John Sweeney — Thanks to the financial and moral support of AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, the "anti-globalization" charade — frequently accompanied by riots and destruction — has provided the spectacle needed for the appearance of popular opposition. If the anti-FTAA/WTO demonstrations relied solely on the radical Greens, with their peculiar (and often repellent) appearance and extreme, anti-human proposals, they would alienate far more people than they attracted. The labor unions provide some balance, with lots of normal-looking "working guys." Union-chartered buses transport thousands of union activists to marches and demonstrations; millions of dollars of union dues help fund the AFL-CIO’s anti-FTAA/WTO campaign.

But it is not truly an anti-FTAA campaign. Sweeney (CFR) told activists at a Miami rally on November 19, 2003 that they must "radically rewrite" the FTAA to "protect workers from profit-hungry multinationals and repressive governments." This fits with his other proposals to empower the UN’s International Labor Organization to enforce a global labor code. It also dovetails with his support for the Clinton and Bush amnesty proposals for illegal aliens, a very definite blow to the U.S. citizens who make up most of his union member base and whose jobs are being taken by a continuing deluge of foreign workers. Like most of the phony opponents of the FTAA, Sweeney is comfortable in both the pro and con camps. Some of his staunchest supporters in the union are Communist Party loyalists and 1960s radicals from the Institute for Policy Studies, Democratic Socialists of America and the American Friends Service Committee. But he is also invited to elite gatherings of the World Economic Forum, David Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission and Council of the Americas, and Gorbachev’s State of the World Forum.

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