What's to happen to the workers who were made to serve as props for George's pitch about the power of trickle-down economics, then tossed aside?
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Playing Politics with Jobs
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The Timken Company, based in Canton, Ohio, makes steel and other industrial products, and last year it was the proud recipient of a visit by his eminence, George W. Bush.
The prez had traveled to Ohio, a state that's up for grabs in this fall's election, to hype the value of all the tax giveaways he passed for the rich. He went to Canton to claim that those giveaways would trickle-down from the rich to create jobs for middle-class America, and he needed a good visual for his televised speech. Timken's factory was the perfect made-for-TV backdrop.
A crowd of Timken's hard-hatted, blue-collar workers was dutifully assembled for Bush. The bossman, Tim Timken himself, was on stage beaming with pride and nodding in approval at George's every sentence. Why wouldn't he? Tim has long been a major financial backer of both Bush presidents.
Now, fast forward to May of this year. Just months after George's highly-publicized rooster strut in Canton, Tim announced that he was closing three of his U.S. factories, eliminating 1,300 jobs, and moving production to low-wage centers elsewhere, including overseas. Curiously, there was no national media coverage of this development, which made a mockery of Bush's earlier political posturing.
What's to happen to the workers who were made to serve as props for George's pitch about the power of trickle-down economics? "I have no idea what I'm going to do," says Scott Anderson, 41-years old, and a 23-year loyal worker at Timken. "There are just no good job opportunities left in this community." Scott added that he now couldn't pay for the college education for his kids: "I want a better America, as my parents did for me," he says.
Ironically, a Timken spokesman coldly replied: "It's a business issue, not a political issue."
He's dead wrong about that. By stiffing America's middle-class, both Bush and Tim Timken are playing with political dynamite.
Jim Hightower is the best-selling author of "Let's Stop Beating Around the Bush," from Viking Press. For more information, visit jimhightower.com.
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