Dean got most applause at Firefighters convention...why are they [View All]

[madfloridian]

courting Republicans so heavily? I guess it is good thing the audience showed their approval by the applause, but most of the speakers were Republicans. Why? What have the Republicans done for them?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/21/politics/21labor.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

With the election season heating up, the Bush administration and the Republican Party used a good deal of energy and charm on Monday to woo a group that has long been part of the Democrats' base: organized labor.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff; Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska; and the Republican National Committee chairman, Ken Mehlman, spoke to the annual legislative conference of the main firefighters' union, saying they were eager to work with the union on issues of common ground. The White House chief of staff, Andrew H. Card Jr., had been scheduled to speak, but canceled, citing illness. Mr. Mehlman praised the union for an increasing focus on bipartisanship.

..."Harold A. Schaitberger, the president of the International Association of Fire Fighters and the first prominent labor leader to back Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, for president in 2004, voiced the views of an increasing number of union leaders in saying it was important to work with Republicans."

And I thought this part was interesting, nice, in fact.

"Underlining the Republicans' difficulties in wooing union members, Howard Dean, the Democratic chairman, received far more applause than any Republican speaker. "We want American jobs that will stay in America," Mr. Dean said to thunderous applause."

I guess that says something.