Chelsea is a city populated with working class people and the working poor. There are also many, many thousands living here who exist perpetually in a state of poverty. There are many thousands as well who have achieved the American Dream over the decades who still call this place their home.
Unemployment is at the 12% level in Chelsea and in cities just like ours across the nation. This means that there are an awful lot of people willing to work who cannot find jobs, who would do literally anything to make themselves self-sufficient in order to care for their families.
Nationwide, there are something like 15 million people unemployed with no real chance of getting employed because there are no jobs available for the great mass of those people. This includes all the folks unemployed in Chelsea.
In recent weeks, demonstrations, occupations as they are being called, have been formed by tens of thousands of unemployed Americans throughout the nation. They are young and old, black and white, of every race and creed.
In Boston, they have been occupying Dewey Square in the financial district for the past ten days. The numbers are growing. Over the weekend, Boston Police arrested about 160 of the occupiers.
These occupations are also taking place in New York City, San Francisco and even in Iowa and they have the collective look and feel of something new about to happen.
Their publicly aired gripes are about no jobs, no economic hope, and it is about big banks being bailed out for trillions by the government while American workers and middle class people lose their jobs, their homes and their literal lives.
Their message is resonating with the American people even though at present these small groups appear a bit odd.
However it appears the time is coming and here when demonstrations against the lack of leadership in Washington have begun and they are in earnest.
That’s how the anti-Vietnam protests began.
Perhaps we are wrong, but it is this type of collective, angry, disappointed national voice that has been lacking in the national discourse that is rising.
Unemployed Americans want jobs, not talk. They want a chance to survive this economy and a government seemingly more in tune with the needs of big banks than with the needs of the people.
This is just the beginning of bigger demonstrations and more importantly, it is likely the beginning of a new age of awareness on the part of our bumbling, fumbling, failing national politicians and a government so out of touch with its people that it doesn’t deserve anything from us.
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