People Before Profit blog

American Axle workers take cuts, hope to fight another day

Wed, 28 May 2008 07:30:00 +0000

Three decades of right-wing attacks on the labor and peoples movements have taken their toll but workers continue to fight back, winning some battles and losing others.

After three months out on the picket line, workers at American Axle voted May 22 to accept concessions and go back to work, hoping to save their jobs and their union for what they know will be more and perhaps bigger battles in the future.

American Axle CEO Dick Dauch made it known from the start that he wanted severe pay and benefit cuts in order to keep the company “competitive” and that he didn’t care if the workers had to suffer for it.

His own compensation over the last 10 years to the tune of $257 million and a 9 percent raise he received this year were apparently not seen by him as a problem. Company profits last year were $37 million.

The contract that was ratified slashes the wages of some workers by more than 50 percent, shuts down both the Detroit and Tonawanda, N.Y., forges in a layoff of 300 in Detroit and 470 in Tonowanda, and offers buyouts and buydowns.

For the 2,000 auto union members at Detroit Gear and Axle, production workers will see their wages cut from $28 an hour to $18.50 an hour and “non-production” workers will be cut to $14.35 an hour. The skilled trades will be slashed from $33 an hour to $26 an hour. There are also cuts in vacation time, holidays, shift premiums and break times, and increases in health care contributions.

New production hires will be paid $11.50 per hour and new skilled trade hires will get $22 an hour. These new workers will receive a 50 cent per hour wage hike every 26 weeks until they reach the full senior level pay.

Almost 800 workers at the Three Rivers plant in western Michigan will have their own separate contract with the lowest wages going down to $10 an hour. The company said that without the extra low wages there it would have shut down the plant. American Axle says that through attrition and buyouts it hopes, on top of the layoffs from plant closings, to cut its union work force by an additional 2,000 before the end of the year.

“It’s not a good agreement, but at this juncture it’s the best we could do,” said UAW President Ron Gettelfinger. He said he didn’t think a longer strike would have netted a better agreement.

Dublin confab would ban cluster bombs

Wed, 28 May 2008 07:04:00 +0000

New Yorker Mark Garlasco knew why he was in Dublin, Ireland representing Human Rights Watch. “I have seen cluster munitions used across the world,” he told Al Jazeera. “These are the types of weapons that should never be used. There is no way to use these weapons in a legal manner.”

Representatives from 100 nations were on hand for a meeting called by the Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC), slated to run from May 19 until May 30. Organizers expected the gathering to arrive at a definitive treaty banning the weapons, building upon a draft treaty devised at conferences in Lima, Peru and Wellington, New Zealand. They count on signing ceremonies taking place in Oslo on Dec. 2-3.

Negotiations initiated by Norway in February 2007 are unfolding outside the UN framework to avoid delays and vetoes. The process is modeled on the one leading up to the 1997 Ottawa Treaty signed now by 158 nations agreeing to outlaw anti-personnel landmines.

CMC activists say the use of cluster bombs delivering hundreds of bomblets over wide areas threatens civilians, not just military targets. Many remain unexploded, posing prolonged risks for civilians. Cluster bombs became the leading cause of casualties in Kosovo in 1999 and in Iraq in 2003. They have wounded or killed over 200 people in Lebanon since the end of Israeli-Hezbollah fighting in 2006.

Negotiators in Dublin are operating under rules requiring two-thirds majority approval of proposals to meld the present draft treaty with any alternative versions or to insert new proposals. Discussion so far has centered on technical considerations relating to definitions, storage, stockpile destruction and victim assistance.

Principal producers and stockpilers of cluster bombs — China, India, Pakistan, Israel, Russia and the United States — have stayed away. Other nations are pressing for exemptions having to do with categories of bombs and extended time allowances for dismantling arsenals and actually using cluster bombs. The majority of nations in attendance seek a total ban on cluster bomb use, production, transfer and stockpiling.

The gathering took encouragement from the addition of Great Britain to the ranks of abolitionist nations, announced May 21 by Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The day before the conference opened, Pope Benedict XVI called for eradication.

Protesters outside the U.S. embassy in Dublin on May 23 demanded that Washington hold off on pressuring other nations and impeding progress toward a ban. The Bush administration has threatened to bow out of peacekeeping and disaster relief operations on grounds that the treaty would “criminalize” military forces of dissenting nations at war with troops of treaty supporters.

Joining the demonstrators, U.S. Nobel Peace prize winner Jody Williams told Reuters, “I hate to see countries like Canada for example, the UK, France, Germany, Australia, who were leaders in the movement to ban landmines, doing the dirty work of the U.S.” She rejected the idea that UN-backed peacekeeping operations would be hurt by eradication of cluster bombs. atwhit @ roadrunner.com

Hold on to your seats in Redbelt

Thu, 22 May 2008 23:36:00 +0000

Don’t miss “Redbelt”. But, when you sit down in the theater, make sure you have a good seat belt (regardless of the color).

“Redbelt” is another David Mamet film that will excite and put you on the edge the entire time.

Granted, you have to like the Mamet style of film making, and in this instance, you have to have some interest in the philosophy of martial arts. The emphasis on maintaining martial art's original philosophy is what sets this film apart from others on the same subject.

Mamet's dialogue is very quick, repetitive and raw. Transitions between and within scenes are fast. You have to be very attentive. Some filmgoers will remember Mamet’s “House of Games” and the “Spanish Prisoner” films. He is a very unique filmmaker.

Turns out that Mamet is something of a martial arts fan and participant, and that is another aspect that makes this film all the more realistic.

The other part is the Brazilian/Japanese connection. This refers to the highest concentration of Japanese people outside of Japan itself, Sao Paolo, Brazil.

“Redbelt” is held together by the amazing acting performance of Chiwetel Ejiofar, an English actor of African descent who demonstrates a flawless California accent. Ejiofar did an incredible performance in “Pretty Dirty Things,” the gripping film about the unlawful international trading in human organs.

Most of the Mamet ensemble is back together again in this one, led by Joe Mantegna, Tim Allen and Rickey Jay. Another English actor, Emily Mortimer, plays a lawyer. Alice Braga plays Ejiofar’s Brazilian wife. Braga is the niece of the talented Brazilian actor, Sonia Braga.

This film will end up within the Academy Awards orbit. No question, Ejiofar will be high on the list.

Rebecca Pidgeon created the music for the film. The score and lyrics are an excellent mix of Brazilian lyrics and music with local sounds of California. Pidgeon also sings a couple of songs she wrote, including one with her husband, David Mamet.

Let the Oscar contest begin.

BOOK REVIEW

Wed, 21 May 2008 23:30:00 +0000

Bush vs. Chavez, Washington’s War on Venezuela By Eva Golinger

Building on her earlier book “Chavez Code” (Olive Branch Press, 2006), Eva Golinger has written “Bush vs. Chavez, Washington’s War on Venezuela,' (Monthly Review Press, 2008 160 pp., $15.95, paperback) a riveting, comprehensive rundown on continuing U.S. assaults against the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez. Golinger is a lawyer living in Venezuela who grew up and was educated in the United States.

Golinger’s new book, published by Monthly Review Press, promises to be an essential tool for anti-imperialist struggle. It covers U.S. preparations for undoing a targeted government.

Using de-classified documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act from U.S. agencies, Golinger used her first book to document U.S. funding and facilitation of the failed April 2002 coup that briefly removed President Chavez from office. “The Chavez Code” also covered the lockout and sabotage campaign paralyzing the state oil company later that year.

Golinger this time provides an update. She notes Washington’s creation of an Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) to support the oil strike and the anti-Chavez recall referendum of 2004. Golinger records U.S. diplomatic and media offensives against Venezuela, also internal subversion and military posturing. Again she relies upon released declassified documents, along with a variety of other sources and her own investigations.

