George Goehl: Winning Rural Voters by Fighting Big Ag, By Doing Better Health Care, Jobs

Broadcast 12/6/2019 at 9:20 AM EST (5 Listens, 3 Downloads, 2353 Itunes)
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George Goehl is the director of People's Action and the People's Action Institute a federation of community-based organizations across the country that bring poor and working-class people together to win economic and racial justice.

https://peoplesaction.org/institute/institute-members/

Rural agenda needed

His org interviewed 10,000 people and found the most important issues for them, in order, were, Health, Education, Clean air and Water, Addiction, Jobs

Doing these interviews it's most important how people feel they are being seen.

I've been out there organizing for 20 years. I have never seen this level of public activity by white supremacist groups.

For those who have given up on rural communities: Please reconsider. So many of these places need organizing to win improved conditions. Despite the stereotypes, rural people are not static in their political views or in the way they vote. Single white rural women and young rural white people represent two of the greatest leftward swings in the 2018 midterms, moving 17 and 16 points respectively toward Democrats. They played a key role in Democratic wins across the Midwest.

White Nationalists are organizing around people's pain and using racism to help make sense of changing economic conditions and racial demographics.

We start by engaging with people around the issues that came up most often during our front-porch conversations, like polluted water, health care, low wages or addiction.

By George Goehl

According to one study, up to 21 million Americans are getting water from systems that violate health standards. Reporting by the Guardian shows that at least 33 major US cities have skirted water quality testing in much the same vein as Flint and the state of Michigan.

There are more than 10,000 factory farms in Iowa now. The state is home to 26 million hogs that produce the equivalent waste of 65 million people. That waste has to go somewhere. So it runs into waterways and eventually into the drinking water system. The city of Des Moines has the largest nitrate removal system in the world in an effort to keep the water drinkable and its residents foot the bill.

the Water Act of 2019 legislation introduced in Congress last month by Representatives Brenda Lawrence and Ro Khanna and Senator Bernie Sanders offers solutions and provides $35bn in funding to assure access to clean, safe water. It also provides for good, green jobs to do that work.

The secret to Democrats winning the midwest: fight big agriculture

George Goehl

Factory farming sucks up money and pollutes rural communities in swing states like Iowa

Wed 4 Sep 2019 06.00

The good news is that the battle for the heart and soul of today's Democratic Party is on, with forces ready to rein in abusive corporate actors gaining momentum. One sign of that shift: five Democrats running for president Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Julian Castro, Tulsi Gabbard, and Marianne Williamson have come out in support of a ban on the expansion of factory farms. These Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) are usually massive industrial livestock operations that pollute the air and water and ruin the quality of life for people who live close to them.

Warren and Castro clarified their position in response to a candidate questionnaire from the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement Action Fund, the largest grassroots organization in the state. Sanders had already declared his position on his campaign website.

Taking a stand on factory farms is the right thing to do. It's also good politics. Unless, of course, your path to the Oval Office is dependent on contributions from corporate agriculture.

"Factory farms profit at the expense of rural communities, displacing family farmers, bypassing main street businesses, and polluting the air and groundwater," Bobby King told me. King works with the Land Stewardship Action Fund, a Minnesota-based farm and rural organization. "Rural people experience this directly. Candidates that have the courage to stand up to corporate agriculture will connect with and inspire rural people as they head into the ballot box."

Factory farms are far from popular. In exit polling from the midterm elections, 73% of Iowa voters said the governor and legislature should require limits to manure pollution runoff into Iowa's waterways. It's not surprising. Iowa is home to 3 million people, and 26 million hogs, which create the waste equivalent of 65 million people.

That waste, full of dangerous nitrate, makes its way into Iowa's waterways. 750 waterways in Iowa are currently affected. It's why the City of Des Moines is operating the largest nitrate removal system in the entire world.

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