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Robert Pear of the Times reports that Judge Rosemary M. Collyer decided on Saturday that the delusional corporate ideologues of the Bush Administration can't use the "War on Terror" as a pretext for eliminating labor rights they've been scheming to get rid of since they were nasty Young Republicans during the Nixon Administration.

Judge Collyer, who was appointed by President Bush, [said] the Bush administration exceeded even the "broad authority" granted by Congress.

Under the personnel rules, Judge Collyer said, "the Department of Homeland Security may be required to bargain in good faith," but "there is no effective way to hold it to that bargain." Under such circumstances, she said, "a deal is not a deal, a contract is not a contract, and the process of collective bargaining is a nullity."

In other words, Judge Collyer said, "collective bargaining would be on quicksand" because the department could unilaterally "absolve itself of contract obligations" while employees and their unions would be bound by those agreements.

"The Department of Homeland Security has reserved for itself the right to declare any part of any collective bargaining agreement null and void" by issuing directives or taking "whatever other actions may be necessary to carry out the department's mission," she said.

Judge Collyer also criticized procedures adopted by the Bush administration to dismiss, demote and discipline employees of the Department of Homeland Security.

These rules, she said, do not provide "fair treatment" or "due process" for employees who appeal disciplinary actions.

Judge Collyer has experience in labor law. President Ronald Reagan appointed her general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board, a position she held from 1984 to 1989. The procedures at the Homeland Security Department, she said, do not meet any definition of collective bargaining.

"Collective bargaining," she said, "has at least one irreducible minimum that is missing" at the department: a binding contract.

"A system of 'collective bargaining' that permits the unilateral repudiation of agreements by one party is not collective bargaining at all," she said.

Wow, she's clearly a looney. Another nutty activist judge putting the law above GOP talking points. Can't wait to see what the right-wing smear machine does to her.