Giving Credit Where It’s Due on Labor Day

We honor organized labor today, as we replace our white clothes with earth-toned cardigans in anticipation of this season’s social events. But in truth, there are a lot of hard working people — both organized and not — who deserve more credit than they get on days like today.

Case in point: campaign staffers, who don’t get today off and won’t get many days off until February 5. Field staff in Iowa often work 80-hour weeks, pulling down salaries between $2,000 and $2,500 per month.

Today, many of them will be frantically building crowds, trying to hang placards on the sides of old barns in advance of events, pushing clipboards and supporter cards on throngs of people, jamming their fingers into rolls of stickers, and enduring interminable conference calls — all in hopes of building a movement, one ID call at a time.

By January, they’ll be freezing in supporters’ attics in counties whose names their parents back in New Jersey can’t pronounce, and every other phone call they make will be a hang-up.

So today, while you’re barbecuing, be thankful that you haven’t had to reduce your entire day into terms Microsoft Excel can understand. And offer a beer to the next person who tries to get you to sign a supporter card, because they’ll probably need it.