force has a mission. and that mission is to turn the union left flank. only the confederate high command knows that mission. troops in the ranks don't understand they're to do anything except locate enemy forces and to fight them and defeat them. that's about the bulk of what the confederate soldier knows about what their mission is here. the roads that the public traverse today on the battlefield, 95% or so are the same routes of movement, the same road lines that were here at the time of the battles. they straightened them out a little, took the kinks out, but were -- you know, that's kind of a preservation plus for the visitor, because they don't have to understand well what was the historic road network? because we just tell them it's the same. it hasn't changed. and then the markering system will clue them in to where missing components are. there were two cabins sitting here. and this would be the point where johnston established his first field headquarters once he enters this portion of the battlefield on the morning of april 6th. so he would have

not only had this federal force encamped, now disembarked at pittsburgh landing in close proximity to his railroad and the corinth junction, but he had three additional union armies pressuring his defenses. he had one in arkansas. he had pope on the river, had just taken new madrid. grant's force here, and don carlos buell of the army of the ohio, which had entered nashville and was maneuvering through middle tennessee. halleck had ordered a concentration of grants force with buell. the plan would be once the two armies were within supporting distance, then halleck would come into the field from st. louis, take command of the whole, and they would carry out the mission of cutting the vital railroads. to the that, they knew they would probably have to contest with the principle army in the west for the confederates. they knew the confederate forces were concentrating, and that the concentration was occurring in front of grant here in proximity to the tennessee river for a direct defense of the railroads. and the key word is defense. the union high command believed the confederates were on their heels in a defensive posture and were not concentrating for off

union forces will attack and seem to gape an upper hand and beauregard will grab nearby forces coming off the fight, reorganize them and are able to throw counterpunches back which will stem the tide of the federal onslaught and the confederates will seize back a little bit of the initiative only to have a fresh federal force arrive from pittsburgh landing and now they're contending with new forces, and beauregard illustrating that the troops needed to be guided forward in person and basically not told to move forward shows the state of the army. it's beginning to dissolve. the question confronting beauregard and the confederates, will they be able to avoid catastrophe? the thing is completely reversed. the euphoria on the first day, a seeming victory, that victory he had wired richmond the evening before that had been won, you know, saddened by the loss of albert sydney johnson, but they had achieved a great victory, which was going to be reported across south in newspapers for the next few days had really turned around. and beauregard faced catastrophe, because if he continues to tr

if us city or you have to exit the european union and you cannot be forced out of the european union and opened trick and leave the european union force outside the us to be voluntary. it is very hard to. to see in these very. dangerous very irresponsible political game that is played being played in all in europe if people are sitting in the tools with talk about it all except use their simple tools they will have either to amend the treaties or. in or out of. resource to the treaty that they used with the treaty of the few which is it be written outside of european union foreign minister terms are as i'm so sorry but unfortunately that's all the time we have thank you for joining us portuguese m.e.p. of artists. and iranian group considered as terrorists by the u.s. for fifteen years is moving off the blacklist government officials are advocating to clear the name of the ek even releasing a number of p.r. adverts this could further strain relations between washington and attack iran jamal abdi the policy director for the iranian american and national council believes it's only case

flag is it carries the pittsburgh landing battle honor that was the official name recorded by union forcesency to name their battles after geographic land points. in this case the landing being the primary feature here. officially, the battle went in as battle of pittsburgh landing. newspaper accounts would talk about the battle of pittsburgh landing. confederates referred to it as the battle of shiloh. that shiloh name, biblical in its connotation, meaning place of peace or house of peace, took dominance and predominance over the identity of the conflict through time. and so it's interesting to see a battle honor for a pittsburg landing on these flags. this was in the possession of lucius d. woodruff of the 21st missouri infantry. a unit that participated in the battle with prentiss's division and fought at hornet's nest. flags underwent renovation. you can see the dark fabric backed by the lighter fabric to fill out what's missing on the flag. same is true for the white stripes as well, where you can see that the flag was in tatters. these fabrics, of course, ravages of time, storage, li

