At the time, she was one of the officers in the teaching assistant's union at University of Wisconsin. The union was enough of a presence in the community that politicians would actively try to get the union's endorsement, so she told me of an evening when the union had a candidate's night, and all the local candidates showed up to try to get some support.
One such candidate made a then topical reference to a recent popular movie. "The United States -- it's like the Titanic. The Titanic was a big ship, a great ship, a powerful ship -- just a great ship."
He paused for effect, then continued. "But there are some people who want to turn that ship around!"