People Before Profit blog

Drug company ok'd spying on FDA officials

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 11:49:00 +0000

Where does spying fit in a drug company budget? Isn't Big Pharma always complaining that the cost of their research warrants high drug prices? Is spying part of the research?

For one company it is. Politico broke the story that Amphastar Pharmaceuticals hired private investigators to gather information on high-ranking officials at the Food and Drug Administration in 2008. The company claims it was looking for evidence of any collusion between the officials and a rival company, during the approval process for an Amphastar-developed blood-clotting drug.

The story caught the attention of Senate Finance Committee chair Max Baucus who voiced outrage. "Pharmaceutical companies should be focusing on getting their drugs approved based on health research and science rather than wasting their resources hiring private investigators to snoop around the lives of FDA regulators and their families," Baucus told Politico. (Maybe he's looking for a way to look tough on drug companies after the heavy criticism he came under for his role during the torturous health care debate?)

According to documents obtained by the Senate Finance Committee, the PI's plan was to look into an FDA official's "and her relatives and friends." Plus, her "financial status and lifestyle change since 2004; any entities ... that [she], her relatives or friends, partially own or are affiliated with in the U.S." The firm conducted a similar investigation into the other official's life, but in both cases, found nothing. (Not that it would be beyond belief that FDA officials collude with drug companies. In 1989, three FDA employees were indicted for taking bribes from drug companies.)

Still the whole bizarre story points to the sickness in the health industry that puts profits before people's needs.

Photo http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomsaint/ / CC BY 2.0

After loan victory, students and labor keep up fight

Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:49:00 +0000

Nationwide students are on the move this week leading rallies, marches and educational forums highlighting student-worker solidarity, the fight for jobs, worker rights and increased access to higher education during the 11th annual National Student Labor Week of Action.

Actions in over 100 locations across the country are scheduled.

At the same time, thousands of students are celebrating the most sweeping overhaul of the college aid system in American history. President Obama signed into law the Healthcare and Education Reconciliation Act last week, which substantially increases grants for students, invests billions to boost college access, and eliminates bank profiteering by cutting them out of the student loan process.

Hundreds of students stormed Capitol Hill to lobby for the bill, now law.

Maria Escobar, national coordinator with the Student Labor Action Project (SLAP) was there the day Obama signed the measure into law.

"It was surreal knowing that this fight has been going on for 20 years," she said in a telephone interview. "And we worked so hard for this all year long and it shows that all of our direct organizing finally paid off."

But the fight is not over, Escobar said.

Escobar said the student-labor solidarity actions this week commemorate the life of two American heroes, who brought together civil rights with worker and union rights, Cesar Chavez and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Chavez was a founder of United Farm Workers.

March 31 is Chavez's birthday and Escobar said if he were alive he would still advocate for farmworker justice connecting the movement with community allies.

"He is still very much alive in the work that many of us do today," she notes. "He represented opportunity and hope for many immigrants who come to this country for work like my father who drives a bus," said Escobar. It's not right that workers like my father are forced to make low wages and that's why the fight for better working conditions and the right to join unions is so important, she said.

President Obama signed a proclamation designating March 31 as Cesar Chavez Day.

"Students and workers are coming together on many issues including the fight to pass the DREAM Act, advocating for fair labor contracts and stopping the devastating state budget cuts," she said.

Escobar said students will rally to support fair contract negotiations for Temple University nurses in Philadelphia, and host forums on green jobs and sustainable living wages for workers in Dayton, Ohio, plus much more.

David Fernandez is a senior at the University of Central Florida. He is also the president of the SLAP chapter on campus.

"Right now the biggest issue affecting students is the higher education crisis," he said.

Fernandez said a recent court ruling gave Florida's Board of Governors, an advisory body appointed by the governor, full control to raise tuition fees at state universities. He said students are already dealing with rising tuition costs on top of major budget cuts. The Board of Governors is not a democratically-elected body and will most likely continue to increase college tuition and make matters worse for the state budget crisis, Fernandez said.

"The university system could be further damaged because of this ruling and that's why we need to build a coalition to combat this problem," he said. "Young people and students need to get mobilized on campus and in their communities because this issue is a big deal for us."

Meanwhile student leaders say young people have also joined the fight against the big banks, to hold them responsible for the home foreclosure and economic crisis.

People are scared and trying to figure out how to survive in this climate, Escobar said. Even students that graduate with college degrees are not safe anymore when it comes to finding decent jobs, she said.

But, at the same time ordinary people everyday are becoming more and more aware and active in the struggle to fight for real alternatives to the current crisis, she said.

Photo: Student Labor Week of Action poster.

Stimulus money provides union jobs in Missouri

Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:30:00 +0000

Jefferson City, MO - "We are doing what we can to put working people back to work. We are getting a double benefit from the stimulus money. We are rebuilding our infrastructure and creating jobs," said Missouri Governor Jay Nixon to about 300 union members at the annual AFL-CIO Missouri Political and Legislative Conference (MPLC) here March 29 and 30.

Nixon continued, "Others have turned down and pushed away the stimulus money. We are trying to get every penny." So far Missouri has received over $146 million in Recovery Act money. Along with other revenue, Missouri has "put $266 million into union construction jobs in the past 85 days," Nixon added

Additionally, the Nixon administration has filed 196 prevailing wage violations in the past year. Prevailing wage laws are designed to insure that non-union contractors cannot underbid union wages on publicly funded jobs.

Huey McVey, president of the Missouri AFL-CIO told union members, "These are tough, tough times." But, "we've got to keep fighting. We've got to fight harder. We can't be afraid to say union."

McVey also talked about the Missouri budget. He said, "This budget is horrible, especially for state workers."

"Nearly 2,000 state employees have been laid-off in the past year," Bradley Harmon, president of the Missouri State Workers' Union (CWA-MSWU) Local 6355, told the World.

"This not only affects our members. It affects they people our members service, Missouri's most vulnerable citizens," Harmon added.

The Missouri State Workers' Union represents workers from the Department of Social Services and Youth Services, as well as other state employees.

"In these hard times Missourians need social services. They need access to unemployment benefits. They need access to Medicaid and Medicare. They need state assistance for groceries and other family necessities. We should have a balanced approach to fixing our budget."

"We have a revenue problem, not a budget problem. We should fix our budget by making corporations and the rich pay their fair share," Harmon concluded.

Additionally, Missouri's state employees are the worst paid state employees in the country. Bob Huss, vice president of the CWA retiree's chapter said, "We aren't even in the race to the bottom anymore. We are the bottom when it comes to state workers' pay."

U.S. Senate candidate Robin Carnahan also addressed the conference. "While we've won some victories," she said, "Washington is still broken. And we've still got a fight on our hands."

"We've won health care for all Americans," she added. "But the moneyed interests have a stranglehold on the democratic process. As a result, it took more than a year to get common sense things done."

Katie Gulley, from the Blue Green Alliance said, "We need to expand the number and quality of jobs in the green economy. We need to create green jobs - blue collar jobs with a green purpose."

According to the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) and the Center for American Progress (CAP), Missouri could see a $2.9 billion net increase in investment revenue and 36,000 new jobs based on its share of federal clean-energy investments.

Additionally, according to PERI and CAP, clean-energy investments create 16.7 jobs for every $1 million in spending, whereas spending on fossil fuels only generate 5.3 jobs per $1 million in spending.

Mark Habbas, from the International Association of Fire Fighters, talked about right-wing attempts to eliminate the Earnings Tax, which generates about 30-40 percent of the city budget for both St. Louis and Kansas City, Missouri. Additionally, it generates about 70 percent of state revenue.

According to Habbas, "Without a Earnings Tax our cities would crumble and our economy would be crippled. This will affect everybody." The Earnings Tax is used to pay fire fighters and police officers' salaries, as well as other vital public services.

Rex Sinquefield, a retired multi-millionaire investment banker, is the main funder of the right-wing initiative to repeal the Earnings Tax. If the Earnings Tax is repealed many Missourians fear that sales tax would increase by 12-15 percent, disproportionately affecting low-income, cash-strapped communities.

After the conference opening plenary union members lobbied at the state capitol, pressuring legislatures to support pro-union legislation.

Study: Junk food addiction similar to crack-cocaine

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:06:00 +0000

It doesn't take neuroscience to figure out that eating too much junk food is not good for you.

Or does it?

According to a new study by The Scripps Research Institute in Florida, scientists found making meals of fatty foods may be as addictive as crack-cocaine, causing compulsive eating and obesity.

The three-year study, involving rats, found that over-consumption of high calorie foods can trigger addiction-like responses in the brain. Scientists found decreased levels of a specific brain chemical that allows a feeling of reward in the overweight rats. The low levels of this chemical (dopamine receptor) in the brain is similar to humans addicted to drugs.

Although research involving the study of animals cannot directly relate to human obesity, scientists say the findings may help in understanding the human condition and developing therapies to treat it.

Scientists devised a diet plan for three groups of rats. One group ate a balanced, healthy diet. Another received healthy food, but had access to high calorie food for one hour a day. Rats in the third group were fed healthy meals and given unlimited access to the high calorie food such as cheesecake, chocolate ding-dongs, bacon, sausage and the like.

The rats in the third group began to refuse the healthy food and preferred the "junk food," quickly becaming obese. The scientists discovered the relentless junk food diet changed the function of the rat's brains so much that they were actually addicted to the pleasure activity of eating unhealthy. When the scientists replaced the junk food with healthier fare, the rodents went on a two-week hunger strike.

In the real world, the availability of junk food is much more readily accessible these days then in the past, said Paul J. Kenny, Scripps Research associate professor and one of the study's scientist, in a telephone interview.

"Let's face it junk food is very pleasant, and people like to eat it," he said. Cafeteria-style food contains high levels of processed sugar and fats but it's also very cheap, Kenny said.

"Take pizza for example," he said. "People like to eat it, and economically, it makes a lot of sense. It's easy to make and it's cheap. But continual access to these types of foods is a major problem."

The underlining aim of the study was to understand how the brain responds to eating enjoyable fatty foods, and if it was similar to how drug users enjoy heroin or cocaine, said the professor.

"We found ourselves asking, 'why do people overeat and why do people use drugs,'" said Kenny. "The behavior we discovered is quite similar."

Kenny said people should ultimately have the choice to decide what they eat, but the ability to choose healthy food may be corrupted. Healthier food is often times costlier.

Another recent study, published in Health Affairs, found children from poor families are twice as likely to be obese as children from well-off families (45 percent vs. 22 percent). Minority children are far more likely to be obese than white children (41 percent of black and Latino children vs. 27 percent of white non-Hispanic children). And despite a host of medical conditions like diabetes, hypertension, asthma, or gallstones caused by obesity, children who become obese are more likely to become impoverished.

Obesity-related diseases cost the U.S. an estimated $150 billion each year, according to government agencies. An estimated two-thirds of American adults and one-third of children are obese or overweight.

"Childhood obesity isn't just a public health issue, it's a social justice issue," writes Eric Tipler in the Huffington Post. Tipler, a current graduate student and former high school teacher says confronting child obesity is one of the major domestic challenges of our time. It's where education, health care and poverty all intersect, he says.

We need to ensure that healthy food is available and more affordable, writes Tipler. He adds that those working for educational justice need to advocate for school cafeterias that offer fruits, vegetable and salad bars, not just pizza, cookies or slushy machines.

Photo: Pepe Lozano/PW

Meek turns in petitions for Florida Senate race

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 16:28:00 +0000

TAMPA, Fla. -- The race for Florida's Senate seat looks to be a tight one. The Republicans are out in full force to maintain their seat and the lead up to the August primary is already brutal.

Slugging it out for the Republican nomination are front-runners, Gov. Charlie Crist, and tea party favorite, Marco Rubio, former state house speaker.
Rubio has been getting most of the press for his outlandish far right-wing views and his clashes with soon to be ex-governor Crist.

According to opinion polls, Rubio leads Democratic front-runner Rep. Kendrick Meek, 48% to 32%, and Crist leads Meek, 45% to 32%, which is down from February when Crist's lead was 48% to 32%.

Some early scenarios have Crist losing the Republican primary to Rubio and running as an independent. Even in such a three-way matchup Meek comes in second with 25% of the vote, Rubio leads with 45% and Crist comes in third at 22%.

However, Meek could pull off a November upset if he wins the Democratic primary. Meek, who is African America, is already on the road to doing something unprecedented in Florida. He may be the first ever statewide candidate to be on the ballot by petition, and not by paying a hefty fee.

On March 29, the congressman turned in more than 145,000 signatures to get on the ballot. Florida offers two ways to get on a statewide ballot: pay $10,000 (the highest filing fee in the nation) or turn in petition signed by at least 1 percent of all registered voters from the past general election. According to the Pensacola News-Journal, that means at least 112,476 valid signatures from all 67 counties in the state.

Meek decided to run a grassroots-style campaign. His campaign manager, Abe Dyk, told the media, ""This is the first candidate placed on the ballot by the people of Florida and not by a check."

"This election is going to be all about who can get their voters out," Meek said in a recent interview. "I believe that when someone signs on the dotted line, it means something." Meek said he believes "no other candidate" has spent more time talking to voters than he has in the past year.

Meek's congressional district is in the Miami-Dade area, but his petition campaign reached far beyond South Florida, SunshineStateNews.com reports. "We're going to be counting on not just the I-4 corridor, but the I-10 corridor," Meek said. "We made it a point to focus on Jacksonville," he said, referring to thousands of signatures his campaign brought in from Duval County. "I don't want to be competitive in Duval County. I want to win it."

Meek said he has campaigned in Escambia County five times so far in the campaign and thinks he will do well in North Florida come November.

The petition process, he said, has helped his campaign in many ways, such as increasing recognition across the state and building his campaign team.

"It's made me a better candidate," Meek said.

Ethic charges plague the Republican front-runners. The St. Petersburg Times reports, "Republican Gov. Charlie Crist may have crossed a legal line" by making a $16,676 American Express payment to reimburse the state Republican Party's then-executive director for "shirts, hats and other paraphernalia" given out at a GOP event last year.

The problem: campaign finance laws prohibit state parties from contributing more than $5,000 to a primary campaign.

Crist's campaign argues that the event in question was a "party function" and "not a campaign function."

