Copyright © 2004 and 2007 by Ethan A. Winning
SHRM, Elaine Chao, and the Congress screwed up in 2004, and I'm still ticked about it. No sense in writing a new article when the old one does just fine. But one note: subscribers and readers of "Labor Pains" know that most states aren't covered by all of the "new" FLSA because their labor codes go beyond the changes. However, one change - doubletalk about "important responsibilities" has made the "new" FLSA even more difficult for employers (who care) to decipher. I no longer apologize for being as upset as I was and still am. In a way, it's unfair to both employers and employees.
This is August 33, 2004, and I'm your ESPUSANBCBS nonpartisan, apolitical, fare-minded correspondent, Cannity Holmes, coming to you from Frostbite Falls, MN where I'd like to introduce you to Commodore Jésus Beverly "Bubba" Ginzburg Smyth, currently vice-mayor of this burg. Smyth is now running for U.S. Senate on the hyphenated party. He is a binary bimanual bisexually transpolar quasi-semi-centrist, running on the musically right Howard and Issac Stern ticket which can be purchased on EBay through midnight yesterday. He has the support of Bill O'Reilly, Bill Maher, Billy D.Williams, and Billy Martin who caught his last three games.
Holmes: Mayor...
Smyth: Call me Bubbula.
Holmes: Bubba, your name suggests a multicultural. perhaps even multilingual background. Do you think this will help your election chances?
Bubba: I am multilingual. I have a forked-tongued. I can satisfy both ...
Holmes: Let's leave that ...
Bubba: ...parties at the same time.
Holmes: No, I meant, speaking Spanish, English, French, Russian...
Bubba: Well, I did have three years of each in a dozen years of high school, and I can email , "With the death of my Nigerian General father, I need your assistance in getting hold of his millions" in 11 languages.
Holmes: As a radical centrist, what's your platform?
Bubby: There's but one plank in my platform. If elected, I will not serve. I will do nothing because doing nothing is the best thing that congresspeoplemen can do for the country. If necessary, I will be actively looking like I'm doing something, but I will do nothing.
Holmes: If you do nothing, you will never be reelected.
Bubba: Then I have served my purpose, and served my people well.
Holmes: You've got to explain that to me.
Bubbee: Seems I have to explain everything to you. You know the guy in your office who always is going somewhere and always carries a piece of paper? That's a guy who's going nowhere, but looks busy. He'll really go places because nobody knows that he's going noplace, but getting there quickly. It's activity that gets you noticed, not accomplishment. Remember this motto: "If you've got no place to go, go quickly."
Now, do you remember the 'Do Nothing Congresses' of '49, '56, '62, '92-00?
Holmes: No.
Bubbull: See! You don't remember them because they did no harm. They did no harm because they didn't do nothin'.
Holmes: That's a double negative.
Bub: Don't go grammatical on me. Actually, it's 300 plus people acting in concert and doing nothing. Or it could be 150 doing something and 150 doing something else. A standoff equivalent to doing nothing, but being very active. A frenzy of nothingness.
Holmes: That's even more than a double negative.
Bubby: Nobody cares. Nobody's paying attention. Everybody's watching reruns of "MacGyver."
Let's just take the Do nothins from 1992 to 2000. Nothing was done. We had money in the bank, individually and countrily. We had no debt. We had a market that ballooned, and millionaires from fakers to fakirs were e-created every e-day. Maybe this will make it easier for you to understand: what was the most popular and successful sitcom of the 90's?
Holmes: Seinfeld.
Bubba: Right! And what was "Seinfeld" about?
Holmes: Nothin'.
Bubba: Now you got it. Government should be the same way. It has to be about nobody doing nothing to be truly successful. During the Clinton years, what did we have? We had so little that we got to pay attention to stuff like Lewinski, OJ, the Simpsons, Billy, Willy, Teddy, Fred...
Holmes: Who's Billy, Willy, Teddy, Fred?
