http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x3223882Oh my.
Horse with no Name Donating Member (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 05:38 PM
Original message
Just shut the bitch down
I am hoping these truckers shut this ****ing country down because congress sure as Hell isn't going to.
As long as everyone is willing to suck it up and pay these high fuel, food, and utility prices...there will be no changes and the corporatocracy will continue to turn the heat up on all of us.
I fully support truckers shutting down their rigs in the middle of the ****ing street. It's going to be a long, hot summer and something has gotta give.
You know, I'm all in favor of whoever it is who processes a paycheck for Ms. Ed, going on strike.
It's a big bonfire. Sample comments of the primitives:
demdog78 (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:17 PM
Response to Reply #15
30. As a former truck driver...
I have to disagree with you. Diesel is over $4.00 right now. At that price, you are asking many of these drivers to work for barely over minimum wage.
They work long hours for their money and it's a very stressful and dangerous job.
Think about it. These guys drive coast to coast hauling between obscene amounts of goods. They drive 10+ hours a day, every day, and many of them have to pay for their own fuel.
How long could you keep that up? How long WOULD you keep it up. Everything in this country is shipped on a truck. They deserve to be paid well; not jerked around.
Yes, it would really suck if they went on strike, but it might also force our government to do something. And in the end, it would benefit us all.
usnret88 Donating Member (797 posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:22 PM
Response to Reply #30
33. So, you and the OP condone holding the country hostage? That does seem sorta like a form of terrorism.
redqueen Donating Member (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:23 PM
Response to Reply #33
35. Uh no... that is the right to strike.
Only the most soulless of capitalist pigs would dare try to call it "terrorism".
Anexio (42 posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:50 PM
Response to Reply #35
48. Nothing wrong with having a strike but....
I can't condone or approve blocking the streets.
As soon as I see protesters blocking the doors to a building or blocking a street they are immediately discredited to me.
If I have to be forced, against my will, to listen to their message I wonder how important it is.
FlyingSquirrel Donating Member (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:26 PM
Response to Reply #22
40. Uh huh. That doesn't work.
A lot of the truckers own their own rigs. What are you gonna do, force them to sell them to someone? This is why the truckers are doing what they're doing, because they don't just work for someone who can replace them behind the wheel with another warm body. (And by the way, it takes a long time to train a new trucker) They're the ones who own their rigs, they're the ones who are paying for their fuel.
Someone wants to get someone else to deliver the goods, fine. But where are they gonna come up with the new trucks and the new drivers in a short time? And what exactly is that "right price" gonna be? People go into the business for the money, partly. If you were gonna have someone else deliver the goods for "the right price", why not just give some subsidies to the CURRENT truck drivers to allow them to continue doing what they know how to do and have the equipment to do?
I don't get what you're saying, I guess.
Exilednight (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:37 PM
Response to Reply #40
43. It's fairly simple...................
Companies like Wal-Mart, Certified Grocers (an umbrella company that owns grocery stores under many different names), Aldi Foods, Home Depot, none of which are unionized, even and many other companies own their own trucking lines. The price of gas doesn't affect the income of these drivers.
Second, an independent driver will not stop working. They still have a mortgage to pay, their truck probably isn't paid off, and all the other bills. Missing even a day or two of work in good times can put them out of business and bankrupt.
Would you be willing to sacrifice the roof over your family's head just to prove a point, and in the mean time the goods are still getting to stores by non-unionized workers making about 60k a year without the same risk.
usnret88 Donating Member (797 posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:25 PM
Response to Reply #13
39. Isn't it true that the current prices are less than or equal to the prices that a lot of Europe, Australia, and Japan have been paying for years? Will a trucker uprising change global fuel prices?
catnhatnh Donating Member (1000+ posts) Tue Apr-29-08 06:51 PM
Response to Reply #39
49. Yes and No....
are the exact answers....but your first question is an apple and oranges deal...the taxes in their higher costs provide a social safety net.As to your second question you ignore that it COULD aid in changing gas prices here-if a strike led to cutting subsidies from oil companies or introducing windfall profit taxes or even just preventing wild speculation in the commodities market (and the house is considering a bill to do just that) then prices here could drop...
The part that sometimes bothers me is when someone points to european gas prices to ask "What's the big deal?"...never recognizing the vast differences in transportation needs between countries with advanced public transport and boundries just a few hundred miles apart and the US where several states rival the entire european common market in size...Then add in the GM push to destroy our trolley systems and the demise of railroads...
Well, I said it above, and I'll keep saying it every time Ms. Ed neighs about having a strike over something; I think it would be a good idea for whoever makes out Ms. Ed's paycheck to go on strike, so the donkied equine would grasp an understanding of what a strike really is.
Gawd, this woman is so stupid one wonders how she manages to remember to breathe.
