FOR THE RECORD

Barack Obama April 2 told the AFL-CIO in Philadelphia that if elected he was "ready to play offense for organized labor" after eight years in which he contended the pendulum had swung sharply the other way.

"It's time we had a President who didn't choke saying the word 'union'," Mr. Obama told labor officials. "A President who knows it's the Department of Labor and not the Department of Management. And a President who strengthens our unions by letting them do what they do best - organize our workers."

Noting that business interests had mobilized opposition to permitting unions to be formed without elections if the majority of employees at a business signed cards, he added, "I've fought to pass the Employee Free Choice Act in the Senate. And I will make it the law of the land when I'm President of the United States of America."

Earlier in his speech, the Illinois Senator noted that Philadelphia was the place where in 1827 the Mechanics Union of Trade Associations was formed and the trade-union movement in this nation began. The preamble to the group's constitution, he noted, advanced "what many believed was a radical idea - that it was in their employers' interests to pay them higher wages because higher wages for workers would help bring general prosperity for all."

Mr. Obama continued, "It was the 19th Century equivalent of the idea that what's good for Main Street is good for Wall Street. And that's an idea we need to remember today. Because what we're seeing is that another, very different view has taken hold in Washington and on Wall Street - the view that we can somehow thrive as a nation when those at the very top are doing better than ever, while ordinary Americans are struggling to get by."

He characterized the Bush Administration as one "that denies labor a seat at the table when trade deals are being negotiated, that doesn't believe in unions, that doesn't believe in organizing, and that's packed the labor-relations board with their corporate buddies."

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The Professional Staff Congress April 2 urged City Council Members during its CUNY Day Legislative Breakfast to respond to Mayor Bloomberg's proposed cuts to the City University of New York budget with restorations and even new spending allocations.

PSC President Barbara Bowen, noting that despite record enrollments CUNY is operating with 5,000 fewer full-time faculty members than it had in 1975, told Council Members that "we must do more than just stop the immediate threats."

The union said that Council Finance Committee Chairman David Weprin assured it that CUNY's funding would be a priority in its discussions with the Bloomberg administration on a final budget, which must be adopted in June for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

The PSC honored the Council's Black, Latino and Asian Caucus for its past support of CUNY. It also gave awards to PSC members Cecelia McCall and Irwin Yellowitz and to its members who volunteered in the Hurricane Katrina reconstruction work.

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Our best wishes to Reuven Blau, who after nearly six years at this paper has decided to leave behind the arcana of civil service and the political machinations of the police unions for the more rambunctious side of life served up at the New York Post.

Mr. Blau, who began here as an intern fresh out of Brooklyn College, where he for some reason didn't bother taking any journalism courses, got his chance to step onto the stage of reporting when another 20-something employee quit abruptly during the week of the Fourth of July in 2002 to tend to a slightly premature mid-life crisis. He didn't immediately come back a star, but he gradually grew into a well-grounded reporter covering the city's police, correction and sanitation unions, as well as those representing state employees from Court Officers to Mental Health Counselors.

We're not sure the tabloid world uptown will ever offer him anything as riveting as the uniformed union backbiting and the internal wars of some state unions, but our guess is he'll enjoy the search.