President Obama and Labor Unions: "Barack Obama has proven himself a political Trojan Horse"

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Mon Nov-21-11 01:00 PM
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President Obama and Labor Unions: "Barack Obama has proven himself a political Trojan Horse"

Co-opting the Language of OWS
Obama and Labor: the Self-Defeating Alliance
by ROB URIE
November 21, 2011

Last week SEIU (Service Employees International Union) echoed the language of the Occupy Wall Street movement to give an early endorsement to Barack Obama in his re-election bid for the presidency in 2012. For both tactical and strategic reasons this endorsement works against the interests of organized labor. And using the language of OWS to endorse the singular symbol of American political dysfunction undermines the efforts of the thousands of OWS protesters who have put themselves at significant risk of physical harm to bring about substantive political and social change.

Since his election Barack Obama has proven himself a political Trojan Horse, a man who because of his personal story and American racial politics appears to personify the hopes and aspirations of the rank and file of organized labor. But while in office he has dutifully represented the interests of the small group of extremely rich plutocrats who have worked for the last forty years to destroy the American working class through the implementation of neo-liberal economic policies. Obama knows what soothing words to say to allay the fears of workers while he implements the same policies that have driven down wages, caused mass unemployment and that have placed all of the economic “gains” of these policies in the hands of a few well-connected mostly white men.

Democrats have depended on the calculus by labor and political liberals and progressives that no matter how bad their policies are, the Republicans’ policies are worse. On social issues this has been true. But how valuable are these morsels of humanity when corrupt economic policies place us on a permanent downward spiral into poverty, unemployment and homelessness with looted pensions and gutted social programs? The same plutocrats who now own everything have demonstrated through their financial support of the Tea Party that they are indifferent to social progress as long as they are free to continue to loot and plunder. And when did we collectively begin to aim so low that that we accept either social or economic progress as a gift from political leaders rather than demanding both?

The attempt by union leadership to co-opt the language and effort of the Occupy Wall Street movement to affect the re-election of the singular symbol of how broken the U.S. political system is simply pathetic. I have proudly marched with the SEIU rank and file in three of the last dozen or so marches that I have participated in. And the central refrain heard from the more politically astute union brothers and sisters is that they are tired of being sold out by the union leadership. Endorsing Barack Obama after he has shown that he will actively work against the interests of labor is just one more sellout. History has shown that there is always a way forward. Blindly holding onto the past by supporting those who work against us is not the way forward.

Read the full article at:

http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/11/21/obama-and-labor-the-self-defeating-alliance/

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Here’s what attempted co-option of OWS looks like
By Glenn Greenwald
November 19, 2011

But whatever else is true, the notion — advanced by SEIU (Service Employees International Union) — that it’s the Democratic Party and the Obama White House working to bring about these changes and implant these values of the 99% is so self-evidently false as to be insulting. Agitating for passage of the jobs bill is a perfectly reasonable and sensible step, but how can casting that in such starkly partisan terms be justified when numerous key Democratic officials opposed the bill and prevented its passage (just as an always-changing roster of numerous key Democrats — the Villains of the Moment — almost always act to protect the interests of Washington’s permanent ruling factions)?

Beyond that, and more important, does SEIU think that people will just ignore these key political facts? How does anyone think these protesters will be convinced that it’s exclusively the GOP — and not the Democratic Party and the Obama WH — who “protect the rich” when: Wall Street funded the Democrats far more than the GOP in the 2008 election; the Democrats’ key money man, Charles Schumer, is one of the most devoted Wall Street servants in the country; Obama empowered in key positions Wall Street servants such as Tim Geithner, Larry Summers, Bill Daley, Rahm Emanuel, and an endless roster of former Goldman officials; JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon has been dubbed “Obama’s favorite banker” after Obama publicly defended his post-bailout $17 million bonus; the President named the CEO of GE to head his jobs panel; the DCCC and DSCC exist to ensure the nomination of corporatist candidates and Blue Dogs whose political worldview is servitude to the lobbyist class; the Democratic President, after vocally urging an Age of Austerity, tried very hard to usher in cuts to Social Security and an increase in the age for Medicare eligibility; and the Obama administration has not only ensured virtually no accountability for the rampant Wall Street fraud that precipitated the 2008 financial crisis, but is actively pressuring New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and others to agree to a woefully inadequate settlement to forever shield banks from the consequences of their pervasive mortgage fraud.

That’s just a fraction of the facts one could list to document the actual factions to which the Democratic Party has devoted itself. If one wants to argue that the GOP is more opposed to progressive economic policies than Democrats, that’s certainly reasonable. If one wants to argue that, on balance, voting for Democrats is more likely to bring about marginally more of those policies than abstaining, I think that, too, is reasonable. But to try to cast the Democratic Party and the Obama administration as the vessel for the values and objectives of the Occupy movement is just dishonest in the extreme: in fact, it’s so extreme that it’s very unlikely to work. Those who believe that further empowerment of the Democratic Party is what is most urgently needed can make their case and should pursue that goal — they should try to generate as much citizen enthusiasm as possible behind them — but they should stop trying to depict and exploit the Occupy movement as an instrument for their agenda.

Read the full article at:

http://www.salon.com/2011/11/19/heres_what_attempted_co_option_of_ows_looks_like/singleton/