Labor & Employment Law

Kentucky Retirees Mobilize to Make Sure Election Night?s Not Fright Night

By Mike Hall

Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican U.S. Senate candidate and Tea Party poster boy, ?scares the you-know-what out of Roy H. Streeter, an IUE-CWA retiree. Rightfully so, too.

Paul, who wants to phase out and privatize Social Security and Medicare, said yesterday that seniors need to pay more for whatever form Medicare would be left after he sliced the heart out of it if elected to the Senate. BTW, Paul?s campaign admits he received half his income from Medicare and Medicaid payments.

At a recent get-out-the-vote rally in Louisville (see video), Streeter said:

This guy Paul, he scares me. He wants to do away with Social Security?.Everything is a ?No,? ?No.? All the things we as union members have worked hard for will be taken away from us if we don?t stand up and be counted. Your vote will count. If you don?t vote, you?ve voted anyway for your opposition.

Charles Clephas, president of the Greater Louisville Central Labor Council, told the group of union retirees that Paul and his Republican cohorts who embrace the failed policies of the past

want to send us back….So we?ve got to be there. If we don?t work, get our people out, we?re in trouble…we need your help.

That help is growing and growing. Just last night more than 100 Louisville union members seemed to discombobulate Paul and his tea-partiers when they showed up at a Paul rally. The candidate rushed through a short speech and then bolted just a half hour into a scheduled two-hour event. Brian Tucker of the Valley Report writes:

The crowd from organized labor, most wearing T-shirts emblazoned with union logos, certainly took organizers of the event by surprise. When Rand arrived to mingle, the union insignias stunned his eyeballs and nearly ruined his mind….What was billed as a two hour event lasted just over half an hour, as the good doctor bailed for the exits after speaking about 12 minutes.

Run, Rand, Run.

Check out this video from  Nate Byer,  AFL-CIO field communications director in Kentucky.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on September 24, 2010 (boomark / email).