I can’t believe my term as Retired Chapter Member-at-Large is almost over. We’ve achieved much together and it was an honor serving the Retiree Chapter in this way. Don’t forget to vote in the General Election to be held Monday, May 5 and Tuesday, May 6 here at the Union Hall. The polls will be open from 6 AM to 6 PM both days. Retirees can vote for Executive Board Members which includes the Retired Chapter Executive Board Member-at-Large. The Retired Chapter Executive Board Member-at-Large is a very important position because it is the Retirees’ voice on the Executive Board. Please be sure to vote.

My first term as Retiree Chairman is coming to a close. I hope I have done some little something in remembrance of Charlie Holt that has touched you in some small way. I love all of you in a very special way. Thank you so much for electing me, Don Kiser, Retiree Chairman; Irv Jackson, Co-Chairman; Norm Richards, Recording Secretary; Andy Lukas, Financial Secretary and John Boyd, Sergeant-At-Arms of the Retiree Chapter at our last Retiree’s Meeting to serve you for three more years.

Our banquet is on May 21, 2008 and it will be held at the Union Hall. Tickets are $5 for each member. Each member is allowed two tickets at that price. Additional tickets will be $25 each. Tickets must be purchased prior to the banquet. If you do not have a ticket you will not get in for this banquet. This will be enforced 100 percent. Only four hundred tickets will be sold for this event. Just think all of this snow that I am looking at now will be gone.

Being on this job, you are involved in losing your follow Brothers and Sisters. My great friend Jerry Reynolds recently passed. We worked together 35 years and retired together. He always helped at our meetings by serving beverages. He did a really great job, and we will miss Jerry. May God bless all of our Brothers and Sisters who have passed away. We lost Joyce Cantrell who I worked with on the 6 cylinder head assembly. Mary Ann and Charlotte worked with her also. She was a great, wonderful person. I just received more bad news. Lou, Calvin Lewis’ wife, passed away. I knew her from the 8 cylinder line in Plant #1. She had a fantastic personality. It’s not going to be easy, Calvin. More losses are Donna Shaffer from Plant #1 and Phillip Phugic who worked in the crank line for many years. Doc Ellensworth, Larson Wener, Bernard Root and Powers will not be forgotten.

Workers in the plant and retirees may bring all aluminum cans to the Charles T. Holt Room (the Retiree’s room) or to my office. All profits go to the retiree fund. We appreciate any contribution you can make.

We will have our raise by the first week of June, and it will be retroactive to October. I don’t know which is worse, the snow or the gas prices. If you have been shopping lately, you know everything is going sky high. A way to save is to plan your shopping trips to do them all at one time. This might save $5 or $10 that you might need to make up for all the losses we are taking.

Many of us have felt the economic crunch of today’s increased cost of living. May I ask you how you feel about this? May I ask you when you feel it will improve? Does it ever feel like the America YOU knew growing up and worked in is being sold to other countries, right out from under your feet? Well, I’m not surprised you feel that way. I feel the same thing myself. Home foreclosures are at record highs. Utility prices continue to go up. Gasoline prices are going off the charts, and I’m sure all of you have given thoughts of buying bicycles to get around, or maybe some other cheap transportation, scooters, etc. Does this sound ridiculous to any of you? Does any of this sound like the America we never thought we’d see? Well, it’s all true, isn’t it? The price of gas that we continue to get gouged with will most likely get worse before it gets better. Foreign countries seem to be having a field day with profits, and we seem to be paying for their laughter and their high life. How did it get this way? Maybe we need to take a good, long look at our political system and the people running our government. Ask yourself, what kind of American leader would allow this? What kind of real American leader would allow contracts such as NAFTA to bring our living standards so low, that proud Americans cannot find jobs, buy homes or educate their children the way we would like them to be educated. Ask yourself why have any of us allowed this to happen? Have we failed, or are we the victims of bad policies in Washington, D.C.? I for one feel the fight is not completely lost yet. I still believe in the American way of life, and I don’t mean hot dogs and playing baseball. I think we all need to find a way to contact our representatives, be it State, Local or Federal. These are the people that are supposed to be listening and working for you. What they do hear is YOUR voice speaking out. Their job is to do what WE WANT, not what foreign countries want us to do. If our politicians aren’t listening to us, there is something drastically wrong in this country. If that’s the case, it’s time to TELL them we DON’T like it. I would like all of you to make an attempt to contact someone in your State or Federal offices to make them aware that the retired generation does care what’s going on in this country because we’re still Americans living in America, and we don’t like what’s happening here. We want someone to make things right. Our cars have gone to foreign auto builders, our product are no longer made here and you cannot purchase anything today without reading a tag or identification that states it was made overseas. When will our government WAKE UP and understand THIS IS ENOUGH ALREADY. There is no fair trade here, who are they kidding?

Now without sounding like a Presidential candidate, I would just like to pass along this fact. If we, as good Americans, don’t care any longer how this country is run, or if our children find jobs, or whether they can find security in this nation and live in harmony then don’t bother writing or contacting anyone. If you do care, make an effort, an honest effort, to so something for your America. Do it for your kids, do it for yourself and do it for future generations that need you to speak up. If you own a computer go to your government web sites and look up your representative and write to them. This isn’t that hard to do. You can also write the old fashioned way with paper and pen. Almost every website has mailing addresses for your representative. Don’t be so lazy, ask someone to find them for you. I’m sure they will. Let’s do something for America besides letting it go to the dogs. America is crying out for your help. Are you going to let her down, or throw her a life line? The time to give back is here, and unless you do something for America, then don’t complain when your gas gauge reaches empty, and you can’t fill it anymore. Start walking, and then start writing. Here’s a list of just some of the people you can write to. Let’s start something.

As I go further down the years, I see more and more things that Brother Charlie Holt taught me. I miss him and love him and like always I like to say, “Good night Charlie Holt. I know you will always be looking down on us.”

Don Kiser
Retiree Chairman