From John Fund, Wall Street Journal’s Political Diary:

DENVER — Democrats narrowly avoided a major embarrassment before holding their abbreviated roll call of the states here on Wednesday night.

Politico.com reported that the Obama campaign was seriously considering letting delegates vote by secret ballot, the better to avoid intimidation and fear of reprisal from local party bosses. But the plan — which was pushed on the Obama camp by supporters of Hillary Clinton — was suddenly dropped when it was realized that a key plank of the Democratic Party platform backs a so-called “card check” provision being added to the nation’s labor laws. Card check would effectively strip workers of the protection of secret ballots in union elections. Business groups and former Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern oppose the measure on the grounds that it exposes workers to harassment and intimidation.

That was precisely the concern of Democratic delegates who wanted to cast a secret ballot vote on the convention floor. The Obama campaign thought seriously about accommodating them until it realized how such a naked contradiction to the party’s stance on union balloting might look to voters and the media.

Mark Mix, National Right to Work Committee, “Barred by a union card?“

The 2008 elections may represent the high-water mark of Big Labor’s political ascendancy. Although union operatives have already announced $300 million in national campaign expenditures, union political spending could exceed $1 billion after factoring in PACs, 527s, and state and local outlays.

What does Big Labor want? A sympathetic president and a filibuster-proof Senate majority mean less federal oversight for corrupt unions and new government-granted special privileges for union bosses.

Danny Glover, actor, pro-democracy reformer, John Edwards supporter:

DANNY GLOVER: Well, I think that what Edwards represented to me and for so many others was that he positioned his candidacy on the issues, domestic issues, and on healthcare and poverty. As we noted in the—as all of us noted in the early campaign days with Senator Clinton and also Senator Obama, that the person who focused on those particular issues was Edwards, and that he brought those issues to our attention. He talked about them, and he based his candidacy on that. That’s the reason why. The fact that—the idea, as we talk about Employee Free Choice Act right now, that would have been a tenet of an Edwards campaign or an Edwards candidacy, as well, that we could use unions as the basis of establishing equity in this country, that we can talk about living wage, healthcare, pensions, etc., benefits. All those things, we can talk about that. So that was the basis of my support of John Edwards.

So do you know what the chief flavoring ingredient is in most pretzels? No, not the beer your drink while eating them. It’s malt (or as the case may be, malted corn syrup). And it’s a sodium-solution baked on that gives the pretzels that nice brown coloring.

Phil Bernas, technical manager of Herr Foods, guides us through the Nottingham, Pa., plant in this week’s Cool Stuff Being Made, explaining all the twists and turns and extrusion into metal dies of pretzel-making.

Pennsylvania is the land of snack-making, and Herr’s got its start with potato chips in 1946. From the company history:

The Herr Foods story began in 1946 when 21-year-old James Stauffer Herr bought a small potato chip company in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for $1,750. In 1947, the business moved into a vacated tobacco shed on the Herr family farm. As he learned more about the business, Jim Herr developed new and better cooking processes and a delicious snack food became even better. As demand for Herr’s^® Potato Chips grew, so did the company.

Today the family-owned Herr’s employs 1,500 people who manufacture and distribute more than 350 snack products nationwide.

Thanks this week and most weeks to Pennsylvania Cable Network for sending the underlying video

National Association of Manufacturers Executive Vice President Jay Timmons is on the road attending the Democratic National Convention in Denver and next week’s Republican National Convention in Minneapolis-St.Paul.

Timmons, a guest on this week’s “America’s Business” with Mike Hambrick, says Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) made history by becoming the first African American nominated to the White House. However, Obama needs to give voters more details on his policies to help manufacturers and workers, he said.

Meanwhile, Timmons said prospective Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) made a smart move Friday in selecting Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate. She could attract some of the supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) to the Republican fold, he said.

“If there are those who are looking at this as an opportunity for women to provie they can lead the nation then certainly she can attract some of those former Hillary supporters,” Timmons said of Gov. Palin.

All that talk about American jobs moving overseas may be overblown. We’ll be joined by Exxel Outdoors founder and Chief Executive Officer Harry Kazazian to discuss why his company is moving sleeping bag production back to the United States from China.

America has a hard time balancing its check book. The White House recently announced the federal budget deficit will hit a record $482 billion for the year ended September 2009. Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget President Maya MacGuineas will join us to talk about what effect this massive deficit will have on our economy.

This is the Labor Day holiday weekend. That means its time to get the annual Labor Day economic report from National Association of Manufacturers Chief Economist Dave Huether. Dave will talk about how trade and exports have proven to be a bright spot in the economy.

