Spurred by state budget crunches and an angry public mood, Republican and some Democratic leaders are focusing with increasing intensity on public workers and the unions that represent them, casting them as overpaid obstacles to good government and demanding cuts in their often-generous benefits.

Unlike past battles over the high cost of labor, this time pitched battles over wages and pensions are being waged from Sacramento to Springfield to New York City and the conflict is marked by its bipartisan tone, with public employee unions emerging as an intransigent public enemy number one in cities and state capitals across the country.

They're the whipping boys for a new generation of governors who, thanks to a tanking economy and an assist from editorial boards, feel freer than ever to make political targets out of what was once a protected liberal class of teachers, cops, and other public servants.

Republicans around the nation have cheered New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, whose shouting match over budget cuts with an outraged teacher--"You don't have to" teach, he told her without sympathy--became a YouTube sensation on the right last week.

And even Democrats, like the nominee for governor in New York, Andrew Cuomo, have echoed the attacks on unions.

there is going to be a revolt at the grass roots level against both parties and it's going to come out of the middle class.

"flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet" in the "pointless exercise" of supporting the failed bid of Bill Halter to unseat Sen. Blanche Lincoln.

Vale went on to say:

"If that's their take on this, then they severely misread how the electorate feels and how we're running our political program. When we say we're only going to support elected officials who support our issues," said AFL-CIO spokesman Eddie Vale. "When they say we should have targeted our money among some key house races among Blue Dog Democrats -- that ain't happening."

Disturbing on a number of levels.  

For one, the public dressing-down of unions for working to help defeat Lincoln and supporting the other Democrat, and for not assisting in the election of more Blue Dogs should make it obvious that the New Dems and this administration have disdain for and are indifferent to the interests of the working men and women that unions represent, that they believe their own political interests far outweigh the interests of the people.  

For another, the Rahm Emmanuel plan to stock the Congress with more and more Blue Dogs continues apace.  

"Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet on a pointless exercise," the official said. "If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November."

From Gabriel Winant at Salon.com:

But that's not the real point the senior official was making. What's being said there, instead, is that organized labor is just an adjunct to the Democrats. Unions shouldn't expect to get the party to move on their main issues, and they shouldn't fight about it. The best they can hope for is that Democrats stay in power and keep workers from being screwed too fast or too dramatically.

Imagine if the president and Bill Clinton had instead thrown in with Halter. I know it's unthinkable for establishment Democrats to do this kind of thing, but just play along: what if they had said that it's important for Democrats to understand that there are consequences for a senator who repeatedly betrays her party and the progressive agenda? It's hard to imagine Lincoln could have pulled it out with Clinton campaigning against her.

In other words, elite Democrats had a real choice, and they decided to stand with the Chamber of Commerce and treat the unions like the misbehaving hired help. They ran the same campaign that conservative Southern Democrats have been running for the better part of a century to keep labor out of the South, and it worked.

[snip]

The direction we're headed in, judging by that White House official, is for Democrats to show the door to working-class voters. For years, Democratic leaders have desperately want theirs to be the party of upper-middle-class suburban professionals. And if Blanche Lincoln loses in November to her Republican challenger, as she probably will, all we'll be able to say is that Democrats got their wish: they wrote off working people, and working people wrote them off too.

This is why AIPAC has such power though.

AIPAC also benefits from a Congress that (for whatever reasons) puts Israeli interests over American interests, and from not having to be governed by any of the laws that other foreign-country interest groups have to obey. No, not a "conspiracy" but it is undeniable that they start with a vastly greater set of advantages than any other interest group.

Keep sending us money and we will use it for pols who have failed you over and over again.

Sadly, this view permeates too many "progessive" blogs, not to mention Dems who, as I've noted, still say they will vote for Obama and the other Dems because the GOP is so vewwy vewwy scawy!

None of us should give a flying patootie what latest insanity the GOP says or does. They are not the ones in power. Paying attention to them is a distraction, and a handy cudgel for those who want to keep us bound to the Democrats.)

The President has tremendous power--especially in the selection of a nominee...

I would not delude myself into thinking a "moderate" Republican like McCain would not hurt the Supreme Court....