Jay Timmons, executive vice president of the National Association of Manufacturers, issued a statement in reaction to President Obama’s announced support for some expanded offshore energy development.

The take away:

• Today’s announcement by President Obama to move forward with opening portions of the Outer Continental Shelf for oil and natural gas exploration and development is a positive step toward a lower cost domestic energy supply and ensuring U.S. energy security and independence. Manufacturers commend the President for his leadership on this issue.
• While manufacturers support the President’s announcement, we also believe the Administration has missed an opportunity to take advantage of proven and known reserves in Alaska and other portions of the OCS and to expedite the leasing process. To shut down known resources only hinders our ability to reduce our foreign energy dependence and create jobs.

Today’s Commerce Department report on manufacturing shipments, inventories and orders in February offered mixed news for manufacturers, economic growth and job creation.Manufacturing shipments fell in February after a sharp slowdown in January, signaling that the strong pace of economic growth in the fourth quarter of 2009 will not be repeated in the early part of this year and appear to have been fueled by temporary factors such as inventory restocking and expiring tax provisions. It is likely that severe winter weather conditions played some role in the weak February numbers, especially in construction-related sectors such as construction machinery, wood and textile products and nonmetallic mineral products such as bricks, glass and cement and concrete.

On a positive note, orders for durable goods – which are a good indicator of future industrial activity – were revised upward to 0.9 percent, indicating that manufacturing activity is on the upswing and should continue on this path in the coming months. The increase was mainly driven by a sharp upward revision in new orders for core nondefense capital goods. Since many of these products are exported, today’s report underscores that continued export growth will be critical to a sustainable manufacturing recovery.

Looking ahead, a weak labor market and lower consumer and business confidence will
likely constrain the pace of the economy and domestic-oriented manufacturing sectors for the next several quarters.

Chevron has recorded several significant victories in recent weeks in resisting the outlandish and orchestrated claims made against it for environmental damages in Ecuador. U.S. trial lawyers and perpetually outraged activists have fomented a $27 billion lawsuit against the company, ostensibly filed on behalf of the Amazonian natives who were harmed by Texaco’s oil operations in past decades; Chevron acquired Texaco in 2001.

The truth of the matter is that Texaco remediated the sites it was responsible for and the Ecuadorian government released it of legal liability after the clean-up. PetroEcuador, the government-owned oil company, has in the meantime continued its environmentally suspect operations. Nevertheless, the combine of trial lawyers, activists and media continue to promote the litigation, and their biggest ally is Ecuador’s leftist government headed by Rafael Correa.

But in undermining the rule of law in Ecuador, Correa is actually helping Chevron: In venues where the rule of law still applies, Chevron succeeds.

The latest example does not involve the trial lawyer/activist litigation, but it certainly makes the case that Ecuador’s government ignores contracts and legal obligations. From Chevron, a news release, “Chevron Wins Arbitration Claim Against the Government of Ecuador.”

SAN RAMON, Calif. – Mar. 30, 2010 – An international arbitration tribunal has ruled in favor of Chevron in a claim against Ecuador related to past oil operations by Chevron’s subsidiary, Texaco Petroleum Company. The tribunal, administered by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, found that Ecuador’s courts violated international law through their delays in ruling on certain commercial disputes between Texaco Petroleum Company and the Ecuadorian government…

In its decision, the tribunal found that Ecuador had violated the United States-Ecuador Bilateral Investment Treaty by failing to provide effective means of asserting claims and enforcing rights. As a result, the tribunal awarded Chevron and Texaco Petroleum Company approximately US$700 million in principal damages and interest as of December 22, 2006, pending further proceedings to determine applicable taxes, compound interest, and costs.

(continue reading…)

The NAM and 18 other leading employer organizations sent the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) extensive comments to reflect our concerns with the agency’s proposed rulemaking on the recordkeeping of musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs). As we detail in our comments, despite many years of study and research, the scientific community remains unable to reliably define, diagnose or determine the cause of MSDs, or identify appropriate remedial measures with any degree of precision.