is that it carries the pittsburgh landing battle honor that was the official name recorded by union forces for the battle at shiloh. united states forces had a tendency to name their battles after geographic land points, and in this kashcase, landing b the primary feature here. officially the battle went in as battle of pittsburg landing. newspaper accounts talk about the battle of pittsburg landing. referring to it at the battle of shiloh. the name biblical in connotation meaning "place of peace" or "house of peace" took predominance over the identity of the conflict through time and so it's interesting to see a battle honor for a pittsburg landing on these flags. this was in the possession of lucius d. woodruff of the 21st missouri infantry. a unit that participated in the battle with prentice' division that fought at the hornist the nest. flags underwent rhone vaenovati dark fabric, the lighter fabric filling out what's missing on the flag. same is true for the white stripes as well. you can see that the flag was in tatters. these fabrics, of course, ravages of time, storage, light. moi

stimulus spending and not talking about hab market reform, breaking the baskets over the unionized forces over every country in europe and giving the entrepreneurs and until you get the formula, europe is continuing to find. >> still ahead, is california headed down the greek path? and news this week that its debt woes are worsening, will governor jerry brown's solution drive more of the middle class from the golden state? >> i don't like to tax anybody, but you've got to go where the money is. four walls and a roof is a structure. what's inside is a home. home protector plus from liberty mutual insurance, where the cost to both repair your house and replace what's inside are covered. so your life can settle right back into place. to learn more, visit libertymutual.com today. of how a shipping giant can befriend a forest may seem like the stuff of fairy tales. but if you take away the faces on the trees... take away the pixie dust. take away the singing animals, and the storybook narrator... [ man ] you're left with more electric trucks. more recycled shipping materials... and a growing n

stimulus spending and not talking about hab market reform, breaking the baskets over the unionized forces over every country in europe and giving the entrepreneurs and until you get the formula, europe is continuing to find. >> still ahead, is california headed down the greek path? and news this week that its debt woes are worsening, will governor jerry brown's solution drive more of the middle class from the golden state? >> i don't like to tax anybody, but you've got to go where the money is. now's the time to move from where you are to where you want to go. look up. with u.s. bank let's get the wheels turning. use our strength & stability to open new opportunities. to lend, and lift ...every business...every dream... to new heights of prosperity. good things are happening. just look up. with u.s. bank. [ whooping ] ♪ it was the best day ♪ it was the best day ♪ ♪ it was the best day ♪ 'cause of you we make a great pair. huh? progressive and the great outdoors! we make a great pair. right, totally. that's what i wathinking. all kinds of vehicles, all kinds of savings. multi-policy discou

it pins down the union infintry. it does force the federal artillery to leaf the field. they've used up their available ammunition and have to retire to find more. it isolates the position, pins the union troops down and allows the two wings of the confederate force to envelope the position. that's the demise of the hornets' nest. that's what crushes it from existence. throughout the entire day the federal troops here have been masters of all they aur va. they've been hit by piecemeal fragments of the confederate army. they've been able to check those easily. when they're left here isolated by the retraction of the union right and retirement of the union left and not able t

is this asripple effect of what happened in your state of pro union forces seeing what they can accomplishied force? >> i think so. and i also think that for whatever reason the republicans in general you have seen it throughout the country. they are trying to blame public and private unions for everything when it is not union's fault at all. it makes sure that we have a very strong middle class. the game plan is very clear and has been for the past year and a half that what the republican governors wanted to do is they want to get rid of unions. so you are seeing it in wisconsin. you saw it in ohio and indiana and now michigan, as well. >> wis wils state senator nice to see you this morning. thanks for your time. >>> it is the biggest scandal to rock the vatican in decades. the pope's long term butler arrested. the butler vowing to cooperate with investigators. joining me from london is an abell roberts. explain what led investigators to his door step. >> the butler had extraordinary access to the pope. he is the person who served him breakfast and helped him dress, official umbrella hold

. >> the european union proposal, forcing countries around europe to put more women in the boardroom. the reason is despite all the years of trying to do that, women still today only make up on average of 3% of european board membership. no doubt that women are underrepresented within europe. 34% of your's biggest companies don't have a woman on the board. that is a remarkable number, given that women represent 60% of all university graduates. if we look at the current rate of recruitment at the moment, it will take 50 years to get women to even represent 40% of the board. five countries in the european union have passed a lot to do this, to force companies to take on women. belgium, france, italy, spain, and the netherlands. the campaigners say that it's good, but that we needed to be all of europe. -- need it to be. >> it does not ensure that companies are able to find competent women. second, it improves economic productivity, efficiency, and the functioning of company boards. >> there's an explanation of the reasons companies should be putting women on the boards. >> thanks very m

