Mr. President: The Fight for the Middle Class Isn't in Washington

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/01/24-11

Tuesday night the nation will focus its attention on the president's State of the Union address, looking for solutions to the economic crisis in this country and in their own lives. We can hope to hear President Obama articulate a bold vision for restoring economic security to our nation's middle class. We can also hope that the president challenges members on both sides of the aisle to stop putting politics before the people's prosperity.

However, as the last two years have proven, hope is not enough. Presidential speeches and the hoped for newly moderated rhetoric of the Congress will not suffice to deliver results. Because while we are focused on Washington, Republicans backed by big business interests are undertaking a coordinated attack, rooted at the state level, on middle class employees. This attack could bring the end of the middle class as we have known it.

As the New York Times has reported, Republican legislatures in ten states across the country are pushing "right to work" laws that undermine the ability of employees who vote to join a union to have their choice respected. And even some states with Democratic governors are less focused on creating jobs than adopting measures that scapegoat those in the middle for economic problems caused by those at the top. The Republicans have been very smart tactically by framing the debate around these issues. We can only hope that people will not fall for their misdirection.

At the national level, Republicans will be talking about reducing the deficit and controlling spending. Their arguments are more about rhetoric than real action. Not only do their proposals stand little chance of being enacted, they are two-faced: even while talking about budget cuts, Republicans advocate huge tax cuts for the wealthy and seek to repeal the cost-saving measures and patient protections of health care reform. In truth, their still-heated rhetoric is primarily designed to give Republicans a message to take back into the districts in the next election cycle. We already know what they will be saying in six months or a year: "We tried to save you money, but the Democrats won't let us." The time to start responding to this disingenuous narrative is now.

We must recognize that the national posturing is a smoke screen designed to conceal the real battle, which is happening in the states.

MORE at the link --

[Hannah Bell]

1. kr

[ProSense]

2. "The President will articulate his vision in this fight on Tuesday and...

<...>

At the end of the day, dismantling the government and attacking public servants means undoing these things. The President will articulate his vision in this fight on Tuesday and is even backing up words with actions like the NRLB's steps to protect organizing via majority sign-up. It's outside of Washington where we face the eliminations of people's ability to voluntarily come together in their workplace to have a say in the conditions of their employment. That would mean creating a country that has a huge gulf between the wealthy and everybody else. It means ending middle class America as we have known it. And that is not something we should let happen without a fight.

Good piece.

[pacalo]

3. Two-faced Republicans never said ONE WORD about the deficit when they ran it up

to $1.3 TRILLION.