The book follows the money trail. From 2001 on, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) distributed $1 million annually among anti-Chavez groups, dispensing $1 million more after the failed 2002 coup. The USAID budgeted over $2 million that year to nurture OTI support for the oil strike. Tracking money since then, Golinger shows that in 2003 NED and the OTI gave out $1 million and $5 million respectively, the combined totals reaching $27 million by early 2005. Funding exceeded $10 million in 2005-2007.

“Bush vs. Chavez” elucidates shifts U.S. strategy. Diplomatically, high Washington officials unleashed serious accusations. They also condemned Venezuela’s supposed military build-up and alleged recalcitrance in confronting drug traffickers. They charged the Chavez government with ties to nations cozy with terrorists. Golinger characterizes the anti-Venezuela international media campaign and internal distribution of anti-government literature, especially to military units, as manifestations of psychological warfare.

The book documents U.S. formation of a spy network along with exploitation of separatist tendencies in the oil rich state of Zulia. Zulian Governor Manuel Rosales, closely associated with former U.S. ambassador William Brownfield, ran against Chavez in the 2006 presidential contest. In 2001 under NATO auspices, the U.S. military launched Plan Balboa, a barely fictitious military exercise carried out in Spain involving an invasion seemingly of Venezuela through Zulia by U.S. troops.

Lastly, Golinger highlights U.S. military threats against Venezuela, direct and tangential. Among them were the Colombian paramilitary infiltration across the Venezuelan border, paramilitary training camps in Florida, and a major amphibian assault exercise in 2005 on the Dutch island of Curacao, located off Venezuela’s northern coast. The following year Curacao saw a growing presence of U.S. military personnel and U.S. companies. Renewed military exercises involved an airplane carrier, other warships, 85 planes, and 7000 troops.

The State Department has published an essay, according to Golinger, proposing that Curacao plus the nearby islands of Bonaire and Aruba form a new geopolitical border for the United States.

Pointing out that her nation is far from alone in receiving unwelcome U.S. attention, Eva Golinger reminded a Venezuelan radio audience April 24 that U.S. operatives in Bolivia have dispensed $129 million since 2005 to opponents of President Evo Morales.

One quibble regarding this useful, well-executed book is that the title, highlighting personalities, gives short shrift to broader forces engaged in the drama. For more information about Eva Golinger and her books, see www.venezuelafoia and www.chavezcode.com.

This week in labor

Wed, 21 May 2008 01:31:00 +0000

Bush abandons safety regs

The Bush administration continues, on all fronts, to abandon enforcement of job safety and health standards. Recent Congressional hearings shed light on the administration’s almost total disregard of ergonomic injuries. The lax attitude was displayed in testimony by Labor Secretary Elaine Chao who tried on May 7 to defend the administration’s budget proposals for enforcement of rules to prevent ergonomic injuries, widely seen as totally inadequate.

Chao told Sen. Tom Harkins (D-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Labor Appropriations subcommittee, that 700 workplaces were inspected last year for ergonomic injuries. Harkins countered that Occupational Safety and Health Administration records show that only 449 inspections had been done. Government records indicate, however, that there were 375,540 ergonomic injuries last year. These injuries include musculoskeletal disorders that develop from repetitive motions, lifting, turning and hauling.

NLRB nominee withdrawn

The Bush administration has withdrawn its nomination of management lawyer Robert Battista, former National Labor Relations Board chairman, to a new five-year term on the board. Unions celebrated the withdrawal after having lobbied hard to urge senators to turn down the nomination. Under Battista’s five year reign the NLRB, established to protect workers, instead became known for a series of rulings that restricted workers’ organizing rights and eased penalties for employers who violated labor law.

Jobless benefits added

In a challenge to the GOP, the Democratic-run Senate Appropriations Committee passed a measure extending federal jobless benefits to 39 weeks in most states – and 52 in a few – up from the present 26 weeks. The panel added the benefits, and money to pay for them, to Bush’s Iraq War funding bill.

Auto worker victory in Virginia

By a 93-7 percent margin, UAW represented workers at the Volvo trucks plant in New River, Va., ratified a new three-year contract. The union represents 2,600 workers who were on strike for seven weeks. The contract gives each worker a $2000 lump sum payment in its first year and 2 percent raises in each following year. It also features better vision and hearing benefits and protected recall rights for workers should there be any layoffs.

Better deal for state workers

By a 524-147 margin on May 3, convention delegates of the previously unaffiliated State Employees Association of North Carolina voted to merge into the Service Employees, SEIU has announced. The state association became SEIU Local 2008 which represents 55,000 North Carolina state workers in one of the least unionized states in the United States.North Carolina workers lag far behind national averages in pay (35th), health care (45th) and pension benefits (30th), SEIU said.

AFL-CIO backs Guatemalans

The AFL-CIO and six Guatemalan unions formally protested workers’ rights violations to a panel established under the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) to hear such cases. The panel, though, has no power to enforce any remedies. In their April 23 complaint the U.S. labor federation and the Guatemalan unions said workers are being left unprotected. Union workers in Guatemala are being systematically harassed, intimidated, assaulted, raped and even murdered, the unions charge.

jwojcik @ pww.org

Separatism threatens left gains in Latin America

Tue, 20 May 2008 19:44:00 +0000

The approval of autonomy by voters in Bolivia’s Santa Cruz department on May 4 stimulated legislators from the right wing New Time Party in Venezuela’s oil rich Zulia state to propose a commission to study the feasibility of separate status there.

Broadcasting to the nation on his weekly television program, President Hugo Chavez warned that separatist agitation could spread beyond Zulia to other western border states. He likened the prospect of a unified Venezuelan separatist movement to its counterpart active in the “half moon” area of eastern Bolivia. That’s the location of Santa Cruz and three other departments.

Characterizing regional and local elections scheduled in November as “the most important in Venezuelan history,” Chavez invoked unity as a “vaccine” against separatism. He has condemned the United States for “articulating, planning, financing, and promoting this divisive, secessionist, and counter revolutionary process.” The CIA, he suggests, is active in promoting separatist referenda.

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa agrees with Chavez. “What is happening in Bolivia is not an isolated development,” he stated. Correa denounced “foreign countries that want to destabilize the region [by] financing groups to create problems for progressive governments” and “Balkanize” Latin America. He cited the 2006 founding in Guayaquil, Ecuador of an International Confederation for Regional Freedom and Autonomy.

President Chavez has implicated the organization and its wealthy backers in separatist schemes throughout Latin America. “They are directing a secessionist crusade in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Guatemala [and] Venezuela” — financed, he adds, in North America. In Venezuela, the group Zulia’s Own Course pioneered separatism in that state. After legislators called for an autonomy commission, spokesperson Alberto Mansueti told reporters, “We want liberalism, the right to compete and the duty to withstand competition.” A separate Zulia would privatize production, end trade barriers, lower taxes and participate in international markets.

Zulia’s Governor Manuel Rosales, long a leader of the autonomy cause, opposed President Chavez in the 2006 presidential elections, losing decisively as the candidate of a rightwing electoral alliance. He had been a confidante of U.S. ambassador William Brownfield before Brownfield’s transfer to the U.S. embassy in Colombia. Zulia is known in U.S. defense circles as the site of a mock invasion of Venezuela staged during NATO military exercises in 2001.

As defense against separatist dissent, Chavez can rely on continuing overall public approval. A national poll conducted in late May by the Venezuelan Data Analysis Institute showed 68.8 percent of Venezuelans holding a positive view of his presidency with 28.2 percent regarding it negatively. Almost half of those polled held a more favorable view of Chavez this year than last; 37.2 percent thought worse of him.

Retired General Alberto Müller Rojas, currently vice president of the Unified Venezuelan Socialist Party, casts separatists as “the most extremist and radical sectors of the Venezuelan Right.” He suggested the possibility of prosecuting them for treason or harm to Venezuelan stability.

Opinion: Thoughts about Israel at 60

Sat, 17 May 2008 09:18:00 +0000

Feelings about the state of Israel occupy a broad spectrum of world opinion, from adoring admiration in some quarters to hate veering into outright anti-Semitism from some others. As an expression of the 19th- and 20th-century Jewish national emancipation movement, Israel has achieved what its founders dreamed of — a country like any other, with all the attributes, positive and negative.

Benefiting from ample U.S. aid, Israel has enjoyed unparalleled success at integrating and assimilating a majority immigrant population from all corners of the globe, many arriving as destitute refugees. Israel has revived the ancient Hebrew language and made it sing anew not only on the street and in the classroom but in world-class literature and film. Its artists and musicians are known internationally. Israel has a highly developed economy for a country with such a small population (about 7 million), and is a leader in medicine, agronomy and high-tech industries. Its per capita income of $33,000 ranks among the world’s highest.

Celebrations of Israel’s 60th anniversary have been muted, however, and seem more obligatory than ecstatic. Massive divides characterize Israel today. A fifth of Israel’s people live below the poverty line. One in three Israeli children suffers from “food insecurity,” i.e., hunger. At the same time that the social safety net has failed, particularly for the ultra-religious and immigrants of color, a class of billionaire plutocrats has arisen whose political influence is profoundly corrupting. A chasm likewise looms between the largely secular population and the religious minority that by historic convention holds not only the swing vote in government, but also regulatory authority over all life cycle ritual from conversion to marriage, death and burial.

The world hardly needs reminding, too, of the enormous gap between Jews and Israel’s Palestinian citizens (Muslim, Druze, Bedouin, and Christian), who number some 20 percent of the population. Israel at 60 seems a long way from honoring the promise made in its ringing Declaration of Independence in 1948: “complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex,” and further, “freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture.”

The single most corrupting factor in Israeli life today is the occupation of Palestinian lands in the West Bank. Taken as war booty in 1967, these territories are increasingly being settled by Israelis in a movement toward expanding Israel’s borders that no other nation finds in concordance with international law. A constant assault on Palestinian pride, the occupation is a powerful impediment to the emergence of a viable Palestinian state. Sadly, two generations now of service in an occupying army, with all the degradation and humiliation that implies toward the native population, have created in too many Israelis an arrogant, chauvinist mentality that ill serves the ideal of peaceful resolution of contentious problems. For all its sophistication and prosperity, Israel is living in a virtual ghetto amidst its Middle Eastern surroundings.

Numerous proposals for solving the Arab-Israeli conflict have been offered. There is by now near-universal agreement that sooner or later a Palestinian state will have to emerge on the West Bank and in Gaza, the Israeli settlers will have to move back to Israel proper behind a mutually adjusted 1967 Green Line, and the city of Jerusalem will serve as capital of both the Israeli and Palestinian states. Compensation will be made for the forfeiture of settler homes, and acknowledgment made of Palestinian losses in the war of 1948 that accompanied Israel’s independence.

A one-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian predicament may seem equitable on its face, but a miniscule percentage of Israelis or Palestinians actively seeks such a state. Israel is here to stay, and given a 2,000-year history of exile and oppression, most Jews will not abandon their national homeland. And most Palestinians would rather control their own government, institutions and land. Utopian proposals at this moment in time are illusory and counterproductive.

Most Jews in Israel and elsewhere support a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, and would negotiate with anyone to achieve it. Indeed, such an outcome is essential to Israel’s very survival. How many more generations of war, violence, occupation and global displeasure can the country take? Already, more than a million Israelis have bailed out by emigrating with their talents and families. For the sake of the Israeli and the Palestinian peoples, as much as for peace itself, our elected officials and the incoming U.S. president must devote everything it takes to bring about a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East.

Ari Goldman is active in the progressive Jewish American movement.

Fourth Fleet threatens peace and democracy in Latin America

Wed, 14 May 2008 14:06:00 +0000

Latin American leaders have been critical of the Bush administration plan to reestablish the U.S. Fourth Fleet which will, according to a Department of Defense press release, operate “in the Caribbean, and Central and South America.” The Fourth Fleet, originally established in 1943 during World War II to patrol and protect maritime traffic from the Nazis, was disbanded in 1950. The new Fourth Fleet will become operational on July 1, 2008, with aircraft, aircraft carriers, war ships and submarines.

In his weekly column “Fidel’s Reflexions” the former Cuban president, Fidel Castro, noted that the U.S. Navy has fleets “deployed the western Atlantic, eastern Pacific, the Middle East, the Mediterranean, eastern Atlantic and western Pacific. All that was lacking was the Fourth Fleet so that it could watch over all the waters of the world.”

Quoting from the DoD press release which said the mission of the fleet was to combat terrorism, drug trafficking and other activities, Castro added, “and to send a message to Venezuela and the rest of the region” which has been electing left-wing governments opposed to U.S. hegemony in the Americas.

The DoD says the reestablishment is also “to demonstrate U.S. commitment to regional partners.” The United States’ biggest military partner in Latin America is Colombia which receives over $750 million in military aid, up from $86.6 million received ten years ago, according to the Center for International Policy's Colombia Program. The right-wing government of Colombia under the presidency of Álvaro Uribe almost plunged the region into a military conflict when he ordered the invasion of Ecuadorian territory to kill a leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia on a humanitarian prisoner exchange mission. The Bush administration supported the violation of Ecuador’s territory by Colombian forces and it has been reported that Colombia had technological support from the U.S. base in Manta, Ecuador. Alejandro Sánchez, an analyst with the think-tank Council on Hemispheric Affairs, agrees with Castro. In a recent interview with the French daily, Le Figaro, Sánchez said, “the reestablishment of the Fourth Fleet is more a political than a military move” motivated by the election of “left governments in the region.” Bolivia’s President Evo Morales and Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez both said in separate interviews that they see the reestablishment of the Fourth Fleet as a new sign of aggression towards their governments, and others, in the region.

Morales has accused the U.S. government of interfering in the internal affairs of Bolivia through its diplomatic cadre and helping to instigate a secessionist attempt by capitalists and landowners in various departments (states). Leaders of various Latin American governments have publicly announced that they support the territorial integrity of Bolivia and would not support secession.

Chávez said that Venezuela is going ahead with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's plan for a South American Defense Council, a military self-defense pact which would exclude the U.S. The Bush administration’s aggressive posture towards Venezuela’s Bolivarian government, including support for the two-day coup of 2002, has moved the Chávez government to buy Russian submarines for its defense. This diverts oil profits the country uses from social needs programs to the military.

Socorro Gomes, president of the World Peace Council, condemned the establishment of the Fourth Fleet. She said this action “poses a severe threat to peace, security and sovereignty to all peoples and nations of Latin America.” She added that the fleet together with military and naval exercises in the region “are part of the United States’ imperialism and war policy.”

Corruption, social debt rule in Colombia

Wed, 14 May 2008 14:01:00 +0000

Contradictory behavior could signify a regime in trouble. Colombian armed forces killed Raul Reyes in Ecuador on March 1, along with 24 others. That ended the present prospect for prisoner exchanges between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the Colombian government. Reyes had served as the principal FARC negotiator.

Through Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe accused Jaime Caicedo, Secretary General of the Communist Party, Carlos Lozano, editor of the Communist weekly Voz, former presidential candidate Alvaro Leyva, and liberal Senator Piedad Cordoba of terrorist leanings. As evidence, Santos cited communications allegedly taken from Reyes’ laptop. Lozano, Leyva, and Cordoba are known as activists working toward humanitarian exchange, Cordoba having served with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as facilitator.

But on May 2, Uribe reopened the possibility of humanitarian exchange by authorizing Lozano and Leyva to contact FARC leaders. In the process he credentialed a Communist as a worthy participant in Colombia’s struggle for peace — an exception to the prevailing cold war standards of Colombian politics. President Uribe may be acting to shore up Colombia’s waning international reputation. In late April French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner came to Colombia to secure a commitment from Uribe to arrange the release of former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, a dual French-Colombian citizen and a FARC hostage for six years. European Union Foreign Relations Director Eneko Landáburu scolded Uribe in Bogota on May 13 because of “concern about the internal political situation” in Colombia, citing human rights abuses and undue paramilitary influence within the government.

Almost 70 members of Congress are being investigated for money-charged deals with rightwing military enforcers; 32 of them are in jail. Paramilitaries have sought political cover in exchange for support for candidates, especially during Uribe’s reelection campaign in 2006. Testimony is circulating from former representative Yidis Medina who refused a bribe from high Uribe officials. Mayors, municipal councilors, governors and former parliamentarians face like accusations.

To avoid arrest on charges of mobilizing paramilitaries to support Uribe’s presidential candidacy in 2002, former Senate head Mario Uribe, the president’s cousin, recently sought and was refused sanctuary in the Costa Rican Embassy. Before a parliamentary Commission of Accusations on April 29, President Uribe charged former Supreme Court President César Valencia Copete with engineering a coup. The retired judge had publicized Uribe’s demand that he free Mario Uribe. Alvaro Uribe proposed a new “Super Court” to process accusations against government officials.

On April 27, Miami’s Nuevo Herald published allegations from former paramilitary Francisco Villalba that as governor of Antioquia, Alvaro Uribe and brother Santiago helped finance, plan, and celebrate a paramilitary attack on Oct. 25, 1997 in El Aro, that killed 15 peasants and displaced 900. Jailed paramilitary capos testified that Uribe and Vice President Francisco Santos encouraged the formation of a “capital [paramilitary] block” for Bogota. Crisis in Colombia has other faces. Allegations are rife that in addition to Chiquita Brands, other banana growers paid off paramilitary groups, among them Uniban, Proban, DelMonte and Suninsa. Medellin Special Attorney Alicia Dominguez indicated earlier this month that indictments are on the way against ten Chiquita Brands executives. The U.S. government last year fined Chiquita $25 million for transferring $1.7 million to terrorists, but shied away from identifying corporation decision-makers.

Colombia’s government accuses Ecuador and Colombia of complicity with terrorists, citing information derived from computers seized after the murder of Raul Reyes. Uribe’s supporters “are putting it out now as a smoke screen to cover up the parapolitical scandal,” explains Piedad Cordoba. The charges have echoes in the United States — a prelude, say analysts, to Washington’s designation of Venezuela as a terrorist nation.

Writing on the Pacocol web site, Luis Jairo Ramirez suggested that “Today’s politics of democratic security is obsolete.” (The expression “democratic security” refers to the Colombian manifestation of Washington’s Plan Colombia, conduit of almost $5 billion in military aid over seven years.) “Generalized corruption, innumerable obstacles for a humanitarian agreement [for prisoner exchanges], and enormous military expenses are breaking social expectations in health, education, and employment,” Ramirez added. He continued, “The mounting agrarian crisis and permanent hostility toward neighboring countries lays bare the regime of social insecurity and militarization that drains the country.” atwhit@ roadrunner.com

Fidel and biofuel

Wed, 14 May 2008 09:16:00 +0000

In all the news reports about food costs, shortages, and riots, don’t expect the corporate media to remind you that it was none other than Fidel Castro who foresaw these events over one year ago.

You may recall in the April 5, 2007 issue, People’s Weekly World ran an article by Fidel headlined “Millions face early death from hunger, thirst” in which the Cuban leader sounded the alarm about the coming food crisis.

Condemning what he called “the sinister idea of converting food into fuel,” Fidel correctly predicted that capitalism’s relentless quest for fuel would take food out of the mouths of the hungry.

Fidel considered this threat to humanity so serious that it was the topic of the first and second articles he wrote after undergoing surgery in 2006. When they appeared in the Cuban newspaper Granma last year, US media attention was focused not on the content of his articles but rather on the fact that their publication suggested Fidel was alive despite characteristic American propaganda to the contrary.

Now, after months of rising food prices and spontaneous mass demonstrations around the world, even the IMF warns that hundreds of thousands face starvation and the World Bank projects 100 million people in poor countries could be propelled deeper into poverty. These twin capitalist institutions held an emergency joint meeting in April to “tackle” the issue. Their response to the global food crisis was a promise of more loans to farmers in so-called developing countries. In double-speak befitting an agent of imperialism, World Bank head Robert Zoellick offered: “We have to put our money where our mouth is now that we can put food into hungry mouths.”

The IMF/World Bank meeting was triggered by what the media has termed “food riots” around the world, including Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Egypt, Ethiopia, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, the Philippines, Senegal, Somalia, Uzbekistan, and Yemen. The incredibly rapid and dramatic increase in the costs of basic staples has driven poor people into the streets to demand relief. The price of rice, for instance, has risen more than 40 percent since Fidel’s warning.

Experts mention various factors causing this food crisis – such as bad weather and growing demand – but the recent drive by the Bush administration to convert food into fuel is the chief culprit. In an article titled “How the rich starved the world” published in the New Statesman, British environmentalist Mark Lynas argues: “The irony is extraordinary. At a time when world leaders are expressing grave concern about diminishing food stocks and a coming global food crisis, [the US] government brings into force measures to increase the use of biofuels – a policy that will further increase food prices, and further worsen the plight of the world’s poor.”

As an example, Lyans continues: “American cars now burn enough corn to cover all the import needs of the 82 nations classed by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation as ‘low-income food-deficit countries.’ There could scarcely be a better way to starve the poor.”

In a world where one billion people live on less than one dollar a day, how can we justify growing food to fuel cars rather than feed humanity? Again, in a recent installment of “Reflections of Fidel,” the Cuban leader blames American imperialism for imposing “a civilization that depends on the consumption of hydrocarbons, where every individual member of a family moves around in automobiles which travel almost empty, [and] the nefarious idea of turning foodstuffs into fuel.”

Fidel’s prediction last year that US schemes to convert food into fuel would lead to global hunger not only reminds us as communists that his analytical mind remains sharp, but reinforces our understanding of Marxism as a science which allows critical and accurate examination of events and trends in this capitalist world.

Society's bullets

Wed, 14 May 2008 09:13:00 +0000

NEW YORK – Although the police pointed the guns that killed Sean Bell and wounded two of his companions, it is the society that put the bullets in the guns.

It is a society that believes young African descendant men are inherently dangerous; that their fathers abandon them and don’t care; that their mothers are punitive. In other words, the society learns that African American families are violence prone – that it is in the DNA. Daniel Moynihan, in his famous Report on the Negro Family as pathological unit, gave ammunition to all manner of public entities to do what they will to our families.

We live in a violent society, born of violence, that makes the victim of violence the enemy. Witness how the indigenous peoples who were invaded by foreigners, were portrayed in our school books and TV shows, when they fought back against their removal and the destruction of their culture. This violent society conversely sees itself as kind and benevolent, spreading human rights around the world. The most brutal of acts, the death penalty, is now delivered in what is considered a kinder, gently method, lethal injection, rather than electrocution.

We named our invasion into Iraq, a people who have done nothing to us, as “Shock and Awe,” believing they would be grateful to us, even though they never asked us, for getting rid of their leader even if we had to kill tens of thousands of their people to do it. The belief that we could perpetrate violence and would be thanked for it, speaks to the duality of the American mindset.

The New York City Police Department is the oldest (1841) and the largest (over 30,000), in the nation. Marilynn S. Johnson, in her book, “Street Justice: A History of Police Violence in New York City,” states that the objects of such violence were those who were perceived (and usually are) powerless: the poor, new immigrants, the working class, and always and continuously, because of and despite of class, African American males. Who was poor or immigrant or working class could and did change, but African descendants were always in their sightlines.

The police are neither the lawmakers or the lawgivers but the law enforcers. They enforce what we tell them to enforce. They are the employees of the society – its security guards. The police do not prevent crime, as we would like to believe. They investigate crimes already committed. The instructions they are explicit and implicit. It is understood (and implied) that law and order means keeping certain neighborhoods under surveillance.

Police, in some areas, are given arrest quotas, which means go looking for wrongdoing. It is about the quantity not the quality of the arrests. In NYC it is prohibited to smoke in the subways, but many smokers light up as soon as they come out of the station. Many young African descendant men have received tickets for lighting up near the top of the stairs leading to the street (but not others). Almost all African and Hispanic men, and some women (myself included), can tell a story of being harassed for no other reason than walking down the street (or driving a car; or doing their job; or walking in a neighborhood that is considered not their own).

In some of the conversations around the acquittal of the three detectives who fired off 50 shots, killing one and wounding two, when no crime was being committed, and no provocation going on, many people have said that they think African descendant men are seen as expendable. Yes and no. Yes, in that in our society young African descendant men are seen as a threat, but it is not a physical threat (or not only), but, let me go ahead and say it - a sexual threat. and no, because the society depends on the image of the “black sheep.”

We live in a society that has to have at all times an enemy as a way of identifying itself. A “black sheep,” (scapegoat), at-large, as in a family, plays the role of the one who is the placeholder of the units pathology. A designated “black sheep” (one is always designated-there is not evil gene), allows the rest of the family, the community, the country, to feel that if not for that one, we would be (happy; wealthy, satisfied) have whatever it is we think we are lacking. In this country it is almost literal that the “black sheep” is called Black and the ones who consider themselves good call themselves white.

The shooting of Sean Bell and his companions, and the acquittal of the police department, needs to be laid directly at the feet of the Mayor. It is the Mayor who appoints the Police Commissioner and from whom the Commissioner gets his marching orders. The city and the country needs to be put on notice that we are not having it. We have to take charge of what is happening and going to happen to us. We cannot wait for the courts to decide what is best for us. They have shown what they think in in our best interests and the society’s best interests, and they are not the same thing.

Temporary worker program blocked by Congressional Hispanic Caucus

Wed, 14 May 2008 08:07:00 +0000

The all-Democratic Congressional Hispanic Caucus, which includes 17 Latino members of Congress, has dug in its heels in an effort to bring relief to undocumented workers and their families who are currently being subjected to immigration raids. But in return, it is becoming the target of heavy pressure from the hotel, resort, seafood and other industries. Last fall, the leadership of the Caucus developed a strategy to create leverage for progress on immigration reform. Concluding that the full package of “comprehensive immigration reform” was not achievable until the Democrats increased their congressional majority and replaced Bush in the White House, the Caucus decided to narrow its focus to measures that would undo the harm being done everyday by the immigration raids and other enforcement procedures ordered by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. So the Caucus tentatively adopted a proposal from grassroots immigrants’ rights activists to provide provisional, renewable five-year visas for most undocumented immigrants now living and working in the United States.

This measure, they believed, would blunt the repressive anti-immigrant offensive, and give everybody breathing space until after the elections. Then the plan for comprehensive reform, involving a path to citizenship and other things, could be taken up in a friendlier environment for immigrants.

Even such a modest measure, however, could not pass unless there was a trade-off with a portion of the Republicans and the business interests they represent. There aren't enough Democratic votes pass the measure in both the House and Senate, and to override a possible presidential veto.

What do the Republicans want to get out of immigration legislation? Some Republicans have as their main objective the expansion of guest worker programs to provide cheap, easily controlled labor for certain industries. Others are more focused on increasing repression against immigrants as a means of permitting them to pose demagogically as defenders of our country against “foreign invaders.” All of them want to undercut organized labor.

Rather than offering the Republicans new concessions in either of these areas, the Hispanic Caucus decided on a strategy to block any new legislation controlling immigration or authorizing guest worker programs, unless it was part of a package that would authorize the five-year provisional visas for undocumented workers and their families.

On a related matter, something strange has been happening with existing H2B seasonal guest worker programs. While Congress originally authorized these programs for specific numbers of people, the Bush administration forgot to count how many individual workers it was letting in, and let far more come into the country than Congress had authorized. This exacerbated the tendency for certain labor intensive industries, especially those with seasonal hiring patterns, to become dependent on guest workers to the exclusion of other possible sources of labor. Landscaping, gardening, seafood processing and summer resort industries were particularly eager to soak up the extra short-term workers. When it was suddenly discovered that far more guest workers had been let in than authorized, employers successfully pressured Congress to allow the extra numbers to come back the following year.

The current cap on H2B seasonal workers is 66,000 per year – half for the summer and half for the winter. The “special dispensation” that applied until this year allowed workers who had come here for the past three years to come back without being counted against the 66,000 limit. This more than doubled the number of H2B workers available to these employers. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus latched onto this situation to get leverage for its five-year provisional visa plan. Caucus members worked to bottle up requests for renewal of the “accidental extra” guest worker slots as a means of pressuring for action on the undocumented workers’ rights issue.

The industries that expected to be able to use the extra guest workers set up a howl. They heaped abuse on the Hispanic Caucus members and Caucus Chair Joe Baca (D-Calif.) for harming essential American industries and, what is more, being cruel to hard working immigrants who really need these jobs! Earlier this year, President Bush pitched in by proposing a whole new guest worker plan with even fewer worker guarantees than the existing ones.

Guest worker plans have a history of outrageous abuses against workers’ rights, and are categorically opposed by most of organized labor, including the AFL-CIO. Hispanic Caucus Chair Baca makes clear, however, that he is not absolutely opposed to all such programs. His stance is simply that it makes no sense to be throwing thousands of undocumented workers out of this country, and creating immense hardship for their families and communities in the process, while also bringing in thousands of new guest workers, sometimes from the same countries to which the undocumented are being deported.

Congressional Republicans and Democrats and others from areas where businesses use a lot of H2B guest workers have been pushing for the passage of legislation to expand the seasonal hiring programs. Whether the efforts of the Hispanic Caucus can hold up to this pressure remains to be seen.

Violence and capitalism: Workers correspondence

Wed, 14 May 2008 07:58:00 +0000

One section of the Declaration of Independence states that 'all men [and women] are created equal,' but does that statement reflect reality? How many times have I heard the mantra: “Pull yourself up by your own boot straps. If you want it bad enough you can get it.'

There are many examples both past and present where individuals were able to overcome all obstacles in pursuit of some personal goal or life-long dream. Whether it was poverty, racism or a less than ideal home environment, some were still able to overcome. But what of all the others?

Without a stable, loving, nurturing home environment the chances of success diminish dramatically. Now comes scientific research presented by neuroscientists at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. They found that “many children growing up in very poor families with low social status experience unhealthy levels of stress hormones, which impair their neural development.” The effect is to impair language development and memory – and hence the ability to escape poverty for the rest of the child’s life. Even pregnant mothers living in a stressful environment create stress hormones in their blood that damage the neural development of their unborn. Over exposure to TV programs both banal and violent affect regions of the brain that are reinforced or diminished by what an individual sees or does not see. Similarly computers and the games played on them, while offering more stimulation through hand and eye coordination, the effect is the same.

As an example of capitalism’s never-ending quest for the next big money maker, a friend of mine gave me an article with a picture of two individuals engaged in the event of Ultimate Fighting. As most of us know, almost anything goes in the effort to get your opponent to cry “uncle.” This violence desensitizing event would be bad enough if the participants were adults, but no these were two eight-year olds! So far only Missouri has sanctioned these events with such young participants.

What may I ask do all these examples have in common and what does the future hold for many of these individuals? Will it be a minimum wage job, the military or prison? While there is a conscious effort being made to under educate many of our young people, leaving them woefully unprepared for the jobs of the 21st century, while the proliferation of violent video games not only desensitizes many of our young people to violence both at home and abroad, but creates an environment and situations which have negative influences on the young and developing brain. The effects of this policy are starting to be revealed. A startling statistic showing the makeup of our all 'volunteer' military gives some insight.

Never before has the physically stretched military accepted recruits from the bottom 20 percentile of educational achievement, waived criminal records, or accepted individuals convicted of a felony to join the ranks of the officer class. The latest statistics available show an increase of over 100% in the recruitment of people with criminal convictions from 249 in 2006 to 511 in 2007.

The efforts to replenish the ranks of the dead and wounded has resulted in the lowest percentage ever of recruits who are high school graduates. It seems that only those whose other options were limited, were motivated by a false sense of patriotism, or were promised educational opportunities not affordable at home were sucked into the pentagon meat grinder of the Iraqi war.

Not only are we giving deadly weapons to individuals who should not have them, but what of the aftermath? Those who survive come back less than whole both physically and mentally to an administration that does all in its power to deny these veterans all the medical and financial benefits they deserve. Trying to integrate these damaged individuals into society would be a difficult task under the best of circumstances but lack of treatment, suicides, foreclosures and bankruptcies tell a different story. Why are our veterans who gave so much in this horrendous war being treated this way? WAR IS HELL!

All indications are that a Democratic administration will have to deal with the prompt and orderly removal of ALL the military, military contractors and the bases they occupy. Once that is accomplished and a government is elected by the people and not selected by the United States huge sums of money need to be given to rebuild their country to pre war levels with a sincere apology from the next president given to the Iraqi people for all the death and destruction caused by Bush and his neocons.

Sanctuary cities protest ICE actions

Tue, 13 May 2008 06:41:00 +0000

SAN FRANCISCO — In an outraged response to ICE raids just days after immigrant rights supporters filled the streets on May Day, labor, faith groups, students and community members rallied around the area last week.

On May 5, hundreds gathered outside the San Francisco headquarters of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to protest the agency’s raids at restaurants operated by El Balazo taqueria chain in several Bay Area cities. During the May 2 raids, 63 workers were detained. Most were released that day pending immigration hearings.

State Senator Carole Migden (D-San Francisco), representatives of other elected officials, clergy from many denominations and labor leaders joined immigrant rights advocates in the noontime rally.

“We marched on May 1, and then they came after us,” San Francisco Labor Council head Tim Paulson told the crowd. “This cannot happen in San Francisco, in California, anywhere in the United States!” he declared. Paulson pledged the continuing support of labor in San Francisco and the East Bay “to fight this injustice in our community.”

Protestant, Catholic and Jewish faith leaders held aloft a symbolic shelter, a canopy “open on all four sides” so that “all people may come in and be welcome within the circle,” before conducting a ceremonial purification of the ICE headquarters. “Our prayer is that God will remove your hearts of stone and replace them with hearts of flesh, ready for mercy and compassion,” one faith leader said, as others prepared to sprinkle the building’s entrance with holy water. The religious leaders also called for immigration laws to be “transformed” so they are “worthy of enforcement.”

As “sanctuary cities” that have pledged to welcome all immigrants and not to cooperate with ICE raids, the San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley communities have been especially angered by the ICE actions.

Elected officials including Oakland Mayor Ronald Dellums raced to the scene May 6 after ICE agents were reported near an East Oakland elementary school campus. Similar reports in Berkeley drew a like response from city officials.

Although it turned out agents had not entered the school grounds as rumored, the school warned parents that ICE was in the neighborhood, and teachers kept their students in classrooms until an authorized person could pick them up.

Two days later, some 80 students at Oakland High School held a lunchtime march and rally outside the school to protest ICE’s actions.

“Who are we to say you can’t be here?” said student Eric Valley. “People could leave their home countries because of war, because of bad economic conditions. They come here thinking America is safe. If this is the land of the free, why can’t people come here?” he added.

“Little kids shouldn’t have to carry ID, little kids are just trying to get an education,” said junior Rosa Perez. While she hadn’t heard of students experiencing raids at their homes, she said, “We’re afraid that will happen; that’s why we’re here.”

Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), whose district spans Oakland and Berkeley, issued a statement saying ICE’s presence near the schools violates “the sanctity of the education process, and is intentionally meant to intimidate those who live in the community.” She said she plans a district outreach event “to hear directly from my constituents about their experiences with agency officials.”

mbechtel @pww.org

What is RSS?

Sat, 10 May 2008 01:30:00 +0000

What is RSS? Watch this video from Common Craft and find out:

House orders feds to move on explosive dust hazards

Wed, 07 May 2008 13:55:00 +0000

In March, Tammy Miser told Congress how her brother Shawn cried out, “I’m in a world of hurt,” as he begged her to take him off life support. Five years earlier Shawn Boone was lying on a floor in a plant that made aluminum wheels, his body smoldering, as the aluminum dust burned through his flesh, then his muscles and finally his internal organs.

In February, a month before Tammy spoke to the lawmakers, 13 workers died similar slow and painful deaths when a sugar refinery in Georgia exploded. Superheated sugar flowed like lava, melting steel frames as the sugar dust burned through the bodies of the workers. For the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA), whose members were hand-picked by the Bush administration, all this was not enough to make them act.

On April 30 the Congress of the United States took action when the House ordered OSHA to write standards requiring companies to curb explosive workplace dust and to prescribe severe penalties for those who violate the standards. 21 Republicans joined 226 Democrats to give the bill a 247-165 vote majority.

The Congress approved the measure on recommendation from the House Education and Labor Committee, which heard Tammy Miser’s testimony in March. At the time, Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), called OSHA’s failure to act “ridiculous” and vowed to push for legislation forcing the agency to act. The committee then drafted HR-5522, the bill that Congress has approved.

Miller derided OSHA for saying it needed more time to investigate. “Everyone already knows what caused the explosion at the Imperial Sugar plant and at the other places,” he declared, adding, “the problem here is that OSHA relies on voluntary agreements with industry and we see that is just not good enough. Workers cannot be asked to wait any longer for these basic protections. OSHA must be forced to act.”

He said that there were 281 combustible dust explosions between 1980 and 2005 that killed 119 workers, injured 718 others and extensively damaged industrial facilities and that the recent tragedy at the Imperial sugar plant in Georgia underlined the reality of the danger for workers and required immediate action from OSHA.

Miller said that OSHA has failed to act after it has known for years about the dangers of combustible dust at workplaces. He said mandatory OSHA standards are the only way workers are going to get the protection they need.

The bill now goes to the Senate.

Jobs with Justice conference calls for working class unity

Wed, 07 May 2008 06:31:00 +0000

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- While the positive work of the Jobs with Justice (JwJ) network were evident at their National Conference May 2-4 in Providence, R.I., new trends were also evident. The organization that was founded by five large industrial unions in 1987 has continued to grow and fulfill its original purpose of reaching outside to assist the union movement. It has also taken on more general tasks of organizing the entire working class both in America and abroad.

Executive Director Sarita Gupta announced proudly that the group had exceeded its goal of tripling its activist data base, and that 45 active coalitions now belonged directly to the network. Each coalition includes unions, churches, community groups, civil rights organizations, and occupation groups not easily incorporated into the legal and traditional structures of unions. Some chapters have been organized in Brazil and other countries. There is an affiliated student organization called the “student labor action project (SLAP).”

Domestic workers, independent taxi drivers, day laborers, security guards, former prisoners, mobile home owners, tenants, imported immigrant construction workers, and other hard-to-organize groups now look to Jobs with Justice and its associated networks for help in organizing. Their confidence is rewarded with success after success, as explained by speakers at the conference. At the same time, the organization’s commitment to organized labor continues, as shown by its commitment to national health care, fair trade laws, and the right to organize as codified in the Employee Free Choice Act. One JwJ goal is to gather 1 million signed commitments for this vital American legislation.

Jobs with Justice is a tax deductible (code 501c3) organization, and thus cannot endorse or support political candidates, but a number of workshop leaders pointed out that a fundamental change in the government is needed to accomplish the many goals of organized labor and working people.

Gupta took note of the giant upsurge in American political activism, which she referred to as a “sea change.”

Internationalism was evident throughout the conference. A raffle was conducted to benefit Colombians, and a large group of “guest” workers from India took the stage to explain their militant fight to make American contractors live up to their promises. The men and women from India had already marched from New Orleans, where they were brought as cheap labor for hurricane Katrina disaster clean-up, to Washington DC. They announced that they would begin fasting for justice on May 14. The Jobs with Justice Education Fund is conducting a world-wide fight for living wages that includes worker correspondents and cooperating organizations in Asian nations.

The first speaker introduced at the first plenary session set off a pattern for wildly enthusiastic responses that lasted through the entire event. When International Longshore Workers Union (ILWU) Organizing Director Peter Olney announced that his union had shut down West Coast ports on May 1 to oppose the Mid-East war, 1,000 American activists rose to shout, applaud, and shake their fists in solidarity. Olney said that government leaders viewed the ILWU action as if it had been an “act of defiance.” “Of course it was an act of defiance!” he told the wildly enthusiastic supporters.

Hardly any sector of the world working class, hardly any concern of workers, was overlooked during the two-day conference.

A new major strategic planning process to meet the needs of the new situation was emphasized throughout with a resounding call for unity and solidarity to meet the shifting challenges mounted by the power elite. There could be no doubt whose side JwJ is on.

Not only has JwJ proven itself a powerful force that is completely on the side of working people, but it is clearly expanding its activities to include the entire working class at home and abroad. Not since the disastrous ideological diversion of the Congress of Industrial Organizations during the Cold War has America seen this level of commitment within our American working class!

Jobs with Justice leaders reject any description of their organization as one that primarily studies and talks. They are nothing if not an activist organization, and they demonstrated it with a major march of a diverse crowd of about 2,000 from the conference hotel to the Rhode Island state capitol, where they demanded fair treatment for state workers. Chants included, “People come first!” The speakers pointed out that the state of Rhode Island is operating at a $450 million deficit and the “economy is going belly up.” The speakers noted that 29 states are operating at a deficit now.

The clear demand was to invest in the community instead of the prisons and military.

Janet Valencia of the Tucson JwJ chapter described her experience at the march as “I thought it was very powerful, moving and inspirational to be part of such a large sea of humanity. It made me realize the power the working class could have to bring about change in our government. It was very moving to see all the unions represented – firefighters on Harleys, a huge 18 wheeler with the Teamsters sign and logo on it, AFSCME, faith based groups and students. It was like a celebration of the power we have together in unity to achieve the demands to advance the working class.”

At a workshop on “Low-wage Workers Organizing! Workers’ Centers,” one of the panelists began his short address in Spanish with the familiar slogan “Workers of the world, unite!”

A workshop moderated by Nick Unger of AFL-CIO clarified tactics to maximize unity in the fight for health care. He suggested that the 2008 election is more than just picking the pilot to fly the plane, it is about picking which direction the plane is going. He pointed out the importance of talking to people about their concerns rather than trying to dictate to them their concerns in organizing efforts. He was clear that the people in power will try to divide us and we need to strive for unity and set aside sectarian differences in order to win. He declared, “If they can’t hear it, don’t say it!”

“Immigrant rights: Defending workers’ rights by fighting ICE raids and “no match” was another workshop which emphasized the importance of working-class solidarity in fighting vicious right-wing anti-immigrant forces. Panelists told horrifying stories of lives shattered by the ICE raids, but also pointed out the public relations disaster which has resulted from the outrageous, unconstitutional attacks. They also spoke of the importance of an international response to the brutality of the anti-immigrant forces. Margarita Alvarez, of Voces de inmigrantes (Voices of immigrants) and Dallas JwJ, pointed out that immigrants should not be confused with criminals and should have a right to live in dignity and “to eat and and sleep in peace.” She declared, “the U.S. belongs to Americans and it doesn’t matter what country you come from.”

There was also a workshop titled “Stop the war and fund public services! Making the case for a peaceful, worker-centered economy.” Paul Bigman of Washington JwJ pointed out that the Iraq war has been used as another excuse for union busting here in the U.S. and in Iraq as well. He noted the war has also been used to justify the attacks against immigrants.

Stewart Acuff, Organizing Director, AFL-CIO and member of the National Jobs with Justice Board stressed unity in an inspiring discussion of the labor movement. He said, “We live in a country that values individualism. How do we struggle for collective action?” He clarified, “We confuse our institutions with our movement. A movement is made up of humanity engaged in common struggle and common vision. Our labor movement includes all who struggle for worker power. It is all of our struggle! The movement does not recognize national boundaries. The movement is all of us.”

Matt Howard of the Iraq Veterans against the War and a participant in the Winter Soldier project reminded us of Smedley Butler, who was one of the most decorated marines in the history of the United States who wrote the book, “War is a racket.” In it Butler concluded his own war exploits made him merely a “gangster for capitalism.”

Steven Valencia from the Tucson JwJ summed up his feelings on the conference experience saying “It was a wonderful conference. It was so good to be around so many activists and people that want to make this country and the world a better place. They embraced the idea that another world is possible and the urgency that was expressed that another world is necessary. I think there has been a real shift in the intensity of the coalition and its content on the issue of the global transnational oppression and our response to it. The conference was full of hope, unity and a new, heightened sense of purpose and at the core of this shift is the multiracial, multicultural, male and female, younger and older struggles that are being fought wherever capitalist oppression is intense.”

Temple University workers demand a fair contract

Wed, 07 May 2008 00:09:00 +0000

PHILADELPHIA--A boisterous crowd of some 500 members of AFSCME Local 1723 and their supporters rallied on the Temple University campus here on May 1 in a noon time action to protest the university’s stalling tactics. The local represents office and professional workers at Temple; they have been working without a contract since September.

Gathering at the Bell Tower in the center of campus, the demonstrators marched down Broad Street to the steps of Conwell Hall outside the office of the university’s first year president, Ann Weaver Hart. Spirited chants of “No Merit Pay” and “the workers united will never be defeated” echoed off the campus buildings. Merit pay has been the main demand of the university administration and, along with healthcare costs, the main stumbling block to a settlement. Local president Paul Dannenfelser drew shouts of agreement when he told the crowd, “We cannot have merit pay at this university; we cannot have the kind of healthcare costs they are demanding.”

Also speaking at the rally were AFSCME international president Gerald McEntee and District Council 47 president Cathy Scott. McEntee told the crowd that, on the issue of merit pay, “We cannot and will not back down; it is bad for workers, bad for students and ultimately will be bad for Temple.” Scott said that “Local 1723 does not intend to be the guinea pigs for all the other workers at Temple.”

Other speakers who addressed the rally included Art Hochner, president of the AFT local representing the 1,250 strong Temple faculty; Andrew Dixon of the graduate student union TUGSA, also an AFT affiliate; and Kathy Black, president of the Philadelphia chapter of the Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW). Black told the crowd “Merit pay has been disgraced time and time again; I cannot believe they are trying to ram it down your throats this time.” She also acknowledged that “Local 1723 has been the strongest supporter of women rights among all the unions in the city.”

A May Day rally where it all began

Tue, 06 May 2008 23:37:00 +0000

CHICAGO--The bonds between the organized labor movement and immigrant rights groups were evident here at a May 1 rally at the Haymarket Square memorial in the West Loop. While thousands gathered in Union Park for a mass march and May Day rally at Federal Plaza members of numerous unions, led by this city’s Central Labor Council, began their observance of the international workers’ holiday at the exact spot in this city where it all began.

The 4-year-old monument on Des Plaines Avenue between Lake and Randolph Streets stands where, in 1886, eight labor activists, standing atop a wagon, urged an eight-hour workday. Their convictions and the execution of some of them after a police attack on their rally stirred millions around the world to declare May 1 as International Workers Day.

Jorge Mujica, an electricians union organizer and community activist who worked hard to organize the big march and rally downtown said he wanted to come first to the gathering at the Haymarket Memorial to emphasize the link between the struggles of organized labor and the struggles of immigrant workers.

“Unions have organized and put out fliers and called upon people to march today,” he declared. “They are building a united effort of labor unions and immigrant workers – they are uniting all workers.”

The same theme was echoed by others at the Haymarket event. Ramon Becerra, the president of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, said, “unions understand that immigrant workers are workers and that we all swim together or else we all sink together.” Becerra said that “employers hire undocumented workers because they know they can really exploit them and when you have one group that you can exploit extra hard then you can better keep everyone else under your thumb.” He praised the labor movement for taking the approach that all workers, regardless of immigration status, should be represented. “Its simple – one for all and all for one,” he said.

Jorge Acosta, who attended the rally, is not a member of a union. He works as a day laborer doing landscaping in Chicago’s northwest suburbs. “You are like a nobody when you don’t have a union,” he said. “I’ve been fired for no reason at all because they can do whatever they want with you. With a union you can at least feel like a human being.”

Joe Baulkis, a Teamster who works for UPS on the city’s south side, said, “We need to overhaul labor law so that it is easier for everyone to have a union. We need the Employee Free Choice Act, so that a majority in favor of a union can get one – no more phony elections manipulated by the bosses. We also need health insurance for everyone.” Baulkis said the 2008 elections were important, for these reasons. “The first step is to throw the Republicans out of the White House and the Congress.”

Larry Spivack, president of the Illinois Labor History Society, also spoke. His group led the successful struggle to build the memorial at Haymarket Square. He praised efforts by labor and others to re-claim May Day for American workers who, he said, “inspired this holiday – the most widely celebrated holiday in the world.”

The memorial, during its short history, has been the site of some incredibly moving events. One such event occurred when two leaders of Iraq’s labor movement placed a plaque at the site last June 23 as U.S. union leaders looked on.

During that ceremony Faleh Abood Umara, general secretary of the 26,000-member Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions, said, “This touches me deeply because in Iraq today, as in America then, workers are killed just for trying to make a living.”

The plaque reads, in Arabic and English, “May the bonds of international labor solidarity help us all in our struggles for justice, peace, democracy and workers’ rights.”

The irony of union leaders coming from Iraq, where the Bush administration says it is fighting for freedom, to the United States to support the struggle for democracy at American workplaces, was not lost on U.S. union leaders gathered at that Haymarket Square event. Cynthia Rodriguez, representing the Service Employees International Union, said at that time, “Our fight is your fight – we can’t let Bush privatize your oil, just as we can’t let Bush privatize the public trust in this country.”

'USA vs. Al-Arian' stirs demands to free jailed teacher

Tue, 06 May 2008 11:38:00 +0000

TAMPA, Fla. — Prof. Melva Underbakke has been crisscrossing the country showing “USA vs. Al-Arian,” a prizewinning film about the ordeal of former University of South Florida professor Sami al-Arian. He has been in jail now for more than five years, despite a Tampa jury verdict finding him innocent of “terrorism” charges trumped up by the Justice Department.

Underbakke and other members of the Tampa-based Friends of Human Rights showed the film once again during her brief return home to Tampa May 2. “It’s outrageous that he is still in prison,” Underbakke told the audience. She said she was on her way to Knoxville, Tenn., Louisville, Ky., St. Louis, various locations in Iowa and Fayettevllle, Ark., the next week to show the film at churches, community centers and college campuses.

Another Friends of Human Rights activist, Lois Price, said, “I always believed that Sami was innocent. I have friends who were in his classes at USF who praised him as such a good, dedicated teacher, concerned about them as people.”

Al-Arian was targeted by the Bush administration, she said, because he is such a passionate defender of the rights of the Palestinian people. “He feels this is not just about him. There are hundreds of others being held in prison,” she said. “He’s standing up for the rights of all Americans.”

Jesse Kern, a veteran peace and justice activist in the Tampa Bay area, said, “I spent 42 days at the trial. I heard all about the government’s intercept of hundreds of thousands of al-Arian’s telephone calls and e-mails going all the way back to 1994. They spent $60 million. Yet the jury said ‘not guilty’ on eight counts and did not convict on the remaining nine counts. Why is he still in jail? It was part of the Bush administration’s buildup to the war in Iraq.”

The film records the tearful, joyous celebration by the al-Arian family and their supporters at a Tampa mosque after the verdict was announced Dec. 6, 2005.

In the film, heartbreak follows when al-Arian’s wife, Nahla, and five children learn that he will not be freed. In a flagrant abuse of judicial power, Judge James Moody and the Justice Department ignored the jury’s verdict and have refused to release Al-Arian. On Feb. 26, 2006, Al-Arian accepted a plea agreement acknowledging he helped a Palestinian man with immigration issues in exchange for a promise that all other charges would be dropped. He would serve a short sentence and then would be deported. But in May 2006, Judge Moody ignored the government recommendation and gave Al-Arian the maximum sentence.

In October 2006, Assistant U.S. Attorney Gorden Kromberg of Virginia issued a subpoena ordering Al-Arian to appear before a third grand jury. Al-Arian refused on grounds the suboena violates the plea agreement. Federa Judge Geral Lee then cited Al-Arian for 'criminal contempt.'

Yet the 52-minute movie by Norwegian filmmaker Line Halvorsen is having an impact despite a near-total blackout by the corporate media.

On May 1, al-Arian was moved from the segregation unit to the general prison population at Hampton Roads Regional Prison in Virginia. The small but important victory was the result of thousands of letters and e-mails to the Justice Department mobilized in part by the film.

Another factor is al-Arian’s repeated hunger strikes, the most recent a 57-day fast he suspended April 28 after losing 40 pounds.

Al-Arian still faces a sentence of five to ten years if convicted on the contempt charge.

To sign a petition demanding that Sami al-Arian be freed, or to learn more about the film and the al-Arian case, visit www.freesamialarian.com.

greenerpastures21212 @ yahoo.com This article was updated on 5/27/08 with more accurate information.