It's Working People Like My Uncle That Built the Middle Class, and It's Wall Street That Destroyed It

By Michael Moore, Michael Moore's Facebook Page

31 December 16

80 years ago tonight my unlce and hundreds of other workers in Flint took over the General Motors factories and held them for 44 days until the company recognized their union, the UAW. GM turned off the heat and water and tried to starve them out. The workers prevailed and families like mine after this were able, for the first time, to make a livable wage, enjoy what was called a "weekend," see a doctor, own a home, buy a car, send the next generation to college. This victory in Flint spread to other cities and other industries and soon working people who were willing to take a stand had a better life. Of course, this would not last more than 5 decades or so as future generations of workers forgot how what they had was originally obtained, taking for granted that their free health care, their generous pensions, their month-long paid vacations and the sort would somehow be there in perpetuity. Before long Wall Street and the banks and the elites found ways to chip away at all those "benefits." The Democratic Party, sworn to defend the working class as Roosevelt had on the streets of Flint, grew weak and ineffectual and beholden in some part to the corporate class. By the end of the 20th century, the wages were stagnant or slashed, the benefits eliminated and the government assisted big business in efforts to find cheaper sources of labor overseas. Flint went from being a workers paradise to one of the poorest, most desperate cities in the country. Half the population was able to escape into a diaspora of low-wage states, while the other poorer, Blacker half was left behind -- only to eventually be poisoned by the water a ruthless Republican governor made them drink. My uncle and his brothers and sisters and entire family would not recognize this New Year's Eve as we enter 2017, be it in Flint or throughout the rest of Trump's America. "Trumpmerica." Of course back in Flint on this night in 1936, the only party anyone was throwing was the one to overthrow the yoke of oppression. It was a great way to ring in the new year. It might still be.