Bernie Sanders aside, politics won't help us as much as organized labor (Wearing the union label)

[Omaha Steve]

X post in GD, Omaha Steve's Labor Group, & Socialist-Progressive

http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20150528_DN_Editorial__WEARING_THE_UNION_LABEL.html

Posted: Thursday, May 28, 2015, 12:16 AM

YOU PROBABLY missed it. The TV news gave little if any news coverage to the presidential campaign announcement of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders ("Hey, we have 'serious' candidates like Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson and Ted Cruz to deal with," I'm guessing they'd say) but the speech was definitely an organic barnburner live from Ben-and-Jerry-land. Sanders wasn't more than a minute or two into it when he belted out what should become his campaign motto:

"Today, we stand here and say loudly and clearly that: Enough is enough. This great nation and its government belong to all of the people, and not to a handful of billionaires, their super-PACs and their lobbyists."

Enough is enough . . . when it comes to yawning gap between the Super Rich and everybody else in America. It's not surprising to hear this from Sanders, the only Democratic socialist (to my knowledge) in the 2016 race for the White House. But other candidates have adopted some variation on this mantra: Income inequality was the only issue that Hillary Clinton raised in her campaign-announcement video and was the topic of recent speeches. Over on the GOP side, the 2012 runner-up-turned-longshot Rick Santorum has ditched the man-on-dog stuff in favor of calling for a higher minimum wage. But Sanders is hitting this the hardest, so far.

But what to do? Government undoubtedly could help speed up the change we need. Sanders - who's fired up the most-engaged base of the Democratic Party even though it may be impossible to overcome the name ID and accumulated goodwill of Clinton with its rank-and-file voters - listed a number of fixes: A $1 billion program to create blue-collar jobs building infrastructure, a higher minimum wage, the end of so-called "free trade" deals, and higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations. Indeed, the once-ridiculed idea of a $15 living wage is on its way to reality in Seattle, Los Angeles and elsewhere. But there's no infrastructure job to repair a Congress that is likely to remain in reactionary Republican hands for the next few cycles, nor to fix the red-tinged conservative statehouses and town halls in many parts of America. And there are other limits to what government can achieve in a capitalist society.

FULL editorial at link.

[RoccoR5955]

1. And all of the Bernie merchandise

is Union Made, in the US!

[BrotherIvan]

2. Well said

I don't think this campaign is so much about Bernie Sanders as a person, but about people standing up to corporate interests and neoliberalism. These policies effect ALL of us and minorities and disenfranchised groups most of all.

[jwirr]

4. There is a lot of truth in that statement. The last time that happened was when socialist scared

the hell our of the business world in 1932. I would love to see that happen again.

[Wilms]

3. ^