Um, dear Senator Sessions:

No, moron - it is not "…a political move aimed at Halliburton" or any other specific contractor. It's actually a minimal attempt to protect victims from misconduct on the part of employees and supervisors of and and all contracted firms, and—by extension—their corporate employer. The thought that a corporation would require advance indemnification against claims of criminal conduct on its part or on the part of its agents or employees is both reprehensible and ridiculous.

And, I say that as a former police officer and US Army officer with a background in military police and military intelligence matters.

A problem with Al Franken's amendment is that it only stops funding of companies which make signing a mandatory arbitration agreement a condition of employment.

KBR could continue asking applicants to sign mandatory arbitration agreements, and tell the Pentagon that it wasn't a condition of employment.

The Department of Defense's explanation is ridiculous. They don't need to know what is in the contractors contracts. All DoD would need to do is insert language into all of its contracts that prohibits mandatory arbitration for the contractor's employees, just as the Franken amendment requires. Further, to deal with employment contracts that already exist or are "secret", the DoD would simply require that arbitration language, to the extent it exists in contravention of the Franken Amendemnet, would be unenforceable. Problem solved.

As Goethean and Eric the Red point out, the DOD explanation is completely absurd on its face. There are all sorts of clauses in laws and in the Federal Acquisition Regulations that "flow down" to all contractors and their sub-contractors, even if they may seem to be totally irrelevant. Civil rights, EEO, drug-free workplace (and drug-free people), water quality, air quality, no financing of terrorists, no kickbacks (for DOD, perhaps "Ha!"), and a lot of others -- these are just the ones that I thought of just while typing.

No one in the Senate has ever spewed more bull sh*t and said less than Senator Sessions. He has no shame or he is too stupid to understand what an ass he makes of himself. The producers should have used him for the young banjo player when they filmed "Deliverance!" The "Mouth of the South."

They should just pass a separate law while we control all the votes that is:

It is illegal for employers to mandate arbitration contractually for criminal matters.

Criminal law > contract law.

A legal contract cannot supercede criminal law. How stupid.

Why are you against privitizing the court system? Isn't it better if we take the power out of the hands of a publicly elected official and put it into an employee of an arbitration company? The arbitrator is chosen by a business who will repeatedly seek to provide arbitration services for an organization, but an individual may seek an arbitrator only once? Do you think that would jeopardize the bias of the arbitrator at all, having an employer who wants to obtain repeat business from the organization? What, and damage their own credibility in the process? Like the insurance companies just did with their Cooper/Waterhouse study? Rush limbaugh said no business would ever compromise themselves because of the possibility of this occurance, losing credibility. But then again, how long did Ford produce pick-up trucks with exploding saddle gas tanks, or Ford Pintos? Or carcinogenic cigarettes, or ... gee there are a lot of examples to suggest arbitrators are not going to be unbiased, aren't there? Judges are not perfect, but I trust them more then I do private enterprise.

Sessions is now supporting foreign corporations? Halliburton moved to Dubai..

Jesus H. Christ. Executive identifies what it thinks is a technical problem with the wording of an amendment, White House says it is working with the Senate to correct the issue and somehow that gets run through the Betrayal Decoder Rings and translated as perfidious sellout to pro-rape lobby.

It occurs to me that this amendment could also be the template for legislation to reverse off-shore outsourcing. Just make it illegal for any corporation whose employment standards worldwide do not conform to the labor conditions and minimum wage requirements of the US to do any business with, or within - or to market any goods or services through third parties to or within - the United States.

My guess would be that there MIGHT be two companies with contract clauses that say an employee can't sue because they were raped. The Pentagon and GOP act there are thousands, maybe everyone in the US Chamber of Commerce!

BS

The title of this story is misleading at best. I atually don't give people the benefit of the doubt anymore. The White House actually agrees with the amendment, but they want to make sure it is enforceable. Ummm, that's almost entirely differnet than opposing it. A couple other pretend dems on this site join in with the phony outrage as usual.