
"Bakers’ union officials and their supporters say also that the demise of Hostess Brands Inc. .... is a warning sign for corporate investors seeking to squeeze more profits out of the working class."

What utter morons. They don't yet realize that the entire country is going to see the unions as the blood suckers who murdered one of America's favorite companies.

This is the worst public relations stunt they could have possibly pulled. They'll be reviled and spat upon for years to come for what they did to Hostess and the 18,000 people who's jobs they killed during this economic crisis.

92 posted on 11/17/2012 6:21:51 PM PST by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: SoldierDad
The union members believe that "shutting" down a company is in THEIR best interests? Really? So, who is going to feed these OUT OF WORK morons??? I hate to tell these idiots, but THEY have just done more harm to unions than anything that any corporation could possibly do.

Not only that for some reason this idiot thinks they are the first to do this. Unions have been closing companies do to unfair demands since they came into existence. I worked for a lumber company that was started in 1945, I started to work there in 1962 after I got out of the army, worked there until in 1998 a sale to a new owner caused him to shut it down to do the Union leasers that refused to renegotiate a new contract. Cost 600 jobs. Now in the mills place there are "service" jobs that pay a small percentage of what the Mill jobs paid, no health insurance and fewer people employed. Plus a bunch of auto dealers moved in and promptly went belly up, no one to buy their cars. A bunch of empty dealership lots sit in the place of some of the old mill buildings.

The Union members that worked there do not have the attitude that "we showed 'em" most of them say that when they drive by the old mill site they feel like crying.

93 posted on 11/17/2012 6:30:07 PM PST by calex59
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Comment #94 Removed by Moderator

To: Windflier

I saw some Tweets that for many hours that the bakers union website was mysteriously down for “maintenance,” right after it really became know that they alone were responsible for the demise of Hostess. By “maintenance” I believe they were referring to the less than supportive emails and calls they were probably getting.


95 posted on 11/17/2012 10:19:48 PM PST by matt04
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To: matt04
Will Twinkies be reborn through new Mexican ownership? by Adrian Carrasquillo, @RealAdrianC 3:02 pm on 11/17/2012

Next week may be Black Friday but sweets lovers across the nation hung their heads in sorrow on a dark Friday yesterday as Hostess announced they would cease making their line of products, which include the iconic Twinkies brand, because of the Bakers Union Strike.

96 posted on 11/18/2012 6:01:01 AM PST by KeyLargo
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To: matt04
So I'm getting the business from the local lefties here in Minnesota on the Hostess thing. They Keep bringing up how some of the Hostess Exec's received a 300% raise while the company was in trouble and negotiating with the union.

I've been trying to research this and all I've found on the web are links to the uber-leftie sites who use this to justify union actions

Question 1:, Is this factoid true? (Execs gave themselves a huge Raise

Question 2: If true, why did the execs do this?

Question 3: If it's not true, how can we kill this meme that execs killed the company not the union

Thanks In advance

97 posted on 11/18/2012 8:00:09 AM PST by Explodo (Pessimism is simply pattern recognition)
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To: panaxanax
I hear people here saying that they “hope they starve”. It is unfortunate that these people are spouting off without knowing the facts. Yes, that’s directed at you, TexasRepublic. While I do agree with you about the bakers, I strongly disagree that the route-drivers should lose their homes and have their kids go hungry.

Okay, I'll be more specific. My venom is directed at the unions, both their elitist leaders and their clueless rank and file that support them. I have witnessed unionist mentality taking down companies time and again. Remember Eastern Airlines? A pox on them! However, I am sorry for their victims, such as your son. I can only hope that any illusions the victims may have had about their unionist coworkers have been dispelled. My vitriol is reserved for the union thugs -- I hope they starve. Better?

98 posted on 11/19/2012 8:12:44 AM PST by TexasRepublic (Socialism is the gospel of envy and the religion of thieves)
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To: TexasRepublic

Much better, thank you.


99 posted on 11/19/2012 9:37:37 AM PST by panaxanax
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To: matt04

I agree these pieces of crap deserve nothing. They quit they walked off of their jobs and put their company out of business. Now the Maine unemployment compensation board are breaking the rules and giving these bums unemployment. This would not happen for anybody else who refused work. Anybody else would be denied because they refused work or chose not to work. Anybody else who turned down even an hour for minimum wage would not be eligible what make these bums so special. Not only did they five up their jobs they lost every job that would have been held there in the future. I also hope that who ever takes over that plant refuses to hire anyone that walked off for fear that the poor babies would do the same thing to me. Then they want us to feel more sorry for them because it is the holiday season they knew what time that it was when they quit.


100 posted on 11/21/2012 4:09:14 PM PST by mc_trump
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