Truckers live in an alternative dimension, at least so I conclude when trying to figure out how to meet up with the convoy of trucks coming into to DC to protest high diesel fuel prices on Monday. JB, aka Mike Schaffner, one of the organizers of the action, calls early in the morning to suggest various highway intersections, and I have to explain there's no way a pedestrian can be just standing on one the super-highways around DC. We eventually settle on a spot in a desolate area of southeastern DC, but even so, I probably couldn't have made the connection without the genes of a grandfather who rode the rails. When I hear the honking, low and steady, and see the first trucks rising out from an underpass, I scramble up to a narrow walkway along their route and start waving frantically. Everyone waves back nicely, and about the fifth truck actually stops. It's JB and I leap aboard.
JB and I have become friends-by-phone in the weeks since I blogged about the first truckers' protests in the beginning of April, but all I knew about him as a physical presence is that he always wears a black cowboy hat. Its brim is turned down, locating him in Larry McMurtry's rather than John Wayne's West, and his eyes twinkle deeply when he smiles, which is pretty much all the time. Everything seems to delight him: Being in DC for the first time, having 250 trucks behind him, the friendliness of the tourists on the street as we inch our way toward the Mall.
Since he hasn't been home in Texas since January 1, this -- the "bobtail" of a truck based in New Jersey -- is JB's world. There's a neatly made bed behind our seats and a laptop that can swivel into view while he's driving, as well, of course, as a GPS, a cell phone and CB radio. From this little control room, which is also a workplace and a living space, JB has helped assemble the hundreds of truckers and their families who are with us now. It's a life stripped bare: He ordinarily eats only one meal a day (nothing fried or from a buffet), sleeps rarely (just an hour and half last night), and drinks no coffee ("it leads to stops") but admits to an occasional Red Bull.
We circle the Mall, slowly, triumphantly, twice. It's hard to talk over the honking and the excited CB chatter, but JB wants to know if I've ever been at a demonstration in DC before. Ah, I explain, I go back to the 60s, but the most recent one was an anti-war demonstration organized by the women's group Code Pink. He laughs, making me think he finds the name amusing. But no, he shows me he has Code Pink in his cell phone. They had contacted him and will be joining us at the rally at the Capitol.
We are to park the trucks at the RFK Stadium and walk from there to the Capitol, giving us about a half an hour to mill around on foot in the parking lot first. There's a bobtail with "Truckin for Jesus" painted on it and, under that, "Truckers and Citizens United." There are Operation Desert Freedom caps and a POW/MIA flag, as well signs indicting oil companies and "Wall Street speculators." I chat with members of the mostly African-American contingent of DC dump truck drivers and with Belinda Raymond, a trucker's wife from Maine, who tells me that people in her area raised $9000 to send a convoy of trucks down here, with the Knights of Columbus accounting for $2500 of that. Whole families have come, and I see a boy carrying a sign saying "What about My Future?" A smartly dressed woman from New Jersey carries a sign asking, "Got Milk? Not Without a Truck."
If there's an ideology at work here I'd call it small-d democratic fundamentalism: We own the government, we pay for it, and now it better do something for us. In fact, JB is carrying hundreds of copies of the Code of Ethics for Civil Servants he's downloaded from the internet to hand out at the Capitol and remind Congress of their duties. The only time I see his smile fade is when the protest's media coordinator -- contributed pro bono by the liberal think tank The Institute for Policy Studies -- lays down the ground rules for a meeting with Senator Jeff Sessions (R, AL) scheduled for the afternoon. "But he works for us!" JB protests.
On the 45 minute long march from the stadium to the Capitol, things degenerate toward the level of farce. No one had counted on the rain, which is back in force, or on the fact that, as one guy puts it to me, they're "truckers, not walkers." JB, I and a few others fall behind because JB insists on running back to his truck and changing into a shirt printed with the American flag and Constitution. Our little band includes Mike Groff, a heavily pierced 20-something from Pennsylvania who is one of the original organizers of the protests and his pregnant wife Melissa. JB and Mike take turns pulling a wagon carrying batteries for the sound system that will be used at the rally. The rain turns into a torrent. We trudge through the ghetto, then on into a middle class neighborhood sporting azaleas and Obama lawn signs, not entirely sure of our direction and soaked to the skin. Melissa reassures me that, if we pee our pants, which seems increasingly likely, no one will notice.