This proposal would require employers to implement a new regimen for recording injuries and illnesses in the workplace.

Our response explains our substantial concerns with the proposed rulemaking and argue that OSHA should withdraw the proposal entirely, including:

In light of the obvious inability to define, diagnose or determine the cause of MSDs with any degree of precision, the logical conclusion, mandated by the applicable OSH Act criteria, is that OSHA must acknowledge the limitations it faces in implementing a workable MSD provision in Part 1904 consistent with its statutory authority and withdraw the Proposed Rule. There simply is no medically and scientifically supported definition for the injuries that OSHA expects employers to record. OSHA’s attempt to establish an MSD column for the OSHA 300 Log fails to serve any useful purpose and would only lead to an inappropriate misallocation of resources that would detract from efforts to advance workplace safety and health in the United States. OSHA’s cost estimate for this proposal strained credulity and the agency utterly failed to provide an adequate factual basis for the certification necessary to avoid having to comply with the Regulatory Flexibility Act as amended by the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act. Finally, the Federal Register notice was defective as OSHA mischaracterized the scope of this proposal and failed to acknowledge the critical recharacterization of MSDs from injuries to illnesses affected by language in the preamble. We urge OSHA to abandon this ill-fated attempt to classify that which is impossible objectively to verify or categorize.

If put into effect, this proposal will pose a considerable burden on employers, and the data that it seeks to collect will be inaccurate and not useful. The rule would force employers to make medical determinations regarding the “work relatedness” of potential MSDs that are often difficult for even medical professionals to determine. Employer compliance costs would rise as companies would be forced to devote extensive time and resources to implementing the new recordkeeping requirements.

To view these comments, click here.

From the American Benefits Council, which represents large U.S. corporations, a news release, “Exorbitant accounting hit to businesses will continue unless health law’s retiree drug subsidy provision is reversed“:

“For months, the American Benefits Council, along with several employers and labor unions, warned that the retiree drug subsidy tax in the health care legislation would impose an enormous hit on company financial statements as soon as the bill was signed into law,” Council President James A. Klein said today. “The recent announcements by major U.S. companies have captured Wall Street’s attention, while the Obama Administration fails to acknowledge their significance. Since the president has made clear that job creation is his top priority, we urge the Administration and Congress to remove this obstacle to economic recovery.

And …

“Over the next several days, many companies will be compelled to either take a hit on their earnings or decide to move retirees into the Medicare Part D program.” Klein said. “As our recent research report clearly shows, as more retirees are moved from employer plans to Medicare Part D, government outlays will increase, and the shift from employer retiree drug subsidy programs to Medicare Part D is likely to be significant. In the end, this so-called revenue raising provision may actually cost the government money.” A separate study, conducted by the Towers Watson consulting firm, reported that unless companies change their benefit plans, the aggregate accounting charge would be nearly $14 billion.

Safe prediction, Mr. Klein. Today’s news is: “Boeing Expects $150 Million Charge In 1Q For Health-Revamp Impact.” More …

• Wall Street Journal, “The ObamaCare Writedowns—II“
• John Fund, Wall Street Journal Political Diary, “Waxman Convenes the First Death Panel“
• Chicago Tribune, “Companies reveal big hits to earnings over health care“
• Newark Star Ledger, “Reform has firms rethinking benefits“

Two more critical views on the signing of the student loan natioanalization provisions of the heatlh care bill, objecting to the changes’ impact on educational quality:

Richard Vedder, a professor of economics at Ohio University and an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, “Over-educated and Over-indebted“:

[The] bill proceeds from a false premise. President Obama asserted Saturday that “by the end of this decade, we will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.” Putting aside the nasty reality of a 45 percent six year college drop-out rate, the Labor Department forecasts that, over the next decade, there will be fewer new jobs requiring college degrees than there will be new college graduates. This bill aggravates a costly and inefficient system, likely will raise tuition charges, and lead to more over-educated and over-indebted young Americans.

