The Washington Times reports:
Mr. Obama doesn't talk about this issue much before general audiences, but it his No. 1 promise when he speaks to unions - pledging that the so-called Employee Free Choice Act will become law in 2009 if he wins the presidency in November.
"We're ready to play offense for organized labor. It's time we had a president who didn't choke saying the word 'union.'
For a look at how Chicago's organized labor movement has historically been controlled by the
Chicago Mob.The
Chicago Sun-Times explains the City of Chicago's government,unionized workforce:
For years, the City of Chicago's garbage collectors and pothole patchers served two masters:
Mayor Richard M. Daley. And the Roti family.
For decades, the Roti family has held extraordinary sway at City Hall. A key part of that clout was its control of a union that represents the city's unskilled laborers and had a long history of mob ties.
Bruno F. Caruso -- a grandson of family patriarch Bruno Roti Sr., identified by the FBI as an associate of Al Capone's -- ran Laborers' International Union Local 1001, which represented 3,500 city workers while Caruso was in power, mostly in two city departments -- Streets and Sanitation, and Transportation. They empty garbage cans, pave streets, fix potholes.
When Caruso left the union leadership, his cousin Nicholas Gironda took over.
Caruso's brother Frank "Toots" Caruso headed another Laborers' local that represented city workers. When he left, his cousin Leo Caruso took over.
Together, the four Roti family members controlled thousands of unionized city jobs, as well as pension funds and other union assets that once topped a billion dollars. Often, they decided who got unskilled laborers' jobs with the city and who got promoted into supervisory positions in those areas, sources said.
and
The Roti family's union power goes back to two late organized-crime figures, Ald. Fred B. Roti and Chicago Outfit boss Anthony Accardo, according to union investigators.
Bruno and "Toots'' Caruso are nephews of Roti. The three were among 47 men identified by the FBI in 1999 as "made'' members of the mob. "Made'' mobsters, according to the report, pledge loyalty to the Outfit "and would carry this oath of commitment and silence to the grave.''
The union movement in Obama's hometown.
