My Thoughts On The Remarks Made By Shawn Fain and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the DNC

I found the remarks offered by UAW President Shawn Fain and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the Democratic National Convention last night to be historic. That a militant union leader and a democratic socialist Congresswoman both addressed the convention and spoke one after the other signals a progressive shift in the Democratic Party and a change in our national political scene. Moreover, both support a ceasefire in Gaza, national healthcare, and a break with what gets called "neoliberalism." They were given enough time to make their cases, which they both did quite well, and their talks were scheduled close enough to the remarks made by Hillary Clinton and President Biden that listeners could not put Fain and Ocasio-Cortez in silos and forget about them or take the line that progressives and labor are being taken for granted at this point in the Democratic Party.

The lessons here are not that the Democratic Party gives us enough or is enough or that it can't move backward. What we're seeing is coalition politics and an exceptional level of unity against Trump and the far-right. So-called "Bidenomics" slowly and almost surreptitiously has begun to take us away from the worst aspects of globalization and neoliberalism, and the political expression of this philosophy has given the working-class in the United States the ability to make or win limited advances. I want to stress "limited" because progress has been uneven and has not gone deep enough or far enough and depends to some extent on a foreign policy and relations that risk world war, more famines, increasing global warming, and a deeper global and corporate fascist reaction. And---let's face it---some of the existing limits have been imposed by conservative and fascist forces here at home and through cave-ins by Sinema and Manchin and some others. 

I'm stressing "limited advances," but I also want to stress the potential in the current moment. If we can elect more pro-labor progressives in November, do much better at supporting progressive unions and union leadership at all levels, extend the unity and good vibes that many of us are feeling right now, build on the successes won under the Biden administration, make our movement younger and darker and women- and LGBTQIA+-led, and break the systemic drives to war, globalization, increasing exploitation we will be storming heaven, as the saying goes. And I do believe that we can do that.

Let’s Get Smart by Chuck Wynns

The post below was written Chuck Wynns and is posted here because we want to maintain a commitment to publishing many of the views of people who have been active in the labor movement. We invite responses from union members to this and to and any other posts.

This blog has a strong record of supporting progressive Democrats and much that the current administration has accomplished for working-class people, unions, women, reproductive justice, and civil rights. It is not our view that the current Addministration, or the Democrats generally, have failed organized labor or that reproductive justice should not be a leading priority for unions and the working-class.  

Let’s Get Smart by Chuck Wynns

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has been doing some good things for workers
under the Biden Administration. Elections for Union Certification are being scheduled promptly
and monitored closely, workers fired in the course of organizing a union are being reinstated at
a 54% rate, and the NLRB is seriously considering forcing a second election at the Alabama
Mercedes plant based on rampant unfair labor practices during the election in late spring.

And then there’s Project 2025:

Trump’s authoritarian Project 2025 says a lot about labor unions, and especially the NLRB, Simply, Trump and his Project 2025 aim to eliminate the NLRB, lock, stock and barrel. On day one, the NLRB General Counsel will be fired and the NLRB stripped of all ability to enforce labor law. The logic is pretty clear, if you have rights but no way to enforce those rights, then you really don’t have those rights.

With this, our task seems pretty clear for the next four months; make sure that Trump and his Project 2025 never sees the light of day. Can we do this? It’s hard to say. Trump and the Republicans right now are ahead in the polls, for President and in the Congress! If Trump and the Republicans win the Presidency and Congress, it’s a whole new game and one I don’t want to look into at all because this is where life becomes a dystopian movie.

Let's assume we can beat back Trump and his authoritarian politics. What happens next?

The first thing we would need to consider is why this election was so close in the first place.

Here we have to consider what the Democrats did wrong, so wrong that the country almost went fascist.

Here, we have to be honest. Biden has done a great job defending unions, morally assisting major strikes such as the UAW strike of last year, and making sure that UPS knew the Administration would not back them in the event of a strike, And we need to remember that Biden is the guy who put the teeth back into the NLRB.

But while Biden has been great for the unions, he and his Democratic Party have completely failed the working class. The track record isn’t great. In 2022, The Poor Peoples’ Campaign organized a 150,000 person march in Washington DC. Instead of meeting with the protesters, the Democrats and Biden organized a total news blackout of the march. I guess that’s the power of “cancel culture”. On the other hand, the Democratic pollsters are worried about eroding support from Black people, I wonder why? Is it out of line to suggest that dissing 150,000 poor and mostly Black protesters might have some consequences?

