The gripes we have with the DLC, Rahm,and No Mo Joe can be ascribed to a lot of union leadership – out of touch with their members, and comfortable in an affluent lifestyle the membership pays for.

Stern is a welcome break from that, and SEIU’s breakaway from the AFL-CIO, though heartbreaking, may be what is necessary to create a new paradigm, just as supporting Lamont was a necessary step to get the attention of Democratic leadership.

Jane has recognized this from the jump, and is to be commended for inviting labor to the lake.

I am convinced if we turn the corner, history is going to remember FDL as one of the reasons.

Marion in Savannah @ 45

Akosua @
44

I’m an enthusiastic member of a local of UFCW. I am most concerned about the recent decision by the NLRB about who is and isn’t a supervisor. In the library where I work, the middle management, who are not represented, are increasingly being exploited in terms of hours, uncompensated overtime, manipulations of schedules, etc., and also in being held accountable for things that do not have the authority to control or effectively influence. More jobs have been redefined as management. It is a bad position and slowly getting worse. It distresses me to see this likely to expand. Whether or not it expands in my shop, it will in many others.

Exellent point. As I understand it charge nurses are now considered “supervisors.” Well, not exactly. Charge nurses supervise patients and their treatment. However, as probably the most senior nurses on the floor isn’t it nice to be able to cut their overtime???

I’m an enthusiastic member of a local of UFCW. I am most concerned about the recent decision by the NLRB about who is and isn’t a supervisor. In the library where I work, the middle management, who are not represented, are increasingly being exploited in terms of hours, uncompensated overtime, manipulations of schedules, etc., and also in being held accountable for things that do not have the authority to control or effectively influence. More jobs have been redefined as management. It is a bad position and slowly getting worse. It distresses me to see this likely to expand. Whether or not it expands in my shop, it will in many others.

Exellent point. As I understand it charge nurses are now considered “supervisors.” Well, not exactly. Charge nurses supervise patients and their treatment. However, as probably the most senior nurses on the floor isn’t it nice to be able to cut their overtime???

my limited recall says there was a split from AFL CIO by SEIU and Teamsters in 05 – which of course gladdened Rove et al, BUT read something in the last few months that says there were stirrings of rapprochement primarily through the upcoming mid terms and 08 of course – correct ?

AFSCME is AFL-CIO affiliated org., does their endorsement of Lamont mean there could be a full org endorsement for Ned, b/c I thought AFL-CIO had bullheadedly stuck by Liarman

I fear a new Great Depression is the only thing that will wake this country up.

From a Lesley Stahl interview, on why Stern sees unions as bridging the gap between rich and poor:

Asked why the 90 percent of Americans not in a union should care, Stern says: “When unions were strong, they raised everyone up. Look at what’s happening in America. The gap between the rich and the rest of the population is growing so wide and so fast that even Alan Greenspan says it threatens democratic capitalism.”

“So, you think if more people join unions, that gap would necessarily have to turn around and start shrinking? Is that what you’re saying?” Stahl asks.

“I think unions are the best anti-poverty program that America’s ever had,” he replies.

And that seems to be Stern’s central motivation: lifting the very lowest-paid service workers into the middle class. So the face of his union isn’t a burly auto-worker, it’s people like Maria Velazquez, who runs a daycare center out of her living room in Chicago.

Velazquez says she is taking care of 16 children, all of whom come from low income families.

SEIU membership is mostly Spanish-speaking, female, minority and immigrant. What’s amazing here in Illinois is that by going door to door, SEIU was able to organize 49,000 other women like Maria who run day care centers.

After 10 years of recruiting and lobbying, Illinois agreed to a union contract, giving the women a 35 percent raise and health care during the next three years.

“I think I’m going to win the Nobel Prize because I think I can finally prove that Ronald Reagan is wrong, George Bush is wrong. Wealth does not trickle down, it trickles up,” Stern said at a rally.

60 Minutes on Stern — May 16 or so

Well, one of my questions would be, to Alan Greenspan at least, is “is there even such a thing as ‘democratic capitalism?’ “

There may have been such when Alan was a lad, but I wonder if the “Age of Greed” put paid to the concept. After all, if you can buy a bigger house with a bigger pool if you own the company by the simple expedient of outsourcing jobs to India or China or Nicaragua, where you don’t have to pay living wages and provide health care, etc., by throwing your employees under the bus, well, why the hell not? Your bottom line is better, and if you’re a large enough corporation your stockholders giggle with glee.

Also, I have seen unions do some of the stupidest things imaginable. When I was a kid in New York City there were 7, count them, 7, daily newspapers. After a particularly ugly printers’ union strike we were down to 3. ‘Scuse me? Why create a position that is so intransigent that half of your jobs are lost? Remember the air traffic controllers? I think they were right, but they called Reagan’s bluff, which wasn’t a bluff at all. As I understand it the plight of the air traffic controller is worse now than it was then. (I’m also old enough to remember Jimmy Hoffa and some of the other “big boys” and their little games.)

Which brings me back to the concept of “democratic capitalism.” Really… How exactly does that work? The workers own the means of production? Where have I heard THAT before???

However, I do in my heart of hearts believe that unions are a good and proud and necessary thing. Gee, instead of “democratic capitalism,” how would Netroots Capitalism work? Sorry for the rant, but while I grieve for the true union movement I’m sanguine enough to remember why it has become less and less important on the national scene.