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Given the emphasis placed by the Party on the importance of the Obama presidency, I had hoped at this point in the Discussion there would be greater analysis of his administration’s policies in regard to labor. So far there hasn’t been.

Nevertheless, I believe there is a need for such a balance sheet – neither ultraleftist condemnation, nor rosy-hued adulation, both of which are usually short on specifics. We need to do this at a time when organized labor is turning its attention to devising electoral strategy and tactics regarding the upcoming elections.

As Sam has mentioned, there is also a need to distinguish between what we in labor want and what is attainable given the present political conjuncture.

After all, Obama is now head of the executive committee of the capitalist state.

Still, many labor activists vote for Democrats because the president is seen as the individual with the most power to effect real change in the country. It is his job not only to excite and inspire, but to build coalitions and lead, based on his campaign promises.

One of the most compelling elements of his candidacy was his emphasis on the need for job creation, and speeches regarding organized labor not as “a special interest”, but whose interests are woven into the heart of the “American dream.” He spoke eloquently of creating an even playing field for working people and the middle class, an end to government handouts to corporations seeking to shift manufacturing jobs overseas, and reversing the growing inequality in American society.

1) A number of Obama’s appointments will benefit Labor. (Sotomayor as Supreme Court justice, Solis as Secretary of Labor, recent NLRB appointments.) Here in New York this may have partly reinvigorated an organizing drive among teaching assistants at NYU.

2) Obama did speak at the AFL CIO convention. As ceremonial as this is, this was a welcome boost to organizing labor. He spoke of his support for EFCA, although since his election he has made little attempt to weave the right to organize into any of his legislative priorities, as he did in his campaign speeches.

Much has been written about the Republic Windows sit-down strike, and its pointing the way forward for labor. But it should also be mentioned that Obama’s stated commitment to “green” jobs played a role in encouraging the workers to take the stand they did.

3) On the negative side, Obama has linked the need for educational reform to a key plank of big business’ privatization program for public education i.e. charter schools. This is seen in his appointment of Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education, who pushed charter schools in Chicago. It is also seen in Obama’s promotion of his “Race to the Top” fund, which ties school funding grants to improvement in test scores and lifting the cap on charter schools.

Obama’s recent praise of the firing of 93 teachers in Central Falls, Rhode Island as “a model of accountability” will serve to intensify the corporate war against teachers and their unions. It sends the message that it is “bad schools and bad teachers” rather than growing inequality in the U.S. that are the reasons for the failure of children in poor communities to achieve their potential. Here in New York Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein are seeking to pit school against school, teacher against teacher, and the UFT from the communities teachers serve, as part of their own union busting agenda.

4) The terms of the bailout agreement of GM and Chrysler accelerate a race to the bottom, not ” a race to the top”. It is important to emphasize that this agreement was not foisted on the UAW by Wall Street or GM. It was the result of Obama’s handpicked Auto Task Force, and an unusually direct intervention by the Obama administration.

Despite $50 billion in taxpayer aid to Chrysler/GM, the ATF divorced the agreement from addressing the causes of the crisis i.e. the need to shift to fuel-efficient 21^st century production lines. Playing into the myth that workers were responsible and not the bosses for the crisis, ATF demanded UAW members agree to slashed wages and benefits that matched non-union U.S. “transplant” factories (Honda, Toyota).

True, UAW pensions were saved, and the union survived to fight another day. But at a time when Obama has pledged to create jobs in the U.S, tens of thousands of industrial jobs will be lost. Dozens of U.S. auto plants will be gutted. Industrial communities will be decimated.

The ATF agreement ratifies and accelerates a flight by the Big Three towards production in non-union plants in Asia, even if these cars are sold later on the U.S. market as an “American” brand. This is because the terms of the agreement did not explicitly link federal assistance to keeping production in the US – unlike recent bailout agreements in France and Italy. The agreement gives the green light to other corporations to bust pensions and benefits of industrial workers, not to mention encouraging municipalities to undertake similar attacks against public workers.

All these developments, positive and negative, should be factored into a discussion of Obama’s labor policies.

Certainly we must build on the positive speeches, words and actions by the Obama administration – and the more militant grassroots actions they have encouraged. In the cases of the charter schools and the auto industry bailout, however, it is clear Labor must organize in its own interest by all means necessary – preferably with, if necessary, without – the support of the Obama administration.

We need more members in the industrial unions. A class struggle left wing in the UAW could have educated and mobilized auto workers against the AFF ripoff that was taking place. It would have helped build a militant movement in support of working class solutions to the crisis in auto, including coordinating action with autoworker unions internationally (e.g. World Federation of Trade Unions, All- China Federation of Trade Unions). It would have called for a worldwide “Race to the Top” in wages, working conditions and benefits, and not a “Race to the Bottom”.

For some background on the basis for such international coordination, check out excellent articles by Scott Marshall and Wadi’h Halabi, among others, in PWW and PA.

I realize we don’t have significant implantation in auto. Fortunately, we do in the UFT, whose strategy and tactics continue to inspire many of us labor activists here in the NY District. It is a major shortcoming in the Discussion so far, however, that labor has received little mention.

I appreciated Scott’s video presentation on the Party’s campaign for job creation, but a report on this issue cannot be a substitute for a report on the larger picture and the present attacks on the working class, some of which are now being enabled, in some cases even spearheaded by the Obama administration.

We need a labor balance sheet. It is in the interests of a full and productive discussion that I offer this contribution.

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