stimulus spending and not talking about hab market reform, breaking the baskets over the unionized forces going over every country in europe and giving the entrepreneurs and until you get the formula, europe is continuing to find. >> still ahead, is california headed down the greek path? and news this week that its debt woes are worsening, will governor jerry brown's solution drive more of the middle class from the golden state? >> i don't like to tax anybody, but you've got to go where the money is. dad, why are you getting that? is there a prize in there? oh, there's a prize, all right. [ male announcer ] inside every box of cheerios are those great-tting little o's made from carefully selected oats that can help lower cholester. is it a superhero? kinda. ♪ of single mile credirds. battle speech right? may i? [ horse neighs ] or too long, people have settled for single miles. with the capital one venture card, you'll earn doubleiles on every purchase, every day! [ visigoths cheer ] hawaii, here we come. [ alec ] so sign up day for a venture card at capitalone.com. and start earning doub

a lot of proud, solid union work force in michigan. just this past summer, the state ledge slay church, in majority with the governor concurring and signing, signed into law a prohibition against the mandatory requirement of p.l.a.'s in government contracts. mr. walberg: the state of michigan work their 10th amendment responsibilities, did that. now unlike what took place with the paths administration as the gentleman from arizona correctly pointed out, under the bush administration, the federal appellate court ruled in favor of doing away with the mandate and leaving neutrality there. that's all the provision of this section, 517, does is simply restore the neutrality. that's all we're asking. that when p.l.a.'s make sense, and ultimately bring about a better project and outcome, fine. but when they don't, for whatever reason that is, there should be no mandate and there ought to be the opportunity within these contracts, within a state like michigan, to make a decision to not go with a p.l.a. if that's the best outcome result. again,

it resulted in a union victory over confederate forces. nearly 110,000 troops took part in the fighting which produced almost 24,000 casualties making it the bloodiest battle to that point in u.s. history. american history tv visited shiloh national military park where stacy allen, the chief ranger, gave us a tour of the battlefield. he talked about the fighting in a sector of the battlefield known as the hornet's nest. >> we have moved to the center of the union line astride the eastern corinth road into a position iconic with shiloh known forever after the battle as the hornet's nest. they marked the center of the brigades participating in the assaults where the confederates are attempting to attack the federals here. they are doing so in piecemeal fashion, primarily lone brigades making assaults in succession in some instances over the course of the mid-day and through the afternoon. they were dead center pretty much on the battlefield. and the confederates attack through what they describe as a dense underbrush, heavy thicketed zone. t

but the europeans refused one uses the railroads and incredibly strategic movement of the union forces. back and forth. companies see from pennsylvania managed to fight carolina, virginia, box bill, vicksburg back in time for the overland campaign. a lot is a real movement. some of that was reporting by journalist when of the reasons mead is not better remembered he had no time for journalist. 1864, a journalist bios a pat me false report. mead has the journalist put to back words. they rally around their own. hot they make a compact not to mention in mead unless it is unfavorable. he is written now and alienated their journalist. the southern general's are jealous. i have been interested in mead. kids are smart. i knew robert e. lee and mead and yankees. it made sense that mead one. i was only later that was told all the reasons why he did not win and why. he had a lot of help. some came from mistakes but again, he saved the union and we have all but forgotten him. >> in the book you talk about there are 160,000 people on the field and you also spent time talking about stuart and rear

force. romney is anti-union.ook at what romney did as a -- as an investment banker, a private equity manager in terms of the type of companies he took over. many of those people were laid off, and many companies couldn't survive and the workers ended up not better off in many of those not better off in many of those instances. >> all right. e-book "beyond outrage: what has gone wrong with our economy and our democracy and how to fix it," thank you for your time this evening. >> thanks elliot. >> he is now trying to hitch a ride where the secretary of state. coming up on "viewpoint." viewer because we're independent. >>here's how you can connect with "viewpoint with eliot spitzer." >>questions, of course, need to be answered. >>we will not settle for the it almost makes me want to scream, itself my number of the day. $120 million to be precise, $119,922,500. that's how much an unnamed buyer paid for a version of edvard moonk painting "the scream." but that number is the budget of a small town for something that mi

businesses can go to other places and do it much cheap sper don't have to deal with the hassel of unionized work forceow do you respond to that when we do know capital is very mobile now and we are seeing -- especially in the manufacturing side, stuff moving elsewhere? how do you reconcile having good management-labor relationshippas here in the united states. >> well, you know, i think fundamentally we are dealing dealing with moral questions here. it is working people that grow the food that pick the food that prepare the food. in my industry we are responsible for moving international cargo. the commerce of the world passes through our hands. we are not only the muscle, but we are also the brainas in making this economy go. but we don't get rewarded. so when you hear things like a jobless economic recovery. what does that mean? does that mean the people who can invest get all of the breaks and those of us who do the producing do nothing? -- get nothing? i think that's not right. what are the thing -- one of the things the labor movement needs to do is the same thing capital does. we need to connect

