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Im happy to join you here in this beautiful part of Kentucky. Ed mentioned horses, but thats not the only passion around here. I think they have a basketball team that plays nearby and rouses passions from Ashland all the way over to Paducah and everywhere in between. Paul Witte tells me that just say youre a Wildcats fan wherever you go, and your stay here will be a pleasant one.

Of course, Kentucky is also known for another fine product bourbon. But of course, this sedate crowd wouldnt know anything about that.

I always enjoy coming to these conferences in Americas heartland. Ive been blessed with the opportunity to serve as International Secretary-Treasurer for about a year and a half now. And I thank you all for electing me to a full term at last years convention. Receiving your support was the greatest honor of my life, one I will never forget and never take for granted.

But serving in the I.O. means that Im not that guy from Illinois anymore. Im from Washington. And that means that I sometimes have to utter that dreaded phrase, "Im from Washington, D.C., and Im here to help."

I think that line ranks right up there with, "The checks in the mail."

The fact is I am here to help, by doing my part and standing united with hard working IBEW brothers and sisters from the Atlantic to the Pacific who are fighting for a better future. Thats the IBEW way, and thats what were going to keep on doing.

But the fact is that Washington is a source of too much grief for our members and all working families.

After September 11, politics as usual went on the shelf. The international unity and solidarity against terrorism, the displays of patriotism, the incredible generosity toward the victims and their families.. all of these were the right response at the right time. And rallying around President Bush, especially during the initial military phases of our response, was fitting and appropriate. Our brave men and women in the armed forces deserve nothing less than our total support.

Our military personnel are chasing al Qaeda on the Pakistan border now, as the war on terrorism enters a more shadowy phase. As long as there is one American or Canadian troop on the line, he or she will have our support. But even the President has urged us to go about our daily lives, and I think we should take him at his word.

You have to give George W. Bush credit for being a man of his word. During the campaign, he never pretended to be our friend and let it be known that he thought big business was just fine. And we have not been disappointed. He is not our friend and does think what good for the corporation is good for America.

And thats exactly what we have to fight.

Im not talking about some green-eye-shade details from a budget. Im talking about real measures that can do and are doing real harm to our workers, including IBEW members in manufacturing facilities.

Last year, the Republican-led Congress before Senator Jim Jeffords pulled the greatest switch since Houdini effectively revoked the ergonomic standards that we had worked so hard for 10 years to win. President Clinton implemented them; President Bush and friends took them away.

Think of how much a fair and workable ergonomics standard could help protect our members in manufacturing. Think of the risks they now face. And the administration wants to tell us that fair standards arent needed?

But dont think they dont want to anything for unions and working people. Why the Department of Labor is getting a budget increase for enforcement of the rules on labor union reporting. You know those pleasant forms you have to file with the Department of Labor accounting for every paper clip? Well, you better make sure theyre accurate because the office that monitors us will have more people if Bush gets his way.

No increase for OSHA inspectors, mind you, there are still fewer of them than there are fish and game inspectors. Just more inspectors to investigate unions.

And then theres trade.

Now, lets engage in a little bipartisanship here. When it comes to trade, there is blame enough for Democrats and Republicans alike. We have seen lawmakers from both sides of the aisle stand with us to protect the rights of workers at home and abroad. But the fact that we have lost the votes of Democrats who are otherwise friends on this issue shows that the power of the corporate dollar is mighty indeed.

Of course, in George W. Bush, the corporations have an unabashed ally on the trade issue. President Bush, like all his predecessors, is seeking the authority to negotiate trade agreements and submit them for Congressional approval on a "fast track," that is, take it or leave it, no amendments, no chance to correct any mistakes. He is also seeking to widen the trade agreements like NAFTA to include all of the rest of this hemisphere. Its called the Free Trade of the Americas Act FTAA or, as some have dubbed it, NAFTA on steroids.

Next year will mark the 10^th anniversary of enactment of NAFTA. Since it went into effect, imports from Mexico into the United States have increased 240 percent. We had a small trade surplus with Mexico in 1993 and a much bigger surplus was widely predicted by the "experts" in the Clinton Administration.

The results were exactly the opposite, as that surplus turned into a $24 billion deficit in the last full year reported. The Economic Policy Institute estimates that about 3 million U.S. jobs have been wiped out since enactment of NAFTA.

To generate congressional support for the Free Trade of the Americas Act, the multinational corporations and their little puppets in government will be singing the same sour song we heard in 1993 about creating jobs in North America. Some were crated, but those jobs are with employers like Wal-Mart. And you have to have special qualifications to get those jobs you have to be willing to lie each year during Wal-Marts Made in America promotion. And of course, youve got to be willing to give up your right to unionize.

And the poorer regions of the Americas are only part of the story. China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Pakistan, Africa wherever there are poor people desperate for any job, there are those willing to use their misery to line their own pockets. It is the never-ending struggle in our world. And wherever, the exploited workers of the world rise up to form a free labor organization, a different form of terrorism is used to keep them in their place.

Overall, the United States lost another 38,000 manufacturing jobs in March of this year. That brings the total to 2 million manufacturing jobs wiped out since 1998, a year of slight recovery for manufacturing.

Thats where we stand in the struggle for maintaining a strong industrial base.

But another place we stand today is where our Brotherhood has always stood on our own, depending on no one but ourselves. Our heritage is not to stop and bemoan our fate but to see what can be done, by us, on our own and right now.

We will protect the jobs we have through our collective bargaining contracts and expand the number of workers who have protections of the union contract. That means we have to organize and we have to continue to emphasize training so that IBEW members continue to be the smartest, most productive on earth.

