A new National Journal piece suggests that HRC has her work cut out for her with the unions.
"I was in northeast Ohio on a mission to find out how organized labor is feeling these days about Hillary Clinton. Seven years ago, Clinton captured a majority of union households in Ohio, en route to a 10-point primary victory against Barack Obama. In Lorain County, her margin was even more resounding: 57-to-41."
"At this fundraiser, however, skepticism toward Clinton was definitely in the air. Of the nine union members I interviewed, just one was supporting her. (Four were undecided, three were backing Bernie Sanders, and one was leaning toward Marco Rubio.) Some associated her with the unpopular trade policies of her husband. Others said she had been tainted by controversy, past and present. Most questioned her commitment to labor."
http://www.nationaljournal.com/s/92139/does-labor-actually-like-hillary-clinton
Marco Rubio?! This is the guy whose tax proposals are crazier than what Ben Carson thinks of the pyramids. I think this is a great line but I have to admit it's Paul Waldman's.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/11/09/happy-hour-roundup-730/
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/11/marco-rubios-comic-book-version-of-tax.html
So we have to ascribe in part the tepid feeling of many rank and file union members to lack of information. Its' one thing to say they think Bernie is better for labor-though I don't know how bringing back Glass-Steagall brings back factories to so many of the small towns that lost them in over 30 years-but Rubio?!
There are, of course, lots of real problems. The pain of so many cities, towns, and regions who have seen industry leave starting in the 80s and 90s.
"Mary Springowski, Tom’s wife and a UAW member who voted for John Edwards in 2008, called Clinton a “Pretend-o-crat.” “These politicians don’t represent labor anymore,” she said. “I’m living in a city that is dying, and they don’t care.”
"Tom Springowski, who voted for Obama in the 2008 primary, wanted to show me why people felt this way. So we piled into his 1998 Ford Taurus and rumbled into downtown Lorain. Though it was a Saturday night, we spotted only a handful of revelers: smokers puffing outside the Palace Theater, killing time before an Arlo Guthrie show. We drove down the main drag, past Bootlegger’s Den (a biker bar), Midtown Bail Bonds (whose neon sign depicted the Monopoly man in jail garb), and the Glass House (a head shop advertising a bong shaped like Felix the Cat). Springowski pointed out a post office that had been remade into a store promising “Cash for Gold.” Later, we passed a shuttered gypsum plant where Obama had promised to spur manufacturing in 2008. Listening to the presidential candidates today, “I don’t hear of any attempt to try and bring industry back into this country,” Tom told me. “There’s no plan."
However, unfortunately too much of the labor movement seems to be wholly focused on political symbolism.
"In recent weeks, Clinton has seemed to sense that she has work to do vis-à-vis organized labor. Not only has she come out against TPP, but, just before I arrived in Ohio, she also endorsed repeal of the Cadillac tax. The question is whether these moves can overcome the baseline skepticism that I heard from many union members—especially in Ohio—and resolve what appears to be a split opinion about her within the world of organized labor. “She’s gotta convince people, particularly workers, that she means what she says and she says what she means. And that’s her challenge, I think,” says AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka. “I think as her positions have clarified, she’s demonstrated, I think, more and more, that she’s on the right side of the ledger with the issues. … In the past, she acted like she wanted our vote. Now she’s actually acting like she wants our support. Major difference. Major difference. And she needs our support—the support of working people—to win.”
I think this is the whole problem. The unions want to see that she really supports them but how do they judge loyalty? Opposition to TPP and repeal of the 'Cadillac tax' neither of which will do much to bring back the kind of factory jobs the unions look back on.
The old factories aren't coming back to these towns and localities because the economy has changed in some very stark ways over the last 20 years.
Hillary actually has some real solutions and these have nothing to do with repeal of the CT-which is mostly a GOP gripe and repeal of it might be a pretty bad idea-and or scorched earth opposition to all trade deals.
She understands that the problem is modernizing regulations and labor laws in what you might call the new Uber Economy.
"I was in northeast Ohio on a mission to find out how organized labor is feeling these days about Hillary Clinton. Seven years ago, Clinton captured a majority of union households in Ohio, en route to a 10-point primary victory against Barack Obama. In Lorain County, her margin was even more resounding: 57-to-41."
