My family's union support go back some time. Not sure if it began with my grandmother, an original FDR Democrat, or before. But a defining event was probably my great-grandfather, who lost fingers and an eye in an industrial accident. He had been a craftsman in the old country, making furniture. In the US he worked in a factory, with the usual results that happened in pre-union days.

I never knew him so I don't know if this incident led him to support unionization, but I do know my grandmother was a solid union supporter and Democrat until the day she died and she passed this on to my mother and through her to my brother and me. In her wilder days my grandmother even had a brief marriage to a communist. My mother focused her radicalism on feminism in the days of the ERA.

My son seems to be picking up the same radical tendencies of my grandmother, brother and mother. By comparison I am a moderate.

It started with Woodie Guthrie. My son fell in love with "This Land is my Land," particularly the Woodie Guthrie version, though I think the first version he heard was the Bruce Springsteen version sung at a rally for Barack Obama. As I was, at his request, looking for other Woodie Guthrie songs we came across Billy Bragg and others singing "I'm Sticking to the Union" at the 90th birthday of Pete Seeger. My son is now playing it over and over and singing the first several lines (the ones sung by Billy Bragg). Here it is:

There considerable resonance in this to me. My mother used to sing union songs (in a bad voice, but what the hell). She introduced me to the songs of Pete Seeger and the Weavers, a blacklisted group from the good days of Folk Music when Woodie Guthrie's working class music wasn't yet replaced by the later, more self-important and strident versions I can't stand even when sung by a voice as wonderful as Joan Baez'. And Billy Bragg is someone I was largely unaware of until hearing him on the IFC program my distant cousin, Henry Rollins, hosted. Here is Billy Bragg on Henry Rollins' show and my introduction to his music:

Somehow it feels right hearing my son belt out: "There once was a union maid, who never was afraid, Of goons and ginks and company finks and the deputy sheriffs who made the raid..." along with Billy Bragg.

Just goes to show, my family's liberal to the core. And damned proud of it.

My wife, from a similar old-Jewish radical background of course, had a role as well. After all, she's the one who taught him that Dick Cheney and Henry Kissinger were "supervillians."

First of all, congratulation to John Liu for becoming the first Chinese-American to be elected to city-wide office in New York City. That's a huge slap on the face for the New York Democratic Party establishment; an establishment that's never been too keen on grassroots movements unless they can co-opt to solidify their status-quo.

The other big grassroots story of the night was Bill de Blasio. He walloped Mark Green, one of the darlings of the New York political elite, in a run-off election and breezed into the Political Advocate's office with 76.9% of the vote.

For a political establishment that doesn't suppor grassroots movements unless it's ready to line their pockets --remember of all the so-called grassroots progressives and Democrats defecting to the Bloomberg campaign?-- these two wins are a wake-up call for the NY Dems political establishment.

Well have to see how these two fare for or against the status quo in the next four years.

1. Obama is not the Democratic Party.
Virginia is the best example of this phenomenon: Even though Obama carried the state, voters repudiated the slim pickings pushed on them by the local Democratic party. Creigh Deeds, the genius Democrat who lost the election, ran as an anti-Obama Democrat. In a state that Obama basically swept during the general elections. WHAT KIND OF STRATEGY IS THAT? Oh right, the strategy of a Democrat who rightfully doesn't look at Obama as representing him.

The biggest mistake for the Democratic Party was to sucker themselves into thinking that whatever genius political strategy Plouffe and Axelrod were able to use in getting Obama elected was going to absolve them of their state and local sins of nepotism, cronyism, corruption but most importantly utter ineptitude.

Last night was a big wake-up call for Democrats who think they'll be able to coast on the coattails of Obama for the next 3-7 years.

Which takes me to the big story of the day: Bill Owens will for New York's Congressional District #23. What's the moral of that story?

2. Carpetbaggers better not fuck with upstaters.
The sleepy corner of upper New York state became an ideological battle ground for the extreme right of the Republican party with a non-Palin-looking Dede Scozzafava being muscled out of the election by the GlennBeckian non-resident of the district Hoffman. Yet in the process of eating their own, out-of-state extremists revealed the awful truth about the New York State Democratic Party: They suck.

Democrats in New York state are rarely differentiated from their Republican counterparts. Abortion is not one a political lightning rod for New York politicians. On the contrary, NYC boasts a rather disturbing amount of African American and Latino right-to-lifers on their rolls. What separates Republicans from Democrats is the amount of money their willing to put at the feet of the political establishment in both Albany and Washington DC.

NY23 happened to be one of those districts that NY Dems didn't look as particularly profitable for them until the teabaggers came into town. And that's basically their modus operandi: Many districts in the state are marked as losses from the get go. NY23 proved what a dangerous strategy that is --especially in a year when one more Democrat in Congress could make a huge difference in Health Care and Immigration legislation.

The challenge for true progressives in New York state will be to not only get rid of anti-gay, misogynist, immigrant hating Republicans. The challenge will be to find progressives to run against Democrats Democrats with similar political views, from local all the way up to Congressional, regardless of whether it is a "red district" or not.

3. Michael Turk put it best, Can we now agree that 2008 was a referendum on Bush and GOP arrogance, and not a vote for radical liberalism?
This bears repeating over and over and over again. Obama wasn't a choice for radical liberalism. Obama wasn't even a choice for the Democratic Party. Obama didn't even win because he was a centrist. Obama won because he successfully sold himself as an outsider from the political establishment who had a vision of a United States that could be better without partisan politics.

