INDEED.

Steven Greenhouse lays out the challenge for John Edwards:

It often appears that the thing that will most help Mr. Edwards secure more union endorsements is not for him to march on a union picket line for the umpteenth time, but for him to get a 5 or 10 percentage point bump in nationwide polls. Many union leaders are wary of endorsing candidate who will flame out the way Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt did in the 2004 primaries, notwithstanding the union endorsements they had.

That said, the Service Employees International Union has said repeatedly that it would not endorse before October, so it shouldn't be seen as a rebuke to Edwards that he was not endorsed this week or last, after high-profile SEIU evaluation events. The union has a process that it is going through, and it's going to take a while. Last cycle, SEIU didn't endorse a candidate (Howard Dean) until November.

--Garance Franke-Ruta