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The hosts of Fox & Friends on Friday suggested that fast food workers should stop striking for higher pay and get a second job because the minimum wage "was never meant to be a career wage."

On Thursday, hundreds of restaurant workers in New York City went on strike to demand a wage of at least $15 an hour. The current median wage of $9 an hour puts workers at about $4,500 lower that the poverty threshold of $23,000 for a family of four. The current minimum wage in New York City is $7.25.

"Here's the deal, you're a minimum wage worker, that's an entry-level salary," Fox News host Brian Kilmeade opined on Friday. "If you're good, you'll get a raise."

"Minimum wage was never meant to be a career wage. If you work hard you will get higher -- you will get more money. Here's the other thing, as hard as it is in some cases, because you are a single mom or a single dad, you've got to get another job. You've got to get another job on top of that so you have two incomes."

"Brian you hit on the nose, I think, the key thing," co-host Steve Doocy remarked. "If it is a minimum wage job, expect to get paid the minimum wage."

"The National Restaurant Association said that they provide 13 million jobs, and those jobs could be jeopardized across the country if the minimum wage goes up," he added. "The industry says one of the best paths to achieving the American dream is to start with an entry level, minimum-wage job that is minimum wage."

(h/t: Media Matters)

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Even though host Bob Schieffer admitted that he has not read conservative author and columnist Amity Shlaes' recent book, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, he and his producers were more than willing to allow her to come on Face the Nation this Sunday and give their viewers a big heaping helping of the right-wing revisionist version of just what Coolidge's economic policies brought to the country.

It's shameful that someone like this right wing hack is still being allowed time on our airways, but not surprising, since I'm sure the bile she's spewing here, dressed up as an intellectual, high-minded conversation about political biographies, fits in perfectly with the economic policies favored by the 1 percent running the network she's appearing on. They don't seem to be concerned one iota if there's nothing but rich and poor left in America, and as long as their pockets continue to be lined.

Here's more on Coolidge that Shlaes and her ilk are doing their best to make sure never makes its way into the history books: What the right forgets about labor history:

Busting unions gave Calvin Coolidge the White House, but it gave America the Great Depression

For years, American workers’ wages have stagnated, even as they produced more. Since 2008, they have been socked with staggering new bills for bank bailouts and hammered by a Great Recession brought on by the very same banks. Now public sector workers are confronted by a new crop of Republican governors who want to put an end to unions. Union workers in Wisconsin have already conceded all of Governor Walker’s draconian demands. But they want to hold onto their right to bargain so that they won’t be at the mercy of the whims of political appointees or rogue school boards. Tens of thousands have swarmed Madison to show their support for the working people of Wisconsin.

Conservatives are tasked with coming up with a narrative that makes villains out of these working folks and heroes out of the powerful people who aim to squeeze them for what’s left of their economic security.

This is not easy. And you have to admire their ingenuity. Amity Shlaes, ever the eager revisionist, has whipped up a widely parroted narrative that contains just enough truth to give it the ring of plausibility.

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Despite Sen. Lindsey Graham's optimism regarding a deal on immigration being passed by Congress, now that labor and the Chamber of Commerce have resolved a dispute over a low-skilled worker program, I'll believe they're going to get something done when I see the House actually vote for it.

Graham: Immigration reform deal could be ‘rolled out next week’:

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C), one of the bipartisan “Gang of Eight” senators working on an immigration-reform bill, said Sunday the group had agreed on a deal to be unveiled soon and that he was confident the bill would eventually be signed into law by President Obama.

“We’ve got a deal,” said Graham on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “2013 I hope will be the year we pass bipartisan immigration reform, signed into law.”

Graham said lawmakers still needed to finish writing the legislation.

“It has to be drafted, it will be rolled out next week,” he said.

The bipartisan group first unveiled their framework in January and has been negotiating over the details, including a path to citizenship and tougher border security measures.

There is growing momentum on Capitol Hill to pass immigration reform this year, with a bipartisan House group also working on unveiling their own proposal, which has already secured the general support of leaders from both parties. [...]

