AFL-CIO Threatens To Primary Tim Johnson Over CEO Pay

Source: Huffington Post

WASHINGTON -- The nation's largest labor union on Friday threatened to challenge the powerful chairman of the Senate Banking Committee in the 2014 elections, if he allows a key set of new executive pay regulations be weakened.

The surprising remark occurred during a panel discussion moderated by The Huffington Post at the Social Investment Forum Conference. The summit was attended by hundreds of socially conscious investors ranging from religious groups like the Unitarian Church to high-profile investment houses like Mesirow Financial.

During the panel, a top technocrat on the Banking Committee, General Counsel Dean Shahinian warned that investors may have to accept a weaker-than-anticipated version of new disclosures on CEO pay mandated by last year's Wall Street reform bill. Shahinian also acknowledged that his boss, committee chairman Sen. Tim Johnson (D-S.D.), would be willing to re-open last year's landmark legislation and rewrite some aspects of the law if bipartisan political consensus about some measures could be established.

AFL-CIO Special Policy Counsel Damon Silvers immediately interrupted Shahinian: "I think Senator Johnson needs to think about his political future," he said. The audience of potential campaign contributors let out an audible gasp.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/10/afl-cio-tim-johnson-primary-ceo-pay_n_875009.html

Actions, votes, constituent Support will get you reelected, NOT just having a "D" attached. That party is Over, a thing of the Past ladies and gentlemen. You have taught us Well "Corp Dems" and Now it's our turn to educate You!

Yet, in Massachusetts, they let anti-collective bargaining legislation go through a Democratic Legislature and a Democratic Governor with nary a demonstration or a speech. No resistance whatever. Very unlike Wisconsin.

So, does organized labor really mean it? And, if it does, how will Democrats respond?

Stay tuned.

Mass. enjoy playing with fire? If so, they (and we) may all get burned.

I don't know the folks in MA and to be honest did not follow that particular outrage .... so many outrages, so little time....

But that would be my guess. It's really too bad, in all senses of the phrase. One really does have to wonder what it is about where the arithmetic of "politically possible" and "least worst" has left Labor that they don't get.

Tearing down the democratic party from the top down.

I'm just wondering if this is a real dissolution, or have they (for instance) just
simply united with the DNC? I have stopped making donations to both the DNC and DLC.
For the time being, I will be making donations to individual politicians of my choice only.

People have started to figure out that the same globalist, "free" traitor outlook that dominates the GOP, also dominates many of the centrist DLC faithful. The go alongs, don't just get along in Washington...they get over. The Joe LIEberman democrats can't do anything that would hurt their own best interests in any way, ever, country and it's voters be damned. The corporations money/agenda has infiltrated infected and compromised both major parties. Corporate greed has divided and conquered our entire political system to the point that it might bring down the entire house of cards faster than corporate stupidity. WHO do you trust these days? Who CAN you trust?

I get tired of paying elected people to lie to me and try to cheat me and to do things that hurt the country instead of helping it heal it's many wounds. I get tired of going to vote for the "best man/woman" only to find out that it's the same old shit after the election. Maybe the politicians are the ones who need to take a lie detector test and random drug tests? After all, the people we elect, do have important jobs. You test a bus driver before you let him haul a load of people. Why shouldn't you test the people who hold the keys to the nukes and who make the laws we are to live by, the very people who sent our kids off to Iraq and Afghanistan and still haven't brought them home. Were Bush and Cheney drunk or on mind boggling drugs when they sat around and decided to invade Iraq, spend another Trillion dollars and over 4,000 service men and women lives on a knee jerk, preemptive, cluster-fuk?

I'll say again I'm tired of being lied to. The truth might hurt sometimes, but it's about time for the fools in DC to get real because OUR country is balling the jack toward even bigger twoubles, on the shit Creek express. I think the engineers could see farther up the line, with their heads out of their "reality creating" ass.

operating under different labels.

