Yes, he said it. Leo Gerard is the International Presdient of United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, AFL-CIO, CLC ("USW"). I had to title this diary with his statement about Nelson, because it is so true.
Many labor leaders and rank and file union members are upset at the failure of Democratic officeholders to help working people. Gerard identified the problem today:
"Our problem is the Senate," Gerard said. "The only thing they can pass is the washroom. I don't want to tar Democrats. Not all Democrats in the Senate are problems."
Leo Gerard, Interviewed on Politico
More, after the fold, and what it means in November 2010.
Labor is seething over the failure to confim Craig Becker to the NLRB, which only has 2 members now and cannot vote on anything.
On a 52-33 vote, Illinois labor attorney Craig Becker's nomination to serve on the National Labor Relations Board failed, as expected.
This was a cloture vote to end debate, and not the actual nomination up or down.
snip
The AFL-CIO released this statement: "It is reprehensible that a minority in the U.S. Senate has blocked an up-or-down vote on Craig Becker, nominated seven months ago by President Obama to serve on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Once again, a Republican-led filibuster has put political interests over the needs of America's working families. For more than two years, the NLRB has had only two of its five members. Without a fully staffed NLRB, working families face a major disadvantage in winning justice in the workplace."
msnbc, First Read
To be expected, but Blanche Lincoln joined Ben Nelson in filibustering Craig Becker’s nomination the National Labor Relations Board.
Lincoln, Nelson Join Filibuster of Craig Becker; Cloture Fails 52-33
But it is more than that. No EFCA, no health care reform, no, no, no. And then there's the attempt to tax worker insurance benefits. The anger of that is obvious. Not only are they not helping working people, the Senate bill would have screwed them. Fortuantely the Obama adminstration worked out a compromise that would improve the Senate bill, but still teh senate fails to act on it.
Organized labor did tremendous work voluntering and contributing to Democrats and they are getting fed up:
"Here's labor getting thrown under the bus again," said John Gage, the national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents 600,000 workers. "It's really frustrating for labor, and a lot of union people are thinking: We put out big time in money and volunteers and support. And it seems like the little things that could have been aren't being done."
snip
"You're just not going to be able to go to our membership in the November elections and say, 'Come on, let's do it again. Look at what the Democratic administration has done for us!'" Gage said. "People are going to say, 'Huh? What have the Democrats done for us?'"
John Gage on Politico
In early January, AFL-CIO head Richard Trumka laid it on the line for Democrats, and we seem to be seeing an answer back:
Government in the interests of the majority of Americans has produced our greatest achievements. The New Deal. The Great Society and the Civil Rights movement -- Social Security, Medicare, the minimum wage and the forty-hour work week, the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. This is what made the United States a beacon of hope in a confused and divided world.
But too many people now take for granted government's role as protector of Wall Street and the privileged. They see middle-class Americans as overpaid and underworked. They see Social Security as a problem rather than the only piece of our retirement system that actually works. They feel sorry for homeless people, but fail to see the connections between downsizing, outsourcing, inequality and homelessness.
This world view has brought Democrats nothing but disaster. The Republican response is to offer the middle class the false hope of tax cuts. Tax cuts end up enriching the rich and devastating the middle class by destroying the institutions like public education and Social Security that make the middle class possible.
But no matter what I say or do, the reality is that when unemployment is 10 percent and rising, working people will not stand for tokenism. We will not vote for politicians who think they can push a few crumbs our way and then continue the failed economic policies of the last 30 years.
Let me be even blunter. In 1992, workers voted for Democrats who promised action on jobs, who talked about reining in corporate greed and who promised health care reform. Instead, we got NAFTA, an emboldened Wall Street - and not much more. We swallowed our disappointment and worked to preserve a Democratic majority in 1994 because we knew what the alternative was. But there was no way to persuade enough working Americans to go to the polls when they couldn't tell the difference between the two parties. Politicians who think that working people have it too good - too much health care, too much Social Security and Medicare, too much power on the job - are inviting a repeat of 1994.
Our country cannot afford such a repeat.
Richjard Trumka (quoted in my diary of Jan. 11, 2010 (link in diary)
Senators Nelson and Lincoln, your corporate buddies cannot save your seats:
Unions Considering Primary Challenges to Turncoat Dem Senators
United Steelworkers President Leo W. Gerard said of the labor chieftains' discussion, "A number of us expressed our dismay with some of the senators from the Democratic Party who have held up and helped delay not only the passage of the health care bill but all kinds of other things that would help middle-class workers."
The prospect of encouraging Democratic primary challenges will be raised with the Steelworkers' executive board when it meets next month, he added. Three senators' names will be brought up specifically, Gerard said: Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, and Ben Nelson of Nebraska. Lincoln is up for re-election this year; the terms of Lieberman and Nelson run through 2012.
"I, for one, am not prepared to work for Democrats who are going to help play that Republican game of just trying to stop legislation."
If you f..k working people, they f..k back.
And the Democratic Party is heading for a disaster at the polls unless they get it turned around quickly.
Richard Trumka:
We swallowed our disappointment and worked to preserve a Democratic majority in 1994 because we knew what the alternative was. But there was no way to persuade enough working Americans to go to the polls when they couldn't tell the difference between the two parties. Politicians who think that working people have it too good - too much health care, too much Social Security and Medicare, too much power on the job - are inviting a repeat of 1994.
Fix the broken Senate or pay a price. Life is not fair, but those who fail to act often lose also even though they are not the Nelsons or Lincolns.
Ornganized labor is being very blunt. Democrats need to listen.