Bubba: A line from 'The Music Man.' You got trouble, my friend...but that's neither her nor here. The point is we didn't just have a do nothin' Congress, we had a know nothing Congress. And that was okay, too, since the country knew less. But it was heaven! Damn media had to go dig up political dirt and keep us in the loop. The media's whatever you got between the left and right wing, and I'm not talking balance.
Now we have an administration that wants to do something. Doesn't matter how lousy the activity is: the philosophy is doing is better than sittin'. And look where we are? Split 60/40 right down the middle.
Holmes: Well, do you have war experience?
Bubba: Yes, I was a commodore in the Wyoming Navy. Not one submarine ever got past Laramie.
Holmes: Where did you go to school?
Bubba: William and Murray. Was a member of the Scull and Groans.
Holmes: That like the Yale secret society?
Bubba: No. It was the crew team.
Holmes: We're getting off track.
Bubba: That's because it's crew.
Holmes: When else are you in favor of doing nothing?
Bubba: When you do something, you have to spend something. Just like some combined law of physics, economics, and the gym, you can't expend energy without spending cash. You think I jest? Uh, uh. From the loftiest to the lowest, I have examples: federal, state, county, school council, and homeowners' association. The only thing more useless than the president of a homeowners' association is hubcaps on a tractor.
No one said that the Fair Labor Standards Act was broken. But the Prez appoints Elaine Chao as Secretary of Labor and she thinks, "I'm in a cabinet position, and I've got to do something." And the new president of SHRM says, "Well, you can't just sit there. You've got to do something. Why not change the Fair Labor Standards Act. It's 60 years old and it must need changing."
A baby needs changing after 60 minutes. The FLSA needed a few modifications, but almost half of us voted for the head man, and the head man appointed Ms. Chao, and Ms. Chao had to do something. We used to write better than we do now. A couple of sentences, that's all that was needed.
If these assumptions on my part were wrong, then where has Ms. Chao and the head of SHRM been last week? Not only was neither on the talk show circuit, but Victoria. Lipnic, a Labor assistant, was the designated hitter. She was probably sent on Lou Dobbs' program with the instructions, "Do something!"
Holmes: You're still hot about the FLSA?
Bubba: Well, there are 14 laws older than the FLSA. I don't see them trying to change those. Want examples on the state level?
Someone recently proposed that the California Legislature part-time, physically, not just mentally. In California, they take the term "lawmaker" very seriously. The California legislature passes perhaps 200 laws a year, about ten percent of what they propose. Sheila Kuhel probably comes up with 1,500 of them, and all will cost employers money and time, if not time and more money. She's so far left, she meets herself halfway on a daily basis. Laws of physics.
And then there was the State Representative who recommended that all new buildings must be subjected to a feng shui analysis. Put a tree in the foyer, open an east-facing window, and send me a check for $20,000. I'll certify it and all therein as certifiable.
Jerry Brown was on a talk show Aug. 26 and said that he "enacted 10,000 laws." If he signed 10,000 into law, how many were considered by the Senate? A hundred thousand? Like a bee hive, these were extremely active people. We love active people. If someone isn't sufficiently active, we recall them so we can be more active.
If anything makes me lean toward Mr. Kerry, it's the dearth of his proposed legislation during his terms in office. So what if he never proposed anything? He must have been there when he was needed. He kept getting reelected, and not just because Heinz is better than Del Monte, although who ever heard of ketchup made with pineapples?
Look, if you do nothing, you spend nothing. We can budget for that. I think that the Congress should meet in Philadelphia once a year on July 4th, declare their independence from Great Britain, and go home. If necessary, they should be revolting.
Holmes: Would you recommend the same for business?
Bubba: Absolutely. Do your job, and when you're finished, go home. Why stick around just to look busy?
Holmes: Because if you don't look busy, you could be fired. Being fired takes courage. Are you that courageous?
Bubba: No way. Courage scares me. And that's the truth....