It seems to me these heroic, simple folk protesting at the factory may have, perhaps without realizing it, fired the first shot, like the shot heard round the world-- one that will get the congress to listen, to start doing things that FIRST take care of we-the-people.Â
We know that GM is facing bankruptcy not because it didn't make green cars. It's because they didn't listen to consumers and they failed to learn from the Japanese approach to working with workers, treating them with trust and respect. Refusing to recognize the essential importance of these two bottom-up approaches of the Japanese to the car business, GM took a top-down path that led to certain ruin, without congressional rescue.Â
But congress is not getting it-- the reality that the same top-down mindset in approaching the economic crisis and bailout numbers 2, 3, etc. will not work either.
These factory workers are the flesh and blood victims, whose hearts are bleeding on the factory floor. THEY, have put their thumbs on this travesty, that the big banks get rescued, but the poor, the working, they are allowed to fall through the massive cracks in the net that only helps big corporations.Â
We need to find some ways to show solidarity with these victims of heartless, shortsighted planning. Â
We need to DO something local that shows that congress must end its misguided top down simple-minded, quick-fixes. They don't work.Â
Obama needs to walk his talk on providing bottom up approaches. His ideas for implementing major infrastructure projects will help those in the construction industry. It's a start. But between now and then, we need to do more. It's hard to find anyone who hasn't already been affected by the economic crisis. We know-- Obama just reiterated it yesterday-- that things are going to get much worse. We MUST make it clear to congress that handing billions over to big companies that have already shown they are failures is absolutely not the way to get out of the mess. And letting the managers and CEOs who rode their companies to close to death are certainly not the ones who should be given the responsibility of using the hundreds of billions in rescue funds we, the American People or footing the bill for.
There may be a time, not too far down the road, when the the Republic Windows and Doors Factory protest will looked at as a tipping point event that woke up the American people. If that happens, it will be because YOU were inspired and did something locally in the next two or three days.
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