JRE Rallies the Home Healthcare Workers in NYC

JRE was part of a SEIU rally yesterday to bring awareness of the poor wages and lack of benefits for home health workers.

CBS) NEW YORK Sen. John Edwards joined scores of home healthcare workers on the steps of New York's City Hall Wednesday to demand better pay and benefits for home healthcare workers. "All they ask is to be treated with some level of dignity and respect," said Edwards, a Democrat from North Carolina.

Rest of transcript here--and you can press the > button on the video clip next to the story. JRE-TV!

Great work, JRE! Hat-tip to NCDem at OAC blog.

Hunter College Commencement tonight--JRE is the keynote, and he speaks at another commencement at University of Maine on Saturday.

Update: more clips or as I call it, JRE-TV; JRE thinks it's kinda weird, but Elizabeth thinks it's great. Listen to their latest podcast.

The Fifth Estate is Us

Last night, I was corresponding with Raging In Miami, who is former journalist who is now fast becoming a blogographer. He blogs his pics at the DU, usually starting with the Photography interest group, but more and more of us are encouraging him to post them on the General Discussion as they are more like photo-journalist pics, covering rallies in Miami and NYC. I posted his pics of JRE from the Justice for Janitors rally a couple of weeks ago.

He captures the moments beautifully. I happen to know his gender because of our correspondence.

Iddybud posted an interesting piece from Editor & Publisher in which a journalism professor, Bill Israel, was concerned that journalists needed to heed their duties more seriously and carefully. Professor Israel was a colleague and friend of Karl Rove when he worked at UT-Austin. Rove often talked to classes while at UT-Austin to discuss political image creation.

Israel expresses concern this way: "The question for journalists, citizens and those of us who care about him and/or the country is not if Karl will be indicted, or when -- but why we’re in this mess."

I talk to so many who keep saying they don't hear or see any of the things I tell them, whether it be that some soldiers in Iraq have called their moms, asking for extra tuna because otherwise, they have to beg for food, or Stephen Colbert's WH Correspondence being dissed by the MSM, but lauded by those of us on the blogs. These are those who only read the MSM, and they don't know about us. I'm convinced the blogsophere is the 5th Estate and we are the only check on the 3 branches as the 4th Estate has failed us on getting the real news out there.

RIM and our blogs are checking on the 4th Estate as much as the other branches. RIM's photos linked here, are covering the ground that those in the 4th Estate are dismissing in terms of what citizens are doing. I'm thankful that the Huffington Post, the real news blog that acts like a newspaper, is in a way, protesting and expressing concerns and warnings to journalists this message: cover more, and figure out why you think we are in this mess.

Whether you agree with RIM's citizen-photojournalist's views, I was so impressed that with the photos that I felt I was at both protests without having to be there personally. I didn't miss the official news reports one bit.

This, my friends, is true virtual reality, and not the stuff you see in gaming technologies, nor an tv event staged for AC Nielsen ratings.

Sing for One America

Michele Bair put together a good photo montage of images matched to music by the Dresden Dolls--really more like a video or what I would call, Blog TV (instead of MTV). Ms. Bair's video points out the need for visionary but empathetic leaders like JRE.

Sing Lyrics

There is this thing that's like touching except you don't touch
Back in the day it just went without saying at all
All the world's history gradually dying of shock
There is thing that's like talking except you don't talk

You sing
You sing

Sing for the bartender sing for the janitor sing
Sing for the cameras sing for the animals sing
Sing for the children shooting the children sing
Sing for the teachers who told you that you couldn't sing

Just sing
Just sing

There is thing keeping everyone's lungs and lips locked
It is called fear and it's seeing a great renaissance
After the show you can not sing wherever you want
But for now lets all pretend that we're gonna get bombed
So sing

Sing cause its obvious sing for the astronauts sing
Sing for the president sing for the terrorists sing
Sing for the soccer team sing for the Janjaweed sing
Sing for the kid with the phone who refuses to sing

Just sing

Life is no cabaret
We don't care what you say
We're inviting you anyway...

I want to know how she did this!