Frank Racism

Unions for McCain:

Dad29 says that there is some trouble among the unions for Sen. Obama:

A prominent union leader on Tuesday blamed racism for Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-Ill.) failure to build a big lead over GOP rival Sen. John McCain.

Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), said many workers are considering voting for McCain (R-Ariz.) because of his military service and status as a hero of the Vietnam War.

AFSCME is one of the strongest of the Democratic Party's support bases, because it's about public sector unions. Public sector unions are all about bigger government, so the establishment of new massive Federal bureaucracies to oversee health care or "a civilian national security corps" are right up their alley. If they're having trouble with the rank and file in AFSCME, they've got trouble indeed.

The early part of the story suggests that it's trouble that is coming from the fact that these blue collar gentlemen admire McCain -- and indeed, the unions draw heavily from veterans. Grim's Hall has long supported Helmets to Hardhats, which assists veterans in finding such jobs. It's not really shocking that veterans admire McCain and value the kind of leadership he showed during his military career.

However, "our members think McCain is just a really admirable guy" is not a sentiment that AFSCME's leadership can allow to go unanswered. McEntee blames his membership for being, well, racists:

McEntee said several union members had approached him, saying they could not vote for Obama because of his race. He also said some local union presidents have failed to support Obama out of fear.

“There are some local union presidents that are afraid — yes, that’s the word, afraid — to hand out literature for Barack Obama,” said McEntee.

Afraid? To say, "The boys downtown say we have to hand this stuff out"? Here's the question: are the union presidents claiming fear in order to resist HQ's demands that they hand out literature when they don't support Obama? Or is it possible that there really is such massive resistance to the guy that a union president would really be afraid to do it?