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Only one week left to vote for the questions you want asked at the nationally broadcast Aug. 7 AFL-CIO Presidential Candidate Forum.
More than 2,200 of you have submitted questions, and more than 25,000 have voted, in our contest, “What Do You Want to Ask the Candidates?” We’re one step closer to choosing the questions you want answered. MSNBC “Countdown” host Keith Olbermann, who is moderating the forum, will ask the winning questions, and the candidates will respond in front of an audience of 15,000 working men and women at Chicago’s Soldier Field.
The 2,200 questions cover a wide variety of topics, from health care and retirement to trade to the war in Iraq. We announced the five winners of the first preliminary round last week; today, we’re revealing the five winners of the second preliminary round. In the final round, running this week, you’ll get the chance to vote for your top two favorites among the 10 finalists.
Here are the top questions from the second round of our contest. This week, they’ll be combined with the five finalists from the first round. You have another chance to vote for your favorites. Voting ends Sun., Aug. 5, at midnight.
Be sure to watch the Forum on MSNBC, or listen on XM Radio, Aug. 7 from 7–8:30 p.m. EDT. You’ll get to see real answers on the issues that matter to you.
The finalists:
“Pride at Work,” an Office and Professional Employees member from Pennsylvania, asks:
Since civil unions do not provide couples with access to federal benefits, and civil unions are failing to provide equal benefits in states where they are in effect, where do you stand on ending marriage discrimination in this country?“Unionist,” a UAW member from Indiana, asks:
We are competing with oppressive nations that have forced and child labor for the jobs we once had. What would you do to end this race to the bottom for America’s workers and what would you do to get the jobs back that were once ours?“JD,” an AFSCME member from Connecticut, asks:
If elected, would you introduce legislation to both make it easier to join or organize a labor union, as well as increasing penalties for those who are willing to break existing unions or unions in their infancy?“Uniongal,” a Communications Workers of America member from Colorado, asks:
How do you feel about the situation with Corporate America and what do you plan to do in order to give the power back to the people?“Union Lifer,” a United Food and Commercial Workers International Union member from California, asks:
How can you reassure people who have rightfully earned a pension that they will be able to take advantage of that benefit without descending into poverty?
You can see, and vote on, the full list of finalists here.
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“John Edwards Polar Bear Song” addresses some of our issues. Go to angelwatch.info and review song. Submit your comments.
I wonder if anyone asks the candidates what they are going to do about the 1.9 Trillion dollars that Congress has stolen from the Social Secuirty Trust Fund. They plan on stealing another 173 Billion dollars this year.
Both parties have a lot of candidates, I believe 8 or 9 each, with more to come. (Gore, Thompson?)
This is well know. All Republicans support Bush and the neo-cons he represents. They, therefore are the most vile of fascists. Forget the Republicans, they are all un-American, working families hating miscreants and will continue the Bush Administruction destruction of America. We, as Americans, simply cannot have another Republican.
A third party? Forget it. A vote for a third party is wasted, you might as well throw it into the Grand Canyon, or some other deep hole.
So we must elect a Democrat president in 2008. Who? I have promised myself not to make a decision until after the primary elections. But I’ll say what I think about the guys. And gal. Well, Hillary. She would make a great president, but I don’t think a women will be elected in 2008. There are still too many Americans who are still too predjudiced. Obama. Same as Hillary. Great, but no president in 2008. Predjudice. Edwards. A pretty good chance to win. Not much bad against him. Fox News is trying hard to dig up dirt on him without much luck. Dennis. A guy who votes just the way I would vote if I was in congress. He would be a great president, but - just like me - I don’t think he is ever going to be elected president.
I can’t remember the other Democrats. The former senator from Alaska. No chance. The senator from Connecticut. No chance.
What is that? Six? Who are the others? Oh, Biden. You know his chance. I can’t think. If he is that hard to remember, what chance does he have? None. Oh, the governor from New Mexico. He would be the greatest on international issues, but get real - he’s not going to win.
So there we are. Several good people who would make great Democratic Presidents. Follow what they do and say for the next 15 months and then vote for the one you think is best.
Then there is Al Gore. Oh, man, does he deserve the presidency!
