SAG September Election: Prez Candidate Anne-Marie Johnson’s Campaign Video

COMMENTS (26)

• @ “zipped”:

  I have had that exact conversation with Adam Arkin. He told me how he was induced into getting involved with SAG politics and I completely understand why he’s doing and saying what he is. And he’s a likable guy – earnest and without guile. And I believe he wants what’s best for SAG. He also brought up some relevant points that I hadn’t considered, but his (indeed, Unite For Strength’s) plan is ‘merge now – work out the details later’. But you don’t put the cart before the horse.

  Ned Vaughn, Richard Masur and Sam Freed are the ringleaders of the coup d’etat from last year. Because of the way they took over – publicly denouncing Alan Rosenberg and Doug Allen, then went on to illegally muzzle board members (which is still in legal contention, I assume) – I don’t trust them one iota. They share a political agenda that includes saving AFTRA from the IRS by attaching it to a weakened SAG. I’ve also seen Gabrielle Carteris in action (at a recent SAG meeting, flitting around the whole room, annoying members with her legal pad of… what?), who was also instrumental in running around an earlier National Board meeting garnering signatures (yes, those signatures) without telling the people what they were signing. (As was later found, that attempt at a coup failed because it wasn’t done properly.) Is this what you call respect?

  After the way in which AFTRA has treated SAG, I feel it’s appropriate to remove all AFTRA board members from the SAG board, as well as all positions within the workings of SAG. AFTRA is no longer a sister-union – they made themselves into our competitors, and having AFTRA board members on our SAG board is a direct conflict of interest. Do board members from Ford Motor Company sit on the board of GM? No effing way. That’s not divisive – that’s a response to changing circumstances brought on by, well, divisiveness.

  You remember AFTRA, don’t you, and how they broke the long-standing agreement to never negotiate without SAG…? And no matter what excuse they gave themselves for doing so, that action was the most divisive thing to happen to SAG in maybe forever. Compounding that was Sam Freed and NYB/USAN starting a nasty public fight for control of SAG. (And worse, they did it during a contract negotiation!) You don’t call that divisive?

  MF and Anne Marie aren’t so much fighting for MF and their political careers, they’re fighting to keep SAG alive today and prosperous in the future. Merging with AFTRA, as it is now, is a huge mistake.

  With regards to the “Anne Marie (and Alan and Doug) didn’t get us a contract…”, that’s a bunch of selective hooey. You state that as if U4S did? The contract we now have is essentially the AFTRA contract. The same contract that our NegCom declined with almost complete stated support from the national board. (This was, of course, before NY/USAN/RBD snuck in at the eleventh hour and pulled the rug out from under them.) All other contracts were being delayed because of the enormity of the TV/Theatrical contract non-ratification. Again, these people are smart enough to know about “first things first”.

  Please stop positioning their reluctance to screw over SAG members as inability to negotiate. Getting the job done means getting it done right, not accepting the first crap offer so that you can put a gold star by your name.

  Comment by Gary A — Tuesday September 1, 2009 @ 6:07pm PDT  Reply to this post