Democrats, labor rally in Montgomery against Bush's plan

http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/local/11101960.htm

MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Democrats and labor rallied against President Bush's Social Security plan Thursday and predicted it will become the issue that reverses Republican gains in the South.

The Alabama Democratic Party and the Alabama AFL-CIO organized the rally on the Capitol lawn in response to Bush's visit to Montgomery to promote his Social Security proposals. The rally attracted about 400 people who chanted, "We'll remember in 2006."

"We're here today to preserve our heritage - the heritage that was given to us by organized labor, the Democratic Party and our grandparents' generation. We are not going to let them take it away from us," state Democratic Party Chairman Redding Pitt* told the crowd.

Joe Reed, vice chairman of the Alabama Democratic Party, said, "This could be the issue that turns around the South for the Democratic Party. Economic issues always tied the South to the Democratic Party."

More…


*Will Pitt's dad?

Yep, that's Will Pitt's dad.

They made me proud to be a native Alabamian.

turns the red states blue?

I can dream, can't I?

Go Bama!

Except this one will be sky blue rather than crimson.

But I don't care what color blue Alabama is as long as it turns blue.

I'll even say nice things about the University--whatever it takes.

I would say that the state Democratic Party and the AFL-CIO did not attempt to organize a mass rally in defense of Social Security. One local of the Teamsters or United Steelworkers Union could easily turn out 400 workers if they had been organized and mobilized to turn out.

If the AFL-CIO and Democratic Party cannot turn out at least 10,000 at a real mass rally in Alabama they ought to fold their tents.

We all know they can do much, much better than that. It seems that the labor movement, civil rights organizations and other progressive organizations have forgotten how to turn out the ranks. I know they haven't. They just didn't do it. Why not? That's what it will take to defend Social Security from ALL of the proposals to cut benefits.

And the slogan "We'll remember in 2006" is at best pathetic. How about something a little more to the point and effective in defense of Social Security? Hey .... how about "Defend Social Security" or "Social Security, No Cuts"? I'm sure that DU'ers can think of a hundred slogans more powerful and effective than "remember in 2006".

Yeah, 400 sounds like a pittance of a number, but reading the story, it seems this was a mid-week rally scheduled to coincide with a state legislature vote. I would suppose that most working people had other priorities on a midweek work day, and the demonstration was called on a spur-of-the-scheduling-moment basis. With those two givens, 400 is rather respectable.

The labor movement use to organize "labor holidays" so that members could participate in mass demonstrations on normal workdays.

We can do that again.

However, you might be right regarding the short notice.

I hope that labor and others organize something much bigger in Alabama with plenty of notice, advance planning and publicity.