But things look up when we get the Capitol, thanks largely to Senator Susan Collins (R, ME), who arranges for the truckers to stage a press conference inside the Russell Building lobby and out of the rain. Three truckers -- two white and one black -- speak about their dwindling livelihoods and the need for immediate government action to push down fuel prices. I can't fight my way through the media to hear much of what they're saying, but one speaker mentions foreclosures. This is a wide-ranging cry from the strangled middle class -- or working class or whatever you want to call it -- and all I can think is: Where are the Democrats? Why aren't they are pouring out of their offices to show support for the truckers? And wouldn't have been wonderful if Obama had shown up? Because he's not going to make it unless he learns to channel the frustration of people like JB, Melissa and Mike.
That's just my concern though. The whole event has been strictly nonpartisan. The truckers are already focused on the May 1 Truckers and Citizens United protest in New York City (see www.theamericandriver.com). That one, JB tells me, will be in solidarity with the San Francisco longshoremen's May Day actions against the war.
I predict that a tent city will be erected in DC over the summer.
I hope people will save their pennies and go there when that is announced.
No one in CONgress - and particularly NANCY PELOSI - is going to lift one finger to help the American public. They should ALL be tried for WAR CRIMES, eveyr last one. (and yes, that goes for Ron Paul, too.)
You want to see better ACTION; send money to Shirley Golub's primary campaign and support Ralph Nadar. Force the media off the sidelines.
Its time to step up and mandate a 55 mph speed limit for all light/ heavy truck and SUV traffic and 65mph for regular cars. This went along way to solving the gas crunch in the seventies. Many of our Interstates are regulated at 70 mph.... which, in reality, means 75 to 85. A common pick-up truck that gets 16 mpg at 70 will get 12 mpg at 80. The same truck though will get 18 mpg at 55 to 60.
Today’s cars run more efficiently at higher speeds and this is why they would fall into the 65 mph bracket.
Thoughts??
T.
I'm a bad person
So there.
The drivers are the victims, like most of us, while somebody else sits back and collects the profits.
This is another example of why we need an *enforced* redistribution of wealth - yes, take back all the ill-gotten gains of the oil companies, the defense contractors, the overpaid CEO's and politicians, health insurance companies, mortgage companies, etc. etc. and give it back to the public from whom it has been stolen.
Sometimes, when I read an article like this, I feel despair. The protests are wonderful and certainly do attract attention - then everybody goes home and nothing changes. The truckers I've known are barely making ends meet. And as noted, too many of the folks driving the trucks are blithely voting for the Repubs who have caused this current crisis. We just plain don't seem to understand the connections between who we vote for and what we get as a result.
Everything I have/use comes by truck. Even the Internet arrives by semi - how did my Net-connected computer get to me? By truck. The electricity I use for that computer? By truck (coal trucks, oil tanker trucks). The content on the Net? Written by people who wear clothes, eat food, and write on a computer - all things that arrive by truck. Sooner or later, everything we do is affected by fuel. Take away the fuel, and eventually everything breaks down.
Now I'm not exactly sure how to get to accurate pricing.... seems like the "solidarity" approach these guys are invoking is a pretty good step in the right direction. Getting organized is clearly in their interest.
As for shorter term changes, perhaps you could institute some sort of interstate shipment tax (which would basically fall on us consumers), that in turn gets rebated to these guys (ie: sort of de facto accurate pricing). Common targets like reducing the gas tax (something like $.24 for diesel) tend to not have much effect. If you cut it $.10/gallon, and you get maybe a $.05 reduction in the price of diesel... which won't mean ANYTHING to these guys, who have been dealing with diesel prices over $4 a gallon.
Anyway, Americans aren't going to change their behavior unless we're feel the real costs. Thus accurate pricing isn't only in the truckers interests, but ours too. Getting there, is another story, unfortunately... any experts out there to fill us in on the other policy ideas being tossed around?
Price shipping of everything indivudually if they choose to play games with paying for shipping.
They want to ship 10,000 units charge for each and everyone seperately. Stop hauilng trailors company's have leased and fill with whatever they want. JUST SAY "NO".
I really doubt that they're all Bush lovers.
Now that it's *THEIR* wallet being hurt, I hear them: "Hhhhhhhhelp meeeee! Hhhhhhelp meeeeee!"
Let's use what remains of our national intellect and realize railroads are more efficient transcontinental freight haulers than any truck.
And you missed the part about truckers fighting fuel efficiency standards. Did they or didn't they?
Oh, and that thing that a truck doesn't bring me? The Internet.
TRUCKER UNIONS HAVE BEEN THE TARGET OF THE REPUBLICANS FOR YEARS.
Destroying the unions to lower shipping prices by eliminating health care and retirement benifits!