One of the scariest and little discussed things that Obama is up to is that he supports “card check” unionism. This means that workers must publically show on a card whether they want a union at their place of employment. Union bosses and organizers then can lean on workers to get them to agree to let a union into where they work.

Of course all unions in the US are already “forced unions”. No employer is going to hire a union without being forced by government to negotiate with the union. So now not only will businesses be forced to negotiate with unions and sign contracts - but now workers will be intimidated into joining unions too. No more secrets ballots, so much for democracy.

Union leaders are hoping that this is finally going to revive private sector unionism in the US. Great, then all businesses can become models of growth like the US big three automakers and the US steel industry! Unions have done wonders for them - just imagine what they could do for Intel, Apple, and Walmart.

If card check passes, this will be the biggest left-wing victory since the New Deal which first established forced-unionism.

The always insightful Mickey Kaus writes today (via Instapundit):

kf hears from a trustworthy non-Republican source (with access to actual insider information) that the Dems are getting set to pass “card check” legislation fast next year, right out of the box, assuming Obama wins and the Democrats get their expected big Senate majority. The legislation–which would eliminate the secret ballot in union organizing elections, allowing union organizers to gather signed cards person-to-person–is cheap, in budgetary terms. And it’s very, very important to organized labor. …Obama’s political history suggests he’s not a “fight the power” kind of guy. He’s an “accommodate the power” kind of guy. It’s highly plausible that he’d be willing to pay off this debt to Big Labor up front if they push him hard enough. … Since I think “card check” legislation is a potential near-disaster economically (unions are engines of adversarial bureaucracy and the mainspring of the wage-price spiral) and procedurally (the secret ballot certainly seems like a key way to avoid intimidation) this is not good news.

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