The Democratic Party's protectionist make-over was completed yesterday, when Nancy Pelosi decided to kill the Colombia free trade agreement. Her objections had nothing to do with the evidence and everything to do with politics, but this was an act of particular bad faith. It will damage the economic and security interests of the U.S. while trashing our best ally in Latin America. Even if the free trade agreement is somehow removed from cold storage, Ms. Pelosi's cheating is a first-order strategic blunder. Colombia is one of America's closest friends in a hostile region menaced by Hugo Chávez's Venezuela. For all the talk of repairing the U.S. "image" in the world, the Democrats don't really mind harming that image if it pleases the AFL-CIO.

It seems clear that this year’s establishment candidate, Hilary Clinton, will not have organized labor rush to her rescue. Part of this may be political payback for her husband’s presidency. After aggressively supporting Bill Clinton twice, many labor unions felt that his administration either ignored them or endorsed legislation (such as NAFTA) that was inimical to union interests.

But there are more fundamental issues that explain labor’s shift. For starters, the leaders of today’s unions are different from those of yesteryear in personality and ideology. Consider Andy Stern, the charismatic president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and arguably the most important labor leader in America. Stern didn’t get his start in the union movement working at a steel mill; instead, he attended the University of Pennsylvania in the late 1960s and first joined the SEIU as a social worker. Unlike Meany or Kirkland, Stern is unabashedly liberal on nearly every policy issue. And when Stern was unhappy with the leadership of the AFL-CIO, he spurned the old labor line about “solidarity,” withdrew the SEIU from the AFL-CIO, recruited like-minded unions to do the same, and formed an entirely new labor federation, dubbed Change to Win.

New media is poised to destroy the entertainment industry, as we know it.

People as diverse as television writer Rob Long and Internet guru Marc Andreesen are talking about the end of Hollywood -- and they have a point. Several, in fact. Netscape’s Andreesen wrote extensively on his blog in November about how Hollywood -- or more specifically movie and television writers, directors and producers -- should emulate Silicon Valley and become entrepreneurial. And that this inevitable revolution has only been hastened by the writers’ walkout. Indeed, there is some anecdotal evidence that this is already happening.