People Before Profit blog

Immigrants continue fighting despite delay in Obama’s executive action

Thu, 02 Oct 2014 14:47:00 +0000

Anger is still boiling after President Obama announced that he was delaying his expected announcement of more executive relief for immigrants until after the Nov. 4 midterm elections. People who are directly involved with struggles of the immigrant communities point out that this means tens of thousands more people will be deported than if he had not delayed the decision.

One sometimes wonders if our politicians know what it means when breadwinners or other family members are deported. They may be sent into situations not only of grinding poverty but of mortal danger, as in the hyper violent areas of Central America from which the child migrants come. If they have jobs, they lose them. If they have homes and are paying on a mortgage, the family members left behind will not be able to keep up the payments, and likely will end up thrown out of their homes. The emotional damage to left-behind spouses and minor children is heartbreaking.

Relatives, friends, neighbors and coworkers of people who are faced with deportation need to keep organizing, protesting and agitating. Anything that has been gained so far has been because of this-nothing, whether legislation in Congress or executive orders from the White House, happens without such pressure.

However, we have to take, also, a realistic attitude toward what the politicians are likely to do and not do. President Obama agreed to implement DACA for the "Dreamers" in 2012 because he and his fellow Democrats thought it might increase the Latino vote for them in that year's elections, and it did. He delayed his scheduled announcement about expanding benefits for the undocumented until after the November 2014 midterm election because he got pressure, from within the Democratic Party, from Senate incumbents and other candidates who feared that their Republican opponents would whip up anti-immigrant fears as an electoral tactic, so he backed off his promise. The Republicans, for their part, did their bit to promote such fears.

The anger is legitimate but like it or not, this is how the U.S. political system works and it is unlikely to change in the short run. Electoral calculations can never be left out of our strategy.

If the Republicans gain control of the Senate and keep their House majority, it will not help a single immigrant family, and it could make things worse. True, it is probable that no progressive immigration reform legislation can get through Congress until after the 2016 elections. But the mischief that a Congress in which both houses have a Republican majority could create on this and other issues is real and daunting. Very negative stuff could get passed, such as sabotaging DACA by eliminating its budget.

So talk of boycotting the Nov. 4 elections is unrealistic and dangerous. Nor in that short period is any alternate candidacy likely to arise that could produce much more than a futile protest.

We should promote voter registration and turnout on Nov. 4, and be especially aware of the fact that Latinos, new citizens and poor people are the target of massive efforts at vote suppression orchestrated by the Republican Party. Democrats are a very mixed bag but I don't know of a single state or congressional district where the Democratic Party Candidate is actually worse than the Republican. Nor do I know of any in which there is a third party candidate who could actually win, and there are many in which he or she would end up helping the Republicans.

Meanwhile, there needs to be an organized fight for each immigrant family facing the catastrophe of deportation. This requires intensive work within the immigrant communities to make sure that everybody who benefited from DACA the first time round understands that they have to apply for an extension, that anybody denied DACA authorization should be helped, that people who are threatened with deportation are defended and not just left to their own devices. For example, in 2011 the Obama administration gave the I.C.E. orders to prioritize for deportation people who represent a danger to the public, but this was sandbagged at the implementation stage by the I.C.E. bureaucracy.

That issue has to be raised again, and pressure put on I.C.E. offices to interpret "prosecutorial discretion" in the most generous way possible.

There are also things we can fight for at the state and local level. An increasing number of city, county and state governments are refusing to cooperate with I.C.E. "detainer orders." These are requests by immigration authorities that jails not release prisoners until their immigration status is checked, including for 5 days beyond the date they would be released. If this becomes a national trend, it could seriously gum up mass deportation efforts. That would help a lot of people as well as creating a new pressure on the whole deportation industry.

Photo: AP

Ferguson residents, at council meeting, voice concerns over lack of change

Thu, 02 Oct 2014 13:49:00 +0000

FERGUSON, Mo. - On Tuesday evening town residents lined up and filled the pews, one by one, inside the First Baptist Church. The city council was about to begin another 7 p.m. meeting, giving the community their weekly platform to voice questions and concerns.

It is not quite two months since a white policeman shot Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, to death here and it is less than two weeks before a planned "week of resistance" from Oct. 10-13.

After the shooting the uprising here was watched nightly by millions around the world who reacted in shock and with anger over police use of armoured vehicles and heavy military-style weaponry which they pointed at peaceful demonstrators. The local and state authorities, the FBI and the federal government launched investigations that are still underway.

