From the AFL-CIO blog, violence-promoting labor chief Richard Trumka urged his fellow leftists to seize back power from the Tea Party movement and take back “control of the national conversation.”

Gloves off:

With the economy continuing to stagger and job creation not moving quickly, “working people are justifiably angry and frustrated” as they approach the Nov. 2 elections, says AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.

Trumka and Working America Executive Director Karen Nussbaum, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, Eric Alterman, journalist and senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, and moderator Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor and publisher of the Nation, led a panel discussion—Which Way for the Working Class? Elections 2010 and Beyond—Friday afternoon in New York City.

More than 400 people attended the event at the Great Hall at Cooper Union. Trumka said it is vital to channel working-class anger away from Fox News and Tea Party extremists who are delivering

a cynical, deeply dishonest and incoherent message—that big government is somehow to blame for the current crisis that the budget deficit will eat our children, and that illegal immigrants took all the good jobs.

However, he added, “The good news is they haven’t bought into right-wing ideology. They are just confused about who to blame.” But:

We have to offer working people something other than the dead-end choice between the failed agenda of greed and the voices of hate and division and violence…

…In the short term, said Trumka, the labor movement has to “recapture the moment and take control of the national conversation.” Building for the future,

we need to fundamentally restructure our economy and re-establish popular control over the private corporations which have distorted our economy and hijacked our government. That’s a long-term job, but one we should start now.