Business: Twilight for Twinkies

I have to say I ate them as a kid but not often and haven't had one in decades.

But in any case, Hostess bakery is going out of business and the union blames management and management blames the unions.

If indeed, management was lousy, a company will buy some of the assets of Hostess that are profitable and some of the union jobs will be restored.

But I suspect as more and more Americans are health conscious about eating habits, Hostess successor company will have to change their product line quite a bit.

As for AFL-CIO President Trumka's attack on Hostess, Bain and Mitt Romney: it is emotionalism and disconnected from economic reality. His charges against mis-management of the company probably has some validity but the changing marketplace which the leadership probably failed to respond adequately to and union demands probably pushed the company over the brink.

On a broader question of unions, the one big difference between a union in the private sector and the public sector is that the private sector company may go belly up if it can't meet the union's negotiating position. Thus, a union in the private sector can only push so hard before the company just goes out of business.

In the case of the public sector union, the government can raises taxes to meet the public sector union's demands. But eventually, there are limits to that too as some city, county and state governments are having their finances pushed to the brink to meet public sector union contracts. The problem is that in this case, the fallout hit everyone taxpayer and is not just limited to the company, its workers and investors.