The AFL-CIO blog is reporting on the union-funded Economic Policy Institute’s “Spotlight on the Jobs Crisis” panel discussion this morning, a gathering of “progressive” leaders. Speakers are: Richard L. Trumka, AFL-CIO president; Deepak Bhargava, Executive Director of the Center for Community Change; Wade Henderson, the president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR); Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and CEO the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; EPI President Lawrence Mishel; andJanet Murguía, President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Council of La Raza.

Trumka’s jobs agenda appears to be an agenda for government jobs:

Trumka is proposing five steps to help end the nation’s ongoing jobs crisis. In the face of a 10 percent official unemployment rate and millions more underemployed or struggling with long-term unemployment, Trumka says, we need immediate action to put people back to work. The five key steps are:

1. Extend the lifeline for jobless workers.

2. Rebuild America’s schools, roads and energy systems.

3. Increase aid to state and local governments to maintain vital services

4. Fund jobs in our communities.

5. Put TARP funds to work for Main Street.

Too general to critique, and there could well be good projects amid the government spending — infrastructure, for example. But the Workforce Fairness Institute notes that the AFL-CIO’s oft-stated priority is the Employee Free Choice, the forced unionization “card check” legislation. WFI issued a statement this morning from its executive director, Katie Packer:

In a comedic yet troubling display of hypocrisy, Richard Trumka will announce this morning “bold, quick action to put people back to work.”  And his solution? A bill that would kill 600,000 jobs in the first year alone.  Trumka’s solution to double-digit, historic unemployment is support for job-killing legislation that will only put more people out of work and force our nation’s top job producers – small businesses – to close their doors.  Union bosses have demonstrated a willingness to distort the truth in order to get the “payback” they believe they are owed in the form of the Employee ‘Forced’ Choice Act.  The notion that this legislation would do anything but further damage our economy is complete nonsense.

UPDATE (11:10): Video of Trumka’s remarks is here. He does indeed make a quick reference to the Employee Free Choice Act, urging its passage. The interesting thrust of the AFL-CIO program is that it relies entirely on the government. The private sector barely enters into his discussion, except as a recipient of government funds.

A former NLRB member and now labor lawyer, Peter Kirsanow blogs over at NRO’s The Corner , noting the NAACP’s endorsement of the Employee Free Choice Act and pointing out some of the consequences of a card check system that its proponents  might not have considered.

Joe is one of 7 blacks out of 38 workers at a casting plant. He doesn’t have much seniority because he just came to the plant after working for the last 12 years at a bearings manufacturer that recently closed.

 Joe suspects most of his co-workers don’t want a union because they’ve seen other plants in the area shut down operations and move to states with lower average labor costs. Joe’s in favor of the union because he thinks it will mean higher wages for someone like him.

 Joe’s the only black employee on second shift. At lunch one day, a co-worker approaches him and in front of everyone in the break room asks Joe to sign an authorization card. Joe begins to reach for a pen but hesitates when he senses his co-workers watching him. He declines to sign.

 EFCA could put any employee in the uncomfortable position of making a public declaration that might be opposed by his employer, co-workers, or union organizers. The fact that the employee is new or a minority in the workplace doesn’t do much to lessen that discomfort. You’d think that if any organization would recognize that fact it would be one that purports to advance the interests of minorities.

It’s unfortunate that groups like the NAACP who have been such adamant champions of protecting voting rights would now wish to  abandon the secret ballot, in the process exposing workers to intimidation in the workplace.