Original Flint group 1976 back row L-R Wayne Gillette, John Long, Bill Gillett, Russ Williams, Ron Castleman

front row L-R Treasurer Jim Gillett, Photographer Bernie Lowthian, Vice-chairman David Lustig, Chairman Mike Westfall

AMERICA’S MIDDLE-CLASS BETRAYAL

Since 1980 more than five million U.S. living wage factory jobs have been restructured away and life has gotten very difficult for working Americans at every level. Conversely, life has never been better for the rich corporations, who have generated tremendous wealth at the expense of labor, and their fellow comrades feasting in finance.

Over this time, tens of thousands of business lobbyists have distributed billions of dollars to political coffers in Washington. This has effectively influenced our government, usurped the voter’s constitutional power and rendered career politicians noticeably unable to carry out our nation’s most important business in a democratic manner. The political agenda has turned into one of absolute power, abusive taxation and the development of a lethal method of transferring wealth from working families to the upper class.

The blueprint for this agenda was forged over thirty-five years ago in the most logical arena, which was America’s premier auto industry. In the 1970s, one of six American jobs were auto related, G.M. was America’s largest automaker, Flint was the founding home of both GM and the UAW and Flint contained the world’s largest concentration of GM workers.

At that time we formed worker groups, which spoke out and demonstrated on how corporate restructuring with no regard for social responsibility would dismantle the American dream. What we forecast occurred.

American workers are the engines, which provide the labor, fight the wars and pay the bills, yet they are the first fired and last hired. They have been rewarded by losing their jobs, having their wages and benefits sliced while experiencing the political attack on their retirees and pensions.

Our government leaders have squandered the resources set aside for the retirees who built this nation. They label our retirees legacy burdens and conspire to bilk them out of their earned pensions, benefits, Medicare and Social Security. Absolute power corrupts absolutely and the Fed has financially rewarded their big bank buddies, whose greed brought us to the brink, with billions of dollars pilfered from powerless savers who get zero interest on their savings.

The crafty right calls God a Republican and asks Christian voters to overlook their economic interests when voting. The laissez-faire liberal left cunningly declares the Democrats as the saviors of working class families. Both political parties twist the truth for votes. While union officials are no better and have been just as political, ineffective and morally corrupt on social issues, the institution of union remains America’s only genuine opposition to absolute corporate dominance relative to worker poverty, inequity and health and safety abuse.

Our first Flint activist group began in 1976 with nine members. I chaired it, and it expanded to other cities and states. We understood how these changes would domino into structural unemployment in all large and small industries across America and deny new generations of workers access to the once abundant living-wage jobs available to previous generations. We also knew our children, who were being chained with ridiculously unjustified high college expenses, might not find meaningful employment. Our work covered corporate restructuring, automation, industrial pollution, healthcare and foreign outsourcing. While being mostly union members and working on full time blue-collar jobs, we worked independently from the union and fought concessions, corporate property tax reductions at the expense of communities, apartheid and other social issues. We led large demonstrations, debated corporate C.E.O.s at stockholders’ meetings and were involved in television, radio and media events. I personally served on the boards of various national organizations, became chairman of the powerful union caucus in power at GM Flint Truck and Bus Assembly, the largest truck assembly plant in the world. I wrote critically negotiated benefit programs for both GM and the International UAW, which saved thousands of workers who were slotted for elimination.

We were not in the plush ivy halls at Solidarity House, and we didn’t just talk about these issues or report on them. We were in the trenches, and we were the American activists fighting for all common workers everywhere. Our work is recognized in films, best selling books, educational text, magazines, and newspapers.

These last thirty-five years were the most destructive decades in the history of modern labor on every front. The militant workers involved in the Westfall groups were on the cutting edge, taking the heat and loudly addressing these deeply disturbing issues from an arena that no one else could speak from. Although we are all now retired, I am pleased that the many concerned and thoughtful people that served with me are identified and archived with our volumes of work in esteemed libraries and elsewhere.

Mike Westfall

..The Guests / Society element of this site (bottom of page) addresses some of the moral questions.

