>And I don't say they pass their job to anyone --just their kids.
>
> I mean doesn't that practice bother you? With all it implies about
>racial exclusion?
In the abstract, it doesn't bother me. I wish they could photocopy them, in fact. And the exclusionary part is not just racial--it's also gender- and class-related. So yes, it bothers me, in the sense that other people are excluded. But, considering capital's full-on assault on unions, members' possessiveness of their status is both understandable and a sort of trifle to quibble with.
>>What was your point again?
>
>My point was that when a union is organized in an exclusionary way, it
>may find it has a problem getting the general population, including
>people of the sort it excludes, to rally to its side when its interests
>are threatened.
Criticizing is one thing, but laughing at their predicament, as I perceived you were doing--the look-who's-come-crawling-back tone--is something else entirely. Unions, no matter how flimsy and flawed, are at least a line of defense. But more importantly, when unions suffer, the real people that belong to them suffer as well.
Eric
p.s. I meant no disrespect toward your daughter's intellectual, journalistic, or argumentative skills.