By Steven Greenhouse, New York Times, September 25/26, 2011

WASHINGTON — Labor unions are seizing on last year’s landmark Supreme Court campaign finance ruling to change how they engage in politics, developing ambitious plans to influence nonunion households in the 2012 election and counter corporate money flowing into outside conservative groups.....

....the ruling also changed the rules for unions, effectively ending a prohibition on outreach to nonunion households. Now, unions can use their formidable numbers to reach out to sympathetic nonunion voters by knocking on doors, calling them at home and trying to get them to polling places. They can also create their own Super PACs to underwrite bigger voter identification and get-out-the-vote operations than ever before.

As part of this overhaul, Richard L. Trumka, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., has said organized labor will be more independent of the Democratic Party, sitting out races where unions are disappointed with the Democratic candidate’s positions on issues important to them and occasionally financing primary challengers to Democratic incumbents.

The unions said they even intended to back a few Republicans they judge to have been generally supportive of their agenda, like....