Out with the Old, In With the New?

This past week I was fortunate enough to attend my great aunt's 80th birthday at my cousin's house in Staten Island. Towards the end of the evening, I found myself sitting around with my cousin's friends, talking about the economy and Obama. The people I was with all would describe themselves as left leaning liberals who all supported Obama. The conversation started with them talking about the Great Depression, and my Great Aunt told us about what it was like to live through it.

What do you think is going to happen, I asked? How do you think Obama is going to pull the country's economy out of this? After all, we are not dealing with the capitalism that Roosevelt dealt with through the new deal. This is a different time, a time of hedge funds and privatization, where wall street and corporations have pushed capitalism beyond what we could have imagined during the great depression. Everyone nodded their heads in agreement. That's right, they said. No, things are not going to change until capitalism is dealt with and it can't be dealt with from above, but must be fought from below. Our problem here is that our leadership has done a very good job of forcing us to become a people divided. We feel shame at being in debt or losing our home or jobs. We believe we are the only ones and asking for help is out of the question. But that is all changing. Too many of us know someone who is suffering today.

Back home in Chicago, I talked about how I noticed the signs of people asking for money has changed. Instead of homeless and hungry, the signs now say laid off or foreclosed on and hungry. My cousin's husband spoke up. See in Italy or Spain, they just go on strike if this were to happen. Here, our traditions have died, he said. Which brought us back to the great depression. I asked my Aunt, do you remember the strikes in 1934? That did more to force change then anything anyone from the top did. I don't envy Obama, someone said. Me neither.