Main Street

Pictures on the Wall

A long story about the gains that unions and working people have made under the Obama administration ends with a telling anecdote:

OSHA’s acting director, Jordan Barab, signaled a new tone at the agency in a speech to the Wisconsin AFL-CIO last month. One of the first things he did when he arrived, Barab said, was to replace pictures of OSHA managers displayed in a conference room with photos of workers who had been killed on the job.

What could be a better reminder of why OSHA staff go to work each day? Pictures on the wall are symbols, but powerful ones that speak directly to the priorities of the organization as a whole.

And those priorities, extending beyond OSHA, are seen in many ways—and have corporations and anti-worker voices squealing. They got used to having everything their way with the active help of the Bush administration, and now they see any challenge to their power as terribly unfair politicizing and an unlevel playing field and it’s just so unfair. But then, to them—to the Chamber of Commerce and WalMart and just about any company faced with the prospect of workers speaking with a united voice and an administration that actually enforces the laws that protect working people—anything less than a Mt. Everest slope in their favor is unfair.