Progressive Politics

I don't agree. I like this paragraph from the article which captures my sentiment (the last sentence in particular):

"The main rationale provided by AFGE president Everett Kelley was that his members were suffering economically from the shutdown. There’s no doubt that this hurt is very real, and I do not doubt the sincerity of Kelley’s commitment to his membership. But AFGE’s leadership could have decided to pressure Republicans rather than Democrats to end the shutdown. That was a political choice."

Union leadership made a political choice, and it's reasonable to hold them accountable for that. This isn't about blaming the unions for the choices made by scummy democrats, but rather a related but distinct beef with the union. Even if the unions choosing to pressure the Republicans instead would have had no bearing on the outcome in this particular situation, their choice doesn't bode well for future issues where the unions' support (or lack thereof) may prove pivotal.

Here, the union showed that it was willing to sacrifice the long term wellbeing of their members for alleviating the short term harms. That makes me question the effectiveness of a union at all. After all, most successful strikes involve the union helping to cohere workers into an organising force, absorbing some (but not all) of the short term harms of striking. If we can't trust them to fight for the long term wellbeing of their members, then what is the union even for?