Labor and National PoliticsPosted by Robert at 19 Sep 2007 01:52 am
SEIU members choose John Edwards
In a straw poll taken after the candidates gave their pitch, SEIU members chose John Edwards. The straw poll is not binding and is not an endorsement. The Executive Board of the International will make a decision next week about who our endorsed candidate will be. Our President Damita Davis-Howard will be voting on behalf of our local.
Each local has a seat on the Executive Board. If Edwards gets the endorsement, this will be a huge boost to his campaign.
September 19th, 2007 at 9:39 am
Goooooooooooo… Edwards!!!
September 19th, 2007 at 9:45 am
By how much did he win?
September 19th, 2007 at 10:06 am
Are you in Local 1000?
Did Local 1000 come out for Edwards?
Stern is saying “the Californians” are strong for Edwards.
See michiganforedwards.blogspot.com for links.
September 19th, 2007 at 10:06 am
This is like winning the lottery for Edwards. SEIU rocks.
September 19th, 2007 at 10:26 am
As a retired employee represented by SEIU, may I just say I was never more proud of my “alma mater” and hope you all bring this to a resounding fruition!
September 19th, 2007 at 10:38 am
Union members picking another loser to endorse? what a surprise.
September 19th, 2007 at 10:58 am
The key to the value of this nod and possible endorsement that follows is follow through on the part of labor.
That follow through will need to be for labor to put its own immediate institutional interests below those of unorganized workers in order for the case to be made to working people as a whole as to the need for worker-centered government if, indeed, that is what Edwards really intends to do if elected.
Labor can only win if it brings along enough unorganized working folks to tip the balance.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 11:05 am
Marc,
SEIU is the fastest-growing union in North America, with 1.9 million members in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. We are organizing in right to work states across the country. If anyone is trying to organize the organized, it is us. Colorado is the state that will tip the balance next year and thats where we are putting our resources…
September 19th, 2007 at 11:12 am
Since Andy Stern took office, over 900,000 workers have become members of SEIU. He nearly doubled our union. The whole reason that SEIU 1021 came into existence is so that we can prioritize organizing the unorganized in areas where we lack strength like the Central Valley.
We have made great strides in Stockton and other areas of Northern California. 10 locals became 1 local in order for us to pool the resources and become stronger.
Again, as I said before, this is a straw poll only and is not an endorsement. That will happen next week.
September 19th, 2007 at 11:23 am
Robert, it takes something like 55,000,000 voters to win a presidential election in absolute terms, fewer when strategic target states are analyzed.
SEIU only needs 53,100,000 more members by next November in order for labor to elect its own president.
We’re all in this together.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 11:40 am
Of course, we are not just focusing on Colorado. We have member organizers working in swing states across the Country. We are in this together. We are, I am, You are, the Union.
Edwards would probably be the best union president in the history of our country. If we endorse him, we will put substantial resources. SEIU was recently ranked the most effective political organization in the country. I say this not to sound like we are tooting our horn, I say this because I truly believe that for the left to turn around this country, SEIU and the Change to Win Coalition must be effective, must win.
September 19th, 2007 at 11:46 am
This is GREAT! This means that when Obama wins the nomination and the presidency, he won’t owe SEIU anything and that’s EXCELLENT! Obama had been with this union from his beginnings, and they choose a sweet-tongued newcomer. Guess Andy Stern won’t be the Sec of Labor after all.
September 19th, 2007 at 11:48 am
re: “SEIU only needs 53,100,000 more members by next November in order for labor to elect its own president.”
Cute riff, but no cigar. When you get SEIU’s endorsement, it’s not simply about picking up a certain number of voters from within the organization. What it gets you is a huge army of ACTIVISTS who phonebank, lit-drop etc for months before they ever cast their votes. It gets you an enormous infusion of resources and the benefit of the most formidable organizing machine in the U.S.
All of which translates into votes well beyond the nearly 2 million members of the nation’s largest advocacy organization.