and as puray reports, the occupy movement is joining forces with labor unions to spread the message.ds are on the streets of manhattan protesting economic inequality. this is the first major demonstration for the occupy movement since their camps were dismantelled last fall. expressing anger, but rallying for worker's rights. >> a banker with a spread sheet deletes a row and there goes your jobs. >> may 1 is also known as international worker's day, and occupy protesters are joining forces with labor unions, calling for a general strike. in san francisco, union workers walked off the jobs, forcing the city to shut down golden gate ferry service. >> it's time for big business to step up the plate and pay their fair share. >> a small group of demonstrators walked through city street. >> occupy organizers hope today's protest will mark a return to widespread demonstrations like last year. and they believe teaming up with labor unions will attract more supporters. >> may day events are taking place around the world. countries across europe, workers protested cuts in pay and benefits. in

union army. we know the right flank is engaged with greater propulsion of confederate force and that driven back to jones field before noon, counter attacks, amazingly, it counterattacks at noon, driving mac almost two-thirds of a mile and engaging those confederate forces again in the vicinity of water oaks pond. it will take the better part of the afternoon for the confederates to halt, stop, and neutralize that federal counter attack and drive it again back into jones field. by now it is 3:00 and the federals having suffered heavy attrition, growing concern about whether they can hold that flank, will decide to retire across tillman branch. so now you can begin to see that the right flank of the hornet's nest is becoming somewhat exposed to confederate forces now which are north of the position. then after johnston falls, confederates will reignite the effort on the extreme confederate right. and we know that stewart retires. we know that union left flank now is beginning to fracture. they attempt to hold the line and up until 4:00 he is quite successful in holding the line in a successive se

project labor agreement clauses that basically give some advantage to companies that have unionized labor forcesng the rail project approves the pla contracts. >> project labor agreement ensures you have qualified labor on the project qualify, meaning they know their trades, likely to do the work, safer, more efficiently. you'll have less lost time and so forth. >> not everyone agrees that giving a slight edge to unionize construction companies makes a project more financially efficient. threatening to pull out, unless the airport's authority scraps the pla preference. virginia's governor and transportation secretary have loudly complained that project labor agreements on the project violate the spirit of the state's right to work law. nonsense, thinks board member, robert clark brown, who tried to get a resolution pointing out that no virginia laws are being violated. even in unionized construction companies, no workers are required to join the unions. the resolution created heartburn for committee chair, tom davis, former republican congressman who says he is desperately trying to keep togethe

union infantry. it does, does force the federal artillery to leave the field. one of the reasons the federal artillery is leaving the field is because they used up the available ammunition and have to retire to find more. it isolates the position, pins the union troops down and allows the two wings to envelope or circle the position. that's the demise of the hornet's nest and what crushes it from existence where as throughout the entire day the federal troops here have been masters of all they survey and only been hit by piecemeal fragments to the confederate army and able to check those easily but when they're left here, isolated by the retraction of the union right and the retirement of the union left and non-able to successfully get themselves out of the envelopment, a fair number of them will find themselves surrendered including general prentiss and will wallace will be mortally wounded trying to lead his command to the north and left on the field as dead. >> you can watch this or other american history tv programs on the civil war at any time by visiting

the system or rakes or do you think the european federalists will succeed in keeping the union together by force. i will that i think they'll be have to germany i don't think german is quite decided and you see the reason the german bonds you know now don't paint thing is it's a safe place to be because. the german economy is the strongest in europe they don't trust banks people are afraid to have the money in the bank because they don't know if the bank has to match the greek debt. and and so there's no place else to put it so the german bonds they say is safe and it's also coming here and they mistakenly think that. this is a safe haven united states so they buy treasuries and the treasuries interest rate goes close to zero and they and they get into dollars but of course the problem here the debt problem is it's probably even greater that's in europe and the banks of probably and even worse situation so the whole notion that they're in a safe havens at all. is a very strange well before we go we just have a minute but you're it sounds like you think that europe is kind of kept some scrutiny a

