Community organizers defended
their work, and that of former colleague Barack Obama, as they fought back yesterday against a series of gibes by speakers at the Republican convention. Organizers described themselves as an antidote to the influence of big-money lobbyists. They cited helping the powerless join forces to demand better schools and safer streets, often by working through churches.
If people in [elected] office were doing their jobs, perhaps we wouldn’t need community organizers,” said John Baumann, executive director of PICO National Network. Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, said, “I don’t like seeing the really hard work that goes on in really poor communities being demeaned by cheap politicians. “Community organizing is as American as democracy.”
There was also significant rebuttal of the community organizer mocking by Palin and Giuliani by CBS News last night whose panel viewed it either as an attack/joke on the poor, which Schieffer strongly objected to, or as a ham-handed and off-script way to wedge rural and urban voters. It was also noted, though, that Karl Rove was still using it in interviews throughout the day, making the former explanation more likely.
