Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken celebrated his New Year by noticing that his new Ronald Reagan calendar shows the same inspirational motto on Reagan’s desk as TenHaken has on his:
Well, I’d rather Republican Paul live in the past celebrating Reagan than pander to Trumpists with an Il Duce calendar.
But note that with this flash to the past, TenHaken and Reagan both are giving a shout-out to labor and good liberals everywhere by invoking the slogan of Dolores Huerta, Cesar Chavez, and the United Farm Workers:
In May 1972, a decade after Cesar Chavez founded the union, the Legislature in his native state of Arizona pushed through a bill sponsored by agribusiness denying farm workers the right to strike and boycott during harvest seasons, and effectively making it impossible for them to organize.
The United Farm Workers asked to meet with Republican Governor Jack Williams, to appeal for him to veto the legislation. Instead, the governor ordered state troopers to bring him the bill and he signed it within an hour after passage. In response to a protest by farm workers, the governor remarked, “As far as I’m concerned, those people don’t exist.”
When news of the law’s enactment reached him, Cesar returned to Arizona and began a 25-day water-only fast. The fast quickly took a physical toll. After a few days Cesar was bedridden. Resting on his back in a small room, with UFW co-founder Dolores Huerta by his side, Cesar was briefed by a group of local Latino labor and political leaders about political realities in the state.
The leaders offered a refrain Cesar and Dolores heard many times: The grower lobby that dominated state politics, the Legislature and governor was so powerful, these Latino leaders declared, it couldn’t be beaten. Cesar and Dolores silently listened while they explained why the fast and efforts by farm workers would be fruitless.
“No, no se puede!” (“No, no it can’t be done”), they kept repeating in Spanish. Then Dolores responded, “Si, si se puede!” (“Yes, yes, it can be done”).
Dolores immediately picked up the call and made the slogan the rallying cry for the farm workers’ campaign in Arizona.
Following Cesar’s 1972 fast, during which he became so weak he was hospitalized, the UFW mobilized thousands of labor, religious and community activists, and collected enough signatures to force an election to recall Governor Williams. The governor escaped the vote with a partisan ruling by the state attorney general.
At a Mass ending the fast, Cesar’s said in a statement that was read for him, “The greatest tragedy is not to live and die, as we all must. The greatest tragedy is for a person to live and die without knowing the satisfaction of giving life for others.”
The state’s punitive anti-farm worker law is still on the books. Yet Cesar Chavez’s historic fast, the UFW’s activism and the message of Si Se Puede! have fundamentally transformed Arizona to the present day.
Cesar has passed, but his legacy of self-sacrifice—and the affirmation ¡Si Se Puede!—is alive wherever farm workers organize and wherever people anywhere stand up nonviolently for their rights.
¡Si Se Puede! [United Farm Workers, “The History of Si Se Puede,” retrieved 2020.01.06]
And we know what other tall, lanky, healthy Christian leader made great use of that motto. It can be done—Sí se puede—Yes we can!
Interestingly, while Barack Obama says he got that slogan directly from Huerta and the United Farm Workers, Reagan got his plaque as a gift from the Saudi government.
Thanks for that reminder, Mayor Paul!
And now we live with ImPotus’ motto … “Es kann rückgängig gemacht warden!” (It can be undone!)
Indeed, that seems to be all the current Executive Branch wants to do, undo, tear apart, destroy…
But we can undo that and redo America.
There’s just one problem. Reagan, who feared the Soviets(Russians), believed in free trade, and didn’t try to quantify what a true hero is, would have never given Trump a “B” for performance, but Ten Haken did during the 2018 mayoral race.
It’s a good slogan. Doesn’t surprise me that it came from the great Dolores Huerta and Caesar Chavez, two leading American heroes.
Reagan thought that you could lower taxes and balance the budget at the same time. Well it could not be done, no matter how much positive attitude he had. Forty years has proven him wrong.
So Ronny raised taxes several times to make up for his mistakes.
Ketchup IS a vegetable
…and it can be found for free at Arbys, so we don’t need SNAP
Ms. MD, you are righter than right. grudznick gets his ketchup at the Hardees over by the Alex. They have plenty and it’s right by the door and much better than the Arbys ketchup. If you need some, hit me up and I’ll hand you a baggie over in the Alley of the Arts.