THE WESTFALL PAPERS

1987 - mIKE wESTFALL.. HISTORIC U.A.W. 50TH ANNIVERSARY / ANTI- CONCESSION RALLY PART A WE SEE OUR PLANTS CLOSING. WE SEE THE DEVASTATION IN OUR FAMILIES FACES. FOR THOSE WHO FOLLOW IT MAY NOT GET BETTER IT MAY GET SIGNIFICANTLY WORSE. . . (MORE)

1987 - VICTOR REUTHER.. HISTORIC U.A.W. 50TH ANNIVERSARY / ANTI-CONCESSION RALLY /PART B IF THERE IS ANYTHING THAT WOULD CAUSE WALTER REUTHER TO ROLE over IN HIS GRAVE ITS THE THOUGHT THAT General motors IS GETTING AWAY WITH WHAT THEY ARE DOING TODAY. .. (MORE)

1987 - JERRY TUCKER.. HISTORIC.. U.A.W. 50TH ANNIVERSARY / ANTI-CONCESSION RALLY PART C . . .(MORE)

6/2009- WESTFALL.. "MAQUILADORA!" AMERICAN exported slavery to foreign workers exploited with shamefully low wages and working conditions. then used as unfair competitive examples of how american workers are under worked and overpaid in and effort to reduce the worlds working class to the lowest common denominator . . . . . (MORE)

5/2009 WESTFALL.. - CANCER IN AUTO TOWN THERE are horrific costs eminating from the irresponsible dumping of corporate toxic wastes and the poisening of communities and workers . . (MORE)

4/2009 WESTFALL.. - TOXIC TIME BOMB .. THE REAL LEGACY COST OF THE AUTO INDUSTRY AMERICA’S DEEP RECESSION HAS EXACERBATED ISSUES WITHIN PROBLEMATIC INDUSTRIES, AND THERE ARE THOSE LOOKING FOR A SCAPEGOAT. . . (MORE)

7/1985 - WESTFALL / RALPH NADER RADIO INTERVIEW THIS IS " NIGHT LINE”. OUR GUESTS TONIGHT ARE MIKE WESTFALL AND RALPH NADER. THEY WILL BE SPEAKING ON G.M. AND TAXES. G.M. SAYS THEY HAVE BEEN UNFAIRLY TAXED AND THEY WANT TAX RELIEF. SHOULD THEY GET IT? . . .(MORE)

3/1990 - EARLY RETIREMENT PILOT PROPOSAL FOR TWO YEARS BEGINNING IN 1988 THE UAW AND GM SET MICHAEL WESTFALL UP IN AN OFFSITE OFFICE COMPLEX, WHICH GM HAD PURCHASED FOR SPECIAL PROJECTS. . . (MORE)

6/1981 - 18 NATION WORLD COUNCIL MEETING DEARBORN- DELEGATES FROM UNIONS REPRESENTING GENERAL MOTORS WORKERS AROUND THE WORLD WERE GATHERING HERE TODAY TO DISCUSS AN INTERNATIONAL UNION RESPONSE TO WHAT THEY CALL GM’S WORLD STRATEGY..(MORE)

10/1987 - AMERICA'S MINORITY SITUATION CORPORATE AMERICA’S RACE TO RESTRUCTURE IS BEING GRIEVOUSLY FELT BY THE WORKING CLASS. THE UPSWING IN THE ECONOMY IS TRANSLATING INTO SOME WORKERS GOING BACK TO WORK BUT NOT IN THE NUMBERS THAT WERE ONCE THERE. . . (MORE)

8/2007 - HISTORIC UAW LEADER SPEAKS OUT FOR RETIREES & WORKERS . WHITEY HALE WAS THE PRESIDENT OF UAW LOCAL 326 IN FLINT, MICHIGAN. the general motors plating factory that he represented had a cancer rate that was twice the national average. it has been torn down. whitey was an exceptional labor leader and hero who fought for both workers and RETIREES. (MORE)

3/2009 - RESPECTED UAW SATURN PRESIDENT SPEAKS OUT ON SHOCKING AUTO FACTORY CANCER It is totally documented that many important Industrial factories have been proven to be mortally unhealthy for the workers and communities in which they are located . . . (MORE)

1985 - PITTSBURGH ECONOMic association today's corporate restructuring REVOLUTION is destined to destroy america's middle-class and radically slash jobs for our next generation in the twenty-first century . . (MORE)

