Why did the SEIU decide Obama was preferable to Clinton?
I think our members feel he is the best candidate to bring change to Washington; a fresh face who can inspire a broad-based movement of people to win fundamental change to the healthcare system. But progressives have been hammering Obama’s healthcare plan because it doesn’t include a mandate for universal coverage. Did that distinction play a role in your decision? The details of their proposals, at this point, are less important than the sense that Obama was the candidate with the best chance of winning in November, and has a better chance of mobilizing the public to overcome the political obstacles to fundamental change. Exit poll data from Super Tuesday seems to indicate pretty conclusively that Clinton got the working-class vote. Do you have any thoughts on why that might be true? Is there a chance that the leadership of the SEIU might be working at cross purposes to the membership? I think the Clinton brand obviously has a lot of positive resonance among working-class voters, and
