The always-nugget-rich Kausfiles has several items on organized labor and the Employee Free Choice Act that shed more light on card check’s failing fortunes.

Hadn’t seen this elsewhere (scroll down):

Buried Lede of the Day: Thomas Edsall, summarizing a new Pew poll, notes the Dems have gained some support recently! While Republicans have lost ground! And voters care more about the economy than “moral values.”   

We knew that. What we maybe didn’t know is this:  

Conversely, public support for labor unions appears to be weakening: the percentage of people agreeing that “labor unions are necessary to protect the working person,” has dropped from 74 percent at the start of this decade to 61 percent this year. The decline was sharper — from 76 to 53 percent, a 23 point fall — among independent voters than among either Democrats or Republicans. [E.A.]

Some 61% say labor unions are “too powerful,” a big jump from 52% in 1999. … Support for unions, says Pew, is at an “all-time low.”. …  Also, perhaps counter-intuitively, ”‘the overall balance of public opinion on the government’s responsibility to provide for the needy has shifted to the right’ despite the onset of a severe recession.” This rightward movement appears to be the result of growing fear among the above $75K set (a big set) that the poor have become too dependent on government programs. …

Kaus, the reform-minded Democrat, has more on EFCA in this post.

Mickey Kaus, a reform-minded Democrat, is one of the few almost-mainstream-media giving the Employee Free Choice Act an extended, serious examination. After attending a public discussion on the legislation, he writes at Kausfiles, “Card Check” Not as Bad as Thought! It’s Worse.”

The arbitration parts of the card check bill are so vaguely drawn that nobody knows who the arbitrators will be. The job appears to be delegated entirely to the Federal Mediation Service. The FMS might decide to use its own employees. It might decide to use arbitrators from the private sector selected along more traditional lines. The two breakfast debaters (Prof. Richard Epstein and attorney Anthony Segall) did seem to agree that, since thousands of arbitrators might quickly be needed for the expected explosion of mandatory arbitration, it’s unlikely they would all be newly hired GS-12s. But they don’t know.

And…

I have been worried that big business would sell out small business in the coming negotiations on a “compromise,” watered-down “card check” bill that everyone expects. Prof. Epstein suggested that, if anything, big business is more terrified of the arbitration provisions than small business–simply because big businesses are more complicated and therefore they have a lot more to lose if an unfamiliar arbitrator suddenly steps in and starts messing around and running things. … P.S.: But doesn’t that suggest another possible sell out, in which the arbitration provisions of ”card check” get dropped while the more notorious anti-secret ballot provisions stay in? I don’t know. If you are Wal-Mart or Toyota I would think you’d be threatened by both provisions.

Judging from the reaction of NAM members, there’s nothing in the when-will-it-be-introduced? bill to invite compromise of any sort, but small businesses are especially concerned about the card check provisions. If you’re a company with 10 or 20 employees, union organizers could hit the softball team’s game on Wednesday and you could be facing a new union by Monday — with pressure on to get that new contract in place within four months or have an arbitrator set your wages and benefits for two years. In a highly competitive industry, the increased costs could simply kill the company.

Mickey Kaus, reform-minded Democrat who writes at Slate.com, scopes out the political scene and comments:

When I tell my liberal friends that “card check” is one of the big issues in the 2008 campaign, they tend to roll their eyes. But when I tell my conservative friends that “card check” is one of the big issues in 2008 … they roll their eyes too. Apparently the words “card check” are not enough, in themselves, to convey the fundamental shift in industrial organization that might result if workers could trigger unionization under the Wagner Act without a normal secret-ballot election.