If SEIU didn’t represent that kind of organizing power, Hillary, Obama, Edwards et al wouldn’t have taken entire days away from the campaign trail in order to sling a mop alongside an SEIU member in the “Walk A Day In My Shoes” Initiative. Presidential campaigns jealously guard every minute of their candidate’s time, and certainly don’t devote an entire day (and that’s not counting their appearances before MPAC, CAP and other SEIU forums) to something that doesn’t hold the promise of a huge payoff.
Lastly, Edwards has publicly committed to be “the best union president in American history,” to walk picket lines and join organizing campaigns as President. So the idea of labor “electing its own president” isn’t as farfetched as you seem to believe.
September 19th, 2007 at 11:56 am
Thomas, from our experience here in San Francisco, it is always a boon to get the labor endorsement, but it takes much more than that to win elections.
If labor is not a decisive electoral force in a union friendly town like SF, then one can expect that labor’s effectiveness outside its strongholds will be less than we see here.
This is not to dis SEIU or labor, rather to ensure that we don’t get into a starry eyed cycle of self ratification that leads to groupthink and losing elections.
Bill Clinton promised us that he felt our pain, and then turned around and inflicted a bunch of it on us through such gems as welfare reform and NAFTA.
It is one thing to elect a candidate, quite another to maintain political power and mobilization to keep that elected in line.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 12:00 pm
PS, Anonymous: “a sweet-tongued newcomer??” I think you’re being a little harsh on the junior upstart from Illinois. I mean sure, it was disappointing that he couldn’t manage more than a “present” vote as an Illinois legislator during our biggest organizing campaign in that state, forcing us to win without his “help.” And sure, he’s kind of a cute face and an empty suit who hopes his lack of substantive accomplishments can be overlooked by way of self-aggrandizing hagiographies like “Audacity of Hope.” And sure, he spent much of his fledgling Senate career appropriating Lieberman’s “faith based” nonsense. And sure, it’s a sad fact that a dude named “Barack Hussein Obama” (D - Oprah) will no sooner get the nomination OR the presidency than one named “Adolf Stalin,” but them’s the facts, Jack.
And the notion that Andy would take a demotion to Labor Secretary from ANY of these people is laughable. If he’s in a good mood during the presidential transition, he MIGHT let the president-elect have Anna or Sal.
September 19th, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Marc, I agree with your point re: Clinton and some of his disappointing policies. I would note that his campaign, however, was always about triangulation toward a middle “3rd way” and he certainly didn’t stake out the kinds of pro-labor commitments that Edwards has. Clinton never billed himself as a progressive, and was always one of the DLC leaders that sought to drive the party toward the center.
re: “If labor is not a decisive electoral force in a union friendly town like SF”…..you may wanna ask Rob Black about that, who was well on his way to victory until SEIU jumped into the race. In any case, the reason labor has MORE, not less, influence in many other, less progressive parts of the nation is simple. It’s because we can carry a message that many other progressive advocacy orgs can’t. If you’re an ordinary, Joe SixPack voter in a rust-belt swingstate like Ohio, Michigan or Pennsylvania, to whose message will you be most receptive: the Sierra Club? Act-Up/Queer Nation/HRC? Or a union, like the one you belong to at work?
That’s not to dis those other groups (I love my friends in the Milk Club, Pride at Work, and we’re lucky to live in a place where advocates like that DO have more sway than they would elsewhere). I’m simply addressing why labor has a bigger, not smaller, share of influence in areas where - for the left - they’re often the only credible game in town.
September 19th, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Thomas, Clinton in 1992 and Clinton in 1996 were totally different creatures. Triangulation did not show up until 1996. Clinton had, did and still does bill himself as a progressive.
Daly 2006 was a full court press with all progressives at the wheel. Labor was swarming on the district to be sure, but with a win that slim, it can be argued that everyone’s contribution was essential.
There is a school of thought that Rob Black never had an advantage, that Barnes, Mosher, Whitehurst and Lauter simply released numbers that would give the business community hope that they could unseat Daly and in turn cause them to spend more money with BMWL which in turn would increase BMWL’s take.
My thoughts are more towards a citywide perspective in general and the swing districts, especially D11, in particular where despite higher than normal rates of union membership, unions have not demonstrated as much effectiveness at the ballot box as they should.
The facts are that union membership rates are still in the toilet from historic highs. I’m not sure that SEIUs pulling out from the AFL/CIO was done as cleanly as I’d like, or that the SEIU leadership is as democratic as I’d like to see, but something had to be done and better something flawed than nothing at all.
Most workers are not organized and most who are work for government. It is an uphill battle even in the sticks of Pennsylvania for that demographic to make the progressive case through unions, but it is clearly better than nothing.
The reason why Edwards rhetoric appeals to me is that it is more populist than progressive or leftist, and that is the key to unlocking the liberal/conservative straitjacket in which we are confined now.
Progressives cannot win a high office election without labor and labor cannot win those elections on their own.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
When Edwards said there’d be no scabs allowed on his watch, to me that meant he was “true union” all the way. Remember the National Guard used by Presidents to quell strikes? Remember the political ties that nearly destroyed the unions? If there was ever a time this country needed a President who wore a union label on his sleeve and was proud as punch to wear it, it is now.
September 19th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
“Triangulation did not show up until 1996.”
Untrue. Even as Arkansas Governor, Clinton was a member of (and I believe has served as chair of) the centrist DLC. He infamously allowed the execution of a mentally disabled African-American in order to innoculate himself against any hint of “Willie Horton” or being “soft on crime.” He jettisoned health care reform while pimping NAFTA before 1996. And he teamed up with Greenspan to placate the bond market and chuck progressive economics pretty much fromt he moment he took office.
“The facts are that union membership rates are still in the toilet from historic highs.”
And it’s a fact that there’s one union who, mare than any other, has produced a track record heading in the other direction. SEIU has doubled its membership since Andy took it over, and is now not only the largest, fastest-growing labor union in the U.S., but the largest advocacy organization of ANY sort (including the NRA, AARP and the Democratic Party).
“Progressives cannot win a high office election without labor and labor cannot win those elections on their own.”
Agreed.
September 19th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
hi ,
i would favor John edwards for to be our next 2008 united states of America President ..I would favor John Edwards oh Yeah!!!!!! let’s get him e lected for untiedstates of America and pls get him to Seattle ,washignto we wants to see him more visit to seattle ,washington and when will eh come to visit for his campaign ? let’s me knwo ..
Todd Clark
September 19th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
Triangulation and centrism are not the same thing. Clinton continues to characterize himself as a progressive.
I did not vote for Clinton in 1996 because it became clear to me that he was not even a liberal, did you?
We’ve been lied to in the past by power hungry democrats, and I am not going to believe a Democrat’s latter day conversion to progressivism until there is some evidence to that effect other than a politician’s words–see Dennis Herrera locally for evidence of that.
While it is good to see changes at labor, the truth is that organized labor is still in the hole. It is nice that you all have stopped digging itself in deeper, but what we need now is a viable political alternative to corporate rule that can do what it takes to win elections.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 1:56 pm
“Triangulation and centrism are not the same thing.”
The former is how you arrive at the latter, so we’re really splitting semantic hairs at this point.
“I did not vote for Clinton in 1996 because it became clear to me that he was not even a liberal, did you?”
Yup, I sure as shit wasn’t gonna vote for Dole. And despite all of Clinton’s/the DNC’s flaws, I’m not so sure that after the last 6 years I’d wanna trot out the “there’s no difference” rhetoric. I was furious with Clinton at times, and found him cynical as hell. There’s also no question that if he or Gore had been president since 2000, this country, our environment, our economy, the fairness of our tax code, our respect for science, the nominees to our supreme court, and our standing in the world would be of a remarkably higher quality than they are today.
September 19th, 2007 at 2:15 pm
Thomas, Triangulation is a tactic where you play extremes off against one another to achieve the middle ground, centrism is a political position. Not all centrists triangulate, not all triangulators are centrists.
As Jim Hightower liked to say, the only thing in the middle of the road are yellow stripes and dead armadillos. Few politicians are truly centrist, as it is difficult to cultivate and motivate a centrist base capable of winning a contested election in a (nominally) two party system.
