This Is My Grandfather, the AutoWorker

[Joanne98]

Tonight the Senate did not see fit to take care of autoworkers. They’d rather union bust and hand out money to companies like AIG, so they can take spa retreats and give out golden parachutes.

They’d rather watch Detroit fall further and further and watch Michigan’s unemployment rate go higher and higher.

For Wall St. they asked few questions and wrote larger checks. For Main St. they demand concessions and czars and oversight.

Pensions and health care and worker protection were demonized all in the name of business. The pension that keeps people like my grandfather able to pay for care in their golden years. The health care that most Americans would work their asses off for. The worker protection no one has anymore, but sure could use in this day and age.

Tonight my government could have helped and impacted those who don’t wear suits and instead will leave them out in the cold.

Tonight the missteps of an industry were held up as a symbol of the free market and it’s workers thrown to the wolves despite GOP Senators welcoming foreign counterparts with open arms in the South.

Tonight we told American workers they mattered less than the 100% Japanese government funding of plants in our states.

I’m not one for bailouts. I’m not one to always scream ‘BUY AMERICAN.’

But I am one who supports local jobs, local manufacturing, and local indstury.

I also support the need for unions in a world of WalMarts.

Tonight I stand shoulder to shoulder with American workers and hope we weather the storm to come.

http://queenofspainblog.com/2008/12/11/this-is-my-grandfather-the-autoworker/

[LaurenG]

1. I stand with you.

:(

[Mike 03]

2. I support this 100%

It would be nice if this were cross posted, because it is very important.

The clock is ticking, and I think people just don't get it.

Thanks for posting this.

[madrchsod]

3. there`s generations of americans that do not understand

what guys like your grandfather and my father have done for america. i look back over the last 40yrs and wonder what this country would be if we still had good union jobs.

as i go into my last days i wonder if we failed the next generation by our silence

[Joanne98]

4. One more rec gets it to the greatest page!

[kernelfarmer]

5. done (nt)

[Joanne98]

7. Thank you KF!

[hootinholler]

6. UNION YES! n/t

[tomreedtoon]

8. Labor needs a voice. Labor leaders are usually quiet.

I've said so often about the UAW that it's been a long time since River Rouge.

But that's also true of other unions. Unions have cooperated so long with management, in so many fields, that they've forgotten that they once stood for something more than money and work rules. They stood for treating workers as people instead of "labor units."

They need to go back to that. There needs to be the equivalent of a Barack Obama in American labor, who is unafraid to speak truth to power - or to speak truth to the union rank and file, to remind them what they are supposed to believe in.