Are they now the "New Democrats"? Or am I mistaken?

Sure they did.

Uh-huh.

Get rid of all the DINOS!

DUMP DIANNE it read

...like the GO(B)P Party has exterminated their RINOs...

Time for true Dems/Libs/Progressives to rid ourselves of the DINOs.

Again, BRAVO!

Thanks for the thread, kpete.

It makes me nervous to hear that the Labor Unions are becoming so independent, because the repugs have never done anything positive for labor. And of course, kill unions is a repug mantra shouted by Reagan and carried on by the minions. Having said that, It is time that labor started exerting its voice again. We need unions to be strong, in order to rebuild the middle class. So good, I sure hope the DEMS get the message. It requires a backbone to do hard labor, it is time for the DEMS to take up society's burdens and grow one.

The banks, that's who. Go to opensecrets.org and see who owns Tim.

respect, trust and -- more members and a bigger voice in our national affairs.

Timidity does not pay in politics.

Maybe if enough of us start making it crystal clear to the pretend Dems that we mean business they'll stop taking us for granted.

now we are stuck with Boozman because she didn't have any money left to challenge the R in the general. It has made the unions look bad here, i.e, that we are ineffective, and are working for the R's, because it certainly has helped the Rs here, not the Ds. I'm conflicted over this. Of course, we only had 45 days to mount a campaign. Do it now rather than working under such a crunch.

her loss was a foregone conclusion...If they had come out and supported the progressive, the outcome would have been entirely different.

Almost the same thing happened in MA. The DLC was living in a third way delusion after their incredible success with 0. After the last election debacle, when everyone thought Dems and Pugs were the same, they "dissolved". However the lesson learned was that many bluedogs lost their seats as pugs prefer real Pugs, while the DLC pretended this did not happen and was not the reason for the huge losses.

Along comes Keith and Rachel who explains everything, so even a political novice can understand.

"Unable to win over Lincoln, the AFL-CIO spent millions of dollars supporting progressive Democratic challenger Bill Halter in the 2010 primaries. Halter lost the primary, but the divided Democratic base caused Lincoln to suffer a landslide loss in the general election."

And then there is Lieberman mentioned above. Lost the primary. Ran as independent. Won the election.

The Republicans put up several RINO-busters that were unelectable. Is that really a good example to follow?

Spin will not work here. You are leaving out several cogent factors that do not support your argument.

sez Sen. Johnson's lackey:


Shahinian responded that Silvers' comment was "inappropriate" for the panel, but the union lawyer did not apologize.

Instead, he instructed Shahinian to consider "the recent personal history of Blanche Lincoln." The AFL-CIO is widely credited with ruining any chance the former Democratic senator from Arkansas had of winning reelection in 2010. Walmart, the world's largest retailer. is headquartered in Lincoln's state, and the labor union had repeatedly objected to her positions on key workers' rights issues.

I find this quite refreshing.No DINOS need apply

Did any of you all for this idea bother to look at where Tim Johnson is from? South Dakota, my home state. There is NO ONE else in state politics here who has the track record, familiarity and moderate Democratic stance that South Dakotans will elect. Hell, Stephanie Herseth, as big of a blue dog as they come, was thrown out for a tea partier...it was only because he wasn't up for reelection this past time that he wasn't replaced with another tea bagger hypocrite.

If he is 'primaried' then enjoy one less Democrat in the senate, you'll get someone like Thune...enjoy that.

but the majority are owned by Wall Street.

Did you even read my post? I guess all democrats must fit the far left mold. I am very liberal myself but face reality, if you get rid of him you WILL get a teabagger to replace him...this is victory? You go right ahead and try and elect a liberal democrat in South Dakota, pump all your money into it...its a waste of freakin' time and money. Sometimes a blue dog is the best a conservative state can do.

Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face...no wonder our wonderful democratic party is doing such a piss poor job, we always shoot ourselves in the foot.