Union members' questions

It's easy to feel really jaded about the politics of unions in the U.S.

As institutions, U.S. unions are expected to do a whole lot with very little, and are under near-constant attack. As a result, their politics are extremely defensive, and their policies are often confused.

Moreover, in order to defend their leadership roles (ie not get voted out), union leaders are forced to soft-sell their policies, cloaking them in soft-focus, feel-good rhetoric. Their politics are often difficult for rank-and-file members to discern, even more difficult than the "insider" politics of Washington (which, after all, considerable ink is devoted to analyzing for a popular audience).

With all that in mind, this is really rather touching- a genuine list of member concerns, addressing most of the important issues facing unions. I can only hope that Dick Trumka will work as hard on his answers as these folks collectively worked on their questions, and sound a note as true.

UPDATE: I want to add emphasis to this post...this is exactly the type of conversation that needs to be happening, and should be happening online. The fact that it is tucked away so deep in the AFL-CIO website is perhaps a problem, but maybe also why the seed that is growing here is so inspiring (and safe from right-wing hacks who would spam the sh!t out of any more public forum).

I strongly encourage all active unionists to look seriously at this list of questions and think hard about how you would answer them- there is a space in the forum for comments on each question, but please please be respectful of what is going on here and by g*d don't just piss some political boilerplate onto these thoughtful posters.