Rolling Back May Day

May Day has come and gone without much enthusiasm in the United States. But for much of the world, May 1st or International Workers' Day, is a time to celebrate the hard-won victories of working people the world over. Millions march militantly demonstrating the power of ordinary working people.

But here in America, we apathetically go to the factory, the retail counter, and the cubicle, ignorant to the fact that May Day is the product of an American, radical workers' movement that successfully agitated for the 8-hour day during the 1880's.

In these uncertain, tenuous times we have much to learn from these heroic men that braved the Billy-club and bullet to overcome economic exploitation.

Distracted by war, working families are unaware the latest Bush budget slashes funding for healthcare, public education, and proven job creation techniques while the Administration showers lucrative contracts on the military-industrial complex and bankrupts the Treasury on an ill-advised, cynical tax cut for upper class constituents and campaign financiers.

The Administration's hostility toward working people has never been more obvious.
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