Wednesday night, as Tiff and I were driving to a birthday dinner at Liberty Tavern, we heard this piece on NPR about our favorite group of homeless people employed as protestors. My favorite section of the article was this one:
Most people who pass the picket line don’t look closely at the protesters. Diego Castaneda, a doctoral student from California, snaps a picture of a marcher and gives her a thumbs up.
“I just like seeing people demonstrating and standing up for their rights,” Castaneda said.
But when I tell him the protesters are actually homeless people, his face falls.
“Are you serious?” he says in disbelief. “It’s pretty disingenuous of the union to hire people who aren’t carpenters.”
Yep, folks, it’s pretty shady to hire folks for $8 an hour to protest when your union members won’t actually protest themselves. Not listed in the story page on NPR’s site was the original postscript when the reporter, Frank Langfitt, asked the workers about their wages, and they wanted more money.
He suggested they formed a union.
This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs
I live and work in the District of Columbia. I write at We Love DC, a blog I helped start, I work at Technolutionary, a company I helped start, and I’m happy doing both. I enjoy watching baseball, cooking, and gardening. I grow a mean pepper, keep a clean scorebook, and wash the dishes when I’m done. Read Why I Love DC.
