Welcome to DK4. I'd like to invite you to join the Jobs Wages and Community Investment Working Group.
This group is dedicated to organizing and advancing the concerns and interests of the poor, the working class and the economically endangered, in a manner consistent with historically sound Democratic Party policies. We hail from the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party. We believe that a healthy economy is one where everyone has what they need to survive and the opportunity to advance their fortunes.
We believe this is not the case today. This group was formed to push our political leaders toward addressing the economic crisis in this country, as ordinary people experience it. At the level of policy, this means public employment programs to triage the immediate crisis, greater home ownership protections for the victims of the mortgage fraud crisis, protecting support programs for the poor and the economically endangered - such as fuel assistance and food stamps - and the forthright recognition by our political leaders that 30 years of neoliberal/neoconservative economic policies have destroyed this country living wage job market.
We also argue that the US government needs to commit itself to the long-term effort to correct the destruction of our living wage job markets and make significant community-wide reinvestment in our most economically troubled communities, including the small business culture of Main Street, in the spirit of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and other great Democrats.
Please read on......
Despite the fact that joblessness and the death of living wage work have driven US politics since the landslide election of 2008, addressing these issues have not gotten more than lip service from our political leaders.
This working group is being formed to push our party toward a more robust and traditionally Democratic Party solution to the crisis. We stand ready to coalition with other DK groups and beyond to advance our mission to put bread and butter issues and solutions to the forefront of our party's agenda.
I formed this working group because a search of other diaries dedicated to 'jobs', 'unemployment', employment' and other keyword searches yielded nothing. I have no particular need to lead or administrate this group alone, and would welcome other like-minded souls interested in sharing the burdens and advancing the greater goals.
We welcome diarists and commentator who are tired of being ignored and want to write about economic or social issues around the poor, the working classes, the economically endangered, community development or to advance activism beyond DK or the virtual realm.
For the sake of this country and all its citizens, for the better future of this party and all the progressive causes at stake, we need to organize and put a bottom line before our party leaders, that they cannot shirk or fob off with empty words. Nothing less than the fate of a hundred million Americans or more stand in the balance. Their descendant's fates are also at stake as well.
This economic crisis is not a normal dip in the capitalist cycle. It was produced by a radically deregulated economic environment that led to massive corruption and fraud. This corruption and fraud eventually crashed the economy. So we need serious structural reform - at the level of the economy where most of us live - as well as robust triage measures to address the current crisis.
I invite you to join me in that effort. Together we can put the 'Democrat' back in the Democratic Party and make our policies relevant to the greater mass of Americans and push our party leaders toward re-embrace of their electoral base: the poor, the working class and the working middle class.
We welcome the angry, the frustrated and the oppressed. Power concedes nothing without a demand. But power also concedes nothing without a viable threat to its ability to rule. Judging by the DK commentary on these pages, a third to a half of our virtual community is angry with our party's policies on these issues. Judging by the last election 44% of those who voted for Democratic Congressmen in 2008, agree.
We have no need of fatalistic cynics. Those who believe that nothing can be done are ballast. From my own personal experience, I have stared down that cynicism and won major battles. Our future and our children's futures are hanging in the balance. Shall we slide helplessly into a corporate feudal nightmare, or by standing up, put paid to this agenda and a rebirth of a more egalitarian and economically inclusive society?
I hope you will join me in that effort.
Updated by Tom Taaffe at Sun Feb 13, 2011, 04:29:49 PM
I'm still sorting out the new technology here, including adding a link to the group site. Alas, the server keeps rejecting the DK site address for this group, when i try to insert a link underneath the name of the group in the preamble.
As with all things DK today, patience is necessary. Please forgive any delays. I'm working to sort it and I'm sure there are some sleepless workers in the DK office who are more ragged than me at this point.