Labor Unions a Fundraising Dinosaur

Politico's top story of Thursday morning regales the woes of organized labor's political campaign fundraising as it limps into election year 2012.

The Robin Bravender story claims that unions have been slow to coordinate their spending strategy under the new campaign rules: "They dont appear to have clear fundraising goals. Many say theyre planning to stick with the same tactics theyve turned to in the past, even after a bruising 2010 election."

Labor is definitely giving to Democratic-led groups, but apparently it's way behind in forming super PACs, the new breed of political action committees. The up-in-the-air approach, says Politico, suggests that unions "will not emerge as the counterweight to the unlimited corporate cash flowing to conservative groups that the left fears could trounce them up and down the ticket in 2012."

One Democratic strategist is quoted as saying, Labors not the most nimble group of organizations out there. They can experiment, but it tends to take a couple of cycles for things to change."