Clinton was not a centrist as president, he was an opportunist who liked to exercise power and did whatever he had to do in order to be the one exercising it to his advantage.
The elections of 1996 and 2000 were very different. In retrospect, running Nader in 2000 was a mistake for both the Green Party and the country as a whole. The country can probably recover, the Green Party, probably not.
And I’d love to discuss Gore and Kerry’s capitulation in 2000 and 2004 but I’m afraid I’d get tased by some of the enforcers in here.
Suffice it to say that if Gore and Kerry did not have enough dedication to fight for their own candidacies against the thieves, I would argue that you are overestimating the degree to which they’d fight for you against the interests which funded their campaigns. Would they have been better presidents than Bush, probably, but that ain’t saying much.
I’d add that Democrats could have stopped the worst of the worst of Bush’s excesses with their position in the Senate, but like their standard bearers in the past two elections they shied away from the fight on things like Iraq, PATRIOT, bankruptcy reform and the like.
Yes Bush is bad, but the Democrat Party did not offer up any sort of leadership in the face of his shredding of the constitution and Iraq.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
“Triangulation is a tactic where you play extremes off against one another to achieve the middle ground, centrism is a political position.”
Right, that’s what I said. One’s the tactical means, the other’s the result of that means. We’re not really going to argue about the difference between the “middle” and the “center,” are we?
Jim Hightower’s good entertainment, but it’s unclear that he’s much of an authority on running and winning elections. The Dems in his home state are in as bad a shape as they are anywhere.
I agree with you about the Gore & Kerry candidacies not being all they could have been, and the Dems not having been much of an “opposition” to Bush. (I used to work for Sen. Russ Feingold, and I think you’ll agree that he was an exception to this hapless trend. It took guts to vote against the Patriot Act in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, which is why he was the only one in the Senate to do so.)
Anyway, I see the American electorate as somewhat like a starving, thirsty and exhausted person crawling out of the desert. We’re not going to turn up our noses at a ham sandwich just because it ain’t a risotto from Chez Panisse.
So….(to hopefully bring this thread back on topic), given where we are right now, and given what Edwards is offering, I think we’re staring at a mighty fine sandwich. :-)
September 19th, 2007 at 2:55 pm
“Anyway, I see the American electorate as somewhat like a starving, thirsty and exhausted person crawling out of the desert. We’re not going to turn up our noses at a ham sandwich just because it ain’t a risotto from Chez Panisse.”
Or we are floating out at sea on a raft, delirious with visions that end up being mirages and fighting off the desire to drink the seawater to quench our thirst.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 3:12 pm
OOOHH!! That’s pretty good. :-) Kinda poetic in its meter, even.
So, uhm, will you vote for Edwards if he’s the nominee?
September 19th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
As a California voter, odds are that my vote for president will not count.
If it provides any solace, I will not be voting for Nader either.
If Edwards is nominated, and he does not take corporate contributions, and he can build and mobilize an organization powerful enough to make a difference, and that organization is designed to stick around after the election and mobilize people to keep Edwards in line, not succumbing to the Clintonia that we all did in 1993, then I’d consider it.
But none of that is not going to happen because the Democrat party has long since applied RoundUP(TM) to its grassroots and the soil is still poisoned.
-marc
September 19th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
I commend you for all your fine work organizing workers.
The Democratic Party has completely abandoned the working man. The major parties are controlled by upper-middle-class lawyer dwebes and fat-ass millionaires who don’t give a rats ass about the working man and woman. At my first job on a bakery line here in Frisco back in the 70s, Phil Burton actually stopped by twice. Can you imagine Nancy Pelosi doing something like that today? Droping by to shake hands with workers and have a beer after work? No, she’s too busy fundraising, lapdancing for dollars with the millionaires. The Democrats are ignoring working people, and the working class and underclass have become cynical and disenfranchised from politics.
By the way, I don’t think Edwards would be the closest president to labor ever. George Meany sat on the right hand side of the father (Lyndon Johnson).
