Give Community Organizers the Credit They Deserve

A politician who calls himself the agent of real change and then denigrates his opponent as a community organizer is like someone who owns five houses spitting on the carpenters and plumbers and electricians who built them.

Those were clearly racist jabs at urban America, the core of Obama's and the Democratic Party's base.

But what do you expect from a counterfeit campaign with a roster of lobbyist top advisors and a long-serving Senator who says he will bring real "change to Washington."

Perhaps they didn't count on Obama wearing those attacks on his community organizer background as a badge of honor, as any good organizer would. It's already stirring up more support and, who knows, could help his GOTV efforts come election day.

After all, it is community organizers who make REAL change -- change from the grassroots -- happen.
People who protect our basic rights, who hold crooked cops and politicians accountable, who built neighborhood watch groups, who keep our schools safe and drug-free, and are responsible for basic labor protections and other things most of us take for granted -- like the weekend.

People like Chicago's Jane Addams and Shel Trapp, people like Cesar Chavez and Lois Gibbs and those union organizers and environmental justice activists, and the organizers of protests at the School of the Americas. People like Dorothy Day and Fannie Lou Hamer and Miles Horton of the Highlander Center and those nameless neighborhood doorknockers who toil for low wages at the edges of the struggle for economic justice. Those who have organized groups like ACORN and Jobs With Justice and the Interfaith Worker Justice center and the National Organizers Alliance.

Historically, so many of the great patriots were organizers -- people like Ben Franklin (who created the first volunteer fire department in America in Philadelphia and helped organized the Continental Congress) and that insurgent Sam Adams and George Washington. People like MLK, Gandhi and Susan B. Anthony.

And the one organizer that ALL right-wing Republicans cite -- Jesus Christ -- who organized the disciples, and turned out the days-traders and commodities speculators from the temple.

Insulting community organizers is to insult everyone and anyone picked up a picket sign or spoken up for justice.

I guess that tells us what side Palin and company are on.

Comments

[EllaMae]

Great blog, Charlie. I love the opening paragraph, and it reflects what Barack Obama says about government and how, if it is "of the people" it should work from the bottom up, rather than top down. As far as those who say community organizing doesn't prepare one for the presidency, I disagree. While the experience alone is not enough preparation, it requires many skills that a good president should have: leadership, inspiration & dedication, the ability to deal with people who have differing points of view and find common ground, and the ability to listen and understand the people one is working for and with.

[Jaid]

Puma Ann supports McSame and Bridge to Nowhere Palin. Duly noted. Now get lost!

[INDmind]

Gee, still searching for things other than the issues.

Community Organization does not make a president. That was the point.

Community Organization, if done properly, is a highly admirable service.

[PumaAnn]

Perhaps, O needs to apologize to small-town mayors, whom he obviously doesn't much respect. And while he's at it, to governors of smaller states whose job apparently isn't "big" enough to even count as being a governor.

This faux outrage is tiresome. He pulls these snarky remarks, gets hit back, and then all his supporters pretend the hit-back was the attack. No, O was rude about Pal, sneering even. I'm surprised he didn't call her bitter and clinging to her religion.

[HunterMR]

You can bet ACORN and other community organizers, will be out November 4th getting the vote out for Democrats. Comments like this will only serve to fuel the hard work already being done, and will carry forth beyond the day Barack Obama is elected president!

[tompoe]

Palin has apologized, right?