Whatever reason “centrist” politicians may have for being made queasy by the idea of reforming labor law in a more union-friendly direction, please do keep in mind that public opinion isn’t the issue:
Meanwhile, to state the obvious, whatever the merits of the Employee Free Choice Act may be, nobody can deny that increasing union membership would be beneficial to the Democratic Party from the standpoint of narrow partisan self-interest. It’s worth asking yourself if you can imagine a scenario in which Republicans would vote against a bill that enjoys majority support and would serve the GOP’s electoral interests. The answer is that you can’t.
But while it should surprise nobody to learn that some Democrats put their own self-interest ahead of the broader public interest, the really striking fact about certain elements of the Democratic Party is that they actually put the welfare of corporate executives ahead of their own self-interest and the public interest at the same time.
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