In New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania, no musician has more respect and more moral authority among white working men than Bruce Springsteen. For thirty-five years he has written songs about the lives of ordinary people struggling to maintain their self-respect in the face of factory closings and a changing economy. When Springsteen plays Philly, he can sell out six shows in minutes. So, his endorsement of Barack Obama means something here. It might mean more than the endorsements of Governor Ed Rendell and Senator Bob Casey.
Dear Friends and Fans:
LIke most of you, I’ve been following the campaign and I have now seen and heard enough to know where I stand. Senator Obama, in my view, is head and shoulders above the rest.
He has the depth, the reflectiveness, and the resilience to be our next President. He speaks to the America I’ve envisioned in my music for the past 35 years, a generous nation with a citizenry willing to tackle nuanced and complex problems, a country that’s interested in its collective destiny and in the potential of its gathered spirit. A place where “…nobody crowds you, and nobody goes it alone.”
At the moment, critics have tried to diminish Senator Obama through the exaggeration of certain of his comments and relationships. While these matters are worthy of some discussion, they have been ripped out of the context and fabric of the man’s life and vision, so well described in his excellent book, Dreams of My Father, often in order to distract us from discussing the real issues: war and peace, the fight for economic and racial justice, reaffirming our Constitution, and the protection and enhancement of our environment.
After the terrible damage done over the past eight years, a great American reclamation project needs to be undertaken. I believe that Senator Obama is the best candidate to lead that project and to lead us into the 21st Century with a renewed sense of moral purpose and of ourselves as Americans.
Over here on E Street, we’re proud to support Obama for President.
Bruce Springsteen
For all those people that used to work at places like Bethlehem Steel, they know Bruce speaks for them. In the haunting 1978 album Darkness at the Edge of Town, Springsteen sang about the grind of life in these struggling Steel Towns.
Factory
Early in the morning factory whistle blows,
Man rises from bed and puts on his clothes,
Man takes his lunch, walks out in the morning light,
It’s the working, the working, just the working life.Through the mansions of fear, through the mansions of pain,
I see my daddy walking through them factory gates in the rain,
Factory takes his hearing, factory gives him life,
The working, the working, just the working life.End of the day, factory whistle cries,
Men walk through these gates with death in their eyes.
And you just better believe, boy,
somebody’s gonna get hurt tonight,
It’s the working, the working, just the working life.
In other songs like Working on the Highway, My Hometown, and Johnny 99, Springsteen has anthemized the plight of working men. And he is dearly loved for it.
In what is really a description of himself, Springsteen sings of the Ghost of Tom Joad from the Grapes of Wrath:
Now Tom said “Mom, wherever there’s a cop beatin’ a guy
Wherever a hungry newborn baby cries
Where there’s a fight ‘gainst the blood and hatred in the air
Look for me Mom I’ll be there
Wherever there’s somebody fightin’ for a place to stand
Or decent job or a helpin’ hand
Wherever somebody’s strugglin’ to be free
Look in their eyes Mom you’ll see me.”The highway is alive tonight
But nobody’s kiddin’ nobody about where it goes
I’m sittin’ downhere in the campfire light
With the ghost of old Tom Joad
I grew up in Jersey where Springsteen is king. But he’s just as big of a legend in the closed-down Steel Towns of the Lehigh Valley, and pretty much anywhere where blue collar workers have struggled against globalization and lost jobs.
