Obama has been working on this since he was elected. He has been after the teachers union since the beginning, insinuating that they are responsible for failing schools. His four billion dollar grant program for school improvement in part demands curbing teacher unions in order to participate.
His takeover of the auto companies, unlike his bailout of Wall Street - had pain for auto workers, as opposed to the bonuses for Wall Street execs.
He has not moved on "card check," and was apparently holding it hostage for cooperation on health care. Well, the Senate made that too hard for the Union leaders, by imposing an excise tax on health care plans - the "Cadillac" plans - like the ones some union members have. The head of the AFL CIO said that the health care bill would never make it out of the House with an excise tax.
Then, this week, a deal was struck with an excise tax. Proof positive that the Unions have no sway with the Democratic leadership at all.
Yes, I know that it was a compromise, and that the price of the plan before tax was raised by less than 5%. Also, vision and dental were excluded. Wow. Oh, and union members (and as a member of the NEA, I wonder which unions) will be exempt for eight years. Great, now how little are we saving compared to a public option? And, how fucked is the average non-union worker with benefits?
But this compromise was face-saving bullshit. The union leadership, and a few progressive House members who still rely on labor support needed something to show for supporting this disaster of a bill. Well, they got something, but it wasn't much. Not enough to take to dues-payers and claim victory. And certainly they are too weak to now ask for card check.
After rolling over like punks, do you really think Obama and the DLC will pass any pro-labor legislation? Hell no! They are going to say "yeah, thanks for our health industry bail-out, now fuck off! Don't call until our next election."
And that's the problem that unions have now. Who do they support? If they are being realistic, they must realize that the Democratic party has taken them totally for granted. Unions aren't even in the back of the Obama bus, they are under it. To keep giving money, endorsements, member hours and labor's legitimacy to the Democrats is masochistic. The Democratic party has abused us terribly, they don't deserve a nickel, or a minute of time from labor. Maybe a few primary candidates do, or some representative that actually fight (if you can find one), but not the party or this president.
And the obvious alternative is horrible. If Democrats are sticking the knife in the back, Republicans want to gut unions with a chainsaw from the front. Supporting Republicans because you can't trust Democrats is not even an option. Fuck! The choices are bleak. But they are choices, and we do have them:
1. Stay home - Unions sit an election out. They keep building their lobby and PAC money, and sit on it. They smile and wave at the Democrats and then shut the door. This largely happened in 1994 when unions were pissed at Clinton, and Newt Gingrich swept into power with the Republican Revolution. And it would mean more Republican seats this time. But if enough members held strong, they could bully in certain districts anyway. The real hope is, that unions' willingness to hold strong breaks through some of the Democratic Party's corporate fortress, and the Dems deliver on what we want before a lost election. I think it's too late for that, though.
2. Vote for "Mr. Burns" - I am obsessed with this. It reminds me of the '92 election when people wanted "none of the above" on the ballot. The recent New York mayoral election found thousands of ballots with the Simpsons tycoon as a write-in candidate. If unions could organize this, so that Spongebob received hundreds of thousands of votes nation-wide, it would be a show of force. The Democratic Party would have to look at losing races while a potential source of support shows how many votes they can move for an invertebrate animated non-candidate. This way union membership stays engaged and mobilized while delivering a kick in the ass to the party that has turned its back on them.
3. Third party candidates - They exists, and could be an excellent alternative. That war chest that unions won't give to the Dems could now fund third party candidates in select districts. You could find independents to challenge corpratist Dems, and Greens or other very left candidates to challenge liberal Dems. Doing both is important. Take down a few corpratists because they are assholes who are destroying the country, and they hate labor. Take down a few members of the Progressive Caucus too! Yes they say the right things, but they won't fight. Make them fear us more than conservative talking points.
Is this risky? Even foolhardy? Absolutely. Conventional wisdom in Washington and the media is that this is the circular firing squad. And I am no political genius. I'm just a cranky liberal with a day job - but I can't stand it any more.
And for those who insist that Obama has only had a year, and we have to give him a chance...well, a year was plenty of time to give a trillion bucks to Wall Street, expand the war in Afghanistan and do a preemptive bail-out for the health care industrial complex. His actions have shown that he runs a DLC corpratist agenda. I can only think of the popular definition of insanity: doing the same thing, and expecting different results.
Supporting the same Democrats and expecting different results is insane. It won't happen. We will continue to get screwed - not as bad as from Republicans - but screwed bad none the less.
Compromise is an essential part of our political process, but if Dems can't deliver for labor, or for choice (both which have been savaged of late), then what good are they? The answer is no good at all.
So, we must use the leverage that we have. We can't match Wall Street or Big Pharma in cash, so we must leverage our votes. We do still live in a country where votes matter. The cash of corporations helps buy votes. By leveraging the votes on the left, we exercise power, power to change the course.
It is insane to do anything else.
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