“I believe it will pass the House because it secures our borders and controls who gets a job,” Graham said Sunday of the forthcoming Senate plan. “I think it will pass both houses, we’re going to need the president’s support. I’m proud of the work product and look forward to rolling it out.” [...]

“Conceptually we have an agreement between business and labor and between ourselves,” Graham said. “As to the 11 million [existing illegal immigrants], they will have a pathway to citizenship but it will be earned, it will be long, it will be hard, but I think it is fair.”

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So much for all of that rhetoric about small businesses being the engine of our economy and job growth. After the news this week that Wal-Mart has decided to pull back its efforts to open a store in Brooklyn, New York amidst protests and political pressure, the talking heads on Fox's "business block" decided this was a perfect opportunity for another round of union bashing -- which is pretty much their favorite thing to do on Saturday mornings. However, panel member Dagen McDowell may have let one slip when she decided to attack "mom and pa" stores as well.

When it was pointed out by her fellow guest, Adam Lashinsky on Fox' Cavuto on Business this Saturday, that how many small businesses are going to end up being shut down if Wal-Mart is allowed in ought to be part of the debate, McDowell wound up the segment by saying that "mom and pa need to get over it."

And of course even though all of them had plenty of time to complain about how terrible those evil union thugs were for keeping that wonderful "job creator" Wal-Mart out of Brooklyn and for stomping on the hopes of all of those poor people out there just dying to get one of those minimum wage jobs, the true cost of the way Wal-Mart does business with shoving their costs onto the taxpayers never came up.

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After complaining about the fact that the economic recovery in the United States hasn't been as robust as most people would like to see and of course blaming President Obama for the number of people who are still out of work, The O'Reilly Factor's guest host, Laura Ingraham, brought in Fox regular Gary B. Smith and Demos' David Callahan to discuss the topic. To no one's surprise, when Callahan suggested that the wealth being generated by our economy is going to the 1 percent and that stronger labor unions and a higher minimum wage might help to fix that problem, he was immediately pooh-poohed by Ingraham.

INGRAHAM: Stronger labor unions? How do we compete with China, Vietnam, South Korea, India, when we are going to have stronger labor unions that insure that we have more work place regulations, more ways that business has to pay more money to make ends meet? The two things don't add up.

Ingraham went on to complain that it's unfair to blame our obstructionist Congress for any of the problems with our economy. She then allowed Smith to make the claim that unionization doesn't work and that is why we have record low levels of unionization in the United States.

Sorry Gary, but record low numbers of union members is not because unions "don't work" or because people don't want to join unions. It's due to union busting and having the laws stacked against them. Unions have worked just fine for what they're supposed to do, which is collectively bargain for better working conditions and wages for their membership -- and we can thank unions for things like ending child labor, the 40 hour work week, overtime pay, and a long list of other protections for workers too long to list here.

I have a question for Laura Ingraham. If she would like a race to the bottom in the name of staying competitive, maybe she can volunteer to work for that same wage, instead of being paid millions to bloviate on the radio and Fox “News”. If below-minimum wage keeps us competitive with Asia, I say let's start with her salary. What do you think Laura? You ready to work for a few dollars an hour or less?

According to Celebrity Net Worth, Ingraham has a net worth of $45 million and is paid $15 million a year. There's nothing like listening to a millionaire telling the rest of us how horrible it is for business that someone is actually paid a living wage.

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From this Friday evening's forum “Vision for a New America: A Future without Poverty” hosted by Tavis Smiley, which included guests Cornel West, Jonathan Kozol, Mariana Chilton, Newt Gingrich, Jeffrey Sachs, Rep. Marcia Fudge, John Graham and the National Nurses United Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro, I wanted to share a portion with Smiley and DeMoro which was also highlighted over at Daily KOS here: 'We Need a Real Economy' to Eradicate Poverty in the U.S.:

“We have to have an economy – a real economy. What do we have now? We want our jobs back. We want our pensions. We want our healthcare. We want to raise standards for everyone in America. We want a civil society…. Where’s our country?”

