Shut-ah U Face

Years ago on a construction site I witnessed the following scenario. It was mid morning during coffee break time and the brick layers, Fitzie, Joe, and Al were sitting under the shade of a nearby tree when a couple of the big shots from Local 25 came over. One of them, a Business Agent for the union dressed in his three piece suit went over to Al and took him with them behind the construction trailer. Not knowing that I was close by, they proceeded by threatening the old timer, Al.

The Business Agent grabbed Al by his wet and dusty t-shirt and said, “You want to keep-ah this job, you keep-ah your-ah mouth shut. Cahpeesh?” Al frighteningly nodded his head to signify he understood. The two men weren’t happy with his nod and they yelled again at him until Al sheepishly uttered the word, yes. As Al was walking back to the area where he was laying bricks, the two men called him. When he turned toward them, the Business Agent said “Remember!” and immediately put his fist in his mouth and made believe he was biting it. Al knew exactly what that meant.

I don’t know what Al knew about the Business Agent, I could only surmise that he had seen something that he wasn’t suppose to see and they were warning him not to tell anyone. You didn’t want to cross these people because they could cost you your future. They controlled who got the jobs and special assignments.

This story was resuscitated from the back of my mind after reading in today's NY Times about the demotion of a woman who had been the chief overseer of contracts at the Army Corps of Engineers.

The Army states that the reason for her demotion is based solely on her poor job performance, but if you read the article one sort of starts smelling a rat. It appears once again someone is being singled out for speaking out against the Bush administration. She invoked the holy name of Halliburton, which is near and dear to Mr. Cheney's fragile heart.

The list of people who have been told to shut-ah your-ah face-ah under the current administration is growing. I wonder if they do it while biting their fists.

Next time you see a picture of Karl Rove of Dick Cheney; see if they don't remind you of a couple of shady Business Agents or used car salesmen. I better be careful, Big Brother is probably monitoring the World Wide Web. Why don’t they send them to find Osama?