Hmmm…this is curious and bizarre. If you go to to website of the Machinists, you find this curious bit of news:

Organizing Drive Gears Up at Alabama Mercedes Plant

March 16, 2006 – Fair wages, a voice at work and decent benefits are the foundations for a good job anywhere in the United States. Increasingly, however, these benefits are only available to union members with access to collective bargaining rights.

In Tuscaloosa, Alabama, nearly 3,000 workers at a state-of-the-art Mercedes-Benz facility are looking forward to joining those ranks as an IAM organizing campaign there gathers steam.

Huh? The Machinists have gotten into the business of organizing auto companies? As far as I know today, the UAW doesn’t know about this. And I doubt that folks in Detroit are going to be very happy about this, particularly if Tom Buffenbarger (the president of the machinists) didn’t bother to let UAW prez Ron Gettlefinger know about this ahead of time.

But, the larger question is: what the heck to the machinists know about the auto industry–or about organizing for that matter? I get that the machinists, which has been hammered lately since so much of its membership is based in the airline industry, has to figure out how to expand its membership. And it is true that the machinists were supposed to be part of Heavy Metal–the once-proposed merger between them, the UAW and the steelworkers (a merger that failed primarily because Buffenbarger, the youngest of the potential leaders, didn’t want to give up the top job, which he would likely have had to, at least initially, since he would have hailed from the smallest of the three unions).

But, this feels like a campaign with no long-term strategy. Admittedly, I speak both as a UAW member and someone who has been…ahem…perplexed by Buffenbarger’s penchant for writing curious letters (you might want to refresh yourself on his summer writings). Still, there’s some explaining to do here. And perhaps some nasty times ahead between the two unions. John Sweeney, get your mediation skills ready.

See the whole press release here.