SEIU Blog

SEIU International President Andy Stern sent this message to our members & activists today.  Join our plan for a New Era for Working Families by signing our petition.

It’s time to take a deep breath.

Now that the Bush Administration’s $700 billion Wall St. bailout appears to be dead, we need to have a full discussion about how to solve our economic problems.

Join me in calling for a New Era for Working Families that puts the government on the side of the people:

http://action.seiu.org/newera

The era of corporate cronyism and worship of the market is over—we need a new economic model that addresses the real concerns of America’s working families.

Tens of millions of Americans can be helped if we invest in programs that will help revive our economy. We’re proposing a $350 billion long-term investment in America’s families:

1. A national health care plan. Estimated cost: $130 billion over two years.
2. A plan for energy independence and green job creation. Estimated cost: $20 billion over two years.
3. Improved infrastructure. Estimated cost: $22 billion over two years.
4. Tax reforms to correct a system that currently favors CEOs and business while contributing to a growing income divide. Estimated cost: $80 billion.
5. Affordable education. Estimated cost: $100 billion over two years.

And there are some programs to help our economy that won’t cost the government a dime:

1. Relief for struggling homeowners - halting foreclosures so families can keep their homes. Estimated cost: $0.
2. Reforms that ensure workers have real freedom to choose a voice at work by passing the Employee Free Choice Act. Estimated cost: $0.
3. Retirement security. Estimated cost: Negligible

Click here to support an investment for a new era of prosperity:

http://action.seiu.org/newera

Thank you for your support.

Sincerely,

Andy Stern

SEIU is spending over $2 million to air the new ad in targeted markets in six battleground states – Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, New Mexico, Wisconsin and Iowa. The ad, titled “Family,” features a mother talking about the strain of trying to provide for her family in an economy defined by higher costs, lower wages, and lost jobs. The ad goes on to detail the stark differences between Barack Obama and John McCain when it comes to jobs and the economy.

It’s a new, aggressive television ad campaign that drives home what is at stake economically for millions of American families in the upcoming presidential election.

SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger’s new piece on the Hill Blog:

America woke up to the news this morning that the unemployment rate jumped to 6.1 percent from 5.7 percent in July – the largest monthly surge in the jobless rate in five years. So far in 2008, we’ve lost about 605,000 jobs, bringing the total number of Americans who face unemployment to 9.4 million.

We’ve always been taught that if you work hard, play by the rules and do everything right, tomorrow will be better and brighter than today. However, with the economy shedding jobs, families struggling to keep up with record gas and food prices, skyrocketing health care costs and a recession that is deepening every day, the implicit promise of the American Dream is no longer so closely within reach.

Over the past two weeks, Americans have seen two very different approaches from the Democratic and Republican nominees for president to turn our country around.

Despite a whopping 18,562 words spoken by the Republican National Convention’s major speakers this week, the critical issues of utmost importance to millions of American families—the struggling economy, the rising cost of health care, the mortgage crisis—barely registered as a blip on the screen. Only three references to fixing health care, four to the struggling economy, and a scant two references to the mortgage crisis. John McCain’s failure to propose any real solutions to the problems lefty by his good friends George Bush and Dick Cheney is really no surprise, considering that his own campaign manager told the Washington Post editorial board this week that this election is not about the issues.

Any person who gets up and goes to work every day will tell you that this election is most definitely about the issues. The numbers in this month’s job report serve as yet another warning signal that this country is tumbling headfirst into a deep recession just two months before Americans elect their next president. Solutions are needed to restore belief in the American Dream and to give all families a fair chance to share in the success and prosperity that their hard work helps create.

Last week, Barack Obama and Joe Biden offered a vision for our country that focused on winning health care for all, turning our economy around, ending the war in Iraq and becoming energy independent. They did this by detailing specific plans that will bring the change our country desperately needs. Electing pro-working family candidates from the White House to the state house is essential to turning the economy around and giving workers the freedom to stand up, organize and unite for their rights on the job.

We stand at a moment of both unnerving economic uncertainty and unprecedented economic opportunity. As a nation, we face a choice between prosperity and collapse, between growing the pie for everyone and enriching a few at the expense of the many. Electing Barack Obama and Joe Biden is an essential part of pulling the American Dream back within reach for American families.

Watch as the Take Back Labor Day Bus Tour arrived in Madison, WI and St. Paul, MN:

The Associated Press detailed this weekend massive efforts to register voters, including some of the efforts of SEIU members:

Graham, the SEIU member, works the neighborhoods of Clairton, where the steel industry’s decline has left more downtown storefronts boarded up than occupied.

Graham finds a potential voter at the first house she stops at. Justin Webb, a father of two, is unregistered, but tells Graham he has serious concerns about the economy.

“We need more jobs,” said Webb, 28. “If we had more jobs, we would have more opportunities to better ourselves.”

It takes Graham less than five minutes to register Webb as a Democrat.

The latest web video from Change to Win:

This messages of support was recorded at the Take Back Labor Day Concert sponsored by SEIU in Minneapolis, MN.

More Labor Day Shout-outs recorded at the Take Back Labor Day Concert, sponsored by SEIU:

Enjoy:

Watch it live, starting at 3pm CT:

UPDATE: And it’s over. Hope everyone had a good time. If you missed it, you can watch it below: