Vol. 77/No. 41      November 18, 2013

Supporters of the Militant in Miami and across the U.S. are hitting the streets to catch up after falling behind in the fall subscription and books campaign.

“To turn this around we needed to get out of the cellar,” Dutrow said. “Earlier we could maybe get one team out during the week, so this is a real step-up. We’re also staying out longer at every sale.”

All the experience of subscription teams shows that interest in a revolutionary working-class explanation for the deepening crisis of capitalism and thirst for discussion about what we can do to fight to defend ourselves is stunningly high. Organization of a real, sustained campaign is what has been lacking.

Miami is one of the areas where supporters have taken special steps to get back on schedule, organizing target weeks, stepping up the number of sales, staying out longer and appealing to new readers to join in the effort.

The drive is built around taking the paper and revolutionary books from Pathfinder Press on special offer with a subscription to workers’ doorsteps, picket lines and political events.

“We had our best weekend yet, selling 11 subscriptions going door to door, one renewal and one to a longshore worker at their hiring hall,” Dutrow said.

This was the final weekend to campaign for Tom Baumann, Socialist Workers Party candidate for mayor of Miami in the Nov. 5 election. Enrique Rodríguez, a campaign supporter active in the Cuban-American Alianza Martiana, joined Baumann and Craine Nov. 3 campaigning in the working-class neighborhood of Allapattah. They sold four subscriptions on one block.

“It was very fruitful,” Rodríguez said, after joining the campaign for the first time. “It taught me a lot, working in favor of the most oppressed classes.”

Rodríguez also came to the social wrapping up the campaign Tuesday night along with two of Baumann’s neighbors.

“On Saturday [Nov. 9] we’re doing a morning team to the longshoremen’s hiring hall and another team is going north to the sugarcane fields to meet agricultural workers,” Dutrow said.

Supporters in Washington, D.C., adopted a goal of selling 90 subscriptions and sold twice as many last week than in the two previous weeks.

“While we are still behind, the momentum is shifting,” said Paul Pederson. “We sold four subscriptions at a rally of taxi cab drivers. Going door to door we met a grocery store worker, who told us about a contract dispute and invited us to stop by a store where they would be leafleting. We did and two workers got subscriptions.”

A Militant subscriber joined in an evening door-to-door team for the first time and helped lead the effort, Pederson said. The team sold three subscriptions. He works at McDonald’s and is part of the fight among fast-food workers to increase the minimum wage.

Topping the scoreboard is subscriptions to prisoners. Two inmates renewed and two new ones signed up in the last week, reaching seven out of a goal of 15.

Philadelphia is also on target. The key is to stay on schedule each week, reported Janet Post. One of the new subscribers is Titus Edwards, a part-time worker for United Parcel Service, who they met Nov. 2 on his doorstep in the working-class neighborhood of Overbrook.

“He told us he had passed his test to be a truck driver, but now they say he needs eye surgery to drive,” Post said. “Of course, he doesn’t have health insurance to get that.”

Edwards was attracted to a working-class paper and expressed special interest in the front-page article on the protests against the cop killing of Andy López in Santa Rosa, Calif.

Lincoln, Neb., has been at the top of the scoreboard since the beginning of the drive. “For us it’s steady as you go, consistently following up for renewals and getting back to people who are interested,” said Joe Swanson.

“Last weekend we went to a conference organized by a food co-op that a subscriber told us about. A couple days later we visited with a person we met there. He got a subscription and The Working Class and the Transformation of Learning,” one of nine books on special offer along with a subscription (see ad below).

In Sydney, Australia, Rebecca Pinkstone bought Women in Cuba: The Making of a Revolution Within the Revolution when she renewed for a year at a Nov. 3 abortion rights rally with 100 participants, reported Ron Poulsen.

Send reports and photos on the progress to catch up by Monday morning. Be sure to include sales of books in your reports.
 
 
Related articles:
Fall ‘Militant’ subscription campaign Oct. 12 – Dec. 10 (week 3)
 
 
 
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