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Mike
Taffarel, MLPC Candidate for Sault Ste. Marie
 Mike Taffarel is the MLPC candidate for the
electoral district of Sault Ste. Marie in the upcoming October 14,2008
federal election.
A member of USW 2251, Mike is a 30-year veteran of Essar Steel Algoma
where he is currently employed as a mechanical maintenance technician
in the Plate and Strip Department. Fifty-six years old, he is married,
father of four and a resident of Sault Ste. Marie since the age of
five. Mike first became active with the MLPC as a university student in
1972.
Mike has this to say:
"During the last federal election I spoke out about what many in the
Sault were thinking, that is, that the power of monopoly capital, such
as Paulson and company, to destroy productive assets of society, like
Algoma Steel, had to be stopped.
"Today, nothing has changed in that regard. Algoma Steel has been taken
over by Essar. Now, new investments are finally being
made at Algoma and we are all working flat out -- some up to 60 hours a
week.
"Where the steel we produce actually goes is not supposed to be any of
our business. We are not paid to think -- just to produce. Armour
plating for the U.S. military -- don't think about it. GM is closing
down production and moving it elsewhere -- don't think about it. Our
labour that is paying off Essar's mortgage -- don't think about it.
"We may be hired hands but we are not oblivious. We see the resources
of the north dug up, cut down and shipped away
with minimal value-added processing or production done here. We know
what the workers at GM, Ford and Chrysler are going through. We see
John Deere moving machinery -- paid for by the labour of those workers
in Welland -- out of the country.
"U.S. financial institutions are collapsing like a house of cards and
we are not supposed to be the least bit concerned. Instead, we are told
that we should just leave our fate in the hands of those who did
nothing while Algoma Steel was forced into bankruptcy, bled white and
sold off!
"Canada needs a self-reliant, socially and environmentally sustainable
economy. The human and natural resources of our country must be put in
the service of our needs as a society and for our future. Monopoly
right is wrecking havoc on our economy. It must be curbed and
subordinated to the public interest.
"The only social force interested and capable of leading such a
nation-building project today is the working class. We have to be
political. We have to work out our own agenda for society and organize
society behind our nation-building project.
"That is why I am a candidate in this election. Join with me to make it
happen for ourselves, our families, our community and our country."
On
October 14: Vote Marxist-Leninist! Vote Mike Taffarel!
Mike can be reached at: saultstemarie@mlpc.ca (705) 256-5568.
What
People Are Saying in the Sault
The remarks and comments made by
people in Sault Ste. Marie in the course of door-to-door work speak to
the
issues on people's minds and to the need for political renewal if
elections are to have anything to do with the will of the people.
One retiree, a senior citizen, referring to an election ad he had seen
on TV said: "They speak like they are the one's who built the country.
We built it, not them. Hard working people built it and yet we have no
say in what is going on at all."
A Native woman spoke with contempt for the Harper government's
"apology" for the abuse and attempt to extinguish First Nations peoples
through the residential school policy of the Canadian government. She
said: "What does an apology mean when they keep doing the same thing
today, stealing the land, putting those who defend our rights in jail.
They don't mean it. Their words don't mean a thing," she
said.
One young man with friends in the armed forces, like many youth in the
north, asked what we thought of Harper's announcement to pull the
troops out by 2011. He said his friends in the armed forces had either
done a tour of duty and had seen their friends die, or were about to be
deployed.
 When asked what his friends thought of
their mission in Afghanistan, he said they were too busy trying to stay
alive to talk about that much. But he was not happy that his friends
and others in the armed forces were put in harms way by a government
that then turns around -- as an election hook no less -- and says it's
no longer necessary to be there. "What's that about?" he asked. "These
soldiers gave their lives for nothing?"
We discussed with the youth that Canadians had no say in the decision
to send troops to Afghanistan, no say about whether or not we should be
part of an aggressive American-led NATO mission to force a U.S. agenda
on the people of Afghanistan. He said that much is very clear, and
signed the nomination form.
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