As another union person wrote me, "I'm so excited to put in office a bunch of people who will sell us out instead of spend all day dreaming up new ways to cut our throats!", and that about sums it up for me. In a politics divided by extreme-right and mushy-center-leaning-right, thank god we got the extreme rightists out of the uniquely powerful position they've been in. I don't think the mushy center is going to deliver anything great like healthcare for all or a fast end to the war. But, there will be some specific gains made.
A number of the small, nuts and bolts gains that can be made out of this relate to rebuilding the labor movement by organizing the jobs that remain in the US. More from the series of wins in governors races than anything in the House. Governors in many states wield substantial structural power, so these wins will help us defeat the republican in the next prez race. Also, as increasing numbers of quasi- public sector service providers make it clear they want to unionize (home health aides, childcare workers, state employees in the south), the ability of this new crop of govs to issue executive orders legalizing collective barganing for those workers is huge.
In addition to that, across the country there are a couple dozen 'corporate campaigns' by workers and unions against big companies for organizing rights or fair election procedures, so they can organize without getting fired, harrassed, lied to, intimidated, etc. And I can think of easily ten of these that will be able to be finally won and settled with the help of a dem governor to pull budgetary and political strings. Very, very good news for organizing committees of workers in a number of big companies who want to get on with winning fair union elections already so they can start to bargain and fight for a bit more of what they deserve.
However, for the manufacturing sector, I fear the increased anti-globalization rhetoric of many of these new dems won't produce much substance. Whether or not there's now an anti-FTAA majority in congress and all, I don't think the hemhorage of manufacturing jobs can any longer be stemmed by the defeat or rollback of indivdual trade treaties. Only a thoroughly changed political landscape in a less right-leaning future can sustain jobs that actually make and build socially usefull things, maybe.
For the existing public-sector unions, the dems' advance in many statehouses are a real good thing. And as for the building trades unions, who knows, they're mostly tied up in municipal politics and urban machines anyway I think.
So, mixed but mostly a bit positive results for rebuilding the labor movement out of yesterday's glorious triumph of the mushy center of politics in the belly of beast. Onward!
I hope I don't have to phone bank for a dem again for a real long time now... Jim -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20061108/040644ac/attachment.htm>