None of these worthy candidates has the stature or experiance of Al Gore.
The Democratic Party, and especially Obama and Hillary, are supported by tens of millions of dollars from corporate interests. The Democratic Party is so saturated with corporate money, the interests of working people can not get any serious support. It would be a waste of money for the unions to try and “compete” in dollars or people or votes against this corporate control.
What to do now? The labor movement should fund the creation of a national mass media radio and/or television network to educate the mass of working people, especially non-union working people. WE NEED THIS NETWORK TO EDUCATE WORKING PEOPLE ABOUT THE ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND POLITICAL FACTS OF LIFE TODAY!
Have you EVER seen a newspaper that has a special news section written for the interest and education of working people. NEVER! Always there is a “Business section” or a “Money” section for the bosses, landlords, and business people to help them to further increase their greed. NOTHING about the crisis working people have trying to survive today… being forced to compete with the millions in China… or feed and support a family without a living wage job.
The terrible decline in our standard of livingis NOT A PERSONAL PROBLEM. When millions cannot afford medical insurance this is a SOCIAL PROBLEM and a POLITICAL PROBLEM.
Knowledge is power. We have no power because most of us don’t know what is going on! We don’t know WHY the schools are in decline FOR YEARS! We don’t know WHY we have unending wars because the same people who profit for wars are the ones who own the mass media.
Our corporate masters don’t want you to know. And they don’t want working people to form a new third party that prohibits corporate funding, that is opposed to unending disasterous wars, that really wants to do something about pollution and Global Warming etc. (Bush has said many times he will not do anyting about Global warming or pollution because it will affect the business profits of the polluters!)
On Righting Civil Wrongs: The Civil Rights Legacy Must Continue
By Phyllis C. Murray
” Education is a field where this contest of ideas for the legacy of the civil rights movement is perhaps most evident, both because of the ways in which Brown had meshed the civil rights agenda with the quest for quality schooling for communities of color and the fact that so much of the promise of Brown remains unfulfilled.”…”Democratic citizenship and collective self-empowerment means that one stays and fights the good fight “From: .American Liberalism, Education And The Legacy Of The Civil Rights Movement: By Leo Casey
Surely it was Martin Luther King who fought the good fight. And it was Martin Luther King who kept the faith. ” Visionaries like James Foreman, Kwame Toure, Ella Baker, Diane Nash, E.B. Nixon and Martin Luther King crafted strategies around mass mobilizations in African American communities, and deliberately, creatively violated the law in order to change the nation’s misguided public policies. It was common practice, for instance, in towns and cities where the 1960s Freedom Movement was in high gear, to turn out a city’s colleges and high schools for days on end.” Bruce Dixon, Editor The Black Agenda attests.
But who will finish the course? Who will lead us today when schools fail to reflect democracy in action? Who will help ensure that parents, students, and teachers share in the decision making process in these turbulent and critical times?
“A significant portion of the black leadership in those days was responsible to black communities alone,”.notes Bruce Dixon. reflecting on the past. “They crafted political responses to the public policy crises of that era which they pursued both inside and outside America’s legal system, responses aimed at changing public policies that harmed African American communities.”
Who will speak out against the ” school to prison pipeline” which has fostered mass incarceration of people of color and created slave labor camps in 21st Century plantations aka prisons? Bruce Dixon reminds us that : “Attorneys Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall crisscrossed the continent defending black prisoners on death row and filing cases to overturn legal segregation. It was due to years of these efforts that Thurgood Marshall, in the 1940s became known as “Mr. Civil Rights”
As we move through the 21st Century, we are reminded that the dream of a new and just American society must not die because “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” The dream of a new and just American society must not die because it is a dream based on the American dream of liberty and justice for all. The dream of a new and just American Society will not die because “The arc of the universe is long but it bends toward justice.” The words of Martin Luther King are remembered, today. Lest we forget that our time has come to ensure that the American dream is fulfilled for all of its citizens. Leo Casey is right” :Democratic citizenship and collective self-empowerment means that one stays and fights the good fight ” Surely, we must press on!.
Phyllis C. Murray
UFT Chapter Leader