>The black exodus from the Republican to the Democratic Party began, I
>think, in 1932. The next black exodus, I believe, won't occur until
>mass movements of working-class people of the magnitude & vitality
>last seen in the Thirties rise again. It is also important to
>remember that it was the rise of a new type of labor movement --
>industrial union organizing -- that prompted this historic exodus.
>Given this past experience, I think that a new type of labor movement
>will have to come out of an initiative to organize the unorganized --
>which should split the AFL-CIO, taking radical unionists along with
>it -- before the next exodus. I'm afraid this type of initiative is
>unlikely to originate in the Nader/Green combo as it is constituted
>now.
Split, divide - why is that the only way you think you can change either the Dems or the union movement?
Why are you so sure the left is powerless to takeover those institutions, yet will somehow be powerful enough to takeover the whole society?
It seems like a very strange contradictory assumption of powerless and power, unfortunately an assumption that is more likely to contribute to the former than the latter. When radicals wants to challenge corrupt Teamster leadership, they didn't attempt a dual union of truckers, they took on the corrupt leadership directly through rank-and-file organizing through TDU. THe same is true throughout the union movement. Why do you think dual unionism is such a better model than rank-and-file opposition and contesting for control?
-- Nathan Newman