Doug wrote: > Well you know, it's the old exit vs. voice model. The unions, despite > spending all that cash and donating thousands of bodies to the cause, > get almost nothing in return, yet they keep writing checks. And unless > the world changes radically, they'll keep writing checks. So why > should Obama offend the people who aren't shy about exiting by pushing > for EFCA?
No doubt, the capitalists have a broader menu of choices than workers. Money and capital are social powers. Workers wouldn't be workers if they had that kind of clout. I have thought a bit about this issue, and I come back to the question of exiting the DP to enter what? The green party? Louis Proyect's listserv? And those who haven't exited yet are only waiting for leftist propaganda to persuade them? The only exit strategy that makes sense to me is a civil war within the Democratic Party, for the control of the Democratic Party, a struggle to win to the workers' cause the hearts and minds of the best people in that party's constituency. It's curious to me that you -- being as skeptical as you are of the ability of workers in the U.S. to even entertain basic of reforms within capitalism -- suggest that unions should consider dumping the Democratic Party already. That's the cart ahead of the horse. The way I envision it, only through a protracted struggle for reforms will workers develop the political will and strength to reform the Democratic Party or -- if it proves to be unreformable -- to abandon it and create a superior political formation. Meanwhile, the threats against the DP will remain empty. I don't endorse what the unions do, but the unions may not be as stupid as they may seem to outsiders. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
