End the occupation of Iraq. No to the privatization of Social Security and cuts in Social Security benefits. These would be the most topical issues, but there is no shortage of reasons why people should be motivated to put a brake on the White House and Congress.
>Unlike you, people have jobs, careers, and people who depend on
>them. They can't just start throwing rotten tomatoes and causing a
>ruckus in the streets.
Proletarians who still have jobs have a more potential power to make an impact on politics than proletarians who have never had jobs or have lost them, but only if they don't think that they can never take any collective action because they have jobs and careers.
In any case, it's not true that all people have the sort of jobs that will get them fired if they take a day off. Tenured professors. Public school teachers. Workers who have unionized civil service jobs. Workers who work for unions and non-profits. Etc.
Besides, millions of Americans are as unemployed. 8 million are officially unemployed ("The Employment Situation: December 2004," <a href="http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm">January 7, 2005</a>). Then, there are larger numbers of proletarians who are regarded as having withdrawn from the labor force. "The proportion of the working-age population that was employed (the employment-population ratio) was 62.4 percent in December, about the same as a year earlier" ("The Employment Situation: December 2004," <a href="http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm">January 7, 2005</a>). About 76 million of the working-age population are "not in the labor force" ("The Employment Situation: December 2004," <a href="http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm">January 7, 2005</a>). Then, there are teenagers and retirees, both of whom have good reasons to worry about Social Security.
So, even if all proletarians who are precariously employed are to be busy at work on January 20th or any other date for collective action, there are more than 100 million proletarians who can protest.
If they don't have money to go to DC, they can of course protest in their home town. If January 20th is a bad day for them, there are many other days. In fact, any day is a good day to protest.
If they don't protest, that's not because they can't, but because they have been told by people like you that it's not worth it. Protest? For what? What's the point? Who cares? It never works! Let them cut any benefits they like. Let them have their war as long as they like. There's nothing you can do about that. That's the message that you and Jon are sending. -- Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * "Proud of Britain": <http://www.proudofbritain.net/ > and <http://www.proud-of-britain.org.uk/>