And there’s the ongoing increase in prices which is incorrectly labeled “inflation”. (it’s not inflation because the dollar is not losing value). The biggest price rises are in housing, food and healthcare, the necessities of life! And these price increases are killing the working class, union and non-union. The response from the Democratic Party in regard to these price increases is denial. Biden and the Democratic Party plead, “it’s global, it’s not our fault”, end of story.

Meanwhile, Trump and the Project 2025 guys have successfully labeled these household-breaking price increases as “Biden’s inflation”. Trump is gaining voters because of “Biden’s inflation”, even though Trump and his gang have no solution at all, except maybe more tax cuts for the billionaire class. Yet Trump acknowledges the pain of these price rises while the Democrats deny this reality. Denial has great political consequences, as the Democrats are now finding out.

So, why even vote in this election if the working class has nothing to gain? This question is on the minds of many voters, including a lot of folks in the working class. The answer to this question is simple. The working class might have nothing to gain, but it has a lot to lose. If we win, then Labor will maintain its right to exist. If we win, the right to protest without facing armed repression will still exist. If we win, women might again start assuming their bodies are their own; that they are persons, not “handmaidens”. If we win, elections will still be open and fair. If we lose, we lose all those rights and more.

Yet, if we win, we will only inherit the status quo. Nothing will have changed except that basic and necessary civil rights have been maintained for another four years. The problem is that the status quo is unsustainable too. It’s as basic as the fact that you can’t eat your union card, that a protest won’t keep you warm at night, and the right to an abortion isn’t going to stop the eviction or foreclosure from happening.

Here’s where the Labor movement comes in.

If the status quo is not sustainable then something has to change to make life once again sustainable for the working class (like 70 to 80% of the population). At this point it would be ridiculous to expect such a radical change in direction to come out of the Democratic Party, whether it’s Biden or someone else.

Yet radical changes in political direction have happened before in this country, and when you look at these changes, whether it’s the Progressive era of the early 20th century, or the New Deal, or Civil Rights movement, you will notice the Labor movement plays a critical part, often the lead part, in all these movements for radical change in America. Honestly and frankly for instance, the New Deal never would have happened if not for a militant Labor movement.

Once again, if we win, the Labor movement will need to step up to the plate and demand the kind of changes that make working class life sustainable, and maybe even a little enjoyable!

First on the list of necessary changes is the need to control prices. We need price caps, at least on the necessities of life like food, housing and healthcare.

Second, the housing situation in America is at the point of complete failure. 40 years of gentrification, MacMansions, high priced condos and apartments designed for the rich or upwardly mobile, and the bizarre notion that housing is an asset first, and a living space a long second have all combined into a giant cash cow that has no room for the working class and poorer people.

To make housing available in Oregon, we need to build 110,000 new living units. In the USA as a whole, we need about 7 million new living units. Instead of providing the banks, developers and real estate agents with another cash cow, why not use government to hire the architects to design better and environmentally sustainable housing, and directly contract with the construction unions to build the housing? Bet you can build a lot of good and affordable living spaces if you deny the banks and developers their giant cut from the top??

Third, a lot more people have health insurance these days. Yet still, health insurance is no guarantee to receiving quality healthcare. The provision of healthcare in this country is organized according to revenue streams, not what people need and what quality healthcare requires. Maybe healthcare needs to be taken out of the hands of corporations and re-designed to fit the needs of people? It’s a radical concept, but again, sometimes necessity requires radical change.

And honestly, I have a four, five, six and seven too, but that’s not the point. The point is that a working class that embraces a program that effectively makes their life better ceases to be fertile ground for anti-union and racist rightwing organizations, and instead become fertile grounds for organizing unions and working class politics. Is this really possible? I’d say, just watch Bernie Sanders do his town hall meetings on Fox News way back around 2020. Yes, it’s very possible!

President Biden's Visit To The AFL-CIO

 President Biden's visit to the AFL-CIO: 

Marion County Democrats Can Use Your Help

This comes from the Marion County Democrats. This is probably a good opportunity for union people, so please consider taking the Dems up on it. And if you are a union person who picks this up, please let our Marion-Polk-Yamhill Central Labor Chapter know that you're doing this great work and check in with us. Thanks!