Edwards is a millionaire, upper-middle-class aristocrat itself, but if he’s the best we’ve got, I’ll give him my full support.
September 19th, 2007 at 4:11 pm
So….if Edwards does A, B, C, D etc etc…than you’d “consider” it.
That’s so very big of you.
This nation is buckling under the worst presidency of the 20th century, we now have a candidate who 1) isn’t afraid to talk about poverty and organizing, 2) has actually worked on organizing campaigns and incurred the wrath of former allies because of it (like Donna Shalala at the Univ of Miami), 3) has presented a detailed plan to get us to universal health coverage, 4) wants to end the war, etc etc…..and you’d “consider” stooping to vote for this man.
Anyone still wondering why Republicans punk us at the polls need to look no further than this kind of self-righteous crap. Somewhere in Texas, Karl Rove is laughing his ass off.
September 19th, 2007 at 4:15 pm
Nakayama, I agree with your comments re: the unfortunate trend from grassroots, community-based politics towards the big money required to run today’s media-based campaigns. I also however, agree with you that we should vote for the best choice we have, instead of pouting and taking our ball home as the very WORST people run our country into the ground.
September 19th, 2007 at 4:37 pm
Sure, you have to hold your nose tight when you climb into that voting booth. The Green Party screwed the nation big-time in 2000 because the ideologues, the cloud-sniffers, sat up on their celestial magic carpets and cast their votes. And I was pleased to hear that even Mediah Benjamin was willing they made a big mistake.
But that doesn’t mean I have to be enthusiastic about it. In 1968, Eugène McCarthy didn’t announce until February, Robert Kennedy in March, and Humphrey in April. In contrast, now our politicians announce their candidacy for the presidency two years before the election. They spend two solid years lap-dancing for dollars, and all the press ever reports is how much money each candidate has raised (not that I fault the press for doing this; it all boils down to money, after all).
So, in a way, you have to admire the working man for being pretty smart. He is the only one who understands that the whole system is rigged and corrupt, and that is why he does not vote.
September 19th, 2007 at 10:05 pm
Hey Todd,
John Edwards was in downtown Seattle, WA this evening (9/19) for a fundraiser event at the Westin Hotel. It was a wonderful evening that was well attended and hopefully succesful from a financial standpoint. Also terrific to see the ethnically diverse, with an age range from college to retired crowd. I was thrilled to be able to attend and shake the hand of the next President of the United States.
September 19th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Thomas, I am a registered Green and don’t intend to reregister to vote in the Democrat primary. Not to worry, California will go Democrat by more than 1m votes.
At the end of the day, House Democrats cut the checks for the worst administration in history. We are buckling under Bush because the House Democrats are too risk averse to stop him because they think that more repression in 2007 leads to more Democrat votes in 2008.
Right now my own representative from one of the most progressive districts in the country who wields the power as Speaker of the House of Representatives is unable and unwilling to stand up to defund the criminal war in Iraq. With a phone call, she could ensure the appropriations bill never saw the light of day. Were the president Democrat and congress Republican, how would that work out?
George W. Bush has only been able to accomplish what he has because the Democrats in the US Senate let him when they were in the minority. The minority Senate Republicans are holding strong on denying Habeas Corpus to presidentially designated “enemhy combatants” in a way that Senate Democrats could not have imagined to stop PATRIOT and most certainly did not muster when they assented to Habeas restrictions. Any self respecting Democrat would be dragged kicking and screaming from the chambers at such desecration of our constitution.
The only reason why US troops are terrorizing Iraq is because Nancy Pelosi assents to cutting those checks to Halliburton–that’s the only way it can happen in our system even if she votes against it–she has the power to stop funding war crimes and does not exercise it.
That makes her and by extension us exposed to war crime liability under the Geneva Conventions.
The only reason why George Bush successfully stole the 2000 election is because the Democrats had exterminated their grassroots base and was institutionally incapable of contesting the theft where it counted.
There is little that Edwards says in his speeches that Nancy Pelosi has not said in her speeches when she has been seeking office.