. >>> occupy protesters and labor unions joined forces today in may day rallies across the country. here in d.c. they're calling for a strike against commerce. the group met at meridian park at 3:30. at 6:30 they plan to march on the white house. may day rallies took place in more than 20 cities in the u.s. and across the world. in new york crowds took the streets to protest against corporate america. organizers plan to block bridges and tunnels leading into and out of manhattan. out west in san francisco protesters planned on blocking the golden gate bridge but canceled that at the last minute. ferry workers there did march against the rising health care costs and for higher pay today. ferry service in the bay area, it was shut down for a while. >>> now to the weather. starting to feel a bit more like summer. but don't put away your umbrellas just yet. doug's tracking the latest conditions for us. doug? >> yeah, outside right now partly cloudy to mostly cloudy skies. temperatures of 83 degrees. it has been a little on the humid side. any time you get a dewpoint with temperatures ab

took place april 6th and 7th, 1862 in hardin county, tennessee, and resulted in a union victory over confederate forces. american history tv visited shiloh national military park where chief ranger stacy allen took us behind the scenes to the park storage facility and showed us two rare civil war tents. >> 1999, it all started in spring of 1999 it was brought to our attention at a new site in the park service, kane river location that a family long living at that area before the civil war had upon the retreat of nathaniel banks army during the red river campaign of 1864, spring of 1864, the united states army had left a large amount of baggage and equipage. and the family went out and recovered this. amongst it were two, two civil war tents. one of the tents was a sibley tent. designed by henry hawkins sibley, bayed on a plains indian teepee pattern. the family had had these tents in their possession since recovering them. one of them is the oil tent, and this is the sibley tent. remarkably is it is now known there are only two sibley tents in the american civil war in exist nens the world, one in each

in the private sector, private sector union density right now is down to 7%. only 7% of the private work force is unionized. that's about where we were when franklin roosevelt got elected president, um, and a sentence that i write in my book here and was tempted to write in several other places of the book as well is it's as if the new deal never happened. another cause is a shortage of skilled labor, and that is caused by the leveling off of the high school graduation rate in the 1970s. this is a hypothesis that was forwarded and, i think, is very persuasive forwarded by harvard economists. as they point out in their book "the race between education and technology," at the start of the 20th century there was something called the high school movement where people were building high schools all around the country. um, i think a lot of people don't realize that that didn't really start to happen in a meaningful way until the 20th century. around 1900 about 90% of the population can't go to -- didn't go to high school, and within a few decades everybody was going to high school. that movement cam

on this issue, in your book, union war, you make a forceful case for the fact that millions of northerners fought this war to save the union, the united states. in fact, i've never read a book on the civil war where the term united states was used as much. i know you well. it is quite explicit on your part. are you in any way as a thoughtful historian that has to live in the present concerned that there is a death of pragmatism? the ultimate aim that a cohesive republic is endangered based on your study of what union meant in the 19th century? do we have a language of union anymore? >> i am not so sure. another thing we don't have. this plays off what you were saying. i don't think we have much of a sense of the civil war or anything else in our history. i think an indication of that is the sort of hysterical treatment of everything that happens now. it is the worst. there has never been anything like this. we have never been as divided as we are now. there has never been a problem with immigration if you are now. the only way you can believe that is if your historical memory goes back to

two years ago oakland passed a measure that forces banks to register and maintain foreclosed props. >> >> nation's first and only unionizedstrip club may be forced to close in san francisco because it is losing money. they voted to unionize in 1997. in three the workers bought the -- in 2003 the workers bought the business. wages have been down in recent months. workers held an emergency vote last weekend to decide whether to sell. the proposal failed prompting the departure of several workers. >>> government says gas prices will be lower than previously expected this summer because oil prices have fallen. the energy department predicts national average of $3.79, 16 cents less than projections. new figures show prices are rising in california. down five cents from last month, but up five cents from last week. cheapest place to buy in the bay area is fremont. >>> twitter fighting an effort by prosecutors in new york to subpoena the tweets of an occupy activist. the manhattan district attorney ordered the san francisco-based company to produce months of older ed tweets from malcolm harris, among several hundred arrested dur

