John Edwards: Union man

[Omaha Steve]

Source: Fortune Magazine

John Edwards: Union man
John Edwards believes a new labor movement is the answer to the country's great divide. Should corporate America be afraid of him?
FORTUNE Magazine
by Nina Easton, Fortune Washington bureau chief
May 6 2007: 8:50 AM EDT

(Fortune Magazine) -- No one was paying much attention to John Edwards in February 2006, when a historic contest for control of Congress was getting underway and the 2008 presidential race was still a sliver of light on the horizon. But Danny Glover was. He had to. For three days the Lethal Weapon star and the one-term Senator were glued to each other's sides like a pair of mismatched LAPD cops as they traveled across the country to lend support to hotel workers and their unions on the eve of a threatened strike.

At the time, Glover was the veteran of poverty politics; Edwards was still a rookie in training. So Glover, who prides himself on his ability to sniff out poseurs and users, warily scrutinized the carefully coifed politician from North Carolina. "There's real humility and false humility," Glover says. Which was Edwards?


Worker's champ: A theme of haves vs. have-nots underlies his campaign for the presidency.

In Boston, he watched Edwards listen to the plight of a single mother, an Italian immigrant who had managed on a hotel maid's pay to raise four children and send each one to college. In Chicago, Edwards took a lesson in the back-breaking work of lifting 113-pound mattresses and changing luxury duvets weighed down by piles of pillows and shams.

In L.A., the former Senator arrived overscheduled and tired, but impressed labor leaders when he readily agreed to squeeze in an extra meeting with a group of kitchen workers on their break.

Read more: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/05/14/100008849/

[pocoloco]

1. I bet he gets the Barber's Union vote!

[Tom Joad]

2. Is that why he voted for the bank-sponsored bankruptcy law? To help working

people?

[iamjoy]

4. He Didn't Vote For The Really Bad One

the one in 2001 was mild compared to the one in 2005. The one Edwards voted for actually included some consumer protections.

[Tom Joad]

9. Thanks for the clarification. the reason for my confusion was that

i did read he said he was wrong to vote in favor of a bankruptcy law (and i thought it was the most recent dreadful one).

Here it is:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/bankruptcy/archives/2005/04/index.php#005440
April 14, 2005
This morning Elizabeth Warren and her students invited me to say a few words about the bankruptcy reform bill. I'm grateful for the opportunity.

I'm now spending a lot of my time tackling the challenges of poverty, but I learned a lot about bankruptcy on the campaign trail last year. I saw how many good families end up broke and poor, and
how they need the safety net of a fair bankruptcy law if they're going to get back on their feet.

Like a lot of Democrats, I voted for a bankruptcy reform bill before. I can't say it more simply than this: I was wrong.
____________________

I see now he was not even in the Senate in 2005.

[The Magistrate]

10. The Trick, Mr. Joad, Is To Look Before Leaping

A certain level of basic knowledge is necessary for comment in any sphere. Attacking Sen. Edwards over a vote he could not have made, because he was not in the Senate at the time the Bill passed, suggests not a reasoned but a knee-jerk response to any mention of the name of any prominent Democrat, and a fixed resolve to disparrage any prominent Democrat at the least hint of an opportunity. It is not, after all, arcane and specialized knowledge, known only to specialists, that Sen. Edwards ran for election as Vice-President in 2004, and not for re-election to the Senate in that year.

"The mind wobbles...."

[Clark2008]

5. Thank you - you said it so I don't have to.

:hi:

[Forkboy]

3. Not in New York apparently.

http://www.nysaflcio.org/press_releases/2007/clinton_candidacy.htm

[w4rma]

6. Hillary plays hardball behind the scenes. The NY chapter likely didn't want to garner her ire.

…
“Her people are using an iron fist,” he said, “when they should be using a velvet glove.”

The donor was referring to the Clinton campaign’s effort at the time to pressure Senator Barack Obama, through press releases and media interviews, into returning money from one of his donors, David Geffen, who had just publicly denounced Mrs. Clinton as “ambitious” and “polarizing,” as well as a liar.
…
http://www.hillaryproject.com/index.php?/sg_distro/hillarys_velvet_glove_approach_to_campaigning/

[Forkboy]

7. Hell,Hillary plays hardball in front of the scenes.

It'll be interesting to see how the unions go nationally.

[w4rma]

8. I am in full agreement, Forkboy. (nt)

[usregimechange]

11. Kick!