I think you DO need to bring some kind of politics into it to justify a programmer's union. Just think what would have happened if those google engineers simpl

I think you DO need to bring some kind of politics into it to justify a programmer's union. Just think what would have happened if those google engineers simply created a union without some "higher moral cause". They would have been fired and replaced instantly. But, Google certainly can't do that if they're gathering together to fight some uniequivocal evil (at least how society sees it) such as "Automated Military drones". Google and facebook can't take any chances on appearing to have unethical behavior - they have far too much at stake.