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), a former Secretary of Education, interviewed by National Review Online:

The American system of higher education has become the best in the world because of choice and competition. Unlike K-12, we give money to students and let them choose among schools, having the choice of private lenders or government lenders. That’s been the case for 20 years. (continue reading…)

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan was on NPR’s “All Things Considered” Tuesday, interviewed on the topic of the student loan nationalization program that President Obama signed into law earlier that day (as part of the health care reconciliation). In the interview, Duncan elevates government service over private sector employment, a world view that seems to be spreading with serious, negative implications for U.S. innovation and prosperity. From the transcript:

NORRIS: For students who already have guaranteed student loans, the changes will place in 2014, and at that point, students can cap their payments at a rate that’s equal to 10 percent of their discretionary income. That’s slightly lower than the cap right now. How do you prevent banks from trying to use that gap between now and when this new law will take effect to try to maximize their profits?

Sec. DUNCAN: Yeah, I don’t think they can do that, and what this really means, let me take a minute to explain to listeners that historically, there is always phenomenal talent, folks who graduated from college who wanted to go into the public sector, but because they had $60, $80, $100,000 worth of loans, they simply couldn’t follow their heart, couldn’t follow their passion. And so we lost a huge amount of that talent.

Now, across the board, loan repayments will be indexed to 10 percent of income. So it helps remove that barrier. But the thing I’m most excited about this: If you choose to go into the public sector, if you choose to become a teacher obviously I’m very biased there or work for the government or run a legal clinic in an impoverished community or help run a health care clinic if you’re coming out of law school or medical school, after 10 years, any debt you have, any remaining debt, will be absolutely forgiven, will be erased.

So this is a monumental breakthrough. It’s a huge chance for this next generation of, you know, hardworking, committed folks to come into public sector, come into education and make a difference and not have to take other jobs just because they pay more money.

Yes, very biased. It’s a strange idea — familiar in D.C., granted — that the nation is better served by encouraging college students to become government employees than enter the private sector.

In conceptually related news, The Washington Examiner reported Tuesday, “Good times for government workers as pay outpaces private sector.”

USA TODAY reported earlier in the month, “Federal pay ahead of private industry”

It’s not as if Craig Becker’s controversial record is going to disappear just because President Obama names him via recess appointment to the National Labor Relations Board.

From the National Right to Work Legal Foundation, a news release, “Legal Aid Foundation Demands Radical Obama-Recess Appointee to Recuse Himself from 12 Pending Cases“:

Washington, DC (March 29, 2010) – After President Barack Obama installed Service Employees International Union (SEIU) lawyer Craig Becker as a recess appointee to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on Saturday, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys are now filing 12 recusal motions asking Becker to step aside in any pending case involving the Foundation.

As associate general counsel of the SEIU, Becker directly litigated against Foundation attorneys and helped orchestrate legal strategies for SEIU affiliates across the United States, so he should recuse himself from cases involving the SEIU or its affiliates. Moreover, his published writings indicate an extreme level of hostility against the Foundation and its legal arguments on behalf of workers, even when the NLRB or United States Supreme Court have agreed and ruled against union officials for their abusive practices.

As the National Association of Manufacturers’ Keith Smith noted Monday, Becker told the U.S. Senate he would recuse himself only from pending cases involving the international unions of the SEIU and the AFL-CIO, his long-time employers. The NLRB’s activities are more likely to involve disputes between union locals and employers.

Employer groups strenuously opposed Becker’s nomination because his writing suggested a willingness to enact provisions of the Employee Free Choice Act through board action. Along those lines, the Right to Work Foundation also mentions the potential reversal of a key case that has helped prevent union abuse of the card check process of certifying union representation.

Union lawyers have devised a legal strategy to overturn Dana Corp, a landmark case won by Foundation attorneys in which the NLRB granted employees the ability to file a decertification petition and demand a secret ballot election to toss out union officials from their workplace within 45 days after an employer recognizes a monopoly bargaining agent by card check.

