I had a news writing instructor at UAA twenty years ago. This guy was the epitome of a classic straight-line journalist. His name was Paul Jenkins. He was a by-the-book, objective, no-nonsense, research your facts kind of guy. He was also the editor of the Anchorage Times. I was steadfast to his principled teaching, and was lucky enough to be hired by him to work at The Times. Anything I wrote during my short time at the paper had to pass Jenkins' absolutely objective standard.
But my old mentor seems to have lost his grasp of that objective pursuit of truth, as evidenced in his column of Feb. 27, where he hoped for the demise of public employee unions, called them corrupt and misrepresented numerous "facts."
If I didn't know better, I would've thought Jenkins graduated from the Dan Fagan School of Journalism.
Jenkins said: "Republican governors and legislators swept into office in the last election by bruised taxpayers weary of paying for cushy public sector union contracts. ..." Jenkins doesn't back this up one iota, or offer any proof public sector union concerns drove voters to elect Republicans. That bastion of liberalism, the Wall Street Journal, released a poll this past week showing 77 percent of Americans support public sector bargaining.
Jenkins also said: "In union-friendly Anchorage, fat, five-year public employee contracts gifts from former Mayor Mark Begich and the Assembly's liberal wing will cost taxpayers about $200 million." That is complete fabrication and exaggeration. The mayor's own budget director made statements on the radio that debunked the administration's previous claims to this fallacy.
Jenkins also said government unions have siphoned millions from members' dues and funneled them as campaign donations to politicians. If Jenkins had done his research and was honest about it, he would know it is illegal to use dues for campaign contributions. Contributions come from voluntary political action committee (PAC) donations.
While Jenkins may have some authority on what corruption means, having worked for years for arguably the most corrupt man in the history of Alaska politics, he is off the mark to claim union involvement in the political process is corrupt.
When Bill Allen hands cash to Vic Kohring in exchange for votes, that is political corruption of the highest order.
When governors in other states whose campaigns were funded by major corporate interests give massive tax breaks to those same businesses immediately upon being sworn into office and then attack the only real source of political opposition to the titans of business, that is corrupt.
When Jenkins and other union critics blame deficit woes on teachers, fire fighters, cops, and other public servants and ignore major tax relief to big corporate donors, that is corrupt.
Robert Reich, former Clinton labor secretary, said last week that if the top thirteen hedge fund managers who earned over a billion dollars each last year were to pay the same relative tax that us average folk do, and not the 15 percent capital gains rate jealously guarded by congressional Republicans, the difference would cover salaries and benefits for 300,000 teachers.
So don't be fooled by those who have been ripping off federal and state government of taxes they should be paying, many of whom are the same people who nearly sent the American economy over the cliff while recklessly playing with pension investments and middle-class families' mortgages.
This shell game of misdirection, blaming public employees whose total compensation is on average less than private sector counterparts, is being perpetuated by the real criminals of corporate malfeasance.
Bargaining rights for public employees haven't caused state deficits. States like Nevada, North Carolina, and Arizona, with no unionized state employees, have massive deficits amounting to over 30 percent of spending. Unionized states like Massachusetts, New Mexico and Montana have small deficits, less than 10 percent.
And sadly, a man whom I used to think was the bastion of factual integrity, seems to have fallen victim to the corrupt influence of those who signed his checks for these past many years.
Vince Beltrami is president of the Alaska AFL-CIO, the state's largest labor organization.
By VINCE BELTRAMI