Obama controlled agencies blocking out the Sunshine Act

The Sunshine Act became law in 1976. As Fred Wszolek writes in Townhall, it was enacted because Congress believed the "public is entitled to the fullest practicable information regarding the decision-making processes of the federal government."

But the clouds of Hope and Change are blocking the sunshine.

More from Wszolek:

The NMB [National Mediation Board] playbook of secret and carefully-orchestrated meetings and contact so as to not trigger the Sunshine Act was the one followed by the NLRB prior to announcing its quickie election rule and has become part of the Obama playbook. In the case of the NMB, the third member of the board had no idea a critical rule change was even being considered and had little to no time to respond to it in dissent. So, once again, an agency stocked with the president's appointees decided in favor of labor bosses and forced unionization on workers by changing a policy in place since Franklin Delano Roosevelt was president.

Interestingly enough, the actions of both the NLRB and NMB and how they went about these rule changes are consistent with the premise of the policies they support: forced unionization. These agencies are forcing radical changes in law and procedures in the workplace without public input and challenge as they are being developed from those who may disagree with them.

This week's hearing at the NLRB [National Labor Relations Board] is not the kind public input the Sunshine Act intended. The three Board members who proposed the rule will not be challenged at this hearing to explain their reasons. Instead, the pubic will be challenged to explain reasons why the proposed rule should not be implemented.

As to the proposed rule itself, the vast majority of employers do not have labor lawyers on staff or easily accessible and they are not familiar with arcane rules that regulators divine to justify their government jobs and salaries. Therefore, reducing the time they have to familiarize themselves with the workplace election process to ensure they don’t break rules yet communicate their viewpoint is tantamount to eliminating their ability to respond, which in turn also hurts workers and will result in lost jobs.

Technorati tags: politics Democrats gop Republican unions news organized labor jobs economy law legal business nlrb