Despite their attendance at the regularly scheduled city council meetings here, many residents say their voices are not being heard. As I took a seat amongst many life-long residents I overheard mention that even being in a "place of God" could not stop or soothe rising tempers nor could it bring all those present to a place of mutual understanding.

At 7:05 p.m. Mayor James Knowles rose from his seat at the city council's table and asked everyone to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Residents rose, stood in place and faced the American flag.

As Mayor Knowles ended his recital of the pledge, the soft murmuring of the final words, "justice for all," echoed throughout the chamber. It was a reminder that, for many, justice is never served and that in this suburban Missouri town justice is, as of yet, nowhere in sight.

Many at the meeting felt that the wheels of justice are turning too slowly, if at all.

Darren Wilson, the officer who shot and killed Brown, is still a free man on paid administrative leave.

In the meantime, over 200 residents have been jailed for their protest activity.

In addition, the St. Louis Grand Jury has been granted even more time to decide what, if any charges to bring against Wilson.

The family of Michael Brown continues to deal with what they hope will not be another failure of the American justice system while police continue to use excessive force to incite violence during peaceful community demonstrations.

Around 7:30 p.m., after the city council completed formal business - including tabling a bill to create a police civilian review board - residents, both black and white, queued up at the two available microphones and prepared to ask questions and deliver comments. They were met with the cold, blank stares of council members who, moments before, explained that they would not answer any questions or respond to any comments.

All eyes were on the first resident who grabbed the microphone, an elderly gentleman sporting an I Love Ferguson t-shirt. He spoke of his life in the town and the many changes he had witnessed personally, from the civil rights movement to the flight of white residents.

Speaking passionately, Sandy, a long-term African-American resident, took her time to let the council know that they could make a real change. "You have the power to fire Darren Wilson and Chief Belmar," she said, closing her comments by letting everyone know that they needed to take a stand for their community.

As the evening moved on it was obvious that many of the black people in attendance, along with some of the white residents, wanted to tackle the issue of race relations. They don't want the issue to be swept under the rug, as they feel it has been in the past.

There were those, however, who disagreed. "This is only between two people and no one else," said one white resident. Our community is being destroyed by the action of two people - that's all."

Many in the crowd insisted, however, that this was "bigger than just two people. It is about racism and police brutality here in our communities, it is about the lack of transparency from this city council!"

Kim Tihen, a city council member, knew that many residents were directing their comments at her. As a Ferguson police officer she had arrested an African-American male in a case of mistaken identity, assaulted him while he was in her custody, and then filed charges against him for destruction of government property (staining her uniform with his blood).

You got the feeling at the meeting that many Ferguson residents are grappling with a status quo that goes well beyond Ferguson and, in fact, encompasses the entire nation.

Photo: Reilly Winters

Silicon Valley breeding nationwide schools-for-profit scheme

Thu, 02 Oct 2014 11:58:00 +0000

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Nearly every metropolitan area these days has its own wealthy promoters of education "reform." Little Rock has the Waltons, Seattle has Bill and Melinda Gates, Newark has Mark Zuckerberg, and Buffalo has John Oishei, who made his millions selling windshield wipers.

Few areas, however, have as concentrated and active a group of wealthy "reformers" as California's Silicon Valley. One of the country's fastest-growing charter school operators, Rocketship Education, started here. A big reason for its stellar ascent is the support it gets from high tech's deep pockets, and the political influence that money can buy.

Rocketship currently operates nine schools in San Jose, in the heart of Silicon Valley. It opened its first school in Milwaukee last year and one in Nashville, Tennessee, this fall. Its first two schools in Washington, D.C., where almost half the students already attend charters, open next year. Rocketship plans include running eight schools in Milwaukee, in Nashville, and in D.C. in the near future.

Rocketship also proposed a charter school in Morgan Hill, just south of San Jose. But there they ran into resistance from parents, teachers, and the teachers' union. That successful campaign to block Rocketship and protect local public schools highlights the importance of confronting charter chains as they try to infiltrate school systems across the country.

"Blended Learning," the Rocketship model

"Blended learning," the hallmark of the Rocketship education model, is based on using computers more and teachers less. Its roots lie in a valley dominated by high-tech factories, where electronic assembly lines belie the hype of entrepreneurship and "creative disruption." Education policy analyst Diane Ravitch describes Rocketship charters as "schools for poor children. . . . In this bare-bones Model-T school, it appears that these children are being trained to work on an assembly line. There is no suggestion that they are challenged to think or question or wonder or create."

