Kyle Loos News Today

Regardless of the immediate mechanical failure, the true cause of this catastrophe is the insatiable greed of Norfolk Southern and other Class I rail carriers, who have pushed for longer trains with smaller crews.

As far as management is concerned, the “contract” is only binding on us workers. They feel emboldened because they know they have not only Congress on their side, but the union apparatus.

As far as management, Congress and the corrupt union apparatus are concerned, the contract is only “binding” upon workers, while the railroads are free to flaunt it whenever convenient.

Rail workers have captured the nation’s attention since September, when their showdown with the Class I freight railroads reached a near-breaking point. Now, in the fallout of what many members feel has been a botched negotiations process, some are taking action in their union halls. After three years of negotiations, a contract rejection, and a strike authorization, the union

The picket, the latest in a series of informational pickets initiated by the Railroad Workers Rank-and-File Committee, was held to organize workers against the deliberate violation of the will of railroaders by the union apparatus and to build support for the railroaders within the general public.

The meeting was attended by hundreds of railroader workers and their supporters, who discussed a strategy for building opposition to the sellout contracts being pushed by the rail unions.

These deals, rolled out piecemeal as part of a divide-and-conquer strategy by the union bureaucracy, are in flagrant violation of the near-unanimous sentiment of railroaders for a national strike and the rejection of the PEB’s settlement.

WASHINGTON (PAI)—Crunch. And a shortage of everything. That’s the warning rail union leaders are sending to consumers as the nation approaches the holiday season.