Tuesday Open Thread

Welcome to your Tuesday open thread.

If you’re a dictator on the run from international forces, it’s probably a good idea to be nattily dressed at all times. Laurent Ggagbo, the rogue president of Cote d’Ivoire, was captured by opposition forces yesterday.

Ivory Coast’s former president is calling for an end to fighting after he was captured on Monday by forces backing the country’s president-elect.  

Former president Laurent Gbagbo is calling on his supporters to lay down their weapons so the country’s political crisis can come to a swift end and life can return to normal.

Mr. Gbagbo says “the fighting is over,” so that is why he asked his chief of staff to “go out with a white handkerchief.”  Mr. Gbagbo spoke on a television station run by President-elect Alasssane Ouattara, hours after he was arrested by Mr. Ouattara’s fighters.

French forces surrounded Mr. Gbagbo’s compound, but they say they did not enter the underground bunker where Mr. Ouattara’s fighters captured the former president, gave him a bullet-proof jacket and helmet, and then took him, his wife, and his son into custody.

Now, after he’s captured he wants the fighting to end. I guess I’ll point out the obvious that Ggagbo could have ended the fighting at any time before.

This is the future of our country if we continue to follow the path of ever crappier benefits and wages (which is what Republicans are arguing). Ikea in Virginia is under fire for labor violations.

It’s quite an ordeal. Workers are forced to work overtime, often with little notice, and those who don’t go along face disciplinary action. Workers have been ordered to attend meetings at which management “discourages” them from forming a union, and Ikea has hired a law firm known for its anti-union efforts.

This is apparently front-page news in Sweden, where Ikea is a celebrated and iconic brand, and where the company is known for progressive labor practices. Indeed, most of the Ikea labor force in Sweden is already unionized.

So, what’s the problem?

Laborers in Swedwood plants in Sweden produce bookcases and tables similar to those manufactured in Danville. The big difference is that the Europeans enjoy a minimum wage of about $19 an hour and a government-mandated five weeks of paid vacation. Full-time employees in Danville start at $8 an hour with 12 vacation day — eight of them on dates determined by the company.

What’s more, as many as one-third of the workers at the Danville plant have been drawn from local temporary-staffing agencies. These workers receive even lower wages and no benefits, employees said. […]

Bill Street, who has tried to organize the Danville workers for the machinists union, said Ikea was taking advantage of the weaker protections afforded to U.S. workers.

“It’s ironic that Ikea looks on the U.S. and Danville the way that most people in the U.S. look at Mexico,” Street said.

Yep, thanks to anti-worker policies in the U.S., we’re offering the low-wage workforce for foreign companies to exploit and mistreat.

Some Republican lawmakers (in Maine and Missouri) have offered legislation to loosen regulations on child labor – so employers can pay them less. Republicans are also arguing that public employees benefits are too generous while private employees get less – and getting worst.