NH-Sen: The Bill Binnie Wiki Wars

Questions for Mr. Binnie (4.00 / 10)

Bill Binnie has been a successful businessman for the past quarter century.  He clearly knows how to make money -- and I, for one, believe that financial analysis and value realization are useful skills for any prospective policymaker.

But Mr. Binnie has a problem: He doesn't have a whole lot of respect for the workers who made him rich.  He busts unions, fires capriciously, and places his own exhorbitant financial lust ahead of his employees' needs.  If he wants to represent New Hampshire workers, he needs to answer questions about his record.  Such as:

1. Excessive Pay: In 1992, during a severe economic recession, your company - Carlisle Plastics Management Corp. -- lost $6.3 million.  How did you justify paying your self $1.5 million in salary while your company was struggling in a price war, and while your employees were fearing for their jobs? (Plastics News, 8/94)

2. Firing Union Organizers: Mr. Binnie, in March 1993 your Tijuana-based plant, Plasticos Bajacal, fired three employees for distributing literature advocating formation of an independent union.  The Washington Post reported that as many as 10 other workers were axed for engaging in union advocacy.  How can you claim to respect New Hampshire workers when you have so vociferously opposed the rights of your employees to bargain collectively?  (Washington Post, 10/27/93)

3. Minimum Wage: An employee at Plasticos Bajacal showed a Post reporter a pay stub indicating that she earned 13 pesos ($4.25) per day.  Does your record of paying workers subsistence wages mean that you oppose our minimum wage of $7.25/hour? (Washington Post, 10/27/93)

4. Worker Intimidation: Did you direct managers at Plasticos Bajacal to intimidate workers who voted for an independent union by identifying them publicly -- a practice revealed by the San Diego Union-Tribune? (San Diego Union-Tribune, 12/23/93)

5. Fixing Union Elections: Union organizers at Plasticos Bajacal claimed that your managers offered $33 (1 1/2 weeks wages) to each worker who voted against an independent union?  Do you endorse such a practice?  If so, how do you sleep at night? (San Diego Union-Tribune, 12/15/93)

6. Abandoning US Workers: When you moved jobs from A&E Plastics to Mexico in 1989, what did you do to assist the workers whose livelihoods you destroyed in order to line your own pockets?  Please provide specifics -- retraining support, etc.

If Mr. Binnie enters the US Senate race, New Hampshire voters will ask him these -- and many other -- questions.  He will be asked to account for his record, and to discuss how it will influence his decisions as a Senator.  

More to come. . . .  

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by: Dartmouth Dem @ Sat Nov 07, 2009 at 23:41:55 PM CST

Voters will ask him... maybe (4.00 / 1)

I say "maybe" because to my knowledge none of this was unearthed by the state media in their "Binnie a possible Senate candidate" articles.

Remember Dorgan's expose of Fred Tausch?  He dropped out just a little after that.

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by: Dean Barker @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 05:42:21 AM CST

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You make it sound like (0.00 / 0)

the worst thing anyone can do is to hire an employee in the first place.

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by: Alex Gallichon @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 10:25:24 AM CST

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Absolutely Not (0.00 / 0)

Like Mr. Binnie, I am an MBA, and I have tremendous respect for entrepreneurs and job creation.  

But there's nothing inconsistent about making money and treating your employees with respect.  Building an enterprise does not need to involve shitting on the workers who enable your creation -- just ask Jeff Swartz, Gary Hirschberg, and untold numbers of businessmen across America who understand this principle.

In 1992, Forbes published an article on Binnie in which the entrepreneur was quoted:  "The first thing I do whenever I visit a plant," he said, "is use the hourly workers' bathroom so I can see how the company's treating them."  But Binnie should know that workers expect more than clean bathrooms -- they deserve the right to bargain collectively, and to stand up for themselves without fear of retaliation.

And if he refuses to address this, New Hanpshire workers will make him do so.

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by: Dartmouth Dem @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 10:52:26 AM CST

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I'm not an expert on Mexican labor law, (0.00 / 0)

but this issue of forming an "independent" union may have been in violation of it, putting the corporation well within the position to terminate those employees who were undermining the established collective bargaining agreement.

I don't think one visits the hourly workers' bathrooms to see how clean they are, so much as to read the graffiti and get a sense of attitudes toward management.

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by: Alex Gallichon @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 11:26:59 AM CST

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Mitt Romney-ish (4.00 / 1)

Remember how Romney made his record as a successful businessman the cornerstone of his candidacy against Ted Kennedy back in 1994?  Then it turned out that he did it on the back of the workers of the companies.  

There is some description of this in True Compass, too - excellent book, two thumbs up.  

"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on."  Franklin D. Roosevelt    

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by: Kathy Sullivan 2 @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 10:33:37 AM CST

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Thanks for reminding me to turn off the computer... (0.00 / 0)

and get back to True Compass... I have to head to Sullivan county in two hours..

Democrats solve problems, Republicans sit and say no.

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by: Ray Buckley @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 11:48:42 AM CST

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