It is time for retired workers to park their motor homes and dock their boats and hit the streets in support of other union workers and the 99%. Besides the support, it will be good physical exercise and give the participant a good feeling about their contributions to the cause. It might even be fun for the retirees, but for sure it would be pay back for us retirees who have healthcare and a good pension.
I hope we have all been good union people, but I am pretty sure some of us have sinned and shopped at WalMart and not at our union stores! Most of us have not spent time in jail or been beaten up for being a union member trying to protect our jobs like our forefathers; but now our union brothers and sisters are getting framed on charges, such as the Longshore union in Longview, Wash., and the American Crystal sugar workers, who are locked out and cannot get unemployment.
The sugar workers are trying to survive on $100 a week from the unions and their savings. They need food. And so do workers at the Cooper Tire workers in Findlay, Ohio, who are locked out, and we have candy workers in southern California, who could probably use some help and there are many others just like the ones listed.
We can just go and stand in solidarity with them, take a pizza or a bag of food. For the sugar workers, there is a defense fund where donations can be made at: http:/www.gofundme.com/d6aas or a check or money order can be sent to Union Local 167G, Wells Fargo Bank, 730 Center Ave., Moorhead, MN 56560. This union might want to rethink about banking Wells Fargo for they are no friends of labor.
The Longshoreman fight was won by the support of their retired members, who took extra shifts at picket lines. They prepared meals, accompanied members to court hearings and trials. They raised funds for the fight so when your union time comes and it will come, we need to be organized with all the help we can get and hope our retired workers have not forgotten us or what was fought and won for us in the 1800s and 1920s and ‘30s.
Good luck and I hope to see some of our union brothers and sisters on the street representing their unions and getting in shape for the spring offense of unions and the 99%.
See you on the streets!