These questions, posed by National Nurses United Executive Director RoseAnn DeMoro set the stage last night as TV and radio host Tavis Smiley convened a group of eight individuals for a landmark national broadcast promoting his goal of a “Vision for a New America: A Future Without Poverty.” [...]

Smiley is calling on President Obama to convene forthwith a White House Conference to Eradicate Poverty. He is asking people to sign on to this letter to the President. [...]

One solution for both the healthcare crisis and poverty, DeMoro said, is a single-payer healthcare system. “ It would cover everyone. The insurance companies would be gone. We could have cost, quality and access and the ability to be a civil society. If we had a single payer healthcare system, we could generate almost three million jobs, which would actually serve to stimulate the rest of the economy so you’re building and actually taking care of the people of America.” [...]

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Dave already touched on the protests and police response to the Michigan right to work for less law that their legislators decided to go ahead and jam through in a lame duck session. Here's more from Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids) who did his best to describe the legislation for what it is -- a right to freeload.

Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids) Speaks Out Against "Right-to-Work" Legislation:

In this clip, State Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids) explains his opposition to House Bill 4054, a proposal to make Michigan a "right-to-work" state. The proposal was pushed through the House in one day without a single committee hearing and without taking a single word of testimony.

These Republicans all love personal responsibility unless it means an opportunity to sock it to the paychecks of everyday working Americans and to bust a union. I'm not sure if the tide can be turned back through legislation or ballot initiatives which reverse or invalidate all or at least part of what just happened here, but I would suspect that is the next move we'll see from labor to try to counter this.

Here's more from the AFL-CIO on this rotten legislation: Breaking: Michigan Senate Passes ‘Right to Work’ For Less Bill:

The Michigan State Senate just passed the “right to work” for less bill. The House passed a similar bill earlier today and Gov. Rick Snyder (R) says he will sign the legislation that rolls back workers’ rights.

The measure passed on a 22-16 vote Thursday after hours of impassioned debate. Four Republicans joined all 12 Democrats in opposition.

After months of claiming “right to work” for less was not on his agenda, Snyder changed course this week and began a rapid push to move the bill through the legislature. The Nation’s John Nichols writes that the Michigan action is “part of a bold anti-labor move launched in coordination with a Koch Brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity project to ‘pave the way for right to work in states across our nation’.”

GOP legislative leaders had plotted behind closed doors with Governor Snyder, to have Michigan join the traditionally lower-wage states that decades ago enacted “Right-to-Work” laws to thwart the rise of a labor movement that promoted civil rights, women’s rights and economic justice.

The Michigan State AFL-CIO released the following statement:

....The only ‘freedom’ gained for Michigan workers will be the freedom to make less, the freedom to be disrespected at work, the freedom to struggle to pay their bills and the freedom to be left out of the American dream. This bill is a blatant attempt by the richest in Michigan to silence the voices of working families in our democracy, build their own power, and make the growing gap between the rich and everyone else even bigger.

Should Snyder sign this legislation, he will join a list of other governors – John Kasich, Scott Walker, and others – who have signed over the future of their respective states to big corporations and CEOs, making a decision to leave working families behind. Regardless of what might happen, working people have made it clear they will continue to fight for our vision of a better, stronger Michigan and work to hold elected leaders accountable.

More than 3,000 union members and workers' rights advocates rallied against the legislation and for several hours police shut the doors to the Capitol, keeping protesters out of the House and Senate galleries. Several people were maced as they tried to enter.

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After the tragic fire this week which killed well over 100 employees of a Bangladesh garment factory, Fox "news" took the opportunity to, what else, bash labor unions in the United States, and to excuse Wal-Mart of any responsibility for the incident.

Fox Host: People Who Died In Walmart Factory Fire Were Thankful For Their Jobs:

The 129 Bangladeshis who died in a fire caused by poor fire safety conditions in their garment factory should be thankful for their jobs, according to Fox Business host Charles Payne. Speaking with Neil Cavuto on Fox News this Monday, Payne excused this Sunday’s fire as a rare event and labelled all critics of the unsafe conditions that contributed to the tragedy as anti-Capitalist:

PAYNE: It is tragic. I don’t think something like this will happen again. Don’t think that the people in Bangladesh who perished didn’t want or need those jobs, as well. I know we like to victimize everyone in this country, particularly when it comes to for-profit motivation, which is being assaulted. But, you know, it is a tragedy but I think it is a stretch, an amazing stretch, to sort of try to pin this on Walmart but, of course, the unions in this country are desperate.

[...] Some believe companies like Walmart — whose brands were found in the burnt factory — would move if production at the faculty were more expensive; that is, if things like basic safety precautions were implemented.

During his defense of the factory, Payne referred to himself as “a spokesman for capitalism and the American Dream” and said “for a lot of people, this [Walmart business practice] is a step in the right direction.”

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It wouldn't be a Saturday morning on Fox "news" if they didn't have at least five or ten of these type of segments their so-called "business block," bashing unions and blaming workers for the problems with our economy. And as always on these shows, they have one Fox "Democrat" on there, who agrees to come on and be ganged up on five to one with very little chance to speak.

Host Brenda Buttner opened up the show asking if the protests against Wal-Mart and the airlines are a bigger threat to a jobs recovery than this "fiscal cliff" which is usually their favorite topic to fearmonger over and push for cuts to our social safety nets and austerity.

Naturally, most of them agreed and did their best to portray unions as the big, bad bullies, even though unionization in the United States is at an all time low and the companies as the poor, aggrieved parties who are being "kicked around" by those union thugs. And the unions are now going to get Congress to allow for easier unionization because President Obama won reelection, never mind the fact that Republicans are still controlling the House and that they couldn't get that passed when the Democrats did have both houses of Congress and the presidency.

I will give their lonely "Democratic consultant" Steve Murphy credit for at least pointing out that it's a good thing for the economy for workers to have money in their pockets and that wages are at all time low right now. He also pointed out that there are economies in northern Europe doing very well with high levels of unionization and that the United States' economy was doing better when we had higher levels of unionization as well, which of course was met by jeers and sneers from the rest of the panel members.

And of course the notion that we should be able to do anything about outsourcing, states competing against each other with a race to the bottom on wages was treated as an impossibility. And naturally, the topic of CEO pay, hedge funds and the Romney/Bain model of extracting wealth from companies, and the increasing income disparity we've seen for decades now never came up.

Another day on Fox, another day of divide and conquer and attack workers as being overpaid, or unreasonable for wanting to earn a living wage and maybe retire with some dignity before they drop dead. I'm sure their wingnut welfare from Uncle Rupert for spreading this anti-worker propaganda pays a whole lot better than those people out there working in the Walmart stores, or for the auto companies or for the airlines.

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Ah yes... somebody's got to look out for those poor, oppressed millionaires and billionaires and stand up to those evil union thugs and Occupy protesters: Malkin Reacts to Union Protests: ‘People Need to Understand That Big Labor Thugs Don’t Have Workers Best Interests at Heart’:

Unions are now flexing their muscle, targeting ports, airlines, and stores just as holiday travel and the shopping season kick into high gear. Adding to that, billionaire George Soros is reportedly urging people to join anti-Walmart protests on Black Friday, even if they don’t work for Walmart. Critics claim it’s all part of a massive effort to unionize Walmart’s 1.4 million employees nationwide, which could bring in billions in union dues.

According to Michelle Malkin, these strikes aren’t about protecting workers, but are about protecting entrenched big labor power. During an appearance on Your World, Malkin called the protests a “toxic combination of these left-wing activist groups funded by George Soros … along with a rag tag group of Occupiers across the country who’ve been fomenting this kind of agitation for agitation’s sake for more than a year now.”

She stressed, “People really need to understand that these big labor thugs do not have workers interests at heart.”

How many people think this hateful woman would ever put up with the conditions or the wages of those who are working these jobs at Walmart? She's got that wingnut welfare coming in which pays quite a bit more than those minimum wage workers make and she's more than happy to help Fox attack them in yet another day in upside down land on GOPTV.

Media Matters has more on their latest Soros conspiracy theory -- Fox Brings Soros Paranoia To Walmart Labor Protests:

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