RUBBER ROOMS 

I've told you about the union atrocity in New York otherwise known as "rubber rooms." This is where union teachers are paid to sit in a room doing crossword puzzles and playing grab-ass. It is a joke that is funded by taxpayer dollars -- $40.5 million just last year -- thanks to the teachers unions that have made it virtually impossible to fire a government school employee. New York is in quite a budget crunch right now, to put it mildly. There's $40.5 million right there that they could use! But they won't. In fact, it is about to get worse ......

Lawmakers in New York realized the "brilliance" of this rubber room idea. So now they want to apply the same concept to all government workers. Democrats in the state legislature have already advanced legislation, which is being called the "Rubber Rooms for All Act." The bill is being introduced by Governmental Employees Chairman Peter Abbate Jr., who proclaims to be "the unions' bulldog." The bill would get rid of any in-house disciplinary proceedings for all government workers accused of wrong-doing. Instead workers would be entitled to a ruling by an "independent" arbitrator that would then have to be approved by the employer AND the employee. There is no provision to break any sort of stalemate between employer and employee, meaning that employees could sit in these "rubber rooms" indefinitely, and still collect a pay check. In other words - load down the system with so much red tape that it isn't worth the time to try and fire someone.

Remember, one of Barack Obama's goals in his quest to "fundamentally transform" the United States is to increase unionization in all areas. Who knows? Maybe one day you will be able to sit in a rubber room collecting a pay check for doing absolutely nothing.