People Before Profit blog

Hotel workers seek industry-wide contract

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 03:12:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES — By an overwhelming 83 percent vote, 2,000 hotel workers here voted Sept. 15 to authorize their union to call a strike if needed. The Local 11 UNITE HERE members joined fellow unionists in San Francisco and Washington, D.C., who also voted to authorize the strike by comparable margins.

Besides wages, working conditions, health care, pensions and workloads, winning a common contract expiration date in 2006 is a key issue, said Local 11 President Maria Elena Durazo. “The strike authorization is necessary to give leverage against the hotels which will lock out all union workers if a strike is called on just one hotel,” Durazo added. “The workers are fed up because they work from paycheck to paycheck.”

In an apparent attempt to divide the newly merged unions, UNITE and HERE, the Wilshire Grand Hotel locked out 17 laundry workers, some with up to 30 years on the job, the day after the strike vote. The locked-out workers belong to UNITE Local 52. Local 11 has filed a complaint against the Wilshire Grand Hotel with National Labor Relations Board for locking out the workers. Union activists say the Wilshire Grand is trying to force the local to the bargaining table to accept a five-year contract instead of the new two-year national contract that would give the union the strength it needs to bargain fairly against the mega-billionaire transnational hotel bosses and consortiums.

Workers at two hotels managed by Starwood — the St. Regis and the Westin Century Plaza — do not get their mandatory meal and rest breaks because of “nonstop” work schedules and staff shortages, according to a suit filed by the union.

The Los Angeles County Federation of Labor AFL-CIO has called on working families and community and religious allies to intensify support to hotel workers. The County Fed charges that “the Hotel Council has threatened workers with a potential lockout or strike, terminated a contract extension, suspended union dues deduction, declared impasse with numerous issues on the table, and signed a lockout pact.”

Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., 3,500 workers in 14 hotels were standing by, nervous but determined, awaiting the word to walk out. They haven’t just been following the progress of negotiations, they’ve been in them. “We have completely opened up the negotiating process,” UNITE HERE Local 25 Executive Secretary Treasurer John Boardman told the World. Boardman says 1,900 workers have attended at least one bargaining session.

At the huge Omni Shoreham Hotel in D.C., sparks were flying at a union conference of women electrical workers when participants heard how the workloads of the housekeepers, doormen, and wait staff of the hotel in which they were meeting have increased so much that 42 percent report having to work through breaks to get their required work done. The 200 conferees spontaneously collected $1,200 for the sister union’s hardship fund. If the union goes out on strike, the women’s donation will fund medical benefits for two pregnancies the fund has been tracking, Boardman said.

Back at the Omni, which was booked solid, a reporter asked Howell, a doorman who has been attending the bargaining sessions religiously, how the hotel’s 800 beds would get made if the workers walk. Howell shrugged his shoulders, but smiled.

The author can be reached at kelsdrumr@webtv.net. Roberta Wood contributed to this story.

Anthony Toney, painter, educator, activist

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 03:07:00 +0000

Anthony Toney, a noted New York painter whose career spanned 70 years, died Sept. 10 in Marin County, Calif., at 91.

At the height of his career, Toney exhibited regularly in New York, taught classes throughout the New York area, published two books on painting and drawing and completed several large murals for Syracuse University.

Born in 1913 to Syrian immigrants in Gloversville, N.Y., young Toney helped his father run his small grocery. At first planning to go to trade school after high school graduation, Toney, the class valedictorian, received the school’s math prize and instead enrolled at Syracuse. He graduated in 1934 and returned to Gloversville and painted murals under the auspices of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). He went to Paris to study in 1937.

The advance of fascism was a frightening and ominous specter for Toney and many other progressives. When General Francisco Franco moved against the democratic government of Spain, Toney joined the U.S. Abraham Lincoln Brigade and fought with other volunteers against fascism.

Severely wounded in the Battle of Gandesa, Toney eventually returned to the U.S. in 1939 and resumed his artistic career in New York City. He worked again for the WPA and presented his first one-man show at the Wakefield Gallery (NYC) in 1941.

With America’s entry into World War II, Toney shipped out to the South Pacific as a flight engineer with a troop carrier squadron of the Air Force. At the end of the war, awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and other honors, he returned to his life as an artist.

In his second one-man show, in 1948, The New York Times characterized Toney as “essentially an abstract painter, (who) utilizes a variety of painting approaches in uniting the ever-widening circle of ideas emanating from his central subject matter. ... Toney has established himself as a painter of unusual capability and real scope.”

In 1947, Toney married Edna Greenfield, an actress and playwright. On the GI bill, he pursued his graduate studies and received a doctorate in Fine Arts and Education in 1955. He taught at the New School of Social Research in New York City for 40 years.

Toney remained a political activist throughout his life, opposing the Vietnam War, the nuclear arms race, and repression at home and abroad. His paintings often reflected his struggles for a saner world.

In the spring of 2003, the College of Marin hosted a retrospective of his work as had City College of San Francisco in 1998. Toney’s works are in the collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art, Indiana Fine Arts Center, The Chrysler Museum at Norfolk, University of Illinois, New Britain Museum (Connecticut), and at Ohio Wesleyan, Columbia, Brandeis, Rutgers, and Syracuse universities and in other collections, public and private.

Edna Toney died in 1993. Toney is survived by his sister, Margaret Toney of Gloversville, his daughter Anita Toney of Fairfax and her family, and his daughter, Adele Toney of Syracuse, N.Y.

Banned church play finds larger audience

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 02:58:00 +0000

CHICAGO — When Delle Chatman, artist and writer turned graduate theology student, wrote “The Answer,” to be performed at St. Gertrude’s Catholic Church Oct. 1-3, she was hoping to start a dialogue between disparate groups about one of the most polarizing subjects of our time: abortion.

“I wanted to tell a story in which a political leader and his family were made to straddle an issue with their personal lives sizzling on a public griddle. Abortion is tearing the country and more than one denomination apart right now, and seems to be the moral arena in which common ground most desperately needs to be found, but, boy, is that proving hard to pull off,” said Chatman.

But when pastor William Kenneally got a call from Bishop Francis J. Kane forbidding the production a month into rehearsals, parishioners were left wondering if it was the play’s content or politics that promulgated the ban.

“It was decided that this was just not something that should be held in a church at a Catholic parish,” said archdiocese spokesperson Jim Dwyer. However, when Kenneally met with the bishop and his deans the next day to discuss the matter, he was told that it couldn’t be performed in the church’s social hall either.

When contacted by the World, Dwyer clarified, “It could give the wrong impression that there is an ambiguity about being pro-life. The Church is not ambiguous about being pro-life.”

The flap began when the conservative Catholic Citizens of Illinois posted the press release for the play on their web site, asking members to bombard the archdiocese with complaints.

The effort quickly grew when other fringe conservative political groups on the web, such as the ultra-right Free Republic, jumped on the bandwagon. Kenneally was told that the complaints had reached a critical level.

At issue was the play’s complex storyline inspired by today’s headlines: A Catholic Democrat is denied communion after supporting pro-choice legislation and watches his re-election campaign lead evaporate after it is revealed by a reporter that his own daughter had an abortion when in college. The revelation costs him core voters and unearths a painful division in his family.

Democratic contender John Kerry and other Catholic Democrats have taken hits from a handful of bishops that have threatened to deny communion to politicians who support pro-choice legislation.

Some bishops, coming dangerously close to subjugating separation of church and state laws, have even claimed that a vote for such a politician would be sinful. Chatman’s play asks the most provocative question of any political campaign: “Can a vote be a sin?”

The Chicago Archdiocese could have taken a cue from the inspiring words of Pope Paul VI when he said, “It would be a disgrace if our dialogue were marked by arrogance, the use of bared words or offensive bitterness. What gives it its authority is the fact that it affirms the truth, shares with others the gifts of charity, is itself an example of virtue, avoids peremptory language, makes no demands. It is peaceful, has no use for extreme methods, is patient under contradiction and inclines towards generosity.”

Instead, caving to political pressures and ducking the current communion controversy, the hierarchy chose to stifle the play and the discussion about abortion that was to take place afterward.

But when the local media picked up the story, Kenneally’s phone started ringing. Ministers from other Christian denominations were calling from all over the city offering to host the play and discussion.

Pastor Bob Goldstein of Immanuel Lutheran Church nearby in Edgewater said, “Father Bill and the St. Gertrude’s community have meant a great deal to us for many years. We’ll do anything we can to help.”

Undaunted by the controversy stirred up by the Catholic bishop’s ban, Goldstein said, “I’ve spoken with our council president, and our bishop. We’re all happy to have this play done here.”

As they say in show business, “Any press is good press,” and ticket sales have been up.

“When any source meets with resistance, it intensifies. The attention it’s received has made more people aware of it,” Chatman told the World. Chatman’s prayer for her play is that the people “who really need to see it, see it.”

“The Answer,” a spiritual musical in one act, will be performed Oct. 1-3, Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 5 p.m. at Immanuel Lutheran Church, 1500 West Elmdale Avenue, Chicago — just two blocks from St. Gertrude’s.

“The Answer” is set to a score of gospel, jazz and sacred music preformed by the nationally renowned multicultural, multi-denominational choir, “Choral Thunder.” Tickets can be purchased at www.theanswerin2004.com.

The author can be reached at vhastings@pww.org.

Incident at Loch Ness:an enigma wrapped in a riddle

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 02:54:00 +0000

Movie Review

I don’t pretend to know much about Werner Herzog, the acclaimed director of 46 films most people have never heard of, but I do know that “Incident at Loch Ness,” which Herzog produced and appears in, is brilliant. You don’t have to know anything about Herzog to enjoy this movie. It’s smart, funny and shocking.

It’s exhilarating to see a movie that is intelligent, inventive and fun but be careful — as Herzog likes to say, fact and truth are not always the same thing.

“Incident at Loch Ness,” directed by Zak Penn, is the story of Herzog’s attempt at making a documentary — with Penn as producer — about Scotland’s infamous Loch Ness monster. That movie was going to be “Enigma at Loch Ness.”

At the time Herzog began production, a camera crew led by John Bailey was also following him for its own documentary on the director. Unfortunately, “Enigma at Loch Ness” came to an abrupt end after a boating accident early in the filming and some unexplained and frightening incidents that drove the cinematographer and soundman to abscond in the middle of the night.

Because Bailey’s crew had been on the scene they were able to combine their footage with that of the ill-fated “Enigma at Loch Ness” to make “Incident at Loch Ness.” This final product is “Lost in LaMancha” meets “Adaptation,” or maybe “Altamont.”

Penn becomes the man you love to hate — and not just because he wrote such box office bombs as “Last Action Hero” and “Inspector Gadget.” The bald-faced efforts by this bald-headed producer to spice up Herzog’s film are hilarious and infuriating at the same time. Granted, nothing is as it seems in “Incident at Loch Ness,” but Penn would still be wise to watch his back, even as he’s taking well-deserved bows for this, his directorial debut.

– Carolyn Rummel

Great escapes

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 02:51:00 +0000

End of summer got you down? Giving up on “Law and Order” once and for all now that Jerry Orbach has moved on? Wondering why “Medical Investigation” isn’t listed as a comedy?

I can’t help you on that last one (Assistant: “Doctor, you’re running out of time!”Doctor: “Don’t tell me I’m running out of time!!”) but here’s some suggestions to help you enjoy the new television season:

• Based on this season’s first episode, “Scrubs” is going to be better than ever. That’s saying something considering it was already the most innovative, consistently funny comedy on television. “Sad sack” Zach Braff — say that five times fast — also has a hit in movie theaters with “Garden State,” which he wrote and directed. If you haven’t already seen it, catch it some evening — just not Tuesdays at 9:30 eastern when “Scrubs” is on — and then buy the soundtrack, which alone is worth the price of admission.

• As the leaves begin to fall, so do the bodies when MYSTERY! opens October with special treat for fans of Britain’s Queen of Crime, P.D. James. “Death in Holy Orders” is MYSTERY!’s newest James adaptation, starring Martin Shaw as the famous Commander Adam Dalgliesh. This story is particularly timely with its focus on the church and the secrets that lie within. Sundays (Oct. 3 and 10).

• Now that “Arrested Development” has won an Emmy for best Comedy Series, maybe Fox won’t cancel it. It’s an acquired taste so let’s hope you have time to acquire it. (Sundays at 8:30 p.m. eastern).

– Carolyn Rummel

Union muscle won health care for all in Hawaii

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 02:49:00 +0000

Opinion

The citizens of the offshore state of Hawaii have something that millions of mainlanders without health insurance want. What is noteworthy is that they got it in 1974 because of a union that cared enough for the health of everybody to include everybody, a union that had the militancy and the muscle to write the legislation and see it through the Legislature and become law.

The union in question, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), has a long history of militancy and fighting for social justice for all. They most recently faced down the Bush administration when Bush threatened to use the Navy to take over the docks in the last round of contract negotiations.

In Hawaii the ILWU wrote legislation called the Prepaid Health Care law of 1974. They crafted the law in such a way that, as of 1994, 94 percent of Hawaiians had health coverage. They then led the struggle to have the law enacted. From that day to this, in spite of the inflationary pressure of the profit-driven health industry in our country, the people of Hawaii enjoy better and fuller coverage than any other state in the nation. Hawaii ranks near the top compared to other states in life expectancy and low infant mortality.

The plan requires employers to pay into the plan for every employee who worked 20 hours or more. The employees pay into the plan no more than 1.5 percent of their monthly wages. Even more radical is the provision that any health insurance company that wanted to do business in Hawaii had to accept all comers. Since for-profit insurance companies do not like to insure people that are not 100 percent healthy, this prevented “cherry picking.” As a result, nonprofits like Kaiser-Permanente were left as the main insurers, keeping cost low. When employers trying to evade the requirements hired more part-timers, the Legislature passed the State Health Insurance Program, which is open to all who do not have insurance, and they pay premiums based on income. Legislation has been passed to add those not covered by Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance, and the law emphasizes comprehensive, preventive care.

In 1994, health care programs for Medicaid and other low-income groups were converted into managed care plans. These programs, along with compulsory auto insurance and workers’ compensation, mean that Hawaiians have the most complete coverage of any state in the union. When the percentage of the gross state product spent on health care in Hawaii is compared to the rest of the states the advantages of the Hawaiian system stand out. In the mid-1990s the national average was 14 percent and for Hawaii it was 9 percent. In other words, more coverage for less money. Survey after survey demonstrated that the majority of small business people approved of the system. With the number of uninsured rising, in New York City, it is now approaching an appalling 27 percent. DC 1707 Executive Director Raglan George Jr.’s column a year ago is more than ever right on the money:

“I say it’s the labor movement itself that should write its own national health legislation. This would put labor at the front door, not back door, of health policies. It is the flip side of labor’s having its own people run for public office, rather than rely on others to protect our interests. Labor has the expertise to write this historic piece of legislation. Labor unions and their negotiated benefits fund leaders have more experience in health care benefits than anyone else in the country.”

When Bill Clinton, newly elected as president, attempted to write new national health care reform legislation, the newspapers had many articles about the Hawaii experience. The headlines read:

Hawaii ranks healthiest in national survey (USA

Today)

Hawaiians like their health care system (The San Francisco Chronicle)

Health care in paradise (St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

Hawaii offers look at state of full coverage (USA

Today)

Health care is called a model for U.S. (The New York Times)

Hula and health care (The San Francisco Chronicle)

Hawaii shows it can offer health insurance for all (The New York Times)

While mainland debates, Hawaii’s system works (USA Today)

Coverage system resembles proposal expected to be offered by the White House (The Washington Post).

The insurance and drug companies unleashed an unprecedented effort to bury the Clinton initiative. They succeeded, and also buried the example of the successful example in Hawaii. It remains the most progressive of any health care system in the nation and should be publicized. And, of course, due recognition should be given to that most progressive and democratic institution, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

David Buxenbaum is a trade unionist. This column originally appeared in the July/Aug. issue of AFSCME District Council 1707’s publication, DC1707 Voice.

Common sense for the left about John Kerry

Sat, 25 Sep 2004 02:45:00 +0000

Opinion

As I talk to friends on the left and center-left, I find too many people picking up on Bush administration propaganda that Kerry is a “flip-flopping” politician, that his stands on the Iraq war are opportunistic and bad, and that his “weakness” is helping Bush. These are mostly people who will vote for Kerry, if they vote, but they are in a passive political mode, preparing to retreat, which is where the Bush administration wants them to be.

Everything that is being said today about John Kerry was said by sections of the broad left about Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 — he was “an opportunist,” a lightweight, a man from a wealthy family with a Harvard education and an uppity wife who couldn’t be trusted to deal with the Depression crisis. But a closer look showed that Roosevelt was, unlike most American politicians, a “principled opportunist,” in that he had represented in his political career broad progressive positions, whatever his shifts on day-to-day politics (by the 1920s these positions began to be called “urban liberalism”). Clearly he was a lot better than the Democrats who had run for the presidency before him: James Cox, John W. Davis, Al Smith.

Of course, Roosevelt was an odds-on favorite to win the election, and a militant left, led by an activist Communist Party, was on the scene fighting to form unions, create public jobs and unemployment insurance, and establish programs to protect poor farmers and save the cities.

When popular movements reached a critical mass in 1934-1935, Roosevelt did not use his power as president to crush them, as all previous presidents including Democrats Cleveland and Wilson had done in response to great strikes. The courage and intelligence of a CPUSA-led left and the “principled opportunism” of FDR interacted dialectically to bring about a center-left coalition politics that produced Social Security, unemployment insurance, the minimum wage, the right of workers to form unions, millions of public jobs for the unemployed, and federally supported public assistance for women with dependent children.

Neither Communists and allied leftists nor New Deal liberals brought this about by themselves. The center-left coalition of the two forces made this far-reaching program possible.

John Kerry’s stands on the major issues of the times, since the 1970s, have been a lot better than those of Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, or Bill Clinton. He is a progressive Democratic senator from a liberal pro-labor state, Massachusetts, as Roosevelt was the progressive governor of New York.

Like Roosevelt in 1932, Kerry is saying some ridiculous things. (Roosevelt, for example, criticized Hoover for running deficits and promised to balance the budget. The deficit was not the problem, but a symptom of the Depression. Hoover was spending too little, not too much. After taking office, Roosevelt sharply increased federal spending to provide for people’s needs, which is healthy for society.) But, like Roosevelt, Kerry is articulating broad themes that lead away not only from the sinister nightmare of the Bush administration, but from a generation of right-wing political hegemony in the U.S.

Kerry is condemning the $200 billion already spent on Iraq and saying that money would be better spent for social programs in the United States — the first Democrat to begin to talk about spending more, not less, for people’s needs since the 1970s. He has come out four-square for labor — something neither Carter nor Clinton ever did — and would clearly use his presidential powers as Roosevelt did in the 1930s to advance the labor movement and place progressive judges on the federal judiciary. While his health proposals can be legitimately criticized, they are the first serious proposals to come forward since Clinton’s disastrous failure in 1994 buried the issue of national health “insurance” in the U.S. On civil rights and civil liberties, Kerry, by any standard, has a good record and George W. Bush has a terrible one.

Unlike Roosevelt, Kerry has a difficult fight to make if he is to be elected. What Kerry can learn from Roosevelt is to go after his enemies on the right, as Roosevelt always did, and make it clear that they represent arrogance, selfishness and greed. But everyone on the left who thinks that the U.S. and the world were better off with Roosevelt than Hoover should realize that the U.S. and the world will be much better off with Kerry than with Bush. With Kerry in the White House we have a chance to regain ground lost over a generation. With Bush back in power, we are in the short run digging our own graves, and the graves of people’s movements throughout the world, not the grave of the capitalist system as some ultra-leftists might hope. For those reasons we must not only support the Kerry campaign but work actively for its victory.

Norman Markowitz is a history professor at Rutgers University. He can be reached at pww@pww.org.

Hold the line!

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:39:00 +0000

Opinion

This is an appeal to the Latino and Mexican American communities, but its main thrust also affects labor, other ethnic groups, and the American public in general, specifically those of us who must work for a living.

Attacks against Latinos are coming more frequently and more viciously day by day. They range from attacks on immigrant workers to attempts to divide our alliances and disrupt our coalition work with the trade union movement and with religious, environmental, women’s and grassroots community organizations and local Democratic Party groups.

The Republicans are using two tactics which they hope will accomplish their goals of divide and conquer. One is the frontal attack, which involves open immigrant-bashing, attempts to reduce the voting power of Latinos through gerrymandered redistricting, as in Texas, and anti-immigrant propositions like Proposition 200 in Arizona.

Prop. 200, the Arizona Taxpayer and Citizen Protect Act, requires a valid ID to receive any public social service (this is already covered by current law); requires public employees to report suspected immigration violations to federal authorities (and be held punishable if they fail to do so); and requires a photo ID to register or to vote. The propaganda claims voter fraud is taking place, but the measure’s proponents have yet to offer any proof that is so.

In fact, the main purpose of Prop. 200 is to reduce Latino voting power, by intimidating Mexicanos from exercising their right to vote. Beyond that, it aims to keep immigrants destabilized and workers divided.

The proposition will hurt all workers, including white workers. It will put the kabosh on grassroots voter registration. It will make union organizing more difficult. And public officials say it will be terribly costly to implement. That is why even some Republicans in the state oppose it. Nonetheless, the projections are that Prop. 200 will pass, forcing the state to spend millions of tax dollars even if in the future the courts rule it unconstitutional.

The second Republican approach is the “compassionate” approach. This calls for organization of “Viva Bush” clubs and similar projects. Here the goals are to break the massive nationwide coalitions forged by labor, community, and Latinos, who vote heavily on the Democratic side. I could bet my cowboy boots there will be plenty of funding behind such efforts.

Latinos have worked very patiently and very hard over many years to put in place these massive coalitions. These coalitions are responsible for our successes in electing Latinos and Latinas to public offices, from school boards to county, state and congressional posts. Most of them have been elected through a sensible approach of working within the Democratic Party. Why? Because it is the mass electoral vehicle available to progressives. The Democrats, in most cases, have been close to our political interests — interests such as good-paying jobs with overtime pay, better education for our children, medical insurance, such as Medicare and Medicaid, equal opportunity and equal treatment with all other citizens of the nation.

It was the social benefits achieved, through struggle, under the Roosevelt administration that won the loyal tie of our fathers and mothers to the Democratic Party. This is the rich legacy left to us, a legacy of fighting unity. My generation is still benefiting from the struggles of our forefathers and mothers.

Shouldn’t we continue this legacy and fight for a better world for our children? Surely we cannot afford to do anything less. The track record of the Republican Party since the Roosevelt era has been to nibble away at those hard-won social benefits. This is why we advocate not only the defeat of George Bush but a change of the entire regime as well.

The old trade union slogan, “United we stand, divided we fall” is pertinent to the election in 2004. No pasaran! Hold the line! Si se puede! These are the answers to Bush’s arrogant slogans at the Republican convention in New York when he said, “Nothing will hold us back.” Well, the thing that we can hold them back with is our vote. Let’s exercise that power to our fullest potential. Vote early, then you won’t have to worry about obstructions on voting day.

Lorenzo Torrez is chair of the Mexican American Commission of the Communist Party USA. He can be reached at pww@pww.org.

Why Bush has failed on terrorism

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 08:35:00 +0000

Opinion

George W. Bush says the war in Iraq has made the world safer. It may sound good in media bites but take a closer look. His campaign is playing on people’s fears of terrorism, wrapping itself in national security, and doing what it does best: lying.

The Bush administration ushered in a new kind of foreign policy with its war on Iraq. Called “preemptive war,” it could best be described as a “shoot first and ask questions later” foreign policy. In order to pursue this illegal action against Iraq, Bush lied to the American people, and continues to lie, about the reason for this war. There are no weapons of mass destruction. There was no connection between Iraq and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Yet Bush and Cheney continue to link the two, claiming the world is safer without Saddam Hussein, but they never mention the post-Sept. 11 number-one-wanted man, Al Qaeda head Osama bin Laden.

Former Bush Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill and anti-terror chief Richard Clarke revealed Bush used the war in Afghanistan as his dress rehearsal — the real target, Iraq, was always in his sights. Why?

In the post-Soviet-Union world, some in U.S. ruling class circles pushed for a new approach to foreign policy. They argued for a “muscular,” single-superpower rule where U.S. corporations have the freedom to pillage and plunder world labor markets and natural resources. In order to do that, control of Middle East oil — on which Europe and Japan (potential rivals) are dependent — is necessary. After Sept. 11 they saw an opportunity to put this scheme into play (see the excellent PBS Frontline documentary on the Project for the New American Century). Their illegal, “shoot first, ask questions later” and go-it-alone unilateralist policies came together in the present Bush doctrine.

Certainly Sept. 11 has made the U.S. feel vulnerable, but truthfully, does anybody feel more secure with Bush and his corporate buddies calling the shots?

During Bush’s watch, terrorist activities have increased. Is it acceptable to say these attacks are “over there” and therefore the U.S. is safer? How safe are those 1,000-plus dead U.S. soldiers and the 20,000-plus wounded? Do you feel safer when you see Russian children taken hostage? Or when the terror-alert goes up to orange? Or when TV news shows promote anti-terrorist kits containing duct tape? How safe do you feel when firehouses are closed, police and fire departments defunded? How secure do you feel when you lose your job and health care? Or your local public hospital closes for lack of funding?

Dick Cheney threatened another terrorist attack if Kerry is elected. He warned a Kerry administration would undo their militarist foreign policy, described by Bush as, “We have to hit them over there before they hit us over here.” But it’s exactly this policy that has made the world more violent, unstable and less secure. Their aggression has opened the door for others to follow suit.

Terrorism thrives on right-wing ideology and policies. As is widely acknowledged, bin Laden was trained and supported by the CIA. Donald Rumsfeld, on behalf of the Reagan administration, shook hands and made deals with Saddam Hussein. U.S. corporations sold Hussein the poison gas he used in the 1980s war against Iran and against the Iraqi Kurds. U.S. imperialism trains and supports terrorists and dictators for its own corporate, profit-driven agenda.

If terrorism is a global issue, then it will take global cooperation and adherence to international law to isolate and defeat it. Bush’s never-ending war policies, including advocating first-strike nuclear attacks, have made that impossible.

In a recent speech, Al Gore called the Bush-Cheney masterminds “digital brownshirts.” With that phrase he pointed to a big concern of many — creeping fascism. This is what the Bush administration has created — fertile soil for creeping fascism. False patriotism, Big Lies, racism, chauvinism, terrorism and fanatical religion are the fertilizer for that bitter soil.

Concern over national security and terrorism can’t be ceded to Bush. The anti-Bush movement has to challenge the idea that Bush has made us safer — be it in letters to the editors, while canvassing or in workplace conversations. The best way toward peace and security is to dump Bush and his dangerous policies in November. The working-class, peace and democratic movements will then be in a better position to struggle for an end to war and terrorism.

Terrie Albano is editor of the People’s Weekly World. She can be reached at talbano@pww.org.

Health care action week to dramatize growing crisis

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:27:00 +0000

Jobs with Justice (JwJ), the national coalition of labor, community, student and faith-based groups, has declared Oct. 3-10 “Health Care Action Week: Affordable Health Care for All.” JwJ urges actions during that week that could include rallies and marches, educational forums, workplace “sticker days,” outreach to not-yet-union workers, and town hall style forums to dramatize the crisis in the U.S. health care system and to offer pro-worker solutions for addressing it.

The week of action will complement efforts by labor unions and other organizations to conduct their membership education and get-out-the-vote efforts.

JwJ’s call to action on the health care issue could not be timelier. The group points to developments like these, all of which have occurred during President Bush’s watch:

• The Census Bureau reports that the number of persons without health insurance in the U.S. increased from 43.6 million to 45 million since 2002, with working families the hardest hit.

• About 9 million people have lost employer-sponsored health insurance coverage since 2001.

• Rather than deal with rising costs, employers are shifting health care costs to workers with higher premiums, co-pays and deductibles, and huge cuts in benefits. They are dropping retiree plans, so millions more are now underinsured.

• The United States spends $1.8 trillion on health care — more than twice the per capita average of other developed nations — yet it is behind most of the developed world on major health indicators such as infant mortality and life expectancy.

• Prescription drug costs consumed 1.8 percent of personal income in 2002, up by 50 percent in just four years. Yet one in four Americans lacks drug coverage. The Bush administration’s Medicare prescription drug plan will cover just 25 percent of the average senior’s expenses after 2006, while giving away billions to drug makers, HMOs, and employers.

• Instead of strengthening the largest and most successful public health insurance program — Medicare — the Bush administration’s fraudulent “reforms” promote Health Savings Accounts and high deductible insurance plans to make patients pay more.

Participating unions in Health Care Action Week include the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees; Association of Flight Attendants; Communications Workers of America; International Brotherhood of Teamsters; International Longshore & Warehouse Union; National Education Association; Paper, Allied Industrial, Chemical and Energy Union – PACE; Service Employees International Union; United Electrical Workers; United Food & Commercial Workers; and United Steelworkers of America.

As JwJ observes in its call to action, the challenge now is to knit together all those affected by the deteriorating health care situation to build a movement strong enough to take on the special interests that stand in the way of reform.

With only five weeks left before the national election, Nov. 2, there is no time to lose in convincing voters how devastating another Bush presidency and GOP-controlled Congress will be to the health and welfare of working people.

While there are definitely limitations to John Kerry’s health care plan, the defeat of George W. Bush would open up political space for labor and people’s advocates to make genuine advances in providing health care for all. Progressive and warriors for social justice showed during the Clinton years that progress is possible when the movement is united and the leadership of the country is beholden to the people’s movements for their election.

Nothing is written in stone. Defeating the Republicans will only be the first step. But, with four more years of unbridled privatization and profit schemes perpetrated by the likes of Senate Majority Leader (and profiteer) Bill Frist, the clock will be turned back even further on health care than it already has been. We must not let that happen.

It makes a big difference who has control over the federal budget, the executive agencies and federal field work, for example, federal community health centers.

Remember, too, to apply pressure on candidates for the House and Senate. Dumping the Bush gang from the White House, as crucial as that is, must be accompanied by dumping these same anti-people officials from Congress.

The author can be reached at pww@pww.org.

Wal-Mart pulls back from Chicago

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:56:00 +0000

CHICAGO (PAI) — Just months after it tried to ram two “supercenters” through the Chicago City Council, giant anti-worker retailer Wal-Mart has apparently thrown in the towel. The reason, though it denies it: The city’s new living wage law.

Wal-Mart said on Aug. 31 that it would let its contract to build a “big box” supercenter in a poor area of the South Side expire, and that it would not renew it.

The council delayed that store due to concerns, raised by UFCW Local 881, Jobs with Justice and other worker groups, about Wal-Mart’s below-market wages, bad working conditions, job discrimination and lack of quality health care benefits.

They also cited Wal-Mart’s negative impact on communities, driving local retailers out of business and costing workers jobs.

UFCW is campaigning continent-wide to organize Wal-Mart’s 1 million workers, and recently made a breakthrough in Quebec.

The Chicago City Council approved a Wal-Mart supercenter in another poor area, on the West Side, but a Wal-Mart spokesman said it’s reconsidering that store, too. “It’s not about a living-wage issue. It’s about an ordinance that singles out some — not all — businesses in Chicago,” he claimed.

Independent analysts note rising and successful opposition to Wal-Mart in major metro areas, now that the retailer has maximized its traditional rural markets. Opposition has kept Wal-Mart supercenters out of southern Los Angeles, Montgomery County, Md., the entire state of Vermont and elsewhere.

In Chicago, the living wage ordinance may be the key. Ordinance co-sponsor Alderman Joseph Moore pointed out the law applies to all big box retailers of 75,000 square feet or more.

“It requires them to provide decent wages and benefits to their employees, while giving hiring preference to local residents,” Moore wrote to the Chicago Sun-Times.

California: Frozen voter funds hit

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:52:00 +0000

On Sept. 17, the Schwarz-enegger administration rejected California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley’s request for release of over $25 million in federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) funds in preparation for the November election.

The announcement by Schwarzenegger’s finance director, Donna Arduin, is the latest move in a struggle that began in August, when the state Finance Department held back some $34 million of unspent HAVA money over allegations that some HAVA funds had been spent on partisan programs. The funds were frozen pending an audit that state Auditor Elaine Howle said could take until after this fall’s election.

Over $15 million earmarked for poll worker training, monitoring election results and making it easier for disabled voters was later released. But Shelley has continued to press for release of the remaining funds and some additional monies — over $25 million in all — saying they were vital for the November election.

The funds that are still frozen were intended for publication of the state’s Easy Voter Guide, prepared by the League of Women Voters, the State Library and others, on which many voters depend for basic information. Also frozen, the Secretary of State’s press office said, are monies for voter education for both domestic and overseas voters, a statewide system for voters to track their provisional ballots, and modernization of voting systems used by some counties. These measures are considered especially important in working-class and minority districts where polling equipment is often poor and voter turnout low.

Arduin — like Schwarzenegger, a Republican — has worked in the past for Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. Shelley, a Democrat, has been a sharp critic of touch-screen voting machines, banning some types of machines and requiring voter-verified paper records or special security measures for others.

In a telephone interview earlier last week, state NAACP President Alice Huffman expressed disappointment at the governor’s withholding of the funds. “I’ve never known the process to be so politicized before,” she said. Huffman said the NAACP and other nonpartisan organizations that conduct voter education had been told proposed HAVA funds would be available as early as July. She said letters to the governor urging release of the funds, which are crucial for assuring voter rights in November, had gone unanswered.

California Democratic Party spokesman Bob Mulholland told the Sacramento News and Review that Schwarzenegger’s stance is “a perfect strategy by the Bush people to block HAVA funding for low-income neighborhoods. And Schwarzenegger, on behalf of the Republicans in the White House, is more than happy to do that.” Mullholland called the move a more genteel version of the past practice of “using 300-pound goons to block Latinos from voting in California.”

Voter rights organizations including the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights were calling on supporters to urge the governor’s office to release the funds.

The author can be reached at mbechtel@pww.org.

Coast-to-coast actions for immigrant rights

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:48:00 +0000

On the occasion of the first anniversary of the historic Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, which reached 101 cities and culminated in a rally and Lobby Day in Washington and a rally of 200,000 in New York City, immigrants, advocates, and their allies are holding a series of actions across the U.S. to renew the push for progressive immigration system reform.

During the Sept. 20-26 “National Week of Action for Immigration Reform,” more than 70 events are taking place in more than 50 cities in 25 states highlighting the need for passage of the AgJOBS bill, giving qualified immigrant farm workers a path to citizenship; passage of the DREAM Act, allowing immigrant students to pursue their goals; opposition to the repressive CLEAR Act and other efforts to turn local police into immigration agents; support for the Civil Liberties Restoration Act; and support for the SOLVE Act, which would reunite families and provide a path for many immigrants to earn legal immigration status.

A national Lobby Day for the legislation took place in Washington on Sept. 21.

The actions are sponsored by a broad coalition of over 70 labor, community, religious, and immigrant groups. Look for more coverage in next week’s World.

Bushs ownership society: No taxes for owners, only workers

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:45:00 +0000

“When you hear them say, tax the rich, be careful,” warned George W. Bush in a speech Sept. 16. “The rich hire lawyers and accountants for a reason, because they don’t want to pay. And you get stuck with the tab. But we’re not going to let him stick you with the tab.”

Well, he ought to know about hiring lawyers and accountants. But the rest is pure deception.

In fact, the problem is the opposite of what Bush asserts. It is that his tax cuts that are shifting more of the burden of taxes to middle-class and working-class households.

This is important because the Bush team is counting on buying millions of votes with their tax cuts. Most people know that the biggest chunk of the tax cut goes to the rich and the super rich: about a quarter of the 2001-2003 tax cuts went to just 1 percent of taxpayers. These are people with an average income of more than a million dollars a year.

But there are many people who think, “Who cares if they give away billions to rich people who don’t need it, so long as I can get a few hundred dollars in the deal?” But they are mistaken.

What they don’t understand is that someone is going to have to pay those taxes that rich people are no longer paying. And that someone is them. The federal government under the Bush administration has done nothing to reduce spending, and in fact has vastly increased expenditures on the military and the war in Iraq. The result is a near-record budget deficit — at 5 percent of GDP, it’s the third largest in the post-World-War II era.

The deficit is even bigger if we compare it to federal government revenue, excluding the revenue from Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes. This is a better measure of the deficit problem, because money that comes out of our paychecks for Social Security and Medicare is by law reserved for those benefits, and will ultimately be used for exactly that.

The budget deficit is now more than 40 percent of federal revenues, excluding Social Security and Medicare. This is an enormous gap that will have to be narrowed drastically at some point, and middle-class taxpayers will “get stuck with the tab.”

The Bush team’s tax policy seems deliberately designed to shift the burden of taxes from the richest taxpayers to those who are, in their estimation, lower down on the food chain.

Getting rid of the estate — that is, inheritance — tax benefited less than 2 percent of taxpayers; about half of them got a windfall averaging $3.4 million. Reducing capital gains taxes is another giveaway to the rich, enabling billionaires to pay a lower marginal tax rate on their income from stock sales than that what a nurse or truck driver pays on their wages. And then there is the tax cut on stock dividends: many people thought that they would get at least something from this, since they own at least some stock in their retirement accounts. But they were tricked here too: if you have a retirement account, your income from dividends will be taxed when you withdraw the money for retirement. Only those who own stocks outside of retirement accounts — overwhelmingly very rich people — got a break.

Of course there were some benefits for the middle class in the tax cuts: the middle 20 percent of taxpayers got an average reduction of about $800 last year. But this will surely be taken back in the near future. The country’s gross federal debt, relative to the economy, is at its highest level in 50 years, and not even the U.S. government can pile up debt at this rate for very long.

While the economy did receive some stimulus from these tax cuts — as opposed to doing nothing — it was very little for the trillions of dollars of present and future revenue that was sacrificed. Much more could have been achieved with a fraction of this money going to beleaguered state governments and people with less income than the rich.

The real purpose of the Bush team’s tax policy was to rewrite the tax code to create, as Mr. Bush calls it, “an ownership society”: one in which owners do not pay taxes, but workers do.

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (www.cepr.net) in Washington. Reprinted from Knight-Ridder/Tribune Information Services with permission of the author.

International notes

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 05:30:00 +0000

Okinawa: Demonstrators protest copter crash

A Sept. 12 demonstration brought some 30,000 protesters into the streets, a month after a U.S. Marine helicopter crashed into a building at Okinawa State University. It was the prefecture’s largest protest in nearly a decade.

The protesters sent a resolution with 55,000 signatures to the Japanese central government in Tokyo, demanding suspension of U.S. military flights over civilian areas, an early return to Japan of the U.S. Futenma base, and fundamental revision of the Japan-U.S. Status of Forces agreement. The resolution also called for an apology, compensation, and a full explanation of the cause of the crash.

U.S. officials have agreed to renegotiate accident guidelines with Japan, but there is no sign that either government is ready to abandon plans for a new heliport or to abandon the Marine station altogether.

Cambodia: Raffles hotel workers win

In agreements they signed Sept. 12 with management of the Raffles chain’s two Cambodian hotels, Cambodian hotel workers won recognition of their union and reinstatement of a majority of workers dismissed during the dispute which began last April, the International Federation of Food, Agricultural and Hotel Workers said last week.

The Cambodian Tourism and Service Workers Federation (CTSWF), an IUF affiliate, signed the pact with the management of Raffles Le Royal in the capital city, Phnom Penh, and Raffles Grand Hotel Angkor, in Siem Riep.

The IUF said unions around the world showed their solidarity in many ways. IUF members demonstrated at Raffles properties around the world. Unions gave financial and political support, and asked their embassies and diplomatic missions in Cambodia to avoid holding official events at Raffles hotels.

CTSWF President Ly Korm thanked all those who contributed to a successful outcome.

N. Ireland: All-party talks resume

All-party talks to revive Northern Ireland’s peace process and restore the power-sharing government established in 1988 by the Good Friday Agreement resumed Sept. 16 after a two-year stalemate. Though the three-day session led by British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern ended without agreement, lower-level discussions were continuing early this week, the British newspaper Morning Star reported.

The main obstacle to power sharing has been the refusal of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) headed by Ian Paisley to share power with Sinn Fein before the Irish Republican Army (IRA) disbands. The Morning Star said the IRA had offered “unprecedented levels of decommissioning,” and that an IRA statement on its conditions for full disarmament and renunciation of violence might be released within a week.

Cuba: UN praises hurricane safety measures

Salvano Briceno, head of the UN’s disaster reduction agency, last week called Cuba a role model for developing countries in cutting risks from hurricanes. He said the country has shown that people’s vulnerability can be cut by determined application of cost-effective measures.

Briceno cited preparedness, education and information as key elements in Cuba’s hurricane response program. He said people know what role they are to play, and local authorities know who needs specialized care and how to help the most vulnerable.

During Hurricane Ivan, nearly 180,000 of Pinar del Rio’s 730,000 inhabitants were evacuated to safety. Evacuation shelters in the province were staffed with doctors and nurses and stocked with food and medicine to guarantee the best possible conditions for the evacuees, many of whom were children.

The effectiveness of the program is shown by Cuba’s low death toll compared to neighboring countries. No deaths or injuries were reported from Ivan, despite the high death toll in neighboring Caribbean areas and in the U.S.

Canada: Steelworkers’ long strike continues

Some 1,400 steelworkers in Labrador City, Quebec, have been on strike against the Iron Ore Company of Canada since mid-July, after management refused to budge from its insistence on concessions amounting to about $7 per hour. The company is owned by virulently anti-union mining giant Rio Tinto.

“Rio Tinto wants to strip health care, pensions, freeze wages and introduce a form of psychological profiling of workers on which to base discipline,” union spokesman Yvon Clement said in announcing the strike.

The strike in the tiny one-industry town of 9,000 has had a ripple effect, for example forcing the Sparrows Point mill near Baltimore to contract with Russia for delivery of pelletized iron.

Rio Tinto is the target of a global union protest network over its treatment of workers around the world. In Australia, the company seeks to undermine the union through “personal contracts,” in Zimbabwe workers have struck over nonpayment of promised wage increases, and in the U.S. Kennecott Utah Copper seeks to end health insurance for retirees.

International Notes are compiled by Marilyn Bechtel (mbechtel@pww.org).

National Clips

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 04:39:00 +0000

WASHINGTON: Bush threatens veto of overtime protection

With the stroke of a pen, Bush robbed 6 million workers of overtime pay, Aug. 23. But the Republican-controlled Congress, feeling the heat from the AFL-CIO and other organizations, is poised to pass an overtime protection bill which would restore overtime pay to workers.

In a 16-13 vote, Sept. 15, the GOP-led Senate Appropriations Committee approved an amendment, already passed by the Republican-dominated House, which would strip funding to the Department of Labor that would implement the White House pay cut. The measure would award workers overtime pay back to Aug. 23.

An immediate threat veto and a barrage of lies issued from the Oval Office. Bush spokesman Alfred Robinson, for instance, said that the administration changes would grant firefighters overtime for the first time.

That charge confused Barry Kasinitz, a Fire Fighters Union governmental affairs official. “I’m at a loss to understand how fire fighters, who have been eligible for overtime since the Fair Labor Standards Act extension of 1986, would suddenly become ineligible.”

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa: 5 women defy Bush protest zone

Sen. John Kerry may draw hecklers, but President Bush draws a crowd of protesters, usually cordoned off into a “free speech pen.” During a campaign stop here in early September, five women tried to escape the free speech pen to get a drink of water. They were promptly arrested and charged with interfering with official acts. Their trials begin Nov. 1. The maximum penalty for the women is a $100 fine and 30 days in jail.

The five women, Alice McCabe, Chris Nelson, Candida Pagan, Pi Nuernberg and Alex Wyrick, all pleaded innocent.

“How do you interfere with an official act, if the act they were committing was perfectly legal?” asked Dave O’Brian, attorney for Nelson and McCabe.

Nelson was wearing a Kerry button and McCabe carried a Bush protest sign. Wyrick is on trial for carrying a sign that read, “No Billionaire Left Behind.” Nuernberg and Pagan were in tree costumes and beating on drums.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala.: Ivan kills 7 in Alabama

In the wake of Hurricane Ivan, utility workers from Alabama to North Carolina to Ohio to Pennsylvania were struggling to restore electricity to millions, and the effort cost one worker at Alabama Power his life, Sept. 19. His name was unavailable at press time.

As Ivan roared out of Florida and headed north, 1.2 million Alabamans were in the dark, listening to torrents of rain batter the havens where they sought shelter.

Altogether seven people were killed by the storm in Alabama. Five people were killed in flooding in western North Carolina. Florida’s toll was 20. Nationwide, at least 52 deaths were blamed on the hurricane.

In West Virginia, Weirton’s main street was clogged with mud after the Ohio River surged over its banks.

Ivan dumped 7 inches of rain on Pittsburgh, Sept. 17, and by Sept. 20, parts downtown remained underwater. Dennis Santiago, 35, died in the flooding. Nineteen western counties were declared disaster areas, with the towns of Shaler and Etna nearly wiped out.

Just as the Pittsburgh Labor Day parade ended, the Bush administration laid off 50 workers at the Army Corps of Engineers, who maintain the lock and dam system on the region’s famous three rivers. The lock and dam system was a product of the New Deal and was designed to relieve yearly flooding.

LAS VEGAS, Nev.: Muslim businessmen fight racial profiling

A group of oil and gas executives from Canada, Egypt and Italy boarded a plane in Vancouver flying to an industry convention in Las Vegas in September 2003 when the flight crew on their Air Alaska flight accused them of “causing a disturbance.” The plane made an emergency landing in Reno, where 13 executives were detained and extensively questioned. All 13 are Muslim.

The group filed a suit against Air Alaska in federal district here, Sept. 18. The airline’s actions were prompted “by animosity directed at the plaintiffs’ predominant ethnic and religious group, Arab and Muslim,” the suit charges. Now, all 13 are on terror watch lists and are harassed when they travel to the U.S., according to the lawsuit.

National Clips are compiled by Denise Winebrenner Edwards (dwinebr696@aol.com). Rosalio Muñoz and Roberta Wood contributed to this week’s clips.

Northern California: Peace leader to be honored at banquet

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 03:47:00 +0000

Honored at the Northern California Friends of the People’s Weekly World/Nuestro Mundo “Beat-Back-Bush” banquet Friday, Oct. 8, will be Fernando Suarez del Solar, a founding member of Military Families Speak Out whose son died in Iraq.

This year’s banquet is held at the Snow Building in the Oakland Zoo complex. Dinner will be served from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., the presidential debate will be shown at 6 p.m., and the program will start at 7:30 p.m.

Since his son, Jesus Suarez, died in Iraq in spring 2003, Fernando Suarez del Solar has rededicated his life to the cause of peace and non-military solutions, and has become a national and international spokesperson for the military families with sons and daughters spread out in Iraq and elsewhere around the globe.

Earlier this month, as the U.S. death toll in Iraq passed 1,000, Suarez del Solar issued a statement in which he noted that President Bush had called the deaths the price of freedom and democracy.

“But I pose the question: to whom does Mr. Bush refer?” Suarez del Solar asked. “More than a thousand of our children lost in Iraq, two thousand distraught parents, one thousand families destroyed. These families do not enjoy the way of life Mr. Bush talks about.” Thousands of Iraqi children have been lost as well, he said.

“As I write these words,” Suarez del Solar said, “another family is receiving the news that their child has been killed in combat. How many lives, how many families, how many orphaned children will be traumatized before this immoral war based on lies comes to an end? When will the American people and the politicians understand that Bush is destroying us?” he added. “The answer will be given on Nov. 2.”

The Guerrero Azteca Project, which Suarez del Solar founded and directs, aims to reach families in the Spanish-speaking community, where large numbers of “green card” and poverty draft youth are entering military service, with information about the crucial choices they face.

Also featured at the banquet will be San Francisco Labor Council head Walter Johnson, the San Francisco Rockin’ Solidarity Labor Chorus, leaders of the Haiti Action Committee and Pastors for Peace/Friendshipment, this year’s Bay Area Venceremos Brigadistas, Total Eklipze Cheer Academy, singer-songwriter Eliot Kenin, and more.

A special presentation by the Alameda County Central Labor Council will highlight Prop. 72, requiring employers of 50 or more to provide health coverage. The measure, which upholds SB 2 passed last year, is under sharp attack from giant retailers, and is a major election focus of the California labor movement.

Reservations are $40, and proceeds benefit the People’s Weekly World/Nuestro Mundo fund drive. Free parking is plentiful; a car shuttle will run from the Coliseum BART station.

Phone (510) 251-1050 for information, reservations and directions.

Election boards swamped with new voter sign-ups

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 03:38:00 +0000

Groups demand speedy action to protect vote

The broad-based coalition seeking to defeat George W. Bush has registered millions of new voters and the flood continues, swamping state election boards even as deadlines near for signing people up.

Just one of many groups, Rock the Vote, reports it has registered 789,905 new voters. The League of Women Voters marked National Voter Registration Week, Sept. 15, with a warning by its president, Kay J. Maxwell, that the flood has created a backlog that, if not cleared, could mean the disenfranchisement of thousands of newly registered voters.

“This may mark National Voter ‘Rejection’ Week,” she charged. “There is more work to be done after the citizen fills out the voter registration application. The application must be acted on by the appropriate government entity in a timely manner and in a way that enfranchises eligible voters.” She called on election boards to hire more personnel to process the backlog.

The NAACP, People for the American Way and other groups affiliated with the Election Protection Coalition (EPC) charged that Duval County, Fla., election officials are threatening to terminate processing of voter registration forms the last week of September, even though Florida’s deadline is Oct. 4. In the stolen 2000 election, 27,000 Duval County votes, mostly cast by African Americans, were thrown out.

Sabrina Williams, a spokesperson for the Advancement Project, one of the EPC groups, told the World, “We will file a complaint with Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood and then go into mediation with Duval County election officials to get this resolved. This problem is not limited to Duval County. There were complaints by voters in Miami-Dade and Broward counties that they were denied a chance to vote in Florida’s August 31 primary because their registrations were not processed.”

Vicky Beasley, a field officer for People for the American Way, told Reuters that the problem is particularly serious in the swing states: “There is a very widespread delay in the swing states because there have been massive registration drives among minorities and those applications are not being processed quickly enough.”

An estimated 250,000 Ohioans have registered over the past year. In Cuyahoga County alone, which encompasses Cleveland, the backlog of applications at one point reached 25,000. The labor movement and its allies demanded that the Board of Elections put on more personnel. They were and the backlog now is down to about 6,000.

The problem is that the 2004 election has energized millions who sat out elections in past years. Only 52 percent, or about 102 million, of those eligible to vote cast ballots in the 2000 election. America Votes, a coalition of 33 organizations with combined membership of 20 million, points out that 50 million eligible women did not vote in 2000. So on Sept. 18, “Election Action Day,” the coalition filled 50 buses with volunteers who fanned out in 17 battleground states to register thousands of women to vote.

“We’re still compiling the numbers from the Saturday effort,” said America Votes spokesperson Sarah Leonard. “We had hundreds of volunteers in Philadelphia and Manchester, New Hampshire who registered thousands of new voters. Nationwide, we’ve registered hundreds of thousands of new voters.”

Joelle Fishman, chair of the Political Action Commission of the Communist Party USA, said the Bush-Cheney campaign “wants everybody to believe the election is already over. Dirty tricks and voter suppression tactics are being used to discourage people. But that strategy is backfiring. Across the country, millions of people are determined to protect our democracy and expand it.” The movement, she said, must work vigilantly to protect the vote. “We demand that every voter registration application be processed before November 2, so that every vote can be cast and counted.”

The Denver-based, nonpartisan New Voter Project (NVP) has the goal of signing up 265,000 new voters between the ages of 18 and 24. So far they have registered 242,697 new voters.

The group’s spokesman, Adam Alexander, told the World, “There are 500,000 people 18 to 24 years old in Wisconsin. To date, we have registered 120,000 new voters. It means we have signed up 20 percent of the people in that age bracket. If you walk down a street in Wisconsin and see five young people standing together, we registered one of them to vote.”

NVP, he said, has hundreds of full time staff and thousands of interns working to increase the youth vote across the nation. Historically, low percentages of youth have voted since 1972, when the voting age was reduced to 18. “Young people have been a neglected part of the political landscape. But we think this year we will break out of that cycle. We believe we’re going to see an unprecedented youth vote.”

Jane Fleming, executive director of Young Democrats of America and spokesperson for the Young Voter Alliance (YVA), told the World, “The candidates must speak to the issues that concern youth. They are the largest group without health insurance, the hardest hit by unemployment. They are the ones fighting and dying in Iraq. Many young people see it as an unjust war.”

The YVA, she said, is mounting a major get-out-the-vote drive in Florida, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, she said.

“It is not enough to register them to vote,” she said. “We have to have a strong effort to get them to the polls on Election Day.”

The author can be reached at greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com.

Texas judicial candidate cites right-wing danger

Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:31:00 +0000

HOUSTON — Unlike many candidates, David Van Os, a Democrat running for the Texas Supreme Court, doesn’t hesitate to bluntly criticize the right wing. He spoke to an enthusiastic crowd of about 150 at a rally Aug. 26 at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church.

Van Os said that the “thievery and criminality” that is “running America today and is trying to run the rest of the world” originated in Texas and, therefore, “Texans have the greatest obligation to confront” the right-wing assault. He argues that the Republican acquisition of power started with the judicial branch in Texas and has developed into a “power machine that exists for enriching the rich.”

He recounted his experience at the Florida recount in 2000 where GOP supporters were waving Confederate flags and where he and his wife were confronted by “mindless goon squads.” He said his wife was called a “baby killer” by one of these individuals. When she informed him that she was a staunch Catholic, did not believe in abortion but supported a woman’s right to choose, and had recently suffered a miscarriage, he responded by asking her if “the D&C felt good.”

Van Os said the U.S. people are at a grave fork in the road: “We have been too nice for too long to people who don’t respect the Constitution of the United States.” He reminded the audience that the nation was founded based on the belief that “we are all created equally.”

Van Os is co-founder of the Texas Progressive Populist Caucus of the Democratic Party. In candidate profiles he presents himself as “the only candidate who will be a voice for the people on the Court” and says “my track record as a union- and workers-side labor lawyer, civil rights lawyer, vocal populist spokesman demonstrates clearly that I will provide that diversity of perspective that is so badly needed.”

Scott Brister is Van Os’ Republican opponent. A resident of suburban Tomball, Brister is a former trial judge who was appointed to office by Gov. Rick Perry last November. Perry, a Bush appointee, was pressured by “pro-life,” anti-abortion groups to make the appointment.

When Brister was asked if he believes in the separation of church and state, he responded, “It depends on the circumstances.” Brister has successfully defended his posting of a copy of the Ten Commandments in his courtroom. He has also represented “anti-homosexuality” groups and has been an avid opponent of same-sex marriages.

When he was chief judge of the 14th Court of Appeals in Houston, he wrote the majority opinion throwing out a jury verdict that had been rendered against Exxon Corp. for negligently poisoning drinking water with benzene, which resulted in the leukemia death of an 11-year-old child. Indeed, Brister gave extraordinary assistance to Exxon by permitting the corporation to submit one-sided exhibits directly to the appeals court, in contradiction to Texas law.

In another commercial lawsuit, the public record reflects Judge Brister made the following statement to the plaintiff’s lawyer during the trial: “We’re going to try this case. And if you win we’re going to declare a new trial and we’re going to keep trying it until you lose.” Clearly, Brister does not see himself as an unbiased public servant, which is one of the important characteristics of people holding judicial authority.

The author can be reached at pww@pww.org.

Edward Teixeira, CPUSA activist, dies at 72

Fri, 17 Sep 2004 08:28:00 +0000

Edward Silva Teixeira, a longtime activist and leader of the Communist Party USA in New England, died in Boston on Aug. 24. He was 72.

Born to Joseph Teixeira and Dorothy Silva Salley on Feb. 28, 1932, Teixeira grew up in New Bedford, Mass. At the age of 16 he left school to work at Aervox, a manufacturer of electrical capacitors. He was fired from Aervox after he became involved in organizing a union there. He then went to work for the United Electrical Workers Union where he continued his involvement in union organizing. Blacklisted from conventional jobs because of left-wing and union activities, he left New Bedford and moved to Boston.

Arriving in Boston in the 1950s, Teixeira quickly became involved in many community struggles. Early on, he was involved in the struggle to obtain African American political representation. He was a key worker in the campaigns to elect Mel King to the Boston School Committee and John O’Bryant to the state Legislature. Although those initial campaigns were unsuccessful, later King was elected as a state representative and O’Bryant was elected to the Boston School Committee. Both served in those capacities for several years.

Teixeira was also involved in the struggles to desegregate Boston’s schools, and was involved in organizing Freedom Schools in Boston in 1964 and in Operation Exodus, a voluntary desegregation project, in 1965. Teixeira was also involved in working to maintain and increase affordable housing in the city of Boston. He was a founding member of the Frankie O’Day cooperative in Boston’s South End.

Teixeira joined the Communist Party at the age of 18. He was an active and leading member of the party and served as chair of the New England party in the 1960s and 1970s. He managed the Frederick Douglas bookstore, the first bookstore in Boston that specialized in books in African American history and culture. The bookstore also specialized in Marxist studies.

With the upsurge in the civil rights movement, Teixeira became instrumental in setting up bibliographies and providing books on African American studies for many institutions in the state, including the New Bedford Public Library and Harvard School of Public Health. In 1972 he ran for the state Legislature from Dorchester’s Ward 14 and challenged the state’s law prohibiting Communists from running for political office.

In his later years, due to illness, Teixeira decreased his community and political activities. However, he never abandoned them. From the late 1990s to his recent hospitalization he was an active member of the Boston chapter of Massachusetts Senior Action Council and worked on issues of affordable housing and health care.

Teixeira is survived by Tillyruth Teixeira, his wife of 51 years; his children Juliet, Victor and Robert Teixeira; his siblings Ralph Teixeira, Julia Taylor, Neil, Don, James Jr., Carol and Vicki Salley; 8 grandchildren and many loving nieces and nephews.

Teixeira had a love of jazz, opera and classical music and wished to see more young people studying music. The family is requesting that in lieu of flowers contributions be made to New England Conservatory Scholarship Fund, 290 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115 or to the People’s Weekly World, 235 West 23rd Street, New York, NY 10011.

The family is a planning a memorial service for later this year.