The mainstream news media in the USA is very curious. They can find the opportunity to display information regarding the �Tea-Party� activists with their anti-Obama irrationality with several thousand people coming to Washington, DC. They can give major attention to an anti-healthcare rally held the day after the recent elections. Yet in October the island and commonwealth of Puerto Rico witnessed demonstrations of somewhere between 150,000 � 200,000 people in response to budget cuts and massive layoffs.

To put things into perspective, the population of Puerto Rico in 2008 was approximately 3,954,037. If I did my math correctly, that means about 5% of Puerto Rico was in the streets on October 15th protesting the planned layoffs of 30,000 workers by Governor Luis Fortuno. Yet, how many of us had a clue that Puerto Rico was on the brink? In fact, how many of us knew that Puerto Rico has a 16.4% unemployment rate?

On one level there is nothing surprising here. Every time that I hear of Washington, DC referred to by statehood advocates as the �last colony of the USA�, I want to go for someone�s throat. Puerto Rico has been a colony of the USA since the Spanish-American War in 1898. A movement for autonomy and independence under the Spanish was cut short by the arrival of US troops removing Spain from its last colonies (along with Cuba) in the Western Hemisphere. Ever since 1898 the US government has kept Puerto Rico in a colonial status, suppressing independence forces but allowing it to have a peculiar commonwealth status through which it is neither a state nor an independent country.

US colonialism not only aborted efforts at independence but also undermined the Puerto Rican economy, among other things destroying the agriculture of the island. Instead of exporting food products, over time Puerto Rico came to be an importer of food. Economic colonialism encouraged several massive waves of Puerto Ricans to migrate to the US mainland in search of a better living, a pattern that would be replicated in the economic relationships that the USA came to have with other Latin American nations.

During most of the one hundred eleven years since the invasion of Puerto Rico, it has received very little attention in the mainstream US media. Not only the constant economic crises, but also political challenges that have been faced (including an uprising in the 1930s) are relatively unknown in the USA outside of Puerto Rican circles and those who follow developments on the island. In the mid 1990s a massive and historic union organizing effort took place among public sector workers in Puerto Rico, and even in the mainland union movement of the USA, little attention was given to this and its significance (and the lessons that could be drawn).

So, in one sense it is not surprising that little has been published or presented regarding the October 15th demonstrations. Despite the fact that Puerto Ricans are US citizens, developments on the island simply do not count in most mainstream US circles.

Yet the importance of these demonstrations cannot be overstated. In fact, the Puerto Rican labor movement and its allies are taking just the sorts of actions that workers on the mainland should be undertaking. In the face of draconian budget cuts, Puerto Rican workers have stood tall shaking the island to its core. Given the history of Puerto Rican worker militancy, it is unlikely that the Governor is assuming that the October 15th demonstrations are a one-shot deal.

In contrast, on the mainland the response to, first, the bailouts of Wall Street, et.al.-without-conditions, and, second, the deepening economic crisis, has been close to anemic. While there certainly has been anger and disgust�which right-wing populists have tapped�this has not translated into mass organizing and mobilizing by progressive forces. Organized labor which should be taking the lead has been reluctant to mobilize. And in the Black Freedom movement activity has not been particularly impressive either. While nicely worded statements have been issued by leaders from both organized labor and the Black Freedom Movement, there has not been a call-to-arms linked with real, practical, and organized action, whether mass demonstrations, the formation of unemployed councils, or even large, but local picket lines.

We should be paying more attention to Puerto Rico. In fact, we should have been paying attention to Puerto Rico for quite a while. I think that movements here on the mainland could learn a thing or two�or three.

BlackCommentator.com Executive Editor, Bill Fletcher, Jr., is a Senior Scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies, the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum and co-author of, Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice (University of California Press), which examines the crisis of organized labor in the USA. Click here to contact Mr. Fletcher.