This infuriates me...

(CNSNews.com) –Speaking at the Daimler Detroit Diesel Plant in Redford, Mich., on Monday, President Barack Obama lashed out at the Michigan legislature, which is preparing to pass a right-to-work law, and declared that Americans only needed to look at Michigan if they wanted to see how unions helped build the middle class.

“These so called right to work laws, they don’t have to do with economics,” Obama said. "They have everything to do with politics.

"What they’re really  talking about is giving you the right to work for less money," said Obama. "You only  have to look to Michigan where workers were instrumental in reviving the  auto industry to see how unions have helped build not just a stronger  middle class but a stronger America.”

Riiiight.

This is what closed shop union shop laws protect:

These workers appealed and were reinstated at their positions.

After being followed and caught on camera getting boozed up and then immediately returning to work. 

Repeatedly.

It is a fact that unions in Michigan in particular have destroyed entire industries, say much less individual firms.  The record goes back decades.

There was a time in this country when labor unions were necessary -- when real honest-to-god sweatshops existed in the nation.  But over time labor unions in both the public and private sectors have evolved into leeches that make impossible-to-meet demands that they know are mathematically impossible to sustain (such as pensions including retiree health care) and then bludgeon management (including cities, counties and states) into acceptance of the impossible under threat of strike, and being a closed-shop union-shop state they are able to prevent the mass-firing of the entire lot of workers and their replacement with non-union employees.

This then ultimately leads to the collapse of the company in question.  When it happens in the private sector those who thought they had "protected" pensions and retiree health care get buttraped and the business disappears, with the pension being dumped into the PBGC, which by law can only pay what is actually there.  The union bosses who negotiated these fraudulent deals are never prosecuted and imprisoned for their knowingly-bogus math and projections, and neither is management for acquiescing -- but both point fingers at the other.

When the institution is a government such as a city, school system, fire or police department then its even worse.  The union points to alleged "constitutional protections" that they managed to get written into the law, making the entire process fraudulent as there never was a true adversarial negotiation in the first place.

This ultimately leads to attempts to dramatically increase taxes.  But taxes can be legally avoided; people can move, for instance, and the producers who pay those taxes do move!  Now you're screwed -- the union has "negotiated" the impossible and when it comes time to pay the money doesn't exist.  Again, they did this knowingly and intentionally, yet nobody is ever indicted and jailed for fraud.

Closed-shop laws are an anachronism that must disappear.  Michigan is taking a necessary and long-overdue step, and Obama is simply full of crap.

As for organizing cops, firefighters and teachers (along with any other public employees) -- that should be a felony.

And when you, as a government official, irrespective of your title, support and promote intentionally fraudulent projections that lead to the bankruptcy of firms and even entire governmental units, you are in fact a douche and I, for one, am not afraid to call you what you are.