First and Goal

 Wow, what a lousy call.  I didn't actually see the game, but on replay, it was pretty obvious that the Seattle Seahawks did not win the game on a last second hail-Mary pass.  And if the Green Bay Packers miss the play-offs by one game.  Ouch.

So what's a good fan to do?  Well, I'm a fan, though admittedly not a die hard, every Sunday parked in front of the big screen, come hell or high water kind of fan.  I'm the kind of fan who doesn't support scab labor.  Yes, fellow football followers, it's time you join me in boycotting the National Football League until the referee lockout is over.

I'm not sure when the United States became an anti-union country.  When I was growing up in western Pennsylvania smart people didn't attack the steel workers, the auto workers, the teamsters or the miners.  It wasn't because of any  threat of violence.  Attacking unionism was a good way to become very isolated in the community.   It was understood that as long as union members made a good wage, they'd buy cars, new clothes, they'd go out to eat in restaurants and go to the local movie house.  In short, union wages drove the local economy and the more money  blue collared workers made, the more they spent.  And the more they spent, the more money was made by everyone else, including the much lauded small business man.

So it's baby step time on the long road back to a strong American labor movement.  If the union refs aren't back this weekend, turn off the TV.  Don't go to the games.  Don't make the wealthy plutocrats who own the teams even richer.  Make it clear that the continued success of the National Football League is contingent on union referees calling the shots.  And after we all back a union that we need to preserve the integrity of our much loved football, we can transfer that allegiance to the UMW, or the UAW, or here's a radical notion your local teacher's union.  Union workers and good union wages make us all better off.