My son, a Marine
My husband has been a Naval officer for 25 years now, which may have a little to do with our son, Trent Helmkamp, joining the Marines through their Delayed Entry Program in June 2003. He was 17 years old and had just finished his junior year of high school.
Grassroots organizing wins big at America West
The announcement of victory spread to airports across the nation at lightning speed after the nearly 3,200 customer service representatives at America West won their union election on Aug. 17. It was the largest union election victory for workers under the Railway Labor Act in over a decade, and the largest private sector union win in the country in over five years.
No paid leave raises level of flu danger
WASHINGTON (PAI) — Lack of paid sick leave in the U.S. may force flu-ridden employees — men and women who caught the flu and didn’t get shots due to lack of vaccine — to work when they should not, the National Partnership for Women and Families says.
ChicagoCity college teachers on strike
CHICAGO (PAI) — Management demands to load $2,000 in increased health care costs on each worker each year, plus its insistence on higher workloads, forced teachers at Chicago’s city/community colleges into their first strike in 27 years.
Workers encouraged in S.F. hotel dispute
SAN FRANCISCO — As the lockout of 4,000 hotel workers by the 14-hotel Multi-Employer Group continued here, workers and their union, UNITE HERE Local 2, were encouraged by several developments:
Expensive oil and imperialist war
In February 2003, Ari Fleischer, then George W. Bush’s press secretary, brushed off millions of demonstrators worldwide demanding “No war for oil!” If the assault on Iraq was for cheap oil, Fleischer said, the U.S. could simply “lift the sanctions so the oil could flow. This is not about that.”
Firms export jobs
Book Review Exporting America: Why Corporate Greed Is Shipping American Jobs Overseas By Lou Dobbs Warner Books, 2004 Hardcover, 208 pp., $19.95
International notes
China: Private workplaces should be union / South Africa: Big victory for restaurant waiters / Iraq: U.S. plans prison expansion / Russia: Millions strike for pay, benefits / Korean peninsula: Demand U.S. compensation for war damage
Cuba moves to be dollar-free
Up against sharpened threats against Cuba’s revolution and a reduced flow of U.S. dollars to Cuba, the government there has acted dramatically to move towards a dollar-free domestic economy. The goal is to prioritize dollars for use in international trade.
Results mixed in California contests
In California, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer won a third term by a whopping 58 percent to 38 percent margin over Republican challenger and former Secretary of State Bill Jones, despite the support Jones received from Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
