You don't recall Reagan brandishing his anti-union stance? Right out of the box, in '81, he crushed the PATCO strike.

I think you mean he never used Taft-Hartley. I don't recall him doing so, either. . .

After the lies by Wolf Blitzer and his correspondents at the White House and Capitol Hill that Harkin is in a very close race and would pay a political price if he voted no, I do not read anymore CW analyis. Today in ABC, Diane Sawyer asked Arthur Levitt the former SEC chairman whether we are becoming a dishonest nation. From the corporate shennanigans to lying on the CV by college coaches and outright lying and misinformation spread by inside the beltway political analysts the answer is very obvious. Lying and misinformation have become the national pastime.

Sorry if I seem uninformed, but what are the provisions of the Taft-Hartley Act?

Yea Dr., I was just referring to the Taft-Hartley Act.

AUSTIN, Texas- Former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dan Morales planned Tuesday to endorse Republican Gov. Rick Perry in his bid for a full term in office, The Associated Press has learned.

Morales, a former Texas attorney general who lost to Tony Sanchez in the Democratic primary in March, would make his endorsement Tuesday in Houston, according to a source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Perry's campaign called a news conference to make "a major endorsement announcement."

There was no immediate response from the Sanchez campaign. A Perry spokesman did not immediately return a call Tuesday morning.

The Taft-Hartley act imposes an 80-day cooling off period to end a strike. The first 60 days is supposed to be for mediation, and the final 20 days is for the union to decide whether or not to accept the latest management offer. Carter was the last president to use it. Even though this case is a lockout, not a strike, the unions don't want Bush to invote Taft-Hartley.

The strike is costing the economy 2 billion dollars a day. Bush has no other choice than to invoke Taft-Hartley. This is tailor-made for that legislation. It is getting absurd.

BushRep,
2 billion is small change in the grand scheme of things. Especially when one considers that worker's rights are really an intangible big enough that they can't be sold like this.

Anyway, the GOP can only push unions so far. They have one of the best national political machines, and the capacity to hand Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and the upper Midwest to the candidate of their choice if it gets serious enough.

2 billion dollars cannot be afforded right now if you care about the economy so much. You can't have it both ways.

Unions are not that powerful anymore that they can swing elections. They can't even win Democratic primaries. Just ask Bob Casey. Every single union endorsed him. This is a union state too.

First of all, I can have it both ways. The economy is important. But there are abstractions which are worth fighting and taking damage for -- among them workers' rights.

There is an argument to be made that unions are not what they once were. That is true in terms of membership. Their political wing, however, is at its strongest ever. You have a point about Casey. Nonetheless, I believe that they have immense power, particular in getting out the vote. For example, when the AFL-CIO endorsed Gore two years ago, he suddenly surged past Bradley in New Hampshire.

BushRep: The unions very nearly delivered OH to Al Gore in 2000 (he lost by 3 points), despite the fact that Gore himself had written the state off. In hindsight, that was one of Gore's biggest blunders of the campaign. Had he not given up on OH, he would very likely be President today. The Democrats won't make that same mistake in 2004.

Had Bush not given up on Pennsylvania throughout September, and had he spent that California money in New Mexico, Iowa, Oregon, and Minnesota, and Wisconsin, he would have all those states. We can both play that game.

Bottom line is that both campaigns made mistakes, and unions had nothing to do with them.

http://www.nbc5i.com/politics/1707582/detail.html

I don't buy them, but here they are.

Not to mention West Virginia. Why do you think the Democrats are even competitive there? The state is pro-gun, anti-choice... yet every Democrat since FDR (except for McGovern, Mondale, and Gore) won it.

BushRep,
So are you admitting that there is a recession?

I'm not sure whose polls they were.

I have to leave now. If anyone responds to that Texas poll by saying it's not accurate, etc., then join the BushRep club.

It's why I don't think Rendell is ahead by 21 points in the latest SurveyUSA poll.

I am in the Bush Rep Club on this one. Survey USA Poll is garbage, as is the Rasmussen Portrait of America Poll. The PA Survey USA Poll showing Rendell ahead by 21 is a joke. The Texas Poll makes me laugh. Hoepfully, UH and others would have more accurate polls soon, as would Mason-Dixon or other indy organizations using legitimate polling means.

Polls are full of contradictions. Here is why I say this:

1. A Poll taken by Ipsos-Reid and Cook Political Report between October 1 and October 3 claims that Dems are loosing momentum as the public is not interested in how Bush handles the economy.

2. A Poll taken by CNN/Gallop between October 3 and October 6 claims that economy is taking center stage again and is helping the Democrats.

3. A Poll taken by CBS/NY Times claims that people want Bush to focus more on domestic issues instead of war issues.

So even in polling, I say take your pick. I personally think that ISPOS-Reid has a GOP bias and CBS generally has a Dem bias. CNN is pretty eratic as is Newsweek. Washington Post has not clue. Last time only Zogby was accurate.

