w/ all due respect, the point is that the  passionate action is bubbling just below the surface.

I'm not arguing that any of the candidates gives a shit...although Edwards' is talking the talk...it's not what I was trying to point out.

My work brings me into contact w/ these guys like those in the survey, all the time, hell, I'm one of them....carpenters, masons, stl workers, all the construction trades....I pay attention, I talk to them....they're pissed, they're scared and they're tired of getting fucked....if the pols don't wake up, it's going to get ugly, and in fact may do so anyway...there's a huge amount of pent up anger and it's going to find a vent, those who ignore do so at their peril.

hasn't happened yet, but don't think for a moment that it's to far fetched a scenario. the workers could shut this country down if they ever got their shit together...bet on it, as AG says...and they will if this continues.

my2¢

like it or not...there ain't no saviours coming...just read the fucking survey...hell take it, then draw your own conclusions.

meet the new boss, same as the old boss...

It's gonna take a lot more passionate action to change the course of this nation, that, or economic collapse...than a few run of the mill politicians, playing within the system.

You are right that it is going to take us to get things changed.  And, sadly, enough passionate action may not come until we experience economic collapse.

As you said in a point below, people are holding on because they are only a pay check or two away from disaster.  I'm afraid it won't be long before even that "safety net" is gone.

Our politicians won't make any changes unless they are forced by us to do so. Hell, most people won't make changes unless something cataclysmic happens.

Nonetheless, I'm encouraged by what Dada is saying.  People are waking up -- slowly -- and realizing they are getting screwed by their own government and politicians.

As of yet, not many are willing to take the risks and pay the price that early labor organizers did.  We'd all like to believe that if we get and stay engaged in the political process, we can effect significant change.  On good days, I believe that.

Regardless of what it takes to effect the change, their is no doubt that it will come from us, not the politicians. They are, at best, allies in our cause -- and then only if they see it as a political necessity.

Peace.

If you want things to get better, be prepared to deal with change.

I think Edwards and Clinton and Obama and Kucinich all care. But they can't do it alone. That's the myth of America - that we have these great elected leaders. But nearly all major social change in this country has come from outside the Oval Office, the notable exception of course being Roosevelt's New Deal. And even then, he did that because that was what Upton Sinclair and Huey Long were gaining power with - plans for jobs and economic fairness. Had they not come before, Roosevelt may have gone a different route.

It IS up to us. But I don't think we have to slam potential leaders in the process.

"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes