The Unemployed, Organized Online, Look to the Midterms

The Unemployed, Organized Online, Look to the Midterms
Jobless Workers Look to Shift Elections
By Annie Lowrey 7/28/10 6:15 AM


Workers march to protest for jobs legislation. (Rasdourian/Flickr)



Sometime this spring, Republicans turned against unemployment. In Nevada, Sharron Angle (R), the candidate facing incumbent Sen. Harry Reid (D), told local reporters, “You can make more money on unemployment than you can going down and getting one of those jobs that is an honest job.” (Untrue.) Angle also called the unemployed “spoiled.”

Rand Paul, a candidate for a Kentucky Senate seat, made similar statements, and politicians in Washington followed suit. Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) said on C-SPAN that extending unemployment would discourage “individuals that are out there to actually go out and go through the interviews.”

But unlike most comments from politicians, these criticisms did not diffuse into the generic noise of political chatter. They began reverberating in what might be termed the unemployed netroots — a system of highly trafficked, influential blogs and sites connecting the jobless and updating them, often in minute detail, about ins and outs of Congress’ work on unemployment issues.

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Jordan has searched hard for a job and is now considering moving away from his family for a few months, if it means he can send home a paycheck. “I have voted Republican my entire life,” he says. “I don’t want to vote for Harry Reid. But I don’t want to be told I’m lazy, and I’m dumb, and I’m living high on the hog, collecting {unemployment insurance} because I want to.”

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Thornton is finding that, rather than losing interest in politics since the end of the fight for extended benefits, the unemployed are “energized and motivated” and have started looking forward to the fall.

“Even Republicans say they aren’t voting Republican anymore,” the soft-spoken former technical writer says. “You have millions of unemployed people out there. If even half of them voted, they could swing a nationwide election.”

Paladinette — the online “zealot for the unemployed” also known as LaDona King — has taken the battle over the unemployment extension as more of a call to arms. She routinely publishes phone numbers, fax numbers and email addresses of lawmakers to target, rallying her thousands of online supporters to the cause. King personally calls 25 or 30 legislators’ offices a day. Sometimes, when she posts lawmakers’ numbers or picks out a particularly egregious example of a legislator blocking a vote or putting down the unemployed, her followers flood a Senate or House office with phone calls. The same goes for LayoffList. At one point, Thornton published the name and number of a House staffer working on unemployment legislation. Soon after, the staffer called and begged him to take it down, he says.

“They’re all concerned about their re-election,” King says. “We’re making sure the Republicans get blasted for their obstructionist behavior. … We have tons of people calling, faxing, emailing.”

“We’re lobbyists in training,” she laughs. “Without all that money!”

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http://washingtonindependent.com/92821/the-unemployed-organized-online-look-to-the-midterms

is that the m$m gets a clue, but we all know that won't happen. It would be refreshing to hear every station and newspaper report on this.

I think this could be important for us.