"At this fundraiser, however, skepticism toward Clinton was definitely in the air. Of the nine union members I interviewed, just one was supporting her. (Four were undecided, three were backing Bernie Sanders, and one was leaning toward Marco Rubio.) Some associated her with the unpopular trade policies of her husband. Others said she had been tainted by controversy, past and present. Most questioned her commitment to labor."
http://www.nationaljournal.com/s/92139/does-labor-actually-like-hillary-clinton
Marco Rubio?! This is the guy whose tax proposals are crazier than what Ben Carson thinks of the pyramids. I think this is a great line but I have to admit it's Paul Waldman's.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/11/09/happy-hour-roundup-730/
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/11/marco-rubios-comic-book-version-of-tax.html
So we have to ascribe in part the tepid feeling of many rank and file union members to lack of information. Its' one thing to say they think Bernie is better for labor-though I don't know how bringing back Glass-Steagall brings back factories to so many of the small towns that lost them in over 30 years-but Rubio?!
There are, of course, lots of real problems. The pain of so many cities, towns, and regions who have seen industry leave starting in the 80s and 90s.
"Mary Springowski, Tom’s wife and a UAW member who voted for John Edwards in 2008, called Clinton a “Pretend-o-crat.” “These politicians don’t represent labor anymore,” she said. “I’m living in a city that is dying, and they don’t care.”
"Tom Springowski, who voted for Obama in the 2008 primary, wanted to show me why people felt this way. So we piled into his 1998 Ford Taurus and rumbled into downtown Lorain. Though it was a Saturday night, we spotted only a handful of revelers: smokers puffing outside the Palace Theater, killing time before an Arlo Guthrie show. We drove down the main drag, past Bootlegger’s Den (a biker bar), Midtown Bail Bonds (whose neon sign depicted the Monopoly man in jail garb), and the Glass House (a head shop advertising a bong shaped like Felix the Cat). Springowski pointed out a post office that had been remade into a store promising “Cash for Gold.” Later, we passed a shuttered gypsum plant where Obama had promised to spur manufacturing in 2008. Listening to the presidential candidates today, “I don’t hear of any attempt to try and bring industry back into this country,” Tom told me. “There’s no plan."
However, unfortunately too much of the labor movement seems to be wholly focused on political symbolism.
"In recent weeks, Clinton has seemed to sense that she has work to do vis-à-vis organized labor. Not only has she come out against TPP, but, just before I arrived in Ohio, she also endorsed repeal of the Cadillac tax. The question is whether these moves can overcome the baseline skepticism that I heard from many union members—especially in Ohio—and resolve what appears to be a split opinion about her within the world of organized labor. “She’s gotta convince people, particularly workers, that she means what she says and she says what she means. And that’s her challenge, I think,” says AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka. “I think as her positions have clarified, she’s demonstrated, I think, more and more, that she’s on the right side of the ledger with the issues. … In the past, she acted like she wanted our vote. Now she’s actually acting like she wants our support. Major difference. Major difference. And she needs our support—the support of working people—to win.”
I think this is the whole problem. The unions want to see that she really supports them but how do they judge loyalty? Opposition to TPP and repeal of the 'Cadillac tax' neither of which will do much to bring back the kind of factory jobs the unions look back on.
The old factories aren't coming back to these towns and localities because the economy has changed in some very stark ways over the last 20 years.
Hillary actually has some real solutions and these have nothing to do with repeal of the CT-which is mostly a GOP gripe and repeal of it might be a pretty bad idea-and or scorched earth opposition to all trade deals.
She understands that the problem is modernizing regulations and labor laws in what you might call the new Uber Economy.
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2015/07/hillary-on-uber-economy.html
But how much scope do you have to educate union members in the middle of a fraught campaign? I think what this does mean is she should frame her Uber Economy agenda as being the real solution to the loss of decent paying jobs.
One can't help but think that this angst of American workers is related to the strange new finding that there is a rise in mortality rates of the white working class.
But how much scope do you have to educate union members in the middle of a fraught campaign? I think what this does mean is she should frame her Uber Economy agenda as being the real solution to the loss of decent paying jobs.
One can't help but think that this angst of American workers is related to the strange new finding that there is a rise in mortality rates of the white working class.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/09/opinion/despair-american-style.html
Hillary wisely mentioned this specific phenomenon-the rise of mortality for poorer whites in her meeting with Rachel Maddow last Friday.
But she has the right answers for labor but just has to make sure she frames it optimally for them to get it.
Hillary wisely mentioned this specific phenomenon-the rise of mortality for poorer whites in her meeting with Rachel Maddow last Friday.
But she has the right answers for labor but just has to make sure she frames it optimally for them to get it.
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