Tim McGuire, the Strib's editor in the '90s and now an Arizona State journalism prof, unleases a self-described rant against the Teamsters amid news the paper's drivers might strike.

While McGuire writes, "Teamsters in Minneapolis have always been pretty hard to love" (prompting longtime Stribber Nick Coleman to tweet "Management has always been hard to love, too"), the ex-editor gets at a subject that really matters in the current dispute: union solidarity.

Writes McGuire:

They too often operated as if there was a set of rules for other Star Tribune unions and a different set for them.  I’ll never forget the 1982 strike when the teamsters and mailers boxed the Newspaper Guild in on their walkout. The Guild thought it was their strike and it never was. The mailers and Teamsters decided when the strike was going to start, and they ended it. One of my favorite true stories of newspaper lore came when a veteran copy editor from the Guild walked up to a teamster or mailer leader (I can’t remember which) and gave him 30 dimes and nickels. Get it? Thirty pieces of silver and all that.

McGuire's speaking in the context of Teamster "arrogance" that might lead them to an excessively hard line, though he says fear is a likelier explanation.

However, the question of whether other unions would support a strike is a huge one for determining whether management would make additional concessions.

Economic pressures aside, interplant resentment exists. When the pressmen were holding out against cuts, newsroom workers about to take their second round of hits weren't all sympathetic. Some pressmen were mad at fellow Teamster drivers and mailers who voted to take cuts last summer, viewing them as less-skilled and less tough.

Does this mean solidarity is screwed? Nope. The three Teamster locals hung together then, and honestly can't say what the newsroom will do down the road.

But as any veteran of labor wars knows, management benefits when labor is divided. Even if ancient history is just that, the race-to-the-bottom dynamic — "we've taken our hit, why not you?" — is caustic and powerful.

It's possible we'll never know how this plays out.

According to a Thursday bankruptcy filing, the drivers and management agreed to a five-day delay in the company's push to abrogate the union's contract. Both sides got the judge to give the union until Monday to respond in court, possibly setting up late-week or weekend deal-making. (I heard there were talks yesterday.) According to their joint request, "The Parties intend to continue substantive negotiations toward an agreed resolution in the interim."

Judge Robert Drain is scheduled to hear the abrogation motion June 9.