Speaking of organized labor, the latest news on unionizing efforts within local Starbucks’ stores has the company accusing the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and the Starbucks Workers United union of misconduct on the basis of allegations made by a whistleblower in the agency. Starbucks has formally claimed that agency officials interfered with elections by providing real-time intel about vote counts to union representatives so as to assist them in maximizing favorable voter turnout. In addition, Starbucks alleged specific misconduct in a Kansas City area election and therefore has asked the NLRB to suspend all mail-in ballot union elections henceforth because of the illegal tampering. Some 220 stores within the Starbucks system have already voted to unionize and another 34 elections are scheduled or in progress. The company has asked that all future elections be held in person rather than by mail. The NLRB will certainly reject the request as, in baseball vernacular, the company has gone hitless (Aspiris Keewenaw, August 1 – 5, July 25 – 29) in agency decisions over the past few weeks.