For years, reports on job trends referred to the loss of "high-paying North American manufacturing jobs." That description is accurate, but it would sound strange to trade unionists of another era, when there was very little rewarding and certainly nothing high-paying about production jobs.

Before North Americans organized in great numbers during the Depression, they worked in dirty, backbreaking jobs that had little pay and less respect. It was said they could not be organized because they were not in a recognizable craft. But what they said couldnt be done was done -- and the result was the greatest expansion of union numbers North America has ever seen.

Unionization is the only explanation for the change in those jobs and unionization was a partner in building an industrial giant that is the envy of the world. And today, were hearing about the New Economy or Globalization and other buzzwords, usually with the punch line that everything has changed and unions are no longer relevant.

As you know from daily experience, much has changed. But one factor that hasnt changed is the workers need for a sustained voice in that changed world a union voice in order to play a role in the future of work in manufacturing.

Long-time employers like Raytheon are shifting production from plant to plant with different unions, telling each union a different story about the companys future plans. Thats why we have met with other unions with members employed at Raytheon to coordinate strategy. Thats why we engage in coordinated bargaining with other unions at GE and other companies. What is good for North America, however, is only the beginning. We have to expand this type of coordination and communications around the world.

I want to talk about another issue that is very important to all of our members and of keen interest to our manufacturing branch pensions.

Pensions, always a source of concern, were brought to the front burner recently by the shenanigans of a company the IBEW has long fought Enron. When a story like Enron story unfolds, the people in this room are not as shocked as the public at large because we knew going in that "greedy corporate executives" is virtually a redundant expression. But the revelations about off-the-books partnerships and cover-up annual audits should serve to guide us on where to look next. We do indeed march under a banner of "No More Enrons." We also know that workers in Lucent have lost, in aggregate, more value from their plans than did those of Enron. We know from bitter experience a thing or two about this topic.

Enron proves again that there is no substitute for a solid, defined benefits pension plan. Our IBEW members at the Enron subsidiary Portland General who were so severely damaged have testified to Congress that the turning point in their disaster came with the demise of their defined benefits plan. First it was replaced by a 40l(k) for all members under 42 years of age. Then employees of all ages became bedazzled, as one of our brothers put it, with the propaganda about Enrons unlimited growth. They, too, chose only Enron for their 401(k) investment.

A defined benefits plan is essential to retirement security. After that, we welcome any profit sharing, 401(k) or IRA we can bargain. And of course the foundation of it all is the Social Security Trust Fund. A solid plan needs all three Social Security, defined benefit pension plan and then, only then, a retirement savings plan. Stock market debacles should lay to rest all of the nonsense about privatizing Social Security and turning it over to Wall Street.

Many of you ask for information about the progress of post-Enron congressional action. In the May issue of the IBEW Journal, we reported on the new rules being proposed for 401(k) plans. The essential ingredients of that reform effort are that workers are represented in the plan management, that they get unbiased investment advice and have at least a 30-day notice before any lock-down. We also want required disclosure of insider sales and guarantees of diversification among investment options.

All of the issues I have talked about here have one thing in common. They have been or will be decided in the legislative arena. And legislation and politics go hand in hand.

As President Hill said, weve got to help our members make the connection between their concern for jobs and trade and their seeming lack of interest in political action or voter registration and mobilization. The less vocal we are on an issue such as trade, the clearer the playing field is for the wealthy and powerful in society.

Political action is the essence of trade unionism distilled in another form. One of the reasons unions have been so good at politics is that we are accustomed to thinking collectively. We know that one worker, with one voice and one vote cant accomplish much. But we also know that when you put workers, with their combined voices and their votes, together, you have a mighty force. We have done that in recent elections to great effect. But we are not even close to our potential.

Our IBEW-PAC is the strongest it has ever been. Reports show that while dues checkoff is still an uphill battle for most of our manufacturing locals, you are doing quite well with the raising of volunteer dollars with raffles, golf outings, bull roasts and other socials. And in recent years, attendees at the Manufacturing Conference have given some of the highest amounts collected at any IBEW meeting, and we thank you for that.

We lifted the bar in the 2000 campaign when IBEW-PAC was funded to the tune of $7.5 million, a record by a long way over the previous high of $4.1 million. And keep in mind that the new campaign finance law makes those "hard money" contributions to IBEW-PAC dollars more important than ever, since "soft money" is allegedly banned. For the 2002 elections, we need you to keep up the good work.

At the I.O., we are looking at new ways to nourish our grass-roots efforts. We are working constantly with the AFL-CIO on the best possible mobilization. I would ask all of you to pay particular attention to our programs to put coordinators in congressional districts with sizable IBEW membership. Some of our branches have their members spread fairly evenly over wide political districts, but by definition manufacturing is more concentrated. So when we talk about areas with "sizable IBEW membership" were usually talking your states and your districts. And of course its that grass-roots effort -- the phone banks, the flyers at the plant gate and the rest of the personal-to-person campaigning that is our strength while our opponents rely on their dollars.

Our performance in 2000, despite the presidential outcome, was a high-water mark. We have set the bar high and it wont be easy to duplicate. We have work to do and heres just one example of where to start: some 5 million U.S. union members are not registered to vote.

If only one of those 5 million were an IBEW member, it would be one too many. Because each and every vote is precious. Each and every vote brings us closer to electing people who support us on all the key issues, not just one here, and one there. Our votes help bring us closer to the day when policies that truly promote the common good take precedence over those with a selfish agenda.

And that, brothers and sisters, is what we are fighting for. Lets keep standing together, fighting together, and working together to do our very best for our members and our cause of dignity and justice for all.

I thank you, and I look forward to spending time with all of you at this conference.

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