Vote for Mitt or Else… Horrible Bosses, Entitlement & the Culture of Bullies …

Mitt Romney's son Josh went viral for his "death stare" during the last debate.

“Vote for Mitt Romney of you’ll lose your job!” That’s the essence of the message handed out over the past couple of weeks by employers including The Koch Brothers at Georgia Pacific, timeshare mogul David Siegel, and Florida software company ASG Solutions. And these are just the ones we know about. It’s a shocking trend really, with heavy-handed dictatorial overtones that hearken back to menacing banana republic regimes. When I first heard about these tactics, I was sure they could not be legal. Turns out they are. Mostly. Depending on where you live, horrible bosses are usually protected under free speech rights. In some places it is actually illegal since states with stronger unions tend to have more worker protections (note to self: vote NO on Prop 32!!!) In California for example the law says:
“no employer shall coerce or influence or attempt to coerce or influence his employees through or by means of threat of discharge or loss of employment to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or following any particular course or line of political action or political activity.”
But most legal experts say, that in most of the country employers representing private companies can get away with this. So, until the ACLU, NAACP or The Federalist Society challenge the practice on the basis of creating a threatening work environment, undue influence or some other common sense principal, horrible bosses will hide behind first amendment rights in order to bully workers!

As if that wasn’t bad enough – the plot thickens! In a story that got incredibly little play, InThese Times reporter Mike Elk on Thursday, published a recording of a newly uncovered audio tape of Governor Mitt Romney asking business owners to coerce their employees to vote for him! Speaking to the conservative group National Federation of Independent Business, this is what Mitt said:
“I hope you make it very clear to your employees what you believe is in the best interest of your enterprise and therefore their job and their future in the upcoming elections. Nothing illegal about you talking to your employees about what you believe is best for the business, because I think that will figure into their election decision, their voting decision and of course doing that with your family and your kids as well.”
Think about what that means. It means that this sudden wave of CEOs threatening their employees is not coincidental. It is orchestrated by Willard Romney himself. In my opinion, this culture of bullying bodes ill for our democracy – legal or not! I’m reminded of Tagg Romney. the Governor’s son, saying he wanted to take a swing at the President…The apple don’t fall far from the tree. I’m reminded of “prankster” Mitt in high school (also a son-of-a-governor,) organizing a mob of other entitled young rich kids to beat up a kid they considered an outsider. I’m reminded of Mitt the debater, interrupting, disrespecting and bossing around the moderators. Willard the candidate, disrespecting, patronizing, and attempting to bully both the office of the president and the President himself…And in doing so being declared a “winner.” (Even Vice President Joe Biden went a bit far with that strategy, and was also declared a winner…Though at least he h ad the facts right, and didn’t boss around the moderator.)

Imagine if Hugo Chavez or Jimmy Hoffa used such strong-arm moves and threatened workers. The conservative right would be screaming from the rooftops about socialism or spewing stereotypes about corrupt union bosses (note to self: Vote no on Prop 32!!)But in the culture of bullies, the entitled wealthy, white male has a different set of rules from everyone else…Or he makes them up as he goes along. He changes his story, changes the rules, even changes his position on the issues and expects zero accountability.

In the second debate President Barack Obama showed us how it should be done, Standing firm, pushing back with real time fact checking, but never disrespecting or bullying either the moderator or his opponent (and the right still tried to tag him an “angry Black man!) The president stood on principal, facts and fairness. And we all must follow suit. Otherwise our society sends the message that the biggest bully wins. The fattest checkbook has the loudest voice, & the horrible bosses can impose a reign of economic terror like so many feudal lords in a democratic society.

That is Willard’s way. And that is why, you can be sure, if you elect Romney & his billionaire boys club on November 6th you can look forward to a society where the weak will inherit…nothing but a higher tax burden and less opportunity! And Goliath will disguise his tax cut for the rich as a “rate reduction” while continuing to tuck his nifty profits into off shore bank accounts. Mitts America is a land where “create 12 million jobs” means minimum wage jobs, for horrible bosses, without the benefits of union protection or living wages. It is a grim terrain where seniors are left to fend for themselves while Medicare & Social Security come under henchman Paul Ryan’s ready budget knife. In Mitt’s America “equal pay for women” means looking at a binder full of babes while rejecting the Lilly Ledbetter Act that makes equal pay the law of the land. In his reality stay-at-home-moms are considered slothful moochers unless they have wealthy husbands. And the only “people” who get a safety net are corporations, actual people, with pulses and heartbeats, get vouchers and programs cuts. Mitt’s America is a land of double talk, and double standards. It is a culture of bullies…That’s the Willard way…Vote for me…Or else? Does that sound like something that should be happening is a free country?