UNIONS HAVE ONE MAIN FOCUS – MORE GOODIES FOR THEIR MEMBERS
I am very pleased for my friend Bruce McPherson that his campaign yesterday was able to trumpet the endorsement of the California Professional Firefighters in his first election to the position of Secretary of State (he is the appointed incumbent, so this is his first run for the office – though he did run statewide for Lieutenant Governor last go-around).  It is a good endorsement to have — it is a major public employee union, and as we saw in the 2005 special election, the unions are a powerful force in politics.  He also has the endorsement of the California Teachers Association.
 
McPherson’s union endorsements gives me an opportunity to express my concern about employee unions, and the inference that their endorsement connotes that the recipient of their endorsement means that they are "good" on policy issue concerning the professional occupation of the members of that union.  This sounds awkward, so let me try to be more specific.  The California Teachers Association likes to speak as if they are the authority on what is good for education.  The California Nurses Association likes to speak as if they are the experts on the medical profession.  And you can be sure that the California Professional Firefighters like to present themselves as people that support candidates who are good on "fire protection" issues.
 
The reality is that all of these organizations are unions — which is to say that their primary purpose is to look out for the job security, wages and benefits of their members.  When they give an endorsement, they (by and large) are looking at these bread-and-butter salary and benefits issues, not public policy issues concerning the area of expertise of their professional membership. 

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 19th, 2006 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.