And with fall approaching football is in the air. Mike will chat with Wilson Sporting Goods plant manager Daniel Riegle about football manufacturing and Wilson’s close ties with the NFL.

In our regular segments, Renee Giachino of American Justice Partnership gives us the latest on tort reform and commentator Hank Cox recalls “The Way It Was.” And our program will close with “The Last Word” from the National Association of Manufacturers President Gov. John Engler.

For more about “America’s Business with Mike Hambrick” and to listen to the program online, please click here. And for video highlights and more, check out http://www.americasbusiness.org.

The NAM has released its 11th annual Labor Day Report.  Facing Up To The Challenge: Trade Energy and the Economy focuses on the current state of the American worker.  Sluggish domestic demand, chiefly due to high energy prices and an ongoing housing recession, have caused employment to decline continuously throughout the first seven months of the year.  The construction sector and a number of manufacturing industries have been hit hard. 

Amid these significant challenges, the one bright spot continues to be exports, which have accounted for more than half of total  economic growth during the first half of this year.  The report calls for a comprehensive national energy strategy that both boosts domestic production and exploration of energy resources as well as increases energy efficiency.  The result will be reduced dependence on foreign sources of energy, lower energy prices and higher disposable incomes for American workers. 

The report also calls for policy makers to aid U.S. exports (which are manufacturing jobs) by passing the three Free Trade Agreements (with Colombia, Panama and South Korea) that are awaiting Congressional Approval on Capital Hill.  

(Bumped to the top: NAM’s executive vice president, Jay Timmons, has been blogging this week from the National Democratic Convention in Denver. Today, Timmons reacts to Sen. John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate, drawing on his experience as the former executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Comimttee.)

While the pick of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was a surprise to many, it was clearly a calculated move by Senator John McCain to also make history in this year’s election. A trailblazer for women, she could be an attractive alternative for those who had believed Hillary Clinton would have been the strongest pick for Barack Obama.

Governor Palin, a star of pro-life party members, will help ease the concerns of social conservatives who were worried McCain would choose a pro-choice Republican (or Democrat) to be his second in command. She is a strong executive (the only candidate for President or Vice President this year who has such experience) and does not shy from difficult decisions. She won admiration from her fellow Alaskans when she returned to the job of Governor last year just three days after giving birth to her fifth child.

She has adhered to a fairly conservative fiscal policy as well (although Alaska has quirky budgetary provisions). On energy, Governor Palin could be helpful in convincing Senator McCain to support development on the north slope of Alaska near ANWR.

No stranger to talking tough challenges, she defeated an incumbent Governor – a fellow Republican – in the 2006 gubernatorial primary. This was the same Governor who appointed her to head an agency in his administration, a job she later resigned in protest over her concern that ethical standards were not being followed.

The Governor is an incredibly engaging public official and will be a strong advocate for a McCain presidency on the trail. In 2004, I sat down with her in a local restaurant near Wasilla, Alaska, to discuss her interest in running for the U.S. Senate against fellow Republican and incumbent Lisa Murkowski. Armed with polling information and precinct data, I was prepared to discuss her thoughts on whether she could win the race. She was only interested in talking about how she thought she could make an impact on national public policy – a focus on fiscal discipline, lower taxes on working Americans and strong support for the military and exporting freedom.

I was thoroughly impressed. And Americans are likely to be impressed with her story and record as well. John McCain has chosen wisely.

From an Anchorage Daily News profile of Todd Palin, the husband of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Republican candidate for vice president.

White-collar jobs in law, education or health care are typical among the current crop of first spouses, but Palin spent nearly 20 years as a blue-collar employee in the oil fields of the North Slope. And every summer he heads west to his birthplace in Dillingham to work the Bristol Bay commercial salmon fishery from his property on the Nushagak River.

A lifetime of manual labor in the state’s two largest and most physically demanding industries is helping Palin carve out his role as Alaska’s first spouse, or “first dude,” a nickname he has in common with the Kansas governor’s husband, Gary Sebelius.

Like other first spouses around the country, Palin has been asked to champion an array of causes or institutions since his wife took office in December.

His favorite is steering young Alaskans toward stable jobs in the oil and gas industry. It’s a singular choice among his counterparts, whose pet issues include schools, public health, domestic violence, poverty or the arts.

It’s great to see any person in the public eye pushing industry as a good place to build a career.

Companies, like lobbyists, are an easy target when it comes to political speeches. “Taxing corporations” unfortunately makes for a good soundbite. But, a good policy maker knows that it’s not that simple. That’s why it was disappointing to hear Senator Obama launch an attack on “big corporations, oil companies…and companies that ship jobs overseas.”

