Commentary: Obama would best aid manufacturing

Ron Gettelfinger, United Auto Workers

In January of 2001, George Bush took office as the first-ever U.S. president to hold an MBA. Seven and a half years later, our nation's bottom line is filled with red ink.

We've lost millions of manufacturing jobs, and real wages are stagnating. But the price of gas, groceries, health insurance and other essentials continues to rise. A basic middle-class lifestyle is out of reach - or soon will be - for millions of hard-working Americans.

Meanwhile, we are bogged down in an endless war in Iraq, with little evidence of prudent management or the wise use of resources.

It's time to change direction. This year, we have a chance to vote for a candidate who will make history in more ways than one: If elected, Barack Obama will be the first president ever with a background as a community organizer.

Dating back to the 1950s, UAW members recognized that union programs for active and retired members should be developed on a broad, community-wide basis. In the 1960s and 1970s, our union helped provide seed funding for what were sometimes called the first "community unions."

We still support these grass-roots efforts because a community organization functions in a neighborhood the same way a union does in a workplace: We bring people together to solve problems.

In 1985, Obama left a position as a financial consultant in New York City to work in Altgeld Gardens, a Chicago public housing project, where residents needed jobs, building repairs and, more than anything, a renewed sense of hope.

Obama went door-to-door, listened to residents and helped neighborhood activists develop their own priorities. The residents of Altgeld Gardens wanted job training. They wanted city authorities to fill potholes. And, they wanted asbestos removed from their apartments.

People still remember the young man who immersed himself in their issues and worked with them to find solutions.

"He has a great understanding of people," Altgeld Gardens resident Linda Randle told U.S. News and World Report in 2007. "And he knows how to bring about change through compromise. That's what we need in Washington."

What we don't need is another politician who thinks you can solve problems from the top down, instead of from the bottom up - and who supports the same failed policies that have collapsed our economy and made our nation less secure.

John McCain served our nation with honor in Vietnam, but he now has little to offer except more of the same. He has been the chief cheerleader for the disastrous war in Iraq, and he has flip-flopped to endorse George Bush's irresponsible tax cuts for the wealthy. McCain's voting record shows he backs the Bush administration more than 90 percent of the time.

On the issue that matters most here in Michigan - manufacturing jobs - McCain's policy can be described in two words: unconditional surrender.

He says the jobs-destroying North American Free Trade Agreement "was a good idea" - and claims that the jobs we've lost are not coming back.

Obama, by contrast, is ready to stand up and fight for our jobs.

As president, he has pledged to sit down with our trading partners from Canada and Mexico to renegotiate NAFTA, so it offers real protections for workers, consumers and the environment.

Obama has proposed a bold $150 billion fund to build the vehicles of the future in the United States. McCain, on the other hand, wants to recycle an old idea that has limited application: subsidies for consumers who buy advanced technology vehicles, regardless of where those vehicles are made.

At a time when America's auto industry is challenged as never before, the last thing we need is a president whose best idea is to send our tax dollars overseas to subsidize foreign corporations. Instead, we need a leader who understands that a strong 21st-century economy requires a strong manufacturing sector.

As a community activist, state legislator and U.S. senator, Obama has shown a unique ability to listen, to bring people together, and to solve real problems faced by ordinary citizens. That's the same spirit that moved the patriots who founded our great country.

About the author:
Ron Gettelfinger is president of the United Auto Workers union. This article first appeared on July 9, 2008, in The Detroit News.

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