In other words: Obama won because he was the ANTI-IDEOLOGICAL, ANTI-PARTISAN candidate. He didn't win because people believed he could change the swamp of Capitol Hill or the rats' nest of the Democratic Party. He won because he not only wasn't part of the swamp or the rats but because he aspired to transcend all of that with his presidency.

Michael Turk's comment was directed to Republicans but you might as well use it to bash into the heads of Democrats why they can't rest on Obama's laurels. 90% of the Democrat Party do not represent "Change We Can Believe In" and that's what got played out in all of lat night's electoral losses.

4. All the money int he world is not going to win you a mandate
The race was called in favor of Bloomberg when he was winning by 3%. He ended up tallying a 4.58% win. That means that the Boss Bloomberg plunked down $21,834,061.1 per each point in his margin of win. That's an obscene amount of bribe money; yet it proves that had New York City a true political grassroots movement represented in the Democratic Party, Thompson would have squeaked in a victory.

5. New York City is ready for a grassroots renaissance
Thompson didn't win because he was one of the ultimate insiders just like his losing predecessor, Freddy Ferrer. It's not just that Freddy was Puerto Rican and Bill was black. It was really the fact that these two have been part of the political establishment of New York City for far too long. Every single Democratic mayoral loser since Dinkins has been part of the party establishment.

Yet look at the massive margins that got both de Blasio and Liu elected. If any of these two guys want to become mayor the lesson is very simple: FIGHT MICHAEL BLOOMBERG FOR THE NEXT 4 YEARS.

You can't raise $100 million to buy yourself the local and national media? Fine. Then fight the man every single step of the way for the next 4 years. Govern like you were still campaigning. Amass grassroots support and boost the numbers of your independent allies. Most importantly though, KEEP YOUR FACE IN THE LOCAL MEDIA. That means every single week, every single month, you gotta get yourself out there in front of the cameras, on the newspapers and most importantly on the blogs to move your message over and over and over again.

Michael Bloomberg doesn't have a mandate. Liu, de Blasio and every single Democrat who wants to become the next mayor needs to keep the campaign going until 2013.

Which gets me to my favorite peeve:  read more »

When good things happen to good people, it's time to rejoice. You may recall that, in the late fall, threatened with layoffs, union workers at Republic Windows and Doors sat-in at the Chicago factory . They won wages and severance but the factory closed.

After months of negotiations, a new owner has bought the place and will reopen it as a union shop. How sweet it is! Oh me of little faith. In this climate of job loss, I never thought they'd win so complete a victory! (The union press release is here. )  read more »

Workers sitting-in at Republic Windows in Chicago won their demands for back-pay, vacation and severance late Wednesday night . The workers have left the building.

In the end, about $1.75 million was brokered to accommodate the workers' demand for 60 days severance wages, vacation pay and a two-month extension of health insurance.

Workers had argued they were owed the pay after Republic Windows shut down the Goose Island plant last Friday on only three days' notice, rather than the two months' notice required by federal law.

$1.35 million was extended by Bank of America as a loan to Republic management, and $400,000 was contributed by JP Morgan & Chase, Co., who own a 40 percent stake in the company. Workers will receive checks within a week representing two months' pay and unpaid vacation time -- about $6000 per worker, said U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), who moderated the negotiations. (Chicago Tribune)

Bank of America was brought to the bargaining table by a boycott threat from Illinois Gov. Rob Blagovisch one day before his corruption arrest. In a perfect confluence of the power elite, JP Morgan-Chase, a minority owner, came to the table represented by its regional president, the brother of Chicago Mayor Richard Daley.

UE News report is here

What did the Republic Windows workers lose: their jobs and their health insurance. Yes, yes, the workers retain their COBRA-rights to buy their own insurance but who can afford to do that with no job?  read more »

Keeping employers from using their leverage over the lives of employees to lock unions out of most work places is a key benefit of "neutrality agreements." Whether unions win and workers join union is a vital question in a number of ways.

I’ve written here and here about the attempts of union to organize unorganized workers using “neutrality agreements” in which employers agree to not campaign against unionization.

As Ed Ott, NYC Central Labor Council Director, said at Demos while ago, unions are the engine for helping lower income people to financial security. This was shown to be true recently in an interesting study by the Center for Economic & Policy Research . The study by John Schmitt compared the wages of unionized with non-unionized workers. Union workers make more (yawn?) But a surprising finding – low-wage union workers make much more – 20% more than non-union workers. (Hat tip to Jonathan Tasini for finding this first, by the way).

In addition strong unions help further the progressive agenda in other ways: unions campaign for affordable housing, for education funding and fair tax. The last 7 & ½ years of Mr. Bush’s class war on low and moderate income people harmed all of us: less money for affordable housing, education, higher gas & food prices and stagnating wages and of course, no start on sustainable energy policy. No matter who’s elected president, the struggle to reverse the impacts of the years of Bush looting will require serious struggle. Strong unions would be helpful in that effort and yet –as Andy McDonald of the Service Workers International Union (SEIU) pointed out -- 7 ½ % of private-sector workers are represented by unions; 92 ½ % are not. .  read more »