Hilda Solis

I've been meaning to write about this for ages and haven't gotten around to it, so this is going to be shorter than it deserves.

The Senate is FINALLY voting on confirmation of Hilda Solis, Obama's labor secretary-designate. Solis is one of the few real, solid progressives in the cabinet. She's a representative from the 32nd District in California, and she's got ironclad labor creds. Which, of course, is why the Republicans don't want her in the position.

From John Nichols' piece in The Nation:

"Lost in all the Washington procedural mumbo-jumbo since the Solis nomination is the recognition that this is truly a historic moment for all of America's workers. She is a true champion of America's workers. Solis will not be your boss's secretary of labor -- she will be YOUR secretary of labor," says the AFL-CIO's Marc Laitin.

"As the child of working class immigrants who both were members of labor unions in California, Hilda Solis is uniquely qualified to lead the Department of Labor during the current economic crisis," adds Laitin. "With hundreds of thousands of jobs being lost every week and millions of Americans struggling to make ends meet, we desperately need someone who will fight for America's workers, not just the interests of CEOs."

They've trumped up some BS about taxes, but unlike certain other people :cough: Geithner, Solis's husband's few thousand in taxes has been paid back--and was before she was nominated.

Just a few of the bills Solis introduced:
H.R. 468, Communities of Color Teen Pregnancy Prevention Act of 2007, which would provide grants to non-profits to do community intervention against teen pregnancy.

H.R. 2847 – Green Jobs Act of 2007, which was included in the energy reform bill signed in 2007.

H.R. 4129 - Homeless Access to Recovery Through Treatment (HART) Act, to increase access of the homeless to mental health care and proper living spaces.

The fact that this hasn't been a bigger issue in the left blogosphere has quite frankly, pissed me off. But once again, labor concerns are often left on the back burner because the blogosphere is not largely populated with people who have to deal with them on a daily basis.

I wish I'd written more about this, other than when Hilda was announced. I've been Twittering action alerts and links to articles, but I should've done more.

You can help here by contacting your Senators. Or call their offices and make sure they know to support Hilda. This is indefensible.