While former Senator John Edwards has had some success in appealing to unions and union voters, and has made union issues a cornerstone of his current campaign, some union officials - most notably those who've endorsed one of his Democratic rivals for the nomination - are questioning his history of support. Sam Youngman reports for The Hill:

In 1998, while running for the Senate, Edwards did not come out in favor of repealing right-to-work laws in North Carolina, and he has only opposed a national right-to-work law. While North Carolina is hardly considered to be a labor stronghold, the former senator's record and his relationship with some unions in the state were used by some unions to judge him as unworthy of an endorsement.

The International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF), which endorsed Sen. Chris Dodd (Conn.), said Edwards's unwillingness to advocate a repeal of the right-to-work measure was a sticking point for the membership when it was seriously considering supporting the former senator's bid.

"How do you walk picket lines and be for right-to-work?" Jeffrey Zack, an IAFF official, said. "It's surprising that it wasn't disconcerting to more people.

"Ultimately, at the end of the day, it's results. It's not what you say. It's results."

Edwards has also come under fire for his support for normalizing trade relations with China after he was elected to the Senate and for voting for fast-track authority for the president. Edwards has said since that he regrets both votes, and Wednesday he told the UAW in Iowa that he would reverse trade policies.

Read the entire article at the above link. Struggling to keep apace of Clinton and Obama in Iowa, and well behind everywhere else, Edwards doesn't need trouble from what he regards as a key source of his support. Iowa's Democrats tend to include proportionately more union households than the national average.

The timing of the assault on his record is particularly inconvenient as the last two weeks have seen Hillary stuck on the defensive for the first meaningful time in the campaign, and Edwards would prefer the harsh spotlight stay focused on her a bit longer.

Not that he was going to win anyway, of course, but he was still in the running for "Miss Congeniality" and "Most Likely to Never Have a Bad Hair Day."