The Washington Post treated President Obama's Detroit Labor Day rally to page A3 coverage, with a 19-paragraph September 6 story by staffer David Nakamura.
Controversial Teamsters president James P. Hoffa -- son of the late Jimmy Hoffa -- was quoted, but not the infamous "take these sons of bitches out" line that has been reported elsewhere.
Indeed, Nakamura aimed to paint the partisanship of the labor union rally in a positive light by comparing Obama to "give 'em Hell" Harry Truman's come-from-behind 1948 campaign:
At one point, Obama quoted a speech that Harry S. Truman gave in Detroit on Labor Day in 1948, in which he said that when labor thrives, so does the rest of the nation. The text was given to Obama aboard Air Force One by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), who said afterward that he wanted to give the president “a give-’em-hell kind of speech.”
Obama will need a strong turnout from labor supporters to help him win reelection in 2012, and Teamsters President James P. Hoffa urged the crowd to turn out at the polls in force.
“There is a war on workers and you see it everywhere,” Hoffa said. “You see it in unemployment, you see it in the tea party, in people who fight what we believe in. President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march and, President Obama, we want one thing: jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs.”
