Also today:  ▪  This holiday season, working families deserve better than Wal-Mart -- Wake-Up Wal-Mart and the UFCW has been urging holiday shoppers to consider the impact on their communities of patronizing Wal-Mart. The campaign to urge Wal-Mart to do the right thing and change for the better has taken several forms, and you are urged to participate!

Reminder:  ▪  Support Goodyear strikers (USW) at leaflet events Saturday across state
▪  At AFL-CIO Now -- Join Goodyear workers in Day of Action -- Hundreds of striking Goodyear workers and their supporters plan to set the record straight about what’s really happening at the giant tire maker. On Dec. 16, the United Steelworkers are holding a National Day of Action, when they will hand out leaflets at 127 stores across the country that sell Goodyear tires.
▪  In today's Topeka C-J -- Goodyear workers feel betrayed by company (op-ed) -- We need Goodyear to keep its retirement promises and invest here, in American workers and American factories.

Local news: 
▪  In today's Kitsap Sun -- Ferry election will be open to all voters in Kitsap -- Kitsap Transit Director Dick Hayes wants area taxpayers to subsidize private passenger-only ferry service, but is forfeiting state money in order to run the new boats without maritime unions. Aiming to avoid an election defeat like Kitsap's 61% rejection of a similar proposal in 2003, Hayes & Co. hoped to gerrymander the service district, but that plan now appears to have been nixed.
▪  In today's Spokesman-Review -- Better nursing home care tied to patients' wealth -- Patients in homes that serve high numbers of Medicaid clients are more likely to suffer from poor quality care, resulting in an unequal system that unfairly penalizes poor seniors and their families.
▪  In today's Seattle P-I -- Boeing laptop stolen; 382,000 IDs lost -- Company promises free 3-year credit monitoring for past and present employees whose personal information was compromised.
▪  In today's News Tribune -- Light rail here would mean trade-offs -- Sound Transit is moving toward extending the light-rail line south to Tacoma-area riders, but getting it built presents headaches.
▪  In today's Everett Herald -- Everett Massacre site draws fire once again -- Burlington Northern plans a 10,000-cubic-yard earthen berm (1,000 dump trucks worth) near the historic site.

Legislative news:
▪  In today's Seattle P-I -- Gregoire plans viaduct verdict by year's end -- The governor's first-of-its-kind decision will change the face of Seattle's waterfront, affect how people move in and out of its downtown and trigger a battle between the city and the state. (No pressure.)
▪  In yesterday's Columbian -- Restraint in good times pays off when road rocky (Brunell column) -- The announcement that state workers' comp and UI rates will be lower is good news for employers, workers and their families, but lawmakers must be careful not to add costs to either system.
▪  In today's Seattle P-I -- "Responsible" fund (editorial) -- Gregoire's proposal for a constitutionally protected fund to help the state in budget storms is a solid idea. We think voters will support it.
▪  In yesterday's Columbian -- Sen. Don Benton interviews to be county's lobbyist -- But he stops short of saying he would resign from the Legislature if Clark County hires him.

National news:
▪  At AFL-CIO Now -- Who owns the media? Labor demands diversity -- Consolidation has caused increasing lack of diversity, both in the content produced and those producing it.  Learn more.
▪  In the USA Yesterday -- Reject flawed trade deals (Sweeney op-ed) -- Without dramatic changes in trade policy, we will continue to hemorrhage good jobs, while corporations take advantage of workers whose basic human rights are violated daily.
▪  In today's Washington Post -- Inequality and health care (editorial) -- This nation's individualistic system goes a long way toward explaining the "middle-class squeeze." Workers' compensation may be rising, but health benefits gobble up an increasing share of that, so wages lag.
▪  In today's Oregonian -- A promising approach to health care for all (editorial) -- An Oregon Senate panel's health-care reform framework could lead the nation in groundbreaking social change.
▪  Today from AP -- Postal workers' union rejoins AFL-CIO (brief) -- The 50,000-member National Postal Mail Handlers Union, part of the Laborers union, has rejoined the giant federation.
▪  In today's Chicago Tribune -- AFL-CIO announces partnership with Interfaith Worker Justice 
▪  In today's Washington Post -- Illegal workers arrested in 6-state ID-theft sweep -- Feds targeting illegal immigrants raid meatpacking plants, arresting hundreds of workers on the uncommon charge of identity theft and shutting down the world's second-largest meat processing company.
▪  Today from AP -- Philadelphia newspapers reach tentative agreement -- The Newspaper Guild calls the agreement with the city's two largest newspapers "a disappointing, giveback deal."