All those “ifs” are fundamental matters of values and priorities. Bush’s baddness cannot excuse Democrat complicity.
One final note, Thomas, that I’d urge you to not confuse your view of the union you work for with the view of that union by the folks represented by it. If my City worker friends are any indication, there is no love lost between SEIU and represented workers at a day to day level. It is not that folks are philosophically opposed to unions or progressive politics, to the contrary, they just don’t see the SEIU as a welcoming institution at the level of the shop, just a bunch of people wearing sateen jackets telling each other how effective they are.
And, yeah, I shook the hand of the next president of the United States, Jimmy Carter in spring 1976 in Dallas Texas. I voted for him in 1980 but that didn’t work out so well.
-marc
September 20th, 2007 at 11:39 am
It’s really, REALLY easy to criticize the efforts of others. It’s another matter to outorganize them and show them how it’s done, isn’t? Given your armchair quarterbacking of SEIU and the Dems, I’m DYING to see how many Americans have health insurance or better wages because of you.
(Sound of crickets.)
No person and no organization is perfect. We’ve all fucked up here and there. But I’m proud of SEIU, of our members, and of the people I work with every day. There are many, many working people who have health care today because of them. There are people who have retirement benefits and better wages because of them. I can cite you concrete, measurable examples of these results if you don’t believe me, from janitors at the University of Miami to security guards in LA to temp workers here in SF to retirees in the Central Valley.
So please, before we have any more armchair pundits throwing spitballs from their little perch of puritan irrelevance, DO show us how it’s done better. How many kids, for example, are able to see a doctor today because you yammered on about Pelosi’s shortcomings?
re: “I’d urge you to not confuse your view of the union you work for with the view of that union by the folks represented by it.”
…and if you NEITHER belong to or work for an organization, I’d “urge you” to not pompously lecture those of us who do. Hamhanded attempts to drive a wedge between members and their union is a tactic we face from management every day, so you’re gonna have to be a little more orginal and bring better game than “I heard so-and-so say such-and-such.” As far as political and organizing dialogue goes, that’s pretty weak sauce.
No gold star on the fridge for Corky.
Let’s stick with who and what we each know, shall we? So how about you don’t lecture us on SEIU, on actually improving the lives of working families, on actually getting people elected, and on getting more than 2% of the nationwide vote…..and in exchange we won’t lecture you on Krissy Keefer and her bongos.
September 20th, 2007 at 5:56 pm
I’ve worked on campaigns for better wages here in SF and to elect candidates who move those agendas. Crickets sound nice to me and are more appealing than the tumbleweeds rolling down the Democrat congressional aisle in DC.
And the tone of Thomas’ post is indicative of exclusivist groupthink in support of mediocrity and failure and of fealty to the heirarchies. We’ve been going down that road since the 1980s and ever since, conditions have deteriorated for American workers and progressives.
The facts are that the Democrats are cynically basing their own political calculus on continued bloodshed and have been unable to leverage their positions to stop the carnage.
My household is a what you would refer to as a union household, okay, so my standing to comment is arguably more legitimate than someone who works for a union by choice.
Perhaps there is some great book in the sky where every effort you make is recorded and those who made the most effort at the end get a special prize. That has nothing to do with identifying points of failure and correcting them. That is happening from the top down in SEIU, it also needs to happen from the botttom up. Compare that with the Democrat Party which is still blissfully cruising along, not playing to win.
The truth is that both the Democrats and labor have a lock on resources due to incumbency. Suggesting that others try to create similar structures and, in the case of Greens, attacking us when we try, demonstrates that it is much more about certain individuals controlling access to power, as the Democrat hierarchy fights the Greens with more vigor than it does the Republicans.
Democrats and labor enjoy hegemony over American progressives because they both earned power in an earlier era and have conserved that power over time by defending it vigorously against all comers, the Democrats by monopolizing access to the ballot and labor by portraying themselves as representing workers who are forced to join them as a condition of employment, to the point of demonizing a member of a labor household.
Applying RoundUp(TM) to your grassroots.
-marc