The reality is that these very companies that Obama wants to tax are major contributors to our country’s economic growth. American manufacturers provide well-paying jobs for employees, investment opportunities for shareholders and high-quality products and services for consumers. Today, more than ever, manufacturers compete in a fiercely competitive global marketplace. In recent years, our trading partners have lowered their corporate tax rates making it harder for U.S. based companies to compete. Raising taxes on these companies won’t make them more competitive and it certainly won’t create more jobs. At a time when the economy is struggling to recover - we need policies that help companies expand and grow. Lowering - not raising - the corporate rate would be a good first step.

We do not have an NAM voting record to post for Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, obviously, and are really aware only of her strong record in support for domestic energy development. (Although there might be a little institutional leaning toward governors around here, too.)  On economic issues, we’re heartened by Larry Kudlow’s praise for her, as Larry is an avid, tireless, smart, good supporter of the U.S. manufacturing economy and global competitiveness. Here’s what Kudlow said this a.m. at National Review Online:

McCain-Palin? I’ll Be Thrilled [Larry Kudlow]

If the rumors about Sarah Palin are true, I will be thrilled. She’s been my first choice all along. She’s a strong pro-life, supply-side, drill-drill-drill-ethics reformer who has worked hard to change the Ted Stevens culture-of-corruption problem in Alaska. A cheap-shot Democratic legislative investigation of Palin appeared to slow her momentum down a few weeks ago. But John McCain would electrify everyone if this choice pans out.

Here and here are the transcripts of my most recent interviews with Gov. Palin on K&C.

08/29 09:39 AM

And here’s Palin from a recent interview on energy with Investor’s Business Daily:

Palin: Alaskans are frustrated because there is opposition in Congress to developing our vast amount of natural resources. We want to contribute more to the rest of the United States. We want to help secure the United States, and help us get off this reliance of foreign sources of energy.

It’s a very nonsensical position we’re in right now. We send President Bush and Secretary (of Energy Sam) Bodman overseas to ask the Saudis to ramp up production of crude oil so that hungry markets in America can be fed, (and) your sister state in Alaska has those resources. But these lands are locked up by Congress, and we are not allowed to drill to the degree America needs the development.

The conservative Heritage Foundation, perhaps straining a little to be counterintuitive, identifies omissions from Senator Obama’s that could alarm “progressives.” Interesting enough. From The Morning Bell blog:

Global Warming: Obama did not utter the phrase “global warming” once last night. Progressives might respond that they prefer to label the issue “climate change,” so Obama should not have mentioned “global warming” anyway. Fair enough. But Obama only mentioned climate change once, and even then it was in reference to “new partnerships” he would form around the world “to defeat the threats of the 21st century.” No mention of cap and trade. No mention of carbon taxes or the preferred progressive term “putting a price on carbon.” All of Obama’s energy policies were framed as energy independence, not climate change. This should deeply worry progressives.

And…

Progressives firmly believe they can form a permanent governing majority if they reverse this trend. To do this they support “card check” legislation that would end the secret ballot in union organizing elections and allow union organizers to intimidate or force workers to sign cards, in public, saying they support unionization. While Obama has voted for card check legislation in the past, he did not mention it last night. Even more surprisingly, he failed to utter the words “labor” or “unions” either.

 

From the AP, “Industry groups file lawsuit over polar bear rule“:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Five industry groups have sued the Interior Department over a rule to protect the polar bear that they say unfairly singles out business operations in Alaska for their contribution to global warming.

Groups representing the oil and gas, mining, and manufacturing industries asked a federal judge Wednesday to ensure that laws designed to protect the bear, which was recently designated a threatened species, are not used to block projects that release heat-trapping gases in the state.

The American Petroleum Institute was joined by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Mining Association, the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Iron and Steel Institute in the lawsuit, which explicitly challenges three words — except in Alaska — that appear in a 62-page rule issued in May.

A copy of the suit, American Petroleum Institute v. Kempthorne, is available here.

API’s statement is here, and it’s a very useful pre-corrective:

The oil and natural gas industry is committed to the conservation of the polar bear and other marine mammals. Companies active in Arctic region energy exploration implement polar bear mitigation and avoidance programs, and they provide funding and logistical support for important polar bear studies carried out in the United States and in Canada. API filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia yesterday because it believes the U.S. Interior Department’s determination that the Endangered Species Act is “not the right tool to set U.S. climate policy‟ makes sense, and that the interim final rule issued by the Department needs to be expanded to include Alaska as the Act is implemented. API member companies are not challenging the listing of the polar bear as a threatened species.