Letters to the Editor
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The USA has Changed, Working Class Barely Even Exists Anymore
All the blue-collar Democrat racists switched to the Grand Old Party years ago, and Abraham Lincoln spun in his grave. Now some are coming back, and many have died. This silliness/snobbiness about "blue collars hating the niggrahs" is at least twenty years out of date. Now, a great portion of the few remaining blue collars are blacks.
But the ranks of the blue collars are much diminished. The Working Class now = The Working Poor, pretty much. These are people who wear T-shirts to work, the No Collars. [Have younger Americans ever even seen the traditional blue workshirts? Do they know where the expression "blue collar" comes from?]
Barack? Hillary? Who cares? Either! Both, I hope! Just, please look around you (Circumspice, in Latin, the motto of the state of Michigan), and see what the Working Class looks like in the twenty-first century. It is NOT what it was in your parents' time, not what it is in the Republicans' deficient, out-of-date imaginations.
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SEIU isn't like the UAW
Hey Andrew,
It's not very illuminating to talk about "unions" and "union members" without distinguishing between service sector unions and more traditional manufacturing and public employee unions. I imagine the service sector unions are endorsing Obama in large part because their leaderships are dominated by professional organizers, like Obama. Manufacturing and public employee unions are largely lead by professional negotiators.
SEIU is lead by Andy Stern, an Ivy League-educated organizer. The Cullinary Workers' Union (in Vegas) is a local of UNITE-HERE, a union lead by Bruce Raynor, an Ivy League-educated organizer, and John Wilhelm, an Ivy League-educated organizer. It's not totally surprizing that these unions have endorsed the candidate who is an Ivy League-educated organizer -- he sounds like the people who lead those unions!
The rhythms of speach, the "movement" language, the philosophy of how power is leveraged, are all shockingly similar between Obama and the leaderships of these unions.
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Racism in Boston
Some of the letters here have been bringing up the issue of racism. Frankly, I was only mildly surprised by how well Obama did in SC & Georgia among white voters. Hillary got a few more white votes, but it was a lot closer than it would have been, say, in 1968. Or 1980. On the other hand, in Massachusetts, a state where Obama should have done well, since it reflects many of the demographics attributed to his successes - support from the higher educated, youth, blacks, etc., Clinton pretty much swamped his boat. I wonder how much of that vote was due to the racism that permeates the Boston mindset. Boston is one of the most racist metropolitan areas in the country, and while the South has come a long way, baby, Boston, sadly, ain't come too far at all.
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Keppie
One of the issues that I've researched just a little in terms of health insurance ... posted below from anther email, just an fyi:
Do you know that the major difference between Hillary's plan and Obama's is her focus on mandates ... which are an idea first put in place by ROMNEY in Massachusetts? Again, a rather republican seeming concept (or at least they've flocked to it, such as Arnie in my state).
Som people will say that this is the only way to keep costs down. But that's a pretty free market argument. How about REGULATING or better yet, getting rid of the damn insurance companies who are the major part of the problem to start with. So, basically - I personally agree with Obama that we need to be careful about mandates. Read about the massachusetts program and see how people hate it. I agree that something needs to be done on the topic, but this free market crap for health care is not where I'd rush to first. Apparently the result in Massachusetts has been that, while premium costs overall are lowered, there is still a "scaling" of premiums according to risk (age, health). So, if you are older or have a previous health issue, your premiums increase significantly. People in mass have said that a lot of their "retirement" money is now going into insurance premiums.
I could go on, but I'll leave you with one final thought - do you know anything about either of these candidates advisors ... Hillary's are known as the "wall street crowd" - gotta love that. She has also taken a ton of money from the insurance companies ... who she would certainly be subsidizing with her mandates to buy private insurance.
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The Obama Drama
Obama now has the political establishment, big money, and the media all squarely on his side, and draws most of his support from people who are wealthy enough that they don't need to worry about healthcare or the economy. I truly hope Clinton can overcome the Obama Drama spin machine, because if she doesn't, we'll have 4 years of stagnation.
After 8 years of Bush, the country is in a terrible mess, and frankly, we need the politics of Soap more than the politics of Hope. We need real solutions from a real leader, not Hollywood drama and pie-crust promises.
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Saying it Doesn't Make it So
I think it's interesting that people think because a candidate details in a speech what they are going to do - it will happen. How long have we been hearing about healthcare reform; relief for the middle class; more oversight - it seems like forever. President Clinton had opportunites and despite his many successes didn't effect any of those promises we've been hearing forever (and we know what happened with healthcare and HIllary). Hillary has been in the Senate 7 years - where is the legislation on any of those major issues? That's not to say she's not capable - but if Obama gets up and details every single plan, that won't make it so. What inspires people is that he dares to even try to change the status quo --- like being a drug addict - the first step is admitting the problem. Given her evasiveness on the Iraq war - which is a no brainer for others (it was a mistake) it's hard to trust that Hillary is 100% honest in her intentions or efforts. Bill Clinton gave up alot of Democratic ideals in his quest to be a centrist--- Hillary has voted much the same way. The fact that unions/working class people think the Clintons are totally on their side - despite Hillary sitting on the board of Walmart (while they tried to quash unions) - means they are either optimistic or naive. And I suspect in 4 or 8 more years we'll have new candidates making much the same promises we hear now - just as Obama is now making the same promises Bill Clinton made 15 years ago. . .