3/1984 - FLORIDA TREND MAGAZINE BY THE TIME MIKE WESTFALL WALKED INTO DETROIT’S COBO HALL ONE MORNING LAST WINTER, HE HAD ALREADY PUT IN A FULL, PREDAWN SHIFT AT THE CHEVY TRUCK PLANT IN FLINT, MICHIGAN …(MORE)

4/2009 - BETRAYED AUTO RETIREES, BLUE COLLAR AND WHITE COLLAR WHAT IS THE TRUE DEFINITION OF THE SO-CALLED LEGACY COST IN THE AUTO INDUSTRY, AND WHO IS REALLY PICKING UP THE. . . (MORE)

2008 - THE DESTRUCTION OF UAW PRESIDENT WALTER REUTHER’S UNION PAST UAW PRESIDENT AND FOUNDING FATHER, WALTER REUTHER, WAS A STRONG PRINCIPLED LABOR LEADER OF VISION. WALTER HAD A BACKBONE AND REFUSED TO BECOME A CORPORATE PUPPET. . . (MORE)

7/1990 - OUT OF CONTROL AMERICAN HEALTH CARE america’s elected bureaucrats are like blind sided deer caught in the headlights. their lack of leadership in DEALING WITH rediculously over priced HEALTH CARE COSTS, questionable QUALITY AND unfair ACCESSIBILITY IS disasterously irresponsible. it has the potential of bringing down our entire economic system. .  (MORE)

1986 - GM AND LIBERAL ARTS  IN DECEMBER’S MICHIGAN TODAY ROGER SMITH USED THE SUBJECT OF LIBERAL ARTS AS THE VEHICLE TO MAKE SOME TYPICAL GENERAL MOTORS PUBLIC RELATION’S COMMENTS ON GM'S RESTRUCTURING. . . (MORE)

7/2009 - BILLY DURANT'S INCOMPETENT AND BANKRUPT GENERAL MOTORS UNCLE SAM HAS ALLOCATED $50 BILLION TO FIX GM AND WILL END UP OWNING 60% OF IT. . . (MORE)

6/2009 - THE REAL STORY ABOUT FLINT IT IS DISTRESSING THAT THE IMPORTANT FLINT STORY WOULD BE REDUCED TO A CARNIVAL SIDESHOW. . .  (MORE)

6/2007 - UAW OFFICIALS' BETRAYAL OF MEMBERS "2007" IN AMERICA THE RICH ARE GETTING RICHER, THE POOR ARE GETTING POORER AND OUR MIDDLE CLASS. . . (MORE)

10/2005 - UAW BLACK OCTOBER 2005  PENSIONS & RETIREMENT BENEFITS SHOULD BE CONSIDERED SACRED & "OFF LIMITS" THROUGHOUT RETIREE'S GOLDEN . . . (MORE)

2005 - NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE...NOW! AMERICA NEEDS NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE FOR ALL IT'S PEOPLE. . . . (MORE)

8/1990 - AMERICA'S HEALTHCARE OUR HEALTH CARE SYSTEM HAS BECOME A BASKET CASE AND IS WASTING BILLIONS OF DOLLARS YEARLY FOR INEFFICIENT HEALTHCARE THAT IS ADVERSELY AFFECTING OUR INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION. . . (MORE)

7/1986 - THE FALLOUT FROM THE CLOUDS OF RECESSION  AMERICAN LABOR IS NOW EXPERIENCING POSSIBLY THE MOST DIFFICULT PERIOD IN ITS HISTORY. BECAUSE OF THE CONCESSION AFTERMATH AND DUE TO . . . (MORE)

7/1985 - THINGS CHANGING AND NOT FOR THE BETTER SIGNIFICANT AUTOMOTIVE CHANGES ARE OCCURRING IN THE GENERAL MOTORS TOWN OF FLINT WE SEE IT WITH GM'S RACE TO EXPORT SO MANY OF OUR DOMESTIC JOBS TO FOREIGN WORKERS. WHO IN MANY CASES ARE BEING EXPLOITED WITH LOW WAGES. . .(MORE)

9/1984 - CONTENT LEGISLATION  IN 1974, THE JAPANESE ONLY HAD ABOUT 6.7% OF THE AMERICAN AUTO MARKET. IN 1982 FOREIGN CAR SALES SHOT UP TO AN AMAZING 27.8%. . . (MORE)

