Clinton, Obama, Labor, Politics
April 11 2008
Union Days panelists gauge angles of '08 election
Ninety minutes into the Union Days panel discussion at ILR Thursday, 12 dozen people were asked the inevitable: "Are there any questions?"
Yes, plenty.
Some drove at labor's choice in what is perhaps the most politically delicious and delicate subject facing millions of American voters today -- who should be anointed the Democratic presidential candidate?
"I'm for Obama … we need people to believe that change is possible," said panelist Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins. She is executive officer of the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council and executive director of Working Partnerships USA.
New York State Assemblywoman Barbara Lifton went next, backing Hillary Clinton.
Clinton and Barack Obama have more progressive voting records than most United States senators, Lifton said, but Clinton has more experience with Republicans. "She has been spit out by the right-wing attack machine. I don't think he (Obama) knows what will hit him."
Jane McDonald-Pines, executive assistant to the executive vice president of the AFL-CIO, addressed the nomination issue in the context of international trade – a lens through which both Clinton and Obama have been critically scrutinized.
"We're not against trade, what we want is fair trade," she said. No nominee should embrace trade negotiations with Colombia – where 3,000 trade unionists have been killed, McDonald-Pines said.
Lawrence Mishel, president of the Economic Policy Institute, said he is neutral on the Democratic candidates. Both Clinton and Obama have moderate trade voting records, he said.
An economist who taught at ILR early in his career, Mishel several times during the panel discussion provided gelling segues to frame panelists' remarks on a wide range of labor-related issues.
After 90 minutes of panel discussion and questions from the audience, the session closed as scheduled. Ten dozen listeners left the humid Ives Hall lecture hall for cooler evening air outside.
Twenty others went straight to the panelists.
Were there any questions?
Oh, yes.