Former NLRB member John Raudabaugh cited the Dana/Metadyne case in a piece on the new NLRB for his lawfirm, Nixon Peabody:

Dana/Metaldyne. The Bush board modified the voluntary recognition bar doctrine (i.e., preventing rival petitions or a decertification petition for a reasonable period, approximately six months, following an employer’s voluntary recognition of a union by a majority of employee-signed cards or petition in an appropriate unit). The Dana/Metaldyne decision would attach a bar only if all employees were given notice of the voluntary recognition and of their right, within 45 days, to file a decertification petition or support a rival union petition with a minimum 30 percent of employees’ signatures, and no such petition(s) is filed. With organized labor’s press for the Employee Free Choice Act to, in part, equate voluntary recognition based on card signatures with a secret ballot NLRB-conducted election, card/check, and neutrality agreements, a Democrat majority NLRB may well overturn Dana/Metaldyne to remove any restrictions on voluntary recognition.

See also this memo from NLRB’s general counsel. The Wall Street Journal covered the Right to Work Foundation’s petition in, “NLRB Fight Begins Anew.”

Mark Hemingway of The Washington Examiner embarked Monday on a weeklong series of columns about the political power of organized labor, commenting that, “Whatever wants, labor gets.”  It’s hard to argue with the thesis when talking about the Obama Administration, but it’s not entirely true when elective representative bodies like the U.S. Senate are involved: Labor has not gotten the Employee Free Choice Act…so far.

Today’s column is “Big Labor fills the ranks of Big Government,” discussing the recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board, the confirmation of Patricia Smith to be the Department of Labor’s solicitor, and Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis herself.

On Monday, Hemingway wrote, “Stuffing union coffers with taxpayer cash,” leading with the example of the anti-democratic unionization of daycare workers in Michigan.

One day last fall, approximately 40,000 private day care owners in Michigan woke up to discover they had become members of a public sector union. Most had no idea what was coming.

Here’s how it happened: The United Auto Workers and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees worked with the Michigan Employment Relations Commission to conduct a vote-by-mail union election.

Of the 40,000 day care workers in the state, only 6,000 responded to the ballot they received in the mail. But that was enough for the state to declare all of the day care owners would henceforth be represented by the newly organized Child Care Providers Together Michigan union.

Governor Ted Kulongoski of Oregon and former Governor Eliot Spitzer of New York also signed executive orders to promote the unionization of private sector daycare workers in their respective states. (See Fordham Urban Law Journal.)

The actions by these governors, heavily supported by organized labor, seems even more economically ominous given a program included in the new health care law. Jeffrey Birnbaum in The Washington Times reports on the issue in a column, “The not-so-Class Act“:

The health legislation signed into law last week by President Obama includes a provision called the CLASS Act, which provides long-term care at home. Few people know about it, but experts agree that it could well explode the federal budget deficit down the road.

The Community Living Services and Support (CLASS) Act was designed to assist people who need help with basic daily tasks and are willing to pay for in-home assistance. The plan, which was long championed by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, would, in effect, enable elderly and disabled people to stay out of nursing homes.

People who paid into the program for five years could qualify for federal subsidies to purchase in-home care. As Birnbaum argues, laudable goals but fiscally unsustainable. We predict when the rules are written, the only in-home care providers eligible for the program will be subject to (forced into) union membership. The SEIU smiles.

Former Vice President Al Gore seizes on enactment of the health care law as the example of sweeping change he hopes to accomplish by limiting the emissions produced by economic activity.
In an e-mail to subscribers to the Repower America list, entitled, “The fierce urgency of NEXT,” the Veep says:

Health care reform is the law of the land, and its inspiring passage has made one thing clear: At this moment in America, sweeping change really is possible.

And sweeping change is exactly what it will take to address the climate crisis and fight for clean energy here at home and around the world.

That’s why we need to seize this new momentum right now. Repower America has a strong game plan to make this happen in the weeks ahead — but we can’t do it without your participation and your support.

In recognition of this crucial moment, a generous donor has agreed to match every gift we receive between now and midnight on March 31st dollar-for-dollar.

So donate now.