One Nation Working Together - October 2, 2010

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Roxanne Karstenetti]

[Jeanetta Clash]

Arthur Delaney
arthur@huffingtonpost.com | HuffPost Reporting

         
Labor Activists Stage Pre-Rally For The Unemployed

First Posted: 10- 2-10 12:06 PM   |   Updated: 10- 2-10 12:13 PM

Hundreds of labor activists staged a pre-rally for the unemployed at RFK Stadium ahead of the One Nation Working Together event at the Lincoln Memorial on Saturday.

"We believe the jobless are the swing vote in this election," said organizer Rick Sloan, who is a spokesman for the International Association of Machinists and creator of the Union of Unemployed website. "We've got to convince them who their tormentors are."

Their tormentors: Republicans in Congress who have spent much of the year obstructing unemployment benefits and other spending bills designed to help the economy. The IAM set up a huge video screen that played an outrage-soaked video with a choice soundbite from Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) talking about extending unemployment benefits. "We should not be giving cash to people who basically are just gonna blow it on drugs," Hatch said.

"They won't even toss us a lifeline unless we pee in a cup," intoned the narrator. The crowd -- hundreds of labor activists sprinkled with layoff victims, many wearing T-shirts that said "Hire US, America" -- booed lustily.

"I'll tell you what, Mr. Hatch," said Edrie Irvine of Silver Spring, Md. "I'll pee right after you do!"

(Incidentally, HuffPost did ask Hatch, who proposed drug testing the unemployed this summer, if members of Congress should also have to pee in a cup: "I don't see why members of Congress should be exempt from anything, to be honest with you," he said.)

Irvine, 58, said she lost her job as a legal secretary last October. At first, she said, she enjoyed the time off, but she gradually became more and more worried about finding work. "As time went by it wasn't as much fun anymore." She's got health insurance thanks to the stimulus bill's 65 percent subsidy for COBRA, but that will only last for a few more months. (People laid off after May 31 are ineligible for the subsidy, which was sacrificed for the appeasement of deficit hawks.)


Leroy Smith, a bus operator for the Chicago Transit Authority, told HuffPost that he and nearly 50 laid-off CTA workers came "to fight for funding to bring people back to work" -- specifically, to advocate for a bill to provide emergency funding for public transportation. They wore purple T-shirts that identified them as "Laid-off Workers."

Smith's colleague Ricky Anderson, a laid-off CTA mechanic, said, "Most of all, we want the Republicans to stop saying 'nay.'"

[Jeanetta Clash]

From a newspaper in Atlanta, GA, regarding Republican concern for the little people:

Here we are in the smoldering ruins of an economy recently wrecked by Wall Street greed, in
a country where for 30 years almost all income growth has been concentrated among the
richest 1 percent of Americans. Rising populist anger, massive long-term unemployment and
record home foreclosures serve as counterpoints to soaring corporate profits, while the
Supreme Court rules that corporations are people and can spend limitless amounts of money
trying to elect candidates willing to serve their interests.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party defends massive tax breaks for the wealthy while blocking

aid to the unemployed, fights bitterly against regulations designed to prevent a repeat of

the Wall Street meltdown, blocks legislation that would at least require corporate and

special interests to identify themselves when they invest in elections and does all that

while proclaiming itself to be the party of the little people.

Do I have that right?

Yeah, I think that's pretty much right on.

[Jeanetta Clash]

Another post that continues to show that our great nation is going to have to change trade policy or multi-nationals will continue to off shore American jobs at every opportunity. The only way to change it is to change the Filibuster rules in the Senate. By changing these rules we can have up or down votes on every issue that pertains to American jobs. We can then easily identify those in the Senate that are protecting multi-nationals and their merchantile policies. In the very near future i am going to be contacting several Progressive organizations around the country to join with me in organizing my project The Great American Boycott.Stay tuned and look for updates on facebook under MrMainstreet.

[Misty Allen]

Christine O'Donnell

the candidate that makes auntie Rove projectile vomit

and she still has 10 more IQ points than Sharron Angle and Michelle Bachman COMBINED.

all the Palin DROIDS

who will deny raped women a safe legal abortion