6/1982 -  TECHNOLOGY CURSE OR PROMISE  WE ARE ENTERING THE DAWN OF A NEW AGE IN INDUSTRY AND NEW TECHNOLOGIES ARE REVOLUTIONIZING EVERY SECTOR OF OUR PRODUCTION AND OFFICE ECONOMY...(MORE)

6/1981 - NATIONAL TECH REPORT  THE AUTO COMPANIES ARE PUTTING UP THE LARGEST SMOKE SCREEN IN AUTOMOTIVE HISTORY. THEY ARE FEVERISHLY TRYING TO COVER UP THE FACT THAT THEY ARE ELIMINATING AS MANY OF OUR JOBS AS POSSIBLE THROUGH TECHNOLOGY, DOWNSIZING, AND THE WORLD CAR...(MORE)

6/2009 - HE'S A REBEL: DARLENE LOVE  / - ELVIS PRESLEY, PHIL SPECTOR, TOM JONES, RONETTES, RIGHTEOUS BROTHERS, BEACH BOYS, TINA TURNER, DIONNE WARWICK, JACKIE WILSON, . . (MORE)

2/2008 - "BUNK" TO RALPH NADER'S 2008 POLITICAL CRITICS! - RALPH NADER IS ONE OF THE FEW PEOPLE EVER BORN IN AMERICA WHO DESERVES. . .(MORE)

2/2007 - FATHER GEORGE SCHULTZE INTERVIEW - CATHOLIC LATINOS. . .FR. GEORGE E. SCHULTZE, SJ, IS THE AUTHOR OF THE NEW BOOK TITLED STRANGERS IN A FOREIGN LAND. . . (MORE)

2/2007 - MARTIN BARILLAS INTERVIEW - WELL RESPECTED MARTIN BARILLAS HAS BEEN A DIPLOMAT AND HUMAN RIGHTS OBSERVER IN EUROPE, LATIN AMERICA. . . (MORE)

6/2005 - AMERICA'S BETRAYED BABY BOOMERS  - AMERICA'S RETIREES ARE BEING SHORT CHANGED AND TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF. HOW ARE OUR BOOMERS BEING TREATED IN THEIR GOLDEN YEARS? THEY ARE BEING BETRAYED! . . (MORE)

5/2007 - DAVID T. HARDY INTERVIEW - DAVID T. HARDY IS A TUCSON, ARIZONA ATTORNEY AND AN ACCOMPLISHED BEST SELLING AUTHOR. . . (MORE)

4/2007 - AMERICA - THERE ARE CONSERVATIVES WHO BELIEVE THAT WE SHOULD NOT ADDRESS THE PEOPLE OR ACTIONS . . . (MORE)

12/1990 - MICHAEL MOORE'S SECRET PHIL DONAHUE, RALPH NADER AND the national MEDIA. flint was the founding home of both general motors and the united auto workers. general motors was america's premier manufacturer and the largest concentration of gm workers was in flint. What is the valid Flint story of thirty years ago? . .(MORE)

3/2009 - MIKE WESTFALL'S CHAPTER IN BIOGRAPHY - IT IS FASCINATING THAT MR. MOORE, WHO HAS A NOTORIOUS REPUTATION FOR BEING THE DREADED BUSHWHACKER, SHOULD FEEL SO THREATENED BY ME. . . (MORE)

4/2007 - WESTFALL INTERVIEWED ON CHICAGO RADIO BY FRANK SALVATO - THE NEW MEDIA JOURNAL RADIO SHOW CHICAGO, ILLINOIS. . . . (MORE)

2011 - DECONSTRUCTING BY THOMAS CLOUGH-  EVERY SUCCESSFUL PREDATOR HAS A DISTINCTIVE WAY OF SUCCEEDING . . . (MORE)

MATERIAL PRINTED IN INTERNATIONAL EDUCATIONAL TEXTBOOKS

Mike Westfall / Ralph Nader

FATHER GEORGE SCHULTZE,SJ INTERVIEW

Mike Westfall / Michael Moore... Bio. by Roger Rapoport

FOUNDING GROUP MEMBER

BERNIE LOWTHIAN EDITOR OF HISTORIC LABOR PAPERS