Following is a message from Brother Travis Patterson, Business Representative, Electrical Workers Local 191 in Everett.  Please download a flier with this information, and then print, post and distribute it to your unions' members ASAP/  Thank you.

Our son, Turner, was diagnosed with leukemia four years ago. On Aug. 25, it relapsed and upon relapse it returned in his central nervous system as well as his bone marrow. He has gone through several rounds of chemo with some good results but the cancer has not gone into remission. At this point we are looking at a bone marrow transplant. Our family has been tested and we are not a match. Now we are searching for a donor. 

(A bone marrow drive held Dec. 4 at the IBEW Hall in Everett, but no match has been found as of yet.)

This is where my family needs your help. The procedure is simple, no needles just cotton swab of the mouth for DNA. 

Here's what you can do to help:

1. Go to any Puget Sound Blood Bank or blood collection agency and donate marrow. Or visit www.psbc.org for a location near you.

2. Go to www.marrow.org. Click on donor information then join NMDP registry, enter your address and they will tell you the closest collection agency. You can also order a kit at this website, test yourself and mail it back.

If you have any questions please contact me at 425-923-7743 or email at tpatterson@ibew191.com.

Wake-Up Wal-Mart and the United Food and Commercial Workers have been urging holiday shoppers to consider the impact on their communities of patronizing Wal-Mart. The campaign to urge Wal-Mart to do the right thing and change for the better has taken several forms, and you are urged to participate! 

In addition to airing television advertisements on Seattle stations describing the working conditions and anti-family corporate practices at Wal-Mart -- see the ads at www.WakeUpWalMart.com/video -- the campaign has grassroots aspects that could use your participation: a rally Friday in Renton, a petition to Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, and distribution of leaflets about how Wal-Mart treats families.

RALLY FRIDAY IN RENTON -- On Friday, Dec. 15, union and community supporters will rally from 3 to 4:30 p.m. outside the Renton Wal-Mart, 743 Rainier Ave. South (near the main Rainier Avenue entrance). The event is among hundreds -- many of them candlelight vigils -- that are being held across the country Thursday and Friday to highlight the moral issues surrounding Wal-Mart’s anti-family business practices. 

SIGN A LETTER TO WAL-MART'S CEO -- Can’t attend the rally? Join thousands of supporters in signing a letter to Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, calling on him to reflect our moral values. In the common ground of all of our faiths, we call on Wal-Mart to put families first, to change, to embrace the simple fact that with “great wealth comes great responsibility.”

FLIER DISTRIBUTION -- Please download, post and distribute a flier on how Wal-Mart treats working families, and women in particular. Here is the text of the flier:

This Holiday Season... WOMEN & FAMILIES DESERVE BETTER THAN WAL-MART

FACT: Over 1.6 million women employees are suing Wal-Mart for gender discrimination in pay and promotions.

Our families deserve better than Wal-Mart this Holiday Season!  It's the holiday season, a time for giving, sharing and family -- except at Wal-Mart. Here are the facts about Wal-Mart's anti-family policies:

• Wal-Mart is the subject of the largest gender discrimination lawsuit in the history of the United States.

• The lawsuit claims Wal-Mart systematically discriminated against women employees by denying them promotions and paying them less than men.

• Wal-Mart fails to provide company health care to 54% of its employees, many of them women.

• 1 out of every 2 children of a Wal-Mart employee lives without health care or is forced onto public health care.

• Wal-Mart has repeatedly broken child labor laws, both overseas and in the United States.

• Wal-Mart's new restrictive attendance policy punishes workers who need a day off to take care of a sick child.

This Holiday Season, THINK before you shop.

For more information on this campaign and how you can get involved, contact Steve Williamson of UFCW Local 21 at 206-436-6580, or 1-800-732-1188, ext. 6580.

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Also see our Dec. 1 report -- Wal-Mart still top user of state health care funds, report says -- New surveys show Wal-Mart still ranks No. 1 in Washington state for the number of employees using public health care programs, even though it is not one of the state’s largest employers. The cost to state taxpayers is pegged at $18.2 million for 2006. (Note: After 2004 figures on this subsidy were leaked last year, Wal-Mart claimed it had vastly improved its health plans since then, saying: "It's an apples and oranges comparison from Wal-Mart in 2004 to Wal-Mart today."  It looks more like comparing rotten apples and rotten apples.)