That made me chuckle, you have a fair point. But again, withholding support is one thing, and speaking at the RNC with republicans who don’t play ball with workers’ rights is another.
Not really; one way to escalate your pressure is to scare them into thinking you might endorse the republican ticket. Insofar as going on strike materially harms a company’s bottom line, potentially endorsing the other candidate works in the same way. We wouldn’t suggest that the objective of a strike is to bankrupt their negotiation partner - why would we make a similar accusation of the Teamsters against the democrats?
And nothing says that republicans necessarily couldn’t offer better support to unions - even if teamsters did endorse Trump, it very well could be because Trump made a material concession to their interest. Nothing says that Teamsters should be interested in anything other than protecting their union’s interests, even if that means getting it from the Republicans, if they are “playing ball”. (The teamsters are a union for a very conservative group of members; it’s not out of the question that Trump might grant some very targeted concessions to that group in order to shore up his base)
That’s why it’s crazy that the democrats aren’t making an effort to be more pro-union - in most other ways, democrats are the obvious harm-reduction choice. But let’s not pretend as if union protections haven’t been under constant attack and legal challenges during the Biden administration - there is a lot of room for Harris to offer more in the way of union and labor legislation and support. There are a lot of reasons why everyone ought to vote for democrats over republicans, but pretending as if there are no material reasons a group with specific labor interests might choose to endorse republicans is itself naieve. Ideally this should motivate the democrats to offer better policy to their constituents, but seems as if democrats would much rather point fingers and accuse those asking for better policy as being covert opposition.
Yes, but the statement you’re replying to was a general statement on leftism. That’s why I follow that up with “Even in this context …”
AOC shouldn’t be blaming Teamsters for agitating for better labor policy, and doing so absolutely is punching left, because the thing Teamsters is interested in is a politically-left objective. Not that AOC doesn’t have personal reasons for ignoring those broader goals, but that doesn’t mean what she’s doing isn’t punching left.
It’s easy to imagine Teamsters as the party at fault because they represent a group of historically very conservative members, but their aim is to secure better labor relations just like every other union.
Not really; one way to escalate your pressure is to scare them into thinking you might endorse the republican ticket. Insofar as going on strike materially harms a company’s bottom line, potentially endorsing the other candidate works in the same way. We wouldn’t suggest that the objective of a strike is to bankrupt their negotiation partner - why would we make a similar accusation of the Teamsters against the democrats?
And nothing says that republicans necessarily couldn’t offer better support to unions - even if teamsters did endorse Trump, it very well could be because Trump made a material concession to their interest. Nothing says that Teamsters should be interested in anything other than protecting their union’s interests, even if that means getting it from the Republicans, if they are “playing ball”. (The teamsters are a union for a very conservative group of members; it’s not out of the question that Trump might grant some very targeted concessions to that group in order to shore up his base)
That’s why it’s crazy that the democrats aren’t making an effort to be more pro-union - in most other ways, democrats are the obvious harm-reduction choice. But let’s not pretend as if union protections haven’t been under constant attack and legal challenges during the Biden administration - there is a lot of room for Harris to offer more in the way of union and labor legislation and support. There are a lot of reasons why everyone ought to vote for democrats over republicans, but pretending as if there are no material reasons a group with specific labor interests might choose to endorse republicans is itself naieve. Ideally this should motivate the democrats to offer better policy to their constituents, but seems as if democrats would much rather point fingers and accuse those asking for better policy as being covert opposition.
AOC shouldn’t be blaming Teamsters for agitating for better labor policy, and doing so absolutely is punching left, because the thing Teamsters is interested in is a politically-left objective. Not that AOC doesn’t have personal reasons for ignoring those broader goals, but that doesn’t mean what she’s doing isn’t punching left.
It’s easy to imagine Teamsters as the party at fault because they represent a group of historically very conservative members, but their aim is to secure better labor relations just like every other union.