in 2001 when john was working as the representative for the united steel workers union, they were forcedfile for bankruptcy protection. they shut their doors and fired 750 workers in the process, but bain walked away with a cool $12 million profit and left the government holding the bag to pay the pension plans of $44 million. thank you for being here. >> nose in your opinions are stunning, but they don't tell the story of the human cost of what happened at gst, what happened to the people working there? >> there were 750 people who immediately had their lives turned upside down. and their entire families along with them. and the entire community in fact. it still has not recovered. when the plant closed down and they filed the bankruptcy, the people lost their health insurance, the retiree health insurance, not only to folks still working there, but we had a lot that worked at that plant that had been retired for years who lost their retiree health insurance. they had their pension slashed by up to $400 a month because the pension plan was so badly underfunded by about $44 million, and

share in them and particularly low paid workers tend to share in them pretty well unions are a powerful equalizing force and they're also a political counterweight you know with with out with the weak union movement then big money is pretty much all there is and it turns out that that that society that fairly decent middle class society that we had forty years ago was sustained to an important extent by the fact that we had a strong union movement and the crushing of that you did movement has had all kinds of consequences that have hurt lots of people who would never have been any how we were in the. should we try to well partly by stopping illegal discrimination against unions i mean it's it doesn't take a whole lot is that the collapse of private sector unions in america took place quite quickly didn't happen and a long slow slide a lot of that happened in a relatively short period in the one nine hundred eighty s. and it was because the reagan administration both legally and to some extent just by disregarding the law tilted the balance heavily against organizing tilt that balance back get back to th

and this day, they're calling forces with labor unions.n san francisco, union ferry workers walked off the job, forcing the city to shut down golden gate ferry service. >> it's time for big business to step up to the plate and pay their fair share. >> reporter: in chicago, a small group walks through city streets, disrupting traffic. >> they hope today's protests will mark the return to widespread demonstrations. and they believe teaming up with labor unions will attract more supporters. >> reporter: mayday events are taking place around the world. in countries across europe, workers protested cuts in pay and benefits. in asia, thousands of people took to the streets, demanding higher wages. in the u.s., critics say the occupy movement doesn't have a clear message, but organizers disagree. >> we do have a clear message. we are the 99%. >> reporter: occupy protestors hope today's events will reinvigorate their movement. in new york, ines ferre, wjz eyewitness news. >> protests are planned throughout the evening as well. so far, they have be

problems with reform like i pointed out earlier we had to work with the head of the soviet union we saw the military forces here deteriorate and it's been a long process of putting them back into order. making them much more focused meaner and meaner i think is the favorite term these days. but there still is conscription here or there is still some contracts work people that are in the list so it's still a long process of reform here but certainly better off than it was ten years ago. i would say so to me. and i'm not completely sure about the shadow of the consequences for mercy's for. professionals and people for certain conference i'm not sure about numbers for. abuse cheryl. professionals he's influenced. their son soon so during the sentencing you know people are. going to be a little more frock. but it's. sort of like indication. of subsidies for studies. and looking at these pictures here it's a stark reminder that the world is a very dangerous place russia lives in a neighborhood where we know the change is going on all of the time but we have to remember. the south side here where georgian forces

the idea that so vast and strong a country could be tamed and forced back into the union by an army of raw volunteers, led by an unschooled frontier lawyer as commander in chief, struck most neutral observers as highly far-fetched if not preposterous. it is in the highest degree likely that the north will not be able to subdue the south british prime minister lord palmerston counselled his own foreign ministry. what's more, the government in washington at the beginning of 1862 appeared completely overwhelmed. the president was increasingly seen as feckless and insufficient. congress was in the hands of a political party that had never governed before. the treasury department was broke. federal spending multiplying as never before. $6 would be spent in 1862 for every dollar spent by the government in 1861. northern banks fearing a panic by demoralized investors had closed their exchange windows in late december of 1861 and were refusing to honor paper money by redeeming it with gold or silver. if the chances of restoring the union seemed slim, even more remote was the notion that a free

>> there are between 7,000,008 million union members in germany. they are still a force to be reckoned with, although their numbers are declining. -- there are between 7 million and 8 million union members in germany. in germany, unemployment has been relatively low in recent years, so there are plenty of people with concerns about conditions and to see that on the streets today. >> it is quite a specific european focus in these demonstrations, and a very strong rejection of this fiscal compact which was championed by angela merkel to end the debt crisis. tell us about that. >> the euro crisis has had a major impact here as elsewhere. labor unions have been reducing working hours. there have been cutbacks in the public sector as well. not as drastic in other countries. the picture is slightly better in germany. the economy is doing not too badly. as for the fiscal pact, the chancellor says europe needs a dose of financial discipline to get debt under control. and watering that down with injections of cash and to the economy is not the way to go. of course, the unions for