Rubio has also faces ethics charges. Again, the St Petersburg Times says, "Republican Marco Rubio got hit with an ethics attack, too, as Fort Lauderdale resident Michael Ryan filed a complaint against the former state House speaker for misusing state party and PAC funds to subsidize his lifestyle." Rubio's campaign dismissed the complaint as "political stunt by Democrats who are either working directly with Charlie Crist, or have already looked past Crist to a general election fight with Marco Rubio."

Photo: Rep. Kendrick Meek, far right. http://www.flickr.com/photos/thirdwaythinktank/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Sick children to get health care

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 15:28:00 +0000

After some strong arm twisting by the Obama administration the insurance industry has backed down from challenging the section of the new health reform law that ends discrimination against children with pre-existing conditions.

Kathleen Sebelius, the president's Health and Human Services Secretary, had condemned the industry repeatedly last week for what she called "denial of health care to the nation's sick children."

In a letter yesterday to Sebelius the industry's top lobbyist says insurers will accept the new regulations.

The capitulation by insurers ends uncertainty that arose after companies initially said they would resist a stipulation in the new law that says children with pre-existing medical problems can get coverage starting this year.

Progressives are warning, however, that the companies will not end their resistance to reform and that they might be planning to use the new requirement to cover children as an excuse for additional rate hikes between now and 2014 when stronger curbs on what they can charge take effect.

The insurers' surrender on the issue of coverage for children came as several other GOP and conservative attacks on the new law also showed signs of crumbling.

Four governors disavowed their right-wing state attorneys general and announced their states will back the federal government against lawsuits attacking the new health reform law.

All four are Democrats while the attorneys general in the four states are Republicans.

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter, Mich. Gov. Jennifer Granholm, Penn. Gov. Ed Rendell and Wash. Gov. Christine Gregoire told Attorney General Eric Holder they will "stand by your efforts to protect the new health care law."

The lawsuits by the 15 attorneys general claim that the new health reform law to forces "unfunded mandates" on the states.

"If the states are against health reform, why havn't they all left Medicaid?," asked Wonk Room's Igor Volsky today. "They're saving dollars by insuring Americans that would otherwise end up in emergency rooms and receive far more uncompensated treatment. Remember. Medicaid is a voluntary program. States do not have to participate at all."

Officers of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO could not be reached this morning because they were in an all-day meeting but they have made strong statements recently that leave little doubt about their opposition to the political gamesmanship of their state's attorney general.

Bill George, president of the state's federation, has argued that health care for the uninsured is dominating Pennsylvania's budget with medical assistance payments now constituting almost 20 percent of state expenditures.

"National health care reform makes sense for everyone in Pennsylvania," he said recently. "It makes sense for both workers and employers. Sick people can't be productive workers and workers have to be healthy to make a living."

Another conservative talking point against the new health reform law, that it will reduce Medicare services to seniors, is also running into a wall as medical professionals across the country join a chorus of people saying reform will increase, rather than decrease, services to seniors.

In a Los Angeles Times oped, Dr. Bruce Chernof detailed how the new law will benefit seniors.

"First is the creation of a public, voluntary long-term care insurance program known as the Community Living Assistance Services and Support Program. Enrolled individuals who have substantial daily needs would be eligible to receive at least $50 a day to defray costs of services such as home care, family caregivers support, adult daycare or residential care."

The law also provides for programs that will help states expand home and community services so that seniors can avoid placement in a nursing home.

A third feature of the new law critical to seniors, Chernof says, is "impoverishment protections that prevent a healthy husband or wife from being forced to spend all the couple's assets in order to get his or her partner access to community based services."

Photo: Seth Wenig/AP A child pushes her brother in his wheelchair while their mother walks beside them at the Specialty Hospital in Cooke Health Care Center in New York

Time for big, bold federal jobs program

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:26:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - Jobs for America NOW is organizing meetings with lawmakers while they are home for the Easter recess to urge them to pass Rep. George Miller's $75 billion jobs bill that would create or save as many as one million jobs when they return to the capital.
The actions come on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the enactment of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration (WPA) that created millions of jobs during the Great Depression.

"We've got a dozen groups planning events on or around April 8, the 75th anniversary of WPA," said Germonique R. Ulmer, a spokesperson for Jobs for America NOW. "The WPA anniversary is time to speak out on the need to take big and bold action to get people back to work."

She added that Jobs for America NOW, a coalition of 60 organizations, is also planning meetings with many lawmakers during the recess to demand that they support Miller's bill that would prevent the layoff of tens of thousands of public employees by fiscally strapped state and local governments. "Many grassroots groups are setting up meetings with members of Congress while they are home during the recess. It includes events in Nevada, Maine, North Carolina, and Illinois. These meetings are an opportunity to put a human face on the unemployment crisis," she said. "It should leave these lawmakers with a sense that they have to take action when they get back to Washington." She described the Miller bill as a "left over piece of legislation" that should be enacted quickly.

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn) announced he is spearheading a nationwide effort during the recess to muster the 216 votes to push the Miller jobs bill through. Ellison said passage of the measure should be a "slam-dunk" if he succeeds in lining up the lawmakers.

Ellison and Miller met with members of the National League of Cities, the National Association of Counties and some of the 60 grassroots organizations affiliated with Jobs for America NOW to win endorsements of the bill.

Like every other measure to assist the unemployed and the uninsured, the Miller bill faces fanatical Republican opposition especially in the Senate. Foes of the measure spout clichés about the federal deficit. But Ellison retorts, that "deficit spending in a recession is wise economic policy" to get the economy moving until private sector spending and investment starts generating jobs and tax revenues
.
Miller, chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, said local communities "are having to choose between raising taxes to sustain essential services or firing more workers. We should not ask students to forgo a year of education or tell families that their safety will be compromised because local governments have to lay off teachers and police officers. This bill will quickly create jobs that we can count and jobs we can count on."

Mayor Elizabeth Kautz of Burnsville, Minnesota, president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors said, "Mayors are pleased to partner with Chairman Miller to push this important legislation. We deal face to face with unemployed citizens....all they want is good dependable jobs so they can support their families."

Unmoved by this humanitarian crisis, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla) once again blocked an extension of unemployment insurance, mimicking his Republican colleague Jim Bunning of Kentucky who blocked an extension of jobless benefits four weeks ago with the tacit backing of the Republican leadership on Capitol Hill.

Photo: Ben Sears

Comptroller: NYC paying slumlords millions to house homeless

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:24:00 +0000

NEW YORK-At a time when Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Governor David Paterson are putting forward budgets that slash programs proven to alleviate homelessness, the Department of Homeless Services is wasting millions of dollars on services that lack oversight, some of which are overtly illegal, according to recent audit of the DHS.

As the homelessness crisis gets worse, the DHS is paying slumlords as much as $4,836 per month, or $58,032 per year, in unregulated housing that likely wouldn't even be considered safe were it to be inspected.

According to City Council Member Ydanis Rodriguez, D-Manhattan, the DHS "must shape up if it is to provide real and valuable services to those who are being hit hardest by the recession."

Currently, the homeless rate in the city is at a record high, with 39,000 people in shelters. At the same time, the annual State of the Homeless report, issued by the Coalition for the Homeless, Governor Paterson's state budget will slash a record $104 million from the city's adult shelters, homelessness prevention services and permanent housing.

"Twenty years ago, when I started working at Coalition for the Homeless, we were bringing hot meals into the notorious welfare hotels," executive director of CFH Mary Brosnahan said at a press conference staged by city Comptroller John Liu, whose office conducted the audit. "There were countless press exposés on the conditions in those hellholes and a resounding cry went out to close those places. New Yorkers across the political spectrum demanded that their tax dollars not be used to subsidize squalor."

But even though most people assume that the city "has gotten out of the business of paying slumlords," she said, it continues "to shelter vulnerable homeless children in horrible conditions-and it's us, the taxpayers, who are footing the bill."

According to the audit, the Department "failed to monitor service providers, leaving individuals and families in hazardous, unsanitary and substandard conditions wrought with open violations."

In 2003, when the local news exposed private landlords raking in huge amounts of taxpayer dollars to house people in squalid apartments, an outraged public demanded that the city stop both endangering families and throwing money at slumlords.

Bloomberg promised to do something. The audit shows he has not.

Instead of signing contracts with service providers, DHS entered into "handshake agreements," and paid providers, in open violation of the city's Administrative Code and the City Charter, from an agency bank account. These payments to non-contracted providers accounted for $152.7 million to 107 providers. Altogether, the agency only used 154 providers. All told, 53 percent of units being used to house homeless families were not contracted.

Further, Liu's audit found that the agency made payments to some providers for no reason at all, and the amount paid per family, even to the same provider, Tilden Hall Family Residence, varied wildly between $810 and $4,836 per family each month. In total, the agency paid $953,635 to this agency, "using duplicate lists of clients and service dates and invented rates as ‘data' to support and justify the payments."

In lieu of contracts, the agency used an "honor system" with its providers. The service provider simply gave the DHS a list of fees and the agency paid it without checking. The audit found duplicate payments amounting to $25,918 and $23,866 in payments for services that were likely never even rendered.

"Who would go into business on an ‘honor system'?" Comptroller Liu asked at the press conference. "How a city cares for its most vulnerable speaks volumes about its people, and we're better than what we show ourselves to be."

After issuing the results of the audit, which began under Liu's predecessor William Thompson, Liu said the DHS should systematize its dealings with service providers, enter into contracts with all of them, and pay for services based upon mutually agreed rates.

In order to ensure that the homeless are not being placed into dangerous dwellings, Liu suggested that the department should "conduct unannounced periodic site inspections and interviews with clients and staff."

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/yourdon/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

Militia arrests signal return of armed “patriot” groups

Mon, 29 Mar 2010 16:14:00 +0000

FBI raids on suspected militia members over the weekend jolted a public already concerned about far-right violence that surfaced during the health care reform fight.

Nine suspected members of a "Christian" militia group have been charged with seditious conspiracy, attempted use of weapons of mass destruction and other related charges, federal prosecutors announced March 29.

The nine are from Michigan, Ohio and Indiana, where federal raids took place over the weekend.

The indictment names a militia group called the Hutaree as conspiring to oppose the U.S. government by force. The group was planning a double attack on local law enforcement, the Detroit Free Press reports.

The Hutaree says it is preparing to fight the "antichrist" until death. On its web site, links to training videos and Biblical-like rants can be found along with a banner across the page telling its members: "Training April 24 contact headquarters immediately."

The Southern Poverty Law Center lists Hutaree as among the 127 active militias associated with so-called "Patriot" groups.

SPLC's Mark Potok warns that radical right, extremist groups are on the rise. These groups are fueled by racism, especially anti-immigrant racism and rage at the nation's first African American president, Barack Obama, he says.

"Furious anti-immigrant vigilante groups soared ... during 2009," Potok writes.

Violent militia groups who had their "heyday" during the 1990s, including in the Oklahoma City bombing, have reemerged, according to SPLC's research.

"Already there are signs of similar violence emanating from the radical right. Since the installation of Barack Obama, right-wing extremists have murdered six law enforcement officers," Potok writes.

He points out a growing "cross-pollination between different sectors of the radical right not seen in years," with more cooperation on agendas and ideologies.

Such "cross pollination" may have been at work with the Hutaree group. The media reports Hutaree members contacted another Michigan militia member for help, which he claimed he declined giving.

Hutaree promotes extremist ideas that have found wide acceptance among right-wing political movements, including the Republican Party.

At the GOP's 2009 Senate-House fundraising dinner, actor Jon Voight got a rousing ovation when he called Obama the "false prophet" in a heavily Armageddon-rhetoric-laden speech.

Similar rhetoric is seen in the tea party movement.

SPLC's Potok says while the tea partiers "cannot fairly be considered extremist groups," they are "shot through with rich veins of radical ideas, conspiracy theories and racism."

New York Times columnist Frank Rich notes a connection between the tea-bag protestors and racism.

"[T]he health care bill is not the main source of this anger and never has been. It's merely a handy excuse," he writes, comparing the anti-health-care attacks to the 1964 attacks on civil rights legislation.

GOP politicians, most notably Sarah Palin, have been promoting extremism, and even violence, along with their favored news outlet, Fox, and spokesperson Glenn Beck. Examples abound. In the wake of the health care vote, Palin urged her followers not to retreat, but to "RELOAD." She also put rifle crosshairs over the map of districts of lawmakers who voted "Yes." Democrats and others have pointed to such language as an example of the way Republicans have incited angry actions and threats.

Beck, among other things, has lectured that "progressivism" is a "cancer" eating America and the Constitution and akin to fascism.

For recent peoplesworld.org articles on the ultra right and racism:

Beware of the new racist counteroffensive

Tea party's ugly reality: racism, sexism, homophobia

Health care victory

Photo: From Hutaree website.

Toolmaker-singer speaks out on ‘one person, one vote’

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:18:00 +0000

SEQUIM, Wash. - Clint Jones, 82, has won fame here with his "Clint's Dandy Digger," a simple tool for digging up weeds, rocks, and roots in well-tended gardens across the nation.

Jones is a man of many passions: his inventions, his operatic singing, astronomy (he has written a book about the Moon's origin), his needlepoint art that decorates his home, and most passionate of all, his belief that the Electoral College is unjust and should be abolished in favor of direct, popular election of the president.

Rave reviews of his digging tool have appeared in the Detroit News, the San Jose Mercury News, and ABC News. The Wall Street Journal listed "Clint's Dandy Digger" in a garden column. Joel M. Lerner, in the Washington Post's "Green Scene" column, wrote that "Clint's Dandy Digger is phenomenally versatile."

David Christian of Port Angeles, Wash., wrote in the Peninsula Daily News, "The Dandy Digger has helped me uproot 20,694 dandelions over the past five years."

Jones failed to persuade corporate toolmakers to manufacture the Dandy Digger. So he makes them in his shop. A neighbor down the road does all the welding for the incredibly strong stainless steel implement. Over the past 10 years he has sold 4,000 of them. His digging tool can be purchased online at www.clintsdandydigger.com.

Or you can drive to his modest home just north of town to buy it from him in person, with the advantage that he might treat you to an Italian aria sung in his pure tenor voice.

"I know a lot of Neapolitan songs," he told my wife, Joyce, and me, on a recent visit. He broke into "Funiculi, Funicula." Then he sang, "Una Furtiva Lagrima" (A Furtive Tear) from Donizetti's "Elixir of Love." For six years in his youth, back in the 1950s, he trained in Naples, Italy, as an opera singer, he said. When he returned to the U.S., in 1963 he sang in a quartet at Radio City Music Hall. "We did four shows a day, seven days a week," he said "What was exciting was to hear 5,000 people applauding us, all at once." He and his wife moved to Sequim 16 years ago.

Jones shows up at many public meetings here to speak out for abolition of the Electoral College system of electing the president. At a recent meeting of the Green Party in Port Angeles, Jones handed out a fact-sheet showing how the Electoral College diminishes the value of votes in high-population states while inflating the value of a vote in low-population states. A vote cast in Wyoming, for example, is worth 2.87, as if that voter got to cast nearly three votes, compared to the value of a vote in Florida: 0.78, less than one.

"Since 1824, there have been 47 elections in which 18 (38.3 percent) were stolen from the majority. That is, 18 presidents did not receive a plurality of the total votes cast by the citizens ... plus three overturned the count by receiving fewer votes than the opponents." (Certainly one of those was George W. Bush who stole the 2000 election).

"We are so accustomed to thinking about electoral votes, as against the true value of our votes, that we never question the validity of an antiquated and gerrymandered method of voting," he said.

Asked how his campaign to abolish the Electoral College is progressing, Jones sighed. "I'm not getting very far," he said. "Some find the subject distasteful. But it's a question of fairness, of one person, one vote."

Photo: PW/Tim Wheeler

News for the rich and famous

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:50:00 +0000

To help correct what has been a decided bias by this newspaper in favor of the working class and its allies, we hereby help put things in balance by offering news of interest to the rich and famous:

Hedge funds make comeback

Researchers at the Hennessee Group, an investment firm, posted the great news this week that hedge funds have "totally recovered" from the "economic unpleasantness of 2008." In fact, assets in hedge funds rose by $751 billion in 2009.

Improvement of that magnitude will allow the top 25 hedge fund managers to do what they haven't been able to do since 2007, a year before the "unpleasantness" began. Estimates are that they can each, once again, pocket more than $360 million in annual salaries.

In other good news for the hedge fund managers, the Washington Post reports that efforts to plug the "carried interest" tax loophole that lets hedge fund managers treat their income as capital gains (with lower tax rates) have "lost momentum in the Senate."

The hope is that the mean-spiritedness exhibited in the House last December, when it voted to raise the tax on hedge fund manager income from 15 to 35 percent, will not be repeated by senators who generally have a better understanding of problems faced by the rich.

Forbes fingers the culprit

Forbes magazine, beloved by big business for being a "capitalist tool," last month revealed both the cause and the cure for large federal deficits. Taking note of the "obscene" paychecks earned by public workers, the magazine said cutting pay for millions of government workers is "the only way to get serious about the deficit." A 10 percent salary cut for all federal, state and local government non-teaching employees, Forbes said, "could generate almost $40 billion a year."

The beauty of the Forbes proposal is that, while protecting the rich, it raises almost exactly the same amount that would be raised if the top 400 earners in the United States paid the same income tax rate that applied to them in 1955.

Dangerous idea in Wales

The Welsh government, in response to the desire of its people to be happier, has decided to undertake a program of tracking national progress on happiness.

Statistics are being gathered to compute an index of "Gross National Happiness."

Helen Mary Jones, a member of the Welsh National Assembly leading the study, says gross domestic product and other traditional economic indicators don't always get at what it is that really enhances "subjective well-being." In short, she says, "the best societies to live in aren't always the wealthiest. The best societies appear to be nations where wealth is shared more equally."

It ain't easy being rich

Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov is apparently the victim of a scam.

Accustomed to making offers that can't be refused, he was taken aback in 2005 when the widow of banker-billionaire Edmond Safra said "no" when he tried to buy her cliff-top mansion on the French Riviera.

Determined to get what he wanted, he kept upping his offer - all the way up to $534 million, the highest price ever offered for a private home.

As much as she loved the mansion, Lily Safra could no longer resist and, in 2008, agreed to sell the joint to Prokhorov who immediately put down a $55 million dollar deposit.

Soon after he put down the money the global recession hit and his worldwide operations started to go belly-up. He reneged on the sale and demanded his deposit back. Safra refused.

Now, to add to his humiliation, pain and suffering, French courts have ruled in her favor and have ordered him to pay an additional $2 million in damages.

Et tu, Wall Street Journal?

What's this world coming to when even the Wall Street Journal can't be trusted to refrain from bashing the rich? The following is excerpted from a recent article in the paper:

"Corporations are now busily reporting CEO pay totals for 2009, but take those totals with a grain of salt. The figures now being released value stock awards to each executive at the time of their grant. Actual rewards can run far higher. One example: Occidental Petroleum CEO Ray Irani took 'expected pay' for 2008 originally valued at $58.3 million. His actual 'realized' pay for the year: $222.6 million.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/epicharmus/ / CC BY 2.0

Tired of bank greed, Missouri protesters say

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:37:00 +0000

ST. LOUIS - "We're tired of corporate America and the CEOs taking all our money," Ashli Bolden said as over 100 people protested inside the Bank of America tower here on March 24.

Bolden, an organizer for the Missouri Progressive Vote Coalition, added, "Corporate bonuses and golden parachutes have got to go. They are the ones that got us into this mess, and now they're using our tax dollars for bonuses!"

Last year Bank of America received $45 billion in federal funding, while its CEO, Kenneth Lewis, received $10 million in bonuses in 2008, 400 times what the average Bank of America teller is paid. Since 2001, Lewis has received over $136 million in pay, bonuses, stock options and pension contributions.

Johnathan McFarland, from the grassroots organization MORE (Missourians Organized for Reform and Empowerment), said, "It's not just about bonuses. Bank of America is aggressively foreclosing on people's homes. All they care about is profit."

As part of the action, protesters set up a tent inside of the Bank of America lobby, demanding to meet with Jack Schakett, BOA's loss mitigation executive. Loss mitigators are supposed to negotiate terms for homeowners to prevent foreclosures.

Protester Richard Monroe fell behind on his mortgage while his wife was fighting cancer. "I've been trying to re-modify my loan for a year," he told protesters.

"And all I want to do is keep my home," he added. "I will pay everything I owe. Just re-modify this loan for me, get it taken care of and then I'll pay everything off when the economy turns around."

Robin Acree, from rural Missouri-based Grass Roots Organizing (GRO), said, "Bank of America is bad for America. They are bad for our economy, bad for business and bad for home owners."

Video from the lively St. Louis rally:

Photo: PW/Tony Pecinovsky

Fight for finance reform next in the national spotlight

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:37:00 +0000

As they celebrate their success with health care reform labor and its allies are already focusing on strengthening the financial reform legislation just approved by the Senate Banking Committee.

Progressives are saying that many of the concerns they had when Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., first introduced the bill remain unfixed. The drive to improve the legislation is being led by Americans for Financial Reform, a coalition of more than 200 labor unions and allied groups.

"At the top of our list," said Heather Booth, the group's executive director, "is our concern about the independence of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency." The Dodd bill would allow decisions by that agency to be appealed to a council dominated by the banks and financial institutions that are the target of its regulations.

The coalition says that, in addition, derivatives and other elements of the shadow markets - including hedge funds and private equity – are not adequately regulated and that there should be stronger curbs on the so-called "too big to fail" banks.

The AFL-CIO, which is part of the coalition, has called for measures that include institution of the so-called "Volcker rule," which would restore rules that strictly separate the activities of commercial and regular banks and a financial transactions tax.

Democrats, meanwhile, are expressing confidence that the Banking Committee's financial reform package will pass in the Senate this year and are publicly, at least, urging Republicans to help shape it rather than trying to block it.

It is widely acknowledged, however, that President Obama has already told Democratic leaders to move ahead with or without Republican backers. The president is reported to have said at a strategy session this week that Democrats have the upper hand and should not give too much ground.

Indicative that it will be politically uncomfortable for the GOP to oppose finance reform are statements yesterday by two Republicans on the banking committee, Sens. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., and Bob CorkerR-Tenn., saying they expected the bill to pass this year despite concerns they have about some of its provisions.

Dodd directly challenged the Republicans yesterday to get on board with finance reform or face voter wrath. "My hope is that they'll want to talk about solutions," Dodd said. "Or they can just sit there and explain to people why they want to side with the largest financial institutions. So we'll see how they respond, and I hope they don't make the same mistake they made on healthcare."

In an unusual breaking of ranks among Republicans Sen. Corker said "now that Democrats are on a roll" there was a missed opportunity for a bipartisan deal. Corker took a rare public swipe at a fellow-Republican, Sen. Richard Shelby, Ala., the ranking GOP'er on the banking committee. "It would have been better, in fairness, had Sen. Shelby been negotiating a bipartisan bill last September, October, November. Instead," Corker said, "Republicans now confront Democratic officials who are emboldened, the testosterone and other juices are flowing after the enactment of the health-care bill."

Big business groups, meanwhile, are coming under attack for their efforts to sabotage finance reform.

The Treasury Department directly criticized the Chamber of Commerce for its campaign against the creation of a Consumer Finance Protection Agency. In a speech at the Chamber of Commerce, Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin blasted the Chamber's $3 million ad campaign against financial regulation legislation, charging that its efforts were aimed at "killing any new regulation."

Photo: Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., right, accompanied by House Financial Services Committee Chairman Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., talks to reporters outside the White House March 24, 2010, after meeting with President Obama to discuss financial reform. Charles Dharapak/AP

Republican lawsuit against health reform called ‘frivolous’

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:14:00 +0000

"Frivolous" and "embarrassing" were words one legal expert used to described a lawsuit filed by several Republican state attorneys general this week to block President Obama's health reform law.

Simon Lazarus, public policy counsel to the National Senior Citizens Law Center, placed the lawsuit in context. "This whole campaign is just the latest chapter in a long pageant of conservative, right-wing scare tactics designed to frighten people into thinking health reform is horrific," he explained to reporters on a press conference call this week.

Lazarus linked the Republican Party lawsuit to false and hysterical rhetoric about "death panels" conjured up by Sarah Palin, and to claims by Republican Party leaders and Republican Party-affiliated media pundits that health reform represents a government takeover.

"These lawsuits being filed now, if you actually look at the complaints, frankly, they're embarrassing from a legal standpoint," he added. "They are totally frivolous. I'm confident they will be summarily dismissed by even the most conservative federal judges."

Lazarus pointed out that attorneys general have no legal standing even to challenge the individual mandate that Congress passed into law as part of the health reform package. He predicted that the courts would agree with past court rulings, including opinions written by right-wing judges like Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, that have supported Congress' power to regulate economic activity and to create laws that provide for the general welfare.

Erwin Chemerinsky, founding dean and professor of law at the University of California, Irvine School of Law, agreed and pointed to federal court rulings upholding the constitutionality of Medicare and Social Security as further evidence.

Chemerinsky cited a 1937 Supreme Court ruling that upheld Congress' constitutional authority to regulate economic activity as long as it is reasonable. "I think any court would find this reasonable," he added.

Working out a program to do this is well within Congress' authority, he explained, because Congress' has the Constitutional power to regulate economic activity that has a substantial impact on the economy, such as health care.

Opponents of health reform have insisted that refusing to get health insurance is the same as refusing to participate in a regulated economic activity, and therefore Congress has no right to force them to buy insurance.

Chemerinsky rejected this argument, saying the refusal to purchase insurance does not exclude an individual from the economic activity of the health care industry. He noted that it reasonable to assume that every person will need medical care at some point, and thus it is reasonable to assume that everyone needs to have coverage and that coverage be paid for. Not participating still impacts the cost and quality of health care across the economy.

Both Lazarus and Chemerinksy compared the Republican Party lawsuit to past failed attempts by conservatives to oppose federal laws that banned racial desegregation of schools and other public facilities.

Lazarus added that the target of this effort isn't just the health reform law but is also likely an attempt to challenge the legality of Medicare and Social Security.

Lawyer Judy Feder, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, noted that the lawsuit represents the next strategy of the Republican Party's failure to stop passage of the health reform law. "Opponents [of the law] simply have no plan to achieve affordable health care for everybody," she explained. "This is a political strategy more than a legitimate case."

Photo: The signed health care law. (whitehouse.gov)

Mississippi court rules school violated lesbian student’s rights

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 14:48:00 +0000

A Mississippi federal court ruled Tuesday that officials at Itawamba Agricultural High School violated a lesbian student's First Amendment rights when it canceled the school prom rather than let the student attend with her girlfriend.

Constance McMillen, an 18-year-old senior, made national headlines when she sued the school district for the right to bring her girlfriend to the prom. School officials had told her she could not wear a tuxedo and had to bring a male date instead.

"It feels really good that the court realized that the school was violating my rights and discriminating against me by canceling the prom," McMillen said in a statement. "All I ever wanted was for my school to treat me and my girlfriend like any other couple that wants to go to a prom."

In the ruling the court wrote, "The record shows Constance has been openly gay since eighth grade and she intended to communicate a message by wearing a tuxedo and to express her identity through attending prom with a same-sex date. The Court finds this expression and communication of her viewpoint is the type of speech that falls squarely within the purview of the First Amendment."

The federal court said the school board does not have to reschedule the dance because parents have already organized an alternative private prom that will be open to all students on April 2.

McMillen said she plans to attend the private prom as well as the Mississippi Safe Schools Coalition's Second Chance Prom, a dance open to all LGBT students in the state as well as straight students who are LGBT-supportive.

"Now we can all get back to things like picking out our prom night outfits and thinking about corsages," said McMillen.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represented McMillien in the case, hailed the ruling as "a win for all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students who just want to be able to be themselves at school without being treated unfairly."

"Public schools can't just stomp on students' free expression rights just because they don't want to deal with these students, and if schools do try to do that they'll be dealing with us," said Kristy Bennett, legal director for the Mississippi ACLU.

Christine P. Sun, senior counsel at the ACLU's national LGBT Project who also represented McMillen, said, "These school officials should be ashamed of themselves for trying to scapegoat a young girl and then trying to lay the blame for their bad behavior at her feet."

McMillen first approached school officials about bringing her girlfriend to the prom in December, and again in February. They said no.

The prom was canceled after the ACLU and supporters demanded the school board reverse its decision to prohibit McMillen from bringing her girlfriend. School officials told McMillen she could not arrive at the prom with her girlfriend and said they would be thrown out if other students complained about their presence.

Both the ACLU and the the Mississippi Safe Schools Coalition say they deal with complaints every year from LGBT students all over Mississippi who face resistance from their schools about bringing same-sex dates to proms. Some students don't feel safe going to their own proms, they note.

LGBT activists hope McMillen's story sheds light on the problem and encourages school districts everywhere to accept students for who they are regardless of their sexual orientation.

About 715 students attend McMillen's high school in the town of 4,000 in rural northern Mississippi.

Since McMillen's case was filed, a Facebook page set up for her case has attracted over 400,000 supporters. McMillen was also a recent guest on the Ellen DeGeneres talk show and received a $30,000 university scholarship.

Photo: Constance McMillen with her father. Facebook/Let Constance Take Her Girlfriend to Prom!

Feminist pioneer Betty Millard dies at 98

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 11:25:00 +0000

Betty (Elizabeth Boynton) Millard, feminist, writer, photographer, political activist and philanthropist, born on Columbus Day 1911 under the presidency of William Howard Taft, died at her home in New York City on March 6, in the second year of President Barack Obama.

Born to a conservative wealthy family in Highland Park, Illinois, that claimed a lateral relationship to President Millard Fillmore, Betty found her true home when she moved to New York to attend Barnard College in 1932. She was drawn to the student anti-war activism at Barnard, and marched against the U.S. government's support of Franco in the Spanish Civil War. Passionately devoted to the ideals of equality and fairness, Millard joined the Communist Party in the 1940s, drawn by the hope that the movement could lead to the realization of the values she held dear.

After World War II, she spent two years in Paris as the American Secretary in the directorate of the Women's International Democratic Federation, a feminist organization aligned with the global Communist movement. She was active in the Congress of American Women, an affiliate of the WIDF. In later years she could hold an audience amused and entranced by her stirring exhortation to Italian women on the need for expanded women's rights, a boilerplate speech that she could deliver in Italian (which she barely knew) at the drop of an invitation.

An editor at The New Masses for four years, she became lifelong friends with Charles Keller, house artist, and other leading literary lights. An early feminist, she authored a 24-page pamphlet entitled Woman Against Myth, released by International Publishers in 1948, which examined the history of the women's movement in the United States, in the socialist movement, and in the USSR. Her analysis of the inequality between the sexes remains an entry of note in the annals of feminist and left history.

In 1959 she appeared as a hostile witness before the House Un-American Activities Committee, which was investigating the Congress of American Women. For five years in the mid-1950s she edited the monthly magazine Latin America Today, reporting on political and social developments south of the U.S. border. She joined Cheddi Jagan on the campaign trail in colonial British Guiana during his successful campaign to become prime minister, and remained close friends with both Cheddi and his wife and fellow politician Janet Jagan.

"This year," she wrote in the concluding paragraph of Woman Against Myth, "as we mark the hundredth anniversary of the publication of the Communist Manifesto, we mark also a hundred years of the organized fight for equality of American women that began with the Seneca Falls convention. Those two events are linked by more than a common date. More and more we come to see that it is only the socialism foreshadowed by Marx and Engels, abolishing as it does all forms of exploitation of one human being by another, that can make it possible for women to achieve real equality. That can give substance to the ringing declaration adopted at that woman's convention holding it to be self-evident ‘that all men and women are created equal.'"

Betty left the Communist Party in the late 1950s, but remained an activist on her own terms, organizing a committee to free Mexican muralist David Siqueiros from prison, and becoming active in the struggle to stop the Vietnam War. At about this time, she developed a love of photography, documenting political struggles as well as her travels. She spent many happy hours in the darkroom that she installed on the top floor of her Greenwich Village brownstone.

During her later years, Millard joined the fight for lesbian and gay rights, and in her 80s she finally was able openly to affirm her own lesbianism. She bought a farm in Dutchess County, N.Y., read Rachel Carson and became interested in environmental issues. With some of her family inheritance, she became a philanthropist, supporting progressive, LGBT, and environmental organizations, and providing early leadership for the North Star Fund, which works to create a more equitable and democratic city for all New Yorkers. She also began writing short stories, several of which were anthologized.

Though never afraid to form an opinion, Betty was always eager to discuss interesting and controversial issues in politics, art, literature, film, and human relations. The stories she accumulated during a lifetime on the frontier of social and political justice, and her love of music and life, drew new friends to her side even well into her ninth decade. Few people now alive will have any memory of Woman Against Myth or her work on The New Masses, but her surviving friends and family will remain lastingly inspired by her characteristic enthusiasm for exploring new ideas, helping others better their own lives, and seeing in every challenge an opportunity.

Photo: Betty Millard, right, with her niece Olivia. Courtesy Olivia Millard.

Banks should pay to repair their mess, rally demands

Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:18:00 +0000

CLEVELAND - Labor and community groups rallied here in Public Square Monday to demand banks pay to repair the massive damage they caused to the U.S. economy.

"Millions have lost their jobs because greedy bankers brought our economy to a halt," Liz Shuler, national secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO, told the boisterous crowd of 150 picketing the Cleveland office of Morgan Stanley. "They invested in junk. They inflated bubbles that popped. They got billions in bailout money. It's time for them to pay their fair share."

But, she said, for Morgan Stanley "it's back to business as usual." They paid their CEO James Gorman $11 million and use taxpayer money to lobby against regulation of the financial industry, she said.

"They refuse to loan money to small business and college students. They put the robber barons to shame."

As she spoke, her point was dramatized by a man wearing a tuxedo and a pig mask who made mock attempts to steal purses and pick the pockets of demonstrators.

Shuler outline the AFL-CIO program to create 10 million jobs and called for taxing bank executive bonuses. The labor organization is also urging support for bills in the House and Senate to tax financial transactions and raise $150 billion a year for jobs programs.

The event was one of nearly 200 being held by the AFL-CIO and allied groups around the country targeting Wall Street banks. Other speakers here included Mike Piepsny, head of the Cleveland Tenants Organization, who said Cuyahoga County was continuing to face 15,000 home foreclosures a year because of layoffs and the subprime mortgage lending policies of the Wall Street banks. Pat Gallagher, sub district director of the United Steelworkers, said refusal by the banks to provide credit had caused thousands to lose jobs at the Republic Engineered Products mill in nearby Lorain.

Wanda Navarro, a member of Workers United and a presser at the Hugo Boss men's suit plant, urged support for the fight to stop the company from closing.

"We can change their minds," she said. "We will keep fighting until they do."

Photo: Debbie Kline

Florida lawmakers put budget woes on backs of retirees

Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:55:00 +0000

As the Florida state Senate tries to balance the budget by stripping teachers of pay and the incentive to teach in Florida, they are now going after retirees and pension plans with the help of the state Legislature.

First, the Legislature intends to change the Florida Retirement System by an amendment that would go into effect immediately. Employees hired after July 2011 will be required to pay 1% gross salary into the FRS. The highest salary definition is changed from the highest five years to the average of total career service and salary.

Overtime and other types of compensation (leave, payouts, etc.) would not be included in pension calculations. The retirement age would be raised from 62 to 65 and the acctual rate is dropped for vested employees from 1.6% to 1.44%.

Under the current law retirees get 100% of their final average compensation. These amendments would drop that to 80%!

The sponsors of these bills claim that revising FRS and public employee retirement benefits would save the state money during this time of declining revenues and the need to fund a $3 billion budget deficit.

But the bill, HB 1319, would result in out-of-pocket costs for public education employees who would suffer reduction of their actual retirement benefit. Further, HB 1319 would result in out-of-pocket costs for public education employees who would be required to make increased payroll deductions towards their retirement plan.

It is imperative that this bill, amendments and SB 6 (Florida Senate bill that eliminates tenure and introduces merit pay) are defeated.

Photo: Florida's former state Capitol. http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamiedfw/ / CC BY 2.0

Students celebrate education aid overhaul in House health bill

Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:49:00 +0000

Nationwide college students are celebrating and applauding leaders of the House of Representatives after they passed major student aid reform along with the historic health care bill on Sunday.

The student measure was part of the package of "fixes" that will be considered by the Senate under the budget process known as "reconcilliation."

Student leaders say the federal government is moving forward with the most sweeping overhaul of college financial aid in decades.

"This is truly a historic day for all Americans," said Gregory Cendana, president of the United States Student Association (USSA). "The passage of HR 4872 is a monumental victory for students and families struggling to keep their heads above water in today's tough economy," he added.

On average each student graduates with nearly $25,000 dollars in debt, said Cendana. "If the U.S. is going to fully recover from the recession, the federal government must enact long-term, prudent fiscal policies that invest in the future. That means investing in college affordability through President Obama's student aid reform plan."

Under the student aid proposal, private lenders would no longer make federally subsidized student loans. Rather, the government would make all such loans itself, instead of only some as it does now. Borrowers will go directly to the federal government for student loans, and not to the banks or other private lenders. It would make college loans that parents take out for their children slightly cheaper and easier to get.

The middleman would be eliminated saving the government an estimated $61 billion over the next ten years. About $36 billion of that would be used to increase Pell grants for lower-income students. The measure would also allocate $2.5 billion to historically minority-serving institutions and community colleges. At least $10 billion would be allocated toward reducing the federal deficit.

The bill would boost annual Pell grants, which go to about 6 million students, to a maximum of $5,975 by 2017 from $5,550 this year.

Some critics say the boost falls short from an earlier House version that addressed tuition inflation, however. Thirty years ago, Pell grants covered 77 percent of the average tuition at a public university. Today, only 35 percent are covered.

Despite some shortfalls, most see the bill as a positive step in the right direction and say the savings will help the most needy students in the country.

In the 2007-08 school year 7.3 million students received Pell grants, out of 14.6 million who applied. A decade ago, 4.9 million students received the aid.

Graduates having trouble paying their loans will also get help, according to the new rules. Starting in 2014, eligible borrowers can cap their monthly loan payments at 10 percent of their discretionary income, down from the current 15 percent. In addition, borrowers who make their monthly payments faithfully for 20 years can have the remaining balance forgiven, down from 25 years under the current law.

The Senate is expected to take up the measure as early as this week.

Meanwhile USSA commends leaders of the House saying the legislation makes great strides to ensure that students can depend of federal financial aid programs as they work towards their goal of achieving a higher education. The measure comes at a pivotal moment in the student movement, says USSA, which recognizes the government's investment in higher education and the country's economic future.

"Students and families are struggling to balance mortgage-sized loan debt, rising insurance premiums, and the everyday cost of living," said Cendana. "USSA's 4.5 million members, and millions of young people around the country celebrate this victory and look forward to its final passage in the Senate in the coming week," he said.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/editor/ / CC BY 2.0

Struggle requires long view, Jesse Jackson tells left gathering

Wed, 24 Mar 2010 11:45:00 +0000

NEW YORK - A conversation with the Rev. Jesse Jackson before an overflow crowd opened this year's Left Forum conference at Pace University in lower Manhattan this weekend.

Labor activist and Left Forum board member Bill Fletcher Jr. introduced Jackson Friday night saying that his two historic presidential campaigns in 1984 and 1988 "shook the United States" and stood in open defiance of the "demon of Reaganism."

Jackson and his campaigns brought together the labor, civil rights and women's movements with key elements of the U.S. left to forge a "pro-equality populism" that challenged corporate power and at the same time built interracial unity, Fletcher said.

Jackson, in brief remarks and then in dialogue with Prof. Max Fraad Wolff of New School University, said, "The left is not on the margins.The left is the moral center of the nation."

He urged participants and the broad left to remember that the struggle for progress requires the long view. He noted that today's struggles stand in the context of the 50th anniversaries of the Sharpeville massacre in South Africa and the lunch-counter sit-in campaigns in the U.S. South that ignited the civil rights movement.

"We have global capital," said Jackson. "But we have not globalized human rights, workers' rights, women's rights, children's rights or environmental security." And, he added, "we have not democratized the economy."

Jackson is president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, which has championed reforming Wall Street and restructuring financial rules. He called for forgiving the student loan debt that millions of student and workers are in default on. "If banks get zero percent interest, then students should get zero percent interest," he said.

Jackson pointed to revitalizing public transportation as a key in the struggle for jobs, the environment and our cities. "Transit worker jobs are green jobs," he said. He also called for reviving the U.S. steel industry in order to build electric cars, light rail and the needed transportation infrastructure.

Jackson spoke on a wide range of topics from job creation to ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the U.S. response to the Haiti earthquake, but particular interest was focused on the left's attitude towards the Obama administration and the health care reform bill, which has since passed, but was then headed for a vote in Congress.

"I support single-payer comprehensive health care ... but I also know this battle is about more than health care," said Jackson. "If we lose this battle this week, it will not end there." He mentioned immigration reform, the Employee Free Choice Act and other pressing legislative measures that would be shelved or set back if congressional Democrats were unable to pass health care reform despite its flaws.

Responding to a question about the "symbolic nature" of Obama's election victory and the pending health care bill, Jackson asked if adding 32 million more people with health care coverage was just a symbol. He called passing health care reform an urgent need, saying, "it is morally right; it is necessary."

Jackson reflected on the history of the civil rights movement and the progression of legislative and legal victories from the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and beyond. He noted that every football player knows that "every play plans to score, but defense decides how far you get."

"It is a real ideological civil war struggle," he said, pointing out that the right wing is against the whole progressive agenda, not just health care reform. "We cannot allow them to break our will to fight."

In response to criticisms and expressions of frustration with the pace or direction of change following the election of Obama, Jackson called on the left and the mass movements to get out in the streets. "We determine the agenda by our action," he said. "Street action makes public opinion."

Again pointing to history, Jackson reminded the audience that President Lyndon Johnson thought pushing for voting rights was premature when Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement began the Selma campaign. "We delivered Johnson, said Jackson. "He didn't deliver us."

Jackson ended his remarks by urging the audience to action.

Speaking of the ultra-right, he said, "They want the country back, and we've got to keep it."

The Left Forum gathered hundreds of activists, academics, organizers and students from around the country and the world to discuss and debate the issues of the day and strategize a progressive agenda.

Many of the panels and discussion were captured on video and will be available online soon.

Full audio recording of jackson's remarks are available at Uprising Radio.

Photo: Left Forum