Someone needs to send NBC’s Lee Cowen a copy of the constitution.

You may well have heard that Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has supposedly decided to appoint former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris to Barack Obama’s senate seat. I just watched Lee Cowen speculate that the U.S. Senate may just have to accept this because, after all, Blagojevich is the legally elected governor of Illinois and he has the sole power to decide this, in spite of Harry Reid’s objects.

Um, no.

Given the nature of this scandal, one might have thought that reporters covering the story would take two minutes to brush up on the appropriate section of the constitution. Since Mr. Cowen didn’t bother, I’ll provide this to any member of the media who wants to comment on this news story. It’s Article I, Section 5 of the U.S. constitution:

Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members, and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, and under such penalties as each House may provide.

Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a member.

Each House shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may in their judgment require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either House on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.

Neither House, during the session of Congress, shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.

Andrew Sullivan provides a clear, cutting explication of why Dick Cheney should be prosecuted for the crimes he has committed as veep. Definitely worth a read.

Why on earth is Tom Cruise portraying Claus von Stauffenberg in Valkyrie? What a bad choice. Then, on top of it, to have him with this dainty little eye patch? Insulting. von Stauffenberg was pretty seriously disfigured by the time he participated in the plot to kill Hitler. He was missing a hand, missing fingers from the other one, and wasn’t without scars elsewhere. He wasn’t a ramrod straight military officer with a dainty little eye patch.

I have watched with growing frustration over the last couple of weeks as grossly inaccurate figures about the pay of UAW workers have been tossed around on the airwaves and in print. I know that the $70 an hour figure that you hear all the time is bullshit. I was pretty sure that the average union worker makes less than half that. I tried looking through the UAW’s website, but the papers I found dealt more with average union wages than Big 3 wages. I tried checking to see if my dad could put me in contact with one of his UAW contacts, but haven’t had much luck there. I did this in the hope of writing an editorial that would debunk all of the anti-union crap that’s been floating around. Well, Jonathan Cohn at The New Republic wrote that article for me. It’s really a worthwhile read even for people who are knowledgeable about these things. Some highlights:

Average UAW wages at a Big 3 automaker are $28 an hour. That compares to an estimated $24-$25 an hour at non-union plants in the south for automakers like Toyota, BMW, etc.

To cut that gap, the UAW’s 2007 labor agreement with the Big 3 introduced a two tier wage system. Essentially, new hires are going to be paid less than current hires for the same work.

I think the whole media coverage on this has been one of the most blatant pieces of classist, anti-blue collar bias by the media that I’ve seen in quite some time.

This is a press release from the CWA:

Judge Slams CNN for Illegal Firing of NABET-CWA Members

In a major victory for NABET-CWA members who worked at CNN, a
National Labor Relations Board administrative law judge issued a
scathing decision against the cable network and ordered that 110
workers be rehired, the union recognized and their economic
losses restored.

CNN violated federal labor law and the legal rights of more than
250 workers at the Washington, D.C., and New York bureaus by
using a phony reorganization scheme for the sole purpose of
eliminating their NABET-CWA representation, the administrative
law judge found.

In late 2003, CNN terminated its more than 20-year contract with
Team Video Services, which employed union camera operators,
broadcast engineers and other technicians for CNN, in effect,
firing more than 110 workers. The network claimed it would
create its own unit of employees, however, Judge Arthur J.
Amchan called that unit a “sham,” used to get rid of employees
and their union. CNN’s goal was to “achieve a nonunion technical
work force in its Washington, D.C., and New York bureaus.” CNN’s
“widespread and egregious misconduct” showed a flagrant and
general disregard for employees’ fundamental rights, he said.

Noting that the case goes back nearly five years, CWA President
Larry Cohen stated: “This is a prime example of the way that
justice comes far too late, if at all, under our labor law
system. These workers never should have lost their bargaining
rights or their jobs, and it wouldn’t have happened if we had
the Employee Free Choice Act. What’s more, CNN has said it will
appeal this ruling. This should fire us up even more to fight to
strengthen workers’ bargaining rights.”

One of the fired workers, Jimmy Suissa, worked for CNN for 17
years, starting as a camera operator, but mastering nearly every
technical job in the Washington bureau, from running the audio
and video boards to technical director. “Many of us rotated
through these positions and that’s why we knew that CNN’s claims
that we weren’t able to learn new equipment were completely
false,” he said.

It was very stressful and difficult in the month leading up to
the point when CNN began firing workers, he said. And it was
clear that anyone associated with the union or providing
representation to workers on the job wasn’t going to be rehired
into the new non-union workplace.

Suissa said the process was disheartening because it took so
long to resolve. “It’s hard to find a job to replace the work I
was doing, and I’ve been making less money over these past
years,” he said.

Sarah Pacheco joined CNN as a videographer and worked at the
Washington bureau from 1990 to 2003, and she also was an active
and aggressive union steward. Despite acknowledged experience in
non-linear editing, a skill CNN management claimed was necessary
when it rejected other applicants, Pacheco was not rated among
the top 55 applicants. A “lack of people skills” described by
management likely “is related to her aggressiveness as a union
steward for (NABET-CWA) Local 31,” the judge wrote.

“I applied to Time Warner (CNN’s parent company) but never was
called,” she said. “This decision is tremendous and a validation
of our long fight,” she said.

