So, I came here to find out what the Daily Kos reaction was to James Hoffa's speech. I expected to find a front pager that had written about the speech. But instead, I found nothing. If you don't believe me, here's the search for the front page diaries on it.
This speech, containing such content as:
There is a war on workers. You see it everywhere: It is in the unemployment, it is in the Tea Party, it is in the people that fight what we believe in.
There is a war on workers, on the middle class, and on the poor. A war on blacks, Hispanics, women, Muslims, and anyone who stands with them. A call to arms is provided:
We have to keep an eye on the battle we face — a war on workers. And you see it everywhere there is the Tea Party. And you know there is only one way to beat and win that war.
...
But it starts with your involvement, it starts with next November. We’ve got a bunch of people there that don’t’ want the president to succeed, and they are called the Tea Party – the people who don’t want him to do anything right and he is working hard for us.
I have been arguing this for a while now. We have a party, the Republicans, that must be stopped. They must not be allowed to have control of Congress until the Tea Party is removed from their ranks, until the racists - like Pat Buchanan - are run from the party, and until corporations are no longer allowed to make decisions for the party.
But what do I hear from the front page about this call? Silence.
Hoffa continues:
President Obama is frustrated by what’s going on. Well, guess what, we’ve got the vote. And the answer to what we say is, we remember in November. We will beat the Tea Party and give this country back to workers and America. We can do it together.
Now, on the other hand, the front page does deliver on Obama's backing away from Hoffa's speech. What short memories we have here. Does anyone else not remember 2008? How Biden and Clinton were allowed to say things that Obama would have to come back and say "Our country is better than that"? We knew what was going on back then. Obama was running for president of the US. He couldn't be seen as taking too strong a side. That's what the Vice President was for. That's what other Democratic leaders were for. That's what the union leadership is for.
He looks out on this army of people and you know what I say? President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march.
I'll bet Hoffa's not happy with every decision Obama has made. I'm not, though I think he's done a pretty good job under the circumstances. But Hoffa also knows that we have to be united to defeat the Republicans and that we will have to fight to keep Obama in office and to bring Democratic majorities back to Congress. We have to be ready to fight as well. Hoffa's speech was empowering, and diaries here should be talking about it and drawing from it.