My hunch is that Dems would gain seats but not take the House, unless the stock market goes under 7,000 during the last week of October, which is a distinct possibility. The undecideds would move one way or the other way during the week before the elections. We have had this happen before....in 1980 Broder claimed that Carter would pull it off, but we all know what happened. In 1986, no one said that the Dems would gain eight seats in the Senate. In 1998, Cook was predicting a 20 seat GOP gain, Rothenberg a ten seat gain, Goeas 25-40 seats gain for the GOP, Cokie Roberts 25 seat gain, Novak was expecting a 20 seat gain...and we all know what happened. In 2000, everyone said that Dems would take the House but the GOP would keep the Senate. We know what happened. Also in 2000 Rove and other indy political pundits claimed that Bush would win a one million vote plurality and carry 325-350 electoral votes...all except Tim Russert and Jim Zogby. There is absolutely no reason to believe that Dems wont regain the House and the GOP wont regain the Senate or Dems take both contrary to what the pundits are saying. For Dems to take the House, however, the stocks should fall further...into the 6,900 range at the right time....last week in October. If the stocks are at 6,900 on October 31, three weeks from Thursday, there is a chance that Dems would regain the House and keep the Senate...it is not beyond the realm of possibility.

If this fires up the unions, the grandson of the principal author is in a lot more trouble than people think.

Last I checked, the last President to invoke Taft-Hartley was a Democrat.

This is a special case, and I think most Democrats are angry at this because Bush will get a bounce in his economic ratings.

No he won't-kind of hard to get a bounce from something most people haven't heard of.

BushRep,
So, what, we don't care about workers' rights, just making Bush unpopular? Stop and think about this. Why would we be Democrats in the first place if we didn't have core beliefs? Why would we want Bush to be unpopular if we didn't have fundamental ideological differences with him?

I am happy if Bush is unpopular as long as he continues to slavishly serve corporate America. If Bush suddenly became progressive, I would not want Bush to be unpopular. You are mixing up the cause and effect of why Democrats don't like Bush.

And by the way, I disapprove of Truman's use of Taft-Hartley as well.

Now that you mention him, just about the only thing about Harry Truman I like was the Fair Deal.

"BushRep: The unions very nearly delivered OH to Al Gore in 2000 (he lost by 3 points), despite the fact that Gore himself had written the state off. In hindsight, that was one of Gore's biggest blunders of the campaign. Had he not given up on OH, he would very likely be President today. The Democrats won't make that same mistake in 2004."

It was a mistake, true... but w/ nadir in the race Gore had to keep going to places like WA, OR, MN, Fla and WI to placate the lefty-left morons and had no time for Ohio anyway.

Having labor being so strong in Ohio is a two-edged sword. Sure, they can deliver votes but they also have an inordinate amount of power in choosing candidates. The candidates are always too liberal and protectionist to the core, and as a result we win no races outside the cities and no statewide offices. The record of labor in delivering and choosing quality statewide candidates is abysmal.

The website linked below presents an interesting history of President Truman and the Taft-Hartley Act. Truman vetoed the legislation (a veto that was overridden), continued to denounce it in later campaigns, tried to repeal it, but also actually invoked it in certain circumstances. Here is the clickable link: http://www.lexisnexis.com/academic/2upa/Aph/truman_docs/guide_intros/tru9.htm

Nadir was no doubt a problem. However, Gore is himself to blame for loosing Ohio. Why in the world was he campaigning in TN and AR when he should have known that "the holier than thou" southern whites, even those who voted for Clinton were not going to vote for him.

If the economy is still weak two weeks from now, and if Edwards gets the nomination, he would probably still have to carry at least Ohio to win the elections. I think that "the holier than thou, we hate trial lawyers" southern whites would still vote for Bush in NC and TN. I think if Edwards wants to win he may do well to write off the south and southern whites, with the exception of Florida and concentrate on winning Ohio and perhaps Indiana by putting Evan Bayh on the ticket.

Bayh? Bleah. He's almost as nauseating as Holy Joe Lieberman.

"Nadir was no doubt a problem. However, Gore is himself to blame for loosing Ohio. Why in the world was he campaigning in TN and AR when he should have known that "the holier than thou" southern whites, even those who voted for Clinton were not going to vote for him."

Nonsense. Look at Gore's travel schedule and you'll see why he had no time for Ohio. I was working the Kucinich campaign...he sure wanted him to come but couldn't.

The state Dem party was in shambles(still is) and they didn't even have a Gore headquarters set up in Cleveland!

The state gop did run a bunch of phoney polls(in concert w/UC and media outlets) that showed Bush well-ahead. Why the state Dem party didn't run any independantly is also a wonder...so maybe Gore's camp has some complicency there, but they had no time for Ohio anyway.

Finally, the media in Ohio is virtually ALL-gop...even sport's talk radio operates as gop spam. Ohio's largest rag, the Plain Dealer, ran polls showing chimpy ahead by as much as 20 points, right up to the Dem convention, at which point they curiously stopped running them. They also sent a self-described conservative to cover the Dem convention- with predictable results. They then said that Gore was 'tired', ran all the gop blast faxes, and in the end endorsed chimpy...like they intended all along. Mind you, this is a paper that serves mainly the overwhelmingly democratic Cuyahoga county where Gore won by 70%+, if memory serves.

nadir and the moronic greens are much more responsible for Gore's lack of appearances in Ohio then the Gore camp.

Bayh...perhaps as nauseating...but just like Leach turned on Bush on the urging of his constituents, Bayh is reacting to his constituents in Indiana.

Regarding Gore and Ohio, I still think that Gore should have campaigned hard in Ohio instead of pandering to southern whites. Nadir is partly to blame. But, it would do the Dems a lot of good if they listened to Judis and Texeira and give up on the Southern whites. Let me make this clear. Outside of the South and Plains and Rocky Mountain States, there is only lukewarm support for the invasion of Iraq. However, whites in the South, Rocky Mountain States and Plains support invasion even without UN support by a margin of 95%, giving it a 53% percent approval at the national level. Elsewhere in the country only 35% of the whites are supporting the invasion.

1998 predicted GOP gains:Cook and Rothenberg revised the 15-20 seat predictions to 6-9 by election day in the House and 2-3 in the Senate.

I for the record NEVER bought the "15-20" seat gains at any point but though the 6-9 seats was resonable,I figured about 3-5 House gains throughout the campaign,and I figured there would be 2-4 gained in the Senate by the GOP.

In 2000,I think Rothenberg assumed the GOP would have about 51-52 seats total after all was said and done,as did I.

NOBODY over estimated the GOPs house gains in 2000,infact they won 90% of the ultra close races and finally over performed expectations.

If the Democrats have another 1998 then they take the House with a 6 seat gain.If the GOP has another 2000(house sector)then they break even or gain 1 seat.I think it will take something out of the ordinary for Dems to gain 7-9 seats or GOP to gain 2-4 seats.A Dem gain of 10 or GOP gain of 5 would require a semi-cataclysim.

Most likely scenario is a 2 or 3 seat Dem gain,a 4 seat gain will be a clear victory,a 5 seat gain for Dems will be a heavy win,and a 6 seat gain will simply be a KO that caused the GOP head to decap.

JDW:

The national media appears to be all pro- GOP these days as well. Read today's write up on the USA Today Poll in Real Clear Politics, Political News, and then read the garbage written the same day by Nancy Gibbs in the Time Magazine. There is a disconnect here.

Last week (October 2), the CNN's Capitol Hill Correspondent was swearing upon his soul that Harkin and Ganske are in a very tight contest in Iowa and if Ganske votes no on war resolution he would pay a price. The day before that a poll was released showing that war support had fallen sharply in Iowa. Harkin was ahead by 20 points although later polls put the lead at 10. There was clearly a disconnect here.

In short lying has become a national pastime, and this includes the media. We have become a nation of pathological liars. Before they accuse Clinton, Martha Stewart and Richard Nixon of lying, Nancy Gibbs, Wolf Blitzer and the Ohio Spammers may do well to look themselves in the mirror. They may actually see Martha Stewart, Bill Clinton or Richard Nixon.

MLM:

It would indeed take the Dems to get anything over 4 seats...but it is possible...stock market between 7,000 and 6,500 and still going down on November 4, 2002.

GCR

Sure, I agree. As for the disconnect, I tend to also agree, but I also spend most of my time amongst like-minded people.

Frankly, it astounds me that Fisher gets all these endorsements. Most Republicans never get them on their first time.

http://www.mikefisher.com/endorse.cfm

CGR: do you have a cite for this? Thanks in advance!

"Outside of the South and Plains and Rocky Mountain States, there is only lukewarm support for the invasion of Iraq. However, whites in the South, Rocky Mountain States and Plains support invasion even without UN support by a margin of 95%, giving it a 53% percent approval at the national level. Elsewhere in the country only 35% of the whites are supporting the invasion."

No the exact quotation. It is my wording. NBC reported on this two days ago in their nightly news, and Washington Post had an article on tepid support outside the south yesterday or may be monday.

thanks!

Although the union didn't want the outside interference, they are making out relatively well. They say they will continue the work-to-rule (it's all about safety... really... ;-) ) like they were doing before they were locked out. Bush chose the better of two politically bad alternatives by imposing Taft-Hartley, but the backlog of container traffic will remain for the forseeable future.