The judge’s order calls for reinstatement and full back pay for
more than 110 employees, with training for those rehired, if
necessary, restoration of union representation and terms of the
former collective bargaining agreement, and the return of
bargaining unit work that has been outsourced since the
termination of the Team Video contracts.

Rachel Maddow credits the head of the Steelworkers’ Union (my dad’s union) with the following quote on the classism involved with bailouts and bailout politics:

“The people who take a shower before work get bailed out. The people who have to take a shower after work get thrown out.”

I’d like to point out that the sacrifice we’re asking of the top leadership on Wall Street and at the car companies includes things like not taking their million dollar bonuses, not flying in private jets, and not going on extravagant corporate retreats. The sacrifice that we’re asking of the line workers at GM, Ford, and Chrysler is their health care and their retirement security.

The following is an editor’s note from InformationWeek’s daily email newsletter. This particular one is focused on IT and Software, but the same can be said for all sorts of industries.

Editor’s Note

GM’s Death Would Hurt The IT Industry

The mob is waving its torches and shouting, “Let them die! Let those fat-cat, private-jet flying dinosaurs collapse in a heap of rust dust!” Based on what I’ve read on some social networking sites, some of the most opinionated on this topic reside in Silicon Valley. Yeah, okay, let GM or another U.S. automaker go under…and then watch how that impacts the industry you work in.

It sure is nauseating to watch automaker CEOs fly into Washington on private jets only to grovel for money. And yes, I know, the tech industry is so cool and so hip and so NOW, while the manufacturers that helped make this country are so…yesterday.

But the breezy, who-gives-a-frick attitude about the U.S. auto industry supposedly on the edge of collapse? Wow. That’s just plain foolish.

It’s hard to get automaker CIOs to reveal specific IT budget numbers, but for those readers that make their paychecks as a result of the IT industry, I’d like to share with you some things I’ve learned.

Companies such as IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and EDS currently benefit from sizeable chunks of $15 billion in IT services contracts GM doled out a few years ago–and that’s just for the services. Software companies big and small are part of the GM ecosystem. GM spends millions, if not billions, on Oracle software licenses every year. iRise, a California-based maker of visualization software, has GM as a marquee customer. And JDA Software now has GM as a customer through its acquisition of i2 Technologies.

GM’s OnStar accident-response system, which handles 70,000 calls a day in the U.S. from GM drivers in need of help, is powered by databases, servers and other technologies from Oracle’s BEA Systems, Sun Microsystems, and HP.

While Ford says it’s not in as bad a shape as GM, Microsoft and Ford have a cool, positive thing going with their Sync partnership.

These are just little tidbits gleaned from my own reporting. The big picture is that the auto industry spends billions and billions and billions of dollars each year on IT. And it has thousands of suppliers that spend billions and billions on IT, too.

Heck, I personally don’t know that taxpayers should bail out the automakers, not having had the hours to study their claims. But those Washington politicos whom are responsible for listening and studying the situation should put disgust, emotion, and partisan politics aside, and use their noggins to answer these questions: 1) What is the actual likelihood that GM and/or Chrysler will “fail” without aid, and what would this “failure” look like; 2) Is pointing them toward bankruptcy protection a reasonable alternative, and 3) If Congress awards aid, what sort of conditions could they attach to it so that any other in-trouble industry would view a similar aid request as a highly unpalatable, last-resort choice?

What do you think? If the automakers fail, how would that effect the IT industry? Let us know.

Mary Hayes Weier

…in the Obama transition appears to be Doris Kearns Goodwin. I swear sometimes I feel like one more mention of “team of rivals” in any news article will send me over the edge.

While I’m talking about things I’m sick of in the media, there’s also an aspect to the potential GM bailout that really bugs me. No one seems to challenge the assertions made by pundits from the Wall Street Journal, Heritage Foundation, etc who claim that the UAW has some responsibility for this mess. Union auto workers have seen their numbers and their standard of living decline for forty years. I’ve seen some of these guys tell some damn misleading stories about the role of the UAW in GM’s fortunes. Autoworkers build the cars. They don’t design the cars. They don’t source the parts. They don’t decide how the cars go together. When the company shuts your plant down or lays you off, you don’t get paid. I watched my UAW uncles not get paid by Ford for years in the late 70s and early 80s. I watched them lose their homes and their cars and one of their marriages. I watched one of my uncles work for years at less than half of his UAW wage laying coaxial cable until Ford had recovered enough to hire him back.

The difference between UAW workers and other manufacturing workers in this country is really just that the UAW has had some say in how much they’ve lost over the last forty years.

Rachel Maddow takes apart the argument that Democrats should play nice with Joe Lieberman to get a sixty seat majority in the senate. Brilliant, but you really need to watch the whole six minutes.

Unfortunately the media plugin I’m using doesn’t seem to work with MSNBC’s embedded video code. Here’s a link instead.

I have developed an ongoing fascination with Chuck Hagel over the last couple of years. He’s a principled guy. When I say that, I mean in it in almost precisely the opposite of how most ideologues and partisans mean the word when they use it. I bought his book, America: Our Next Chapter this summer, but had a hard time reading it. I eventually did read most of it, but skipped a few chapters. It was terribly pedestrian. Hagel, however smart he may be, is no intellectual. Even with a co-author who no doubt did the heavy lifting of putting Hagel’s thoughts to paper, it often comes off like a high school student’s “write your own biography” assignment. You need not be an intellectual to be smart and to be shrewd. Tonight, I read an interesting portrait of Hagel that came out in the New Yorker just before the election. It’s worth checking out.