A report by Gordon Lafer for the Economic Policy Institute, Do Poor Kids Deserve Lower Quality Education than Rich Kids? examined the Rocketship model: "The 'blended learning' model of education exemplified by the Rocketship chain of charter schools," it found, "often promoted by charter boosters - is predicated on paying minimal attention to anything but math and literacy, and even those subjects are taught by inexperienced teachers carrying out data-driven lesson plans relentlessly focused on test preparation. But evidence from Wisconsin, the country, and the world shows that students receive a better education from experienced teachers offering a broad curriculum that emphasizes curiosity, creativity, and critical thinking, as well as getting the right answers on standardized tests."

The contradiction between high-tech hype and regimented reality is a hallmark of the Silicon Valley model, and is not just found at Rocketship. "Blended learning" is promoted by John Fisher, who started the $25 million Silicon Schools Fund. Fisher is the son of Gap founders Don and Doris Fisher, among the world's wealthiest clothing manufacturers and scions of San Francisco's elite.

On the website of Navigator Schools, for example, a video promoting its Gilroy Prep charter (at the south end of Silicon Valley's Santa Clara County) is full of superlatives like "incredible." It claims its 1st and 2nd graders are "engaged 100 percent of the time." Images show youngsters, each in an identical pale blue polo shirt with the Navigator logo, chanting in unison while a teacher holding an iPad moves through the classroom.

The slick video is just one indication of the big money at stake in the expansion of corporate charter schools in Silicon Valley. Students use "the best adaptive software," the video enthuses. On their desks are "student responders," remote controls with buttons for answering multiple-choice questions. "Gone are the days of textbooks and endless worksheets," the narrator boasts.

The first goal of the Navigator mission statement is "to develop students who are proficient or advanced on the California state standards test."

The use of computers in the Navigator video is a pale shadow of the dependence on them at Rocketship. In Education Week, Benjamin Herold ("New Model Underscores Rocketship╒s Growing Pains") explains: "For years, schools in the network have used the 'station rotation' model of blended learning, with students cycling each day between about six hours of traditional classroom time and two hours of computer-assisted instruction in 'learning labs.' That model . . . has allowed Rocketship to replace one credentialed teacher per grade with software and an hourly-wage aide, freeing up $500,000 yearly per school that can be redirected to other uses."

According to Lafer, students in Milwaukee will take the state standardized test every eight weeks and the MAP three times a year. All their work in the learning lab is converted to data daily. Teachers' salaries are primarily based on their students' math and reading scores.

Education As a Profit Base

Rocketship's tech connection starts at the top. Co-founder John Danner is on the board of a company that sells DreamBox Learning math education software. According to Lafer, venture capitalists John Doerr and Reed Hastings are primary investors in DreamBox and big donors to Rocketship; Hastings sits on the national advisory board. In turn, Rocketship uses DreamBox in its learning labs. "Thus," Lafer concludes, "Hastings and Doerr help fund the nonprofit Rocketship chain, which contracts with a for-profit company they partially own; the more Rocketship expands, the greater DreamBox╒s profits."

Profits come other ways as well. Also according to Lafer: "Rocketship's school buildings are owned by a sister company - Launchpad - which in turn charges Rocketship rent for the facilities. Rocketship's official business plans include the goal that 'Launchpad will charge relatively high facilities fees' and that 'the profit margin will be used to finance new facilities.'"

Hedge fund investors fund individual sites. One of them is former tennis star Andre Agassi. "Now it's proven," Agassi boasted to Bloomberg Business News. "Across the board, everybody is starting to realize that there is an innovative private sector solution." His partner, Bobby Turner,adds, "If you want to cure - really cure - a problem in society, you need to come up with a sustainable solution, and that means making money." Investors in the Turner-Agassi Charter School Facilities Fund include New York City's Pershing Square Foundation. By summer's end it will complete 39 schools for 17,500 students, growing eventually to 60 schools for 30,000.

Where do teachers fit into this picture? Rocketship's charter application in Morgan Hill specified that its staffing ratio would go from 35.92 students per teacher in 2014-15 to 41.27 in 2016-17. Many teachers are hired from Teach For America, and non-credentialed paraprofessionals staff the learning lab.

"The student-teacher ratio at Rocketship schools is 27:1 during traditional classroom instruction," Rocketship media contact Shayna Englin responded. "The learning lab is staffed by tutors and individualized learning specialists who receive extensive professional development and training for the months before the school year starts and participate in required hours of additional development weekly throughout the school year."

