Today, under the watch of another Democratic President and a Democratic majority in the Senate, the NLRB is now in danger of being completely stripped of its authority. The protections that workers fought and died for, already diminished by subsequent legislation and court decisions, will soon disappear if the Senate fails to confirm the president’s nominees before its summer recess. [...]Cohen was at Netroots Nation in San Jose this year, and sat down with Daily Kos to talk about the NLRB and the filibuster and the long-term project by the far-right, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and elected officials to whittle away at our democracy:If the Senate does not act, we’ll soon be celebrating Labor Day without any labor law. Zero enforcement and no protections for 80 million American workers in the private sector.
This conspiracy—it is a conspiracy—between corporate laywers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the right-wing media, and the Senate minority all working together, and judges—all kinds of judges that were appointed in the last ten years—it is a conspiracy that has basically shut down the ability of the Obama government to govern. Even within the White House there are people who say "we can't rock the boat, we won't get anything done." This is like a sinking, sinking, sinking ship. [...] It's central to the larger [income inequality] fight, it's central to the conspiracy that's working against us, that's been working against us for decades. [...] They've had a 40-year plan and they're winning at it, when they lose every election. [...] This is not democracy.It's not democracy. And Senate Democrats can fix it, but they have to be pushed. When they return to work next week, the NRLB appointments, as well as three other executive nominations, wait for them. Senate Republicans are likely to block at least several of these nominees. Democrats are going to have to decide what to do about it, whether they'll finally put an end to the painless filibuster Republican's have used to shut down the Senate.