Back at work, still deserving of prosecution

Well, the thugs who ripped off New York City for three days are giving in to the public's outcry – the transit workers strike has come to end, despite the lack of a new contract, and the city should be operational by tomorrow morning.

But it didn't happen quite soon enough. Today a fireman was biking to work in the freezing cold – an action apparently forced upon him by the disgraceful union – and he was struck by one of the private buses that has been chartered to, yep, you guessed it, deal with the issues created by the malicious union. The firefighter is said to be in critical condition.

Hopefully he will survive. And prayers are surely with him.

But the image is unmistakable. One of New York's finest was almost killed by New York's most despicable. A firefighter struck down by a selfish union.

Again, it is my fondest hope that this man will survive and live to see the trials of the union leaders who so maliciously broke the law and attempted to blackmail all of Gotham. But should something go wrong, I would hope the same union leaders would see indictments for criminally negligent homicide – it was their intentional act of lawlessness that led to this disaster and they must be held accountable if things turn to the worst-case scenario.

I've long felt that unions are inherently contrary to capitalism. They serve to strong arm employers, deduct funds from employees' paychecks and, when they don't get their way, attempt the usual blackmail tactic of a strike. The idea behind them, innocuous enough, is that employees will be treated decently and equally – but nowhere in the principles that guide capitalism will one find a provision for coercion by way of a strike. An unhappy employee may quit – see how the company does without their talent. The crueler the firm, the less likely it is to find qualified employees willing to work.

Think about it – if companies banded together to fix their offerings to employees based on a standard scheme, it would be collusion. But when the other end of a contract does the same, it is a union. And, yes, that is why unions are detrimental to America.

But a strike of this variety takes a particularly vicious, heartless union run by sheer thuggery. To not mess with a single corporation but an entire city at the heart of America, creating countless inconveniences, devastating the holiday season and creating a near-fatal hazard takes the worst brand of radical-selfishness.

I'm glad they're all coming back to work now. But I still think New York City should find some replacements because charges ought to be filed against – and jail time served by – every single person who illegally walked out of their job earlier this week and, collectively, left a firefighter in critical condition today.