However, a report by the Alum Rock, California, school district last spring said Rocketship was "misleading" when it didn't include computer labs in its calculation of teacher-student ratios. They decided to reject Rocketship's proposal.

Buying Politicians

There is a national trend toward corporate education reformers investing heavily in state and local campaigns - including city council and school board races. California is a scary example, with Silicon Valley money at the center.

In 2012, the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, run by the high-tech industry, formed an organization to promote charters, Innovate Public Schools. It got its first $750,000 from the Walton Foundation and $200,000 from Silicon Valley sponsors.

Innovate's head is Matt Hammer, who for 10 years has been executive director of People Acting in Community Together (PACT). PACT has a history of supporting immigrant rights and a base in Catholic parishes. In the Silicon Valley area, however, it has also mobilized support for Rocketship and Navigator.

School reformers have spent heavily on local school board races. The Santa Clara County Schools Political Action Committee (created by the California Charter Schools Association) and Parents for Great Schools raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the 2012 election - $40,000 from Fisher, $50,000 from Netflix founder Reed Hastings, and $10,000 from Rocketship board member Timothy Ranzetta, among others.

The PACs spent more than $250,000 to try to knock out Santa Clara County Board of Education member Anna Song, who survived nonetheless. They spent lavishly in East San Jose districts as well. Parents for Great Schools got $5,000 from Ranzetta and more from former San Jose Mayor Susan Hammer, PACT's Matt Hammer, and Rocketship consultant Erik Schoennauer. "Had donors given money directly to support high performing schools, they would have had a more beneficial impact," Song told the San Jose Mercury News.

Silicon Valley capital is bent on playing a much larger political role. Former California State Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuûez is now a strategist for Students First, the reform lobby set up by Michele Rhee and headquartered in Sacramento. Nuûez used to be a California Teachers Association representative and assistant to the late Miguel Contreras, secretary of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor. Nuûez shepherded $3.7 million to 105 candidates, including about $1 million to three Democratic candidates to the California Assembly, school board races in West Sacramento and Burbank, and $350,000 to the Coalition for School Reform, a political action committee that funneled money to candidates for the L.A. Unified school board.

This spring the industry's titans ran a trade negotiator from the Clinton administration, Ro Khanna, against one of the most progressive members of the U.S. Congress, Mike Honda. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Silicon Valley needed a voice for "those high-tech titans (Eric Schmidt of Google, Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook, Marissa Mayer of Yahoo among them)" and that the word among tech executives is "They just want more. They want - and this district deserves - a stronger voice in Washington."

Buying a judgment against teacher tenure

The valley's most far-reaching intervention took place this year - a successful legal attack on teacher tenure with chilling national implications. In 2012 David Welch, president of Infinera, a Silicon Valley fiber-optic communications corporation, set up another education reform advocacy group, Students Matter. He then filed a class action suit, representing nine children purportedly harmed by "ineffective teachers" to overturn teacher tenure in California. This past June, L.A. Superior Court Judge Rolf M. Treu ruled against teachers and in favor of Welch and the students in Vergara v. California.

Welch, whose company has revenue of more than half a billion dollars annually, gave half a million in seed money to Students Matter, and then lent it another million. The Broad Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation kicked in more. In 2012 alone, Students Matter spent more than $1.1 million on one of the state's most powerful corporate law firms, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, which fought the Vergara case.

In a Mercury News op-ed, Welch defended his attack on teacher tenure. "Experience is valuable," he said, "but years on the job alone do not determine effectiveness. California law must explicitly prohibit the use of seniority as the primary basis for critical employment decisions."

Diane Ravitch pointed out that at Rocketship "about 75 percent of the teachers are Teach For America, so we don't expect to see many experienced teachers... The founder of Rocketship is unalterably opposed to unions because, he says, they would limit his flexibility." There is no union at David Welch's Infinera, either, nor is there at any of the other high-tech firms active in promoting education reform.

"We believe the judge fell victim to the anti-union, anti-teacher rhetoric and one of America's finest corporate law firms that set out to scapegoat teachers for the real problems that exist in public education," Joshua Pechthalt, president of the California Federation of Teachers, told the Mercury News. "It's discouraging when people who are incredibly wealthy, who can hire America's top corporate law firms, can attempt to drive an education agenda devoid of support from parents and community."

Judge Treu was greatly influenced by a controversial Silicon Valley figure, