Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Remembering The Band's Babies

October 15th is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. Something everyone of us has been affected by in some way. Maybe you've lost a baby, maybe you've miscarried, or maybe someone close to you has gone through one of these.


So on Saturday October 15 Band Back Together will be~


Remembering The Band's Babies


The Band will have a post that will be continuously updated with your babies you want to remember. To participate please send the following to jana@bandbacktogether.com with the subject OCTOBER 15.

Baby’s name (or names for twins, triplets or multiple losses)
Dates and the cause of death (miscarriage, stillbirth, prematurity, heart defect, group b strep, etc.)
URL to your blog or a post about your baby(ies)
Your first name if you want it included


If you'd like to share your stories here you can e-mail me at rsavu30@gmail.com with the same information as above. We may not have our babies here with us physically, but their memories never leave us and deserve to be shared.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Yea I'm a union wife

The hubs is a United Auto Worker. He works for the company that didn't take a bailout. His father before him worked for the same company. My grandparents both worked for rival auto companies. Needless to say I grew up understanding that the UAW was important and that they were what helped keep food in my belly and a roof over my head. But I also understood then and now what they did for the labor movement. Without the UAW workers rights would have been and still would today be trampled all over. Safety would be next to non existent. I'm not saying the UAW did this on their own, lord knows unions all across this country in many different forms made a difference but the UAW is what I know. They're the ones that have taken care of me and mine for pretty much my entire life in one form or another and I'm sick and tired of sitting back and listening to people bash the union and it's members. Now I'm not naive I know they're not perfect. I know there's corruption, I know there are area's that need improvement. But I also know without the UAW there would be 10s of thousands or more men and women unemployed or working at unreasonably low wages with craptastic to no benefits. These members fought long and hard to get what they have today and without doing what they've done, people in other industries would have no map to follow to fight for their own wage increases, better benefits etc. These are hard working men and women who go to work everyday, they have earned and deserve what they get. Sure they're are some that have learned to work the system. They're are always going to be a few bad apples. But to sit and call an entire group of people lazy and worthless because of a handful of people is ridiculous. I hear almost daily how the unions did what was needed and just aren't needed any longer. Really? Do people really believe if they just went away that big business wouldn't just do away with all the hard fought for and earned rights they gained? Who would be there to make sure they were kept in line? Government? I somehow doubt it when in most places it seems our government is hard at work looking for ways to get rid of our unions. What about health and safety? Who will look out for the health and safety of the workers? Again I don't see the government doing this, they can't even look out for our poor. The wages of the union members have helped keep economies going, think I'm wrong look at areas where plants have shut down. Take away those jobs and money is no longer being spent in those areas before long those areas dry up. Flint, Michigan is a perfect example of this, and I'm sure that many of you can think of other areas this has happened to. Take away the unions all together and we go back to the days of big business being our overlords and all the rest of us being their serfs. Maybe I'm wrong and I'm just holding on because of the hubs job, maybe if he was in another industry I would feel differently but some how I doubt it. Oh and for the record the average income of an hourly worker in 2010 was not $109,000 as one idiotic Michigan news station reported, nor do workers make $58 or more and hour. The average income in 2010 was around $74,000 if that person was lucky enough to pull in overtime maybe more if they worked 65 to 70 hour weeks but I guarantee you the average was no where near what was quoted. (I know this because the hubs worked every minute of overtime his building allowed and didn't come near that and he had the highest hours in his building) and $28 an hour is the max that any worker is making without o/t. Yes they do receive pretty good benefits, but don't hate them for that.If you want to be mad that your employer can't or doesn't offer the same be mad that the system is so screwed that it's not affordable for everyone, or that insurance companies are allowed to get away with the crap they are. Either way all the ills of the world are not the UAWs fault they can only do so much and their jobs are to take care of their workers. At the end of the day unions aren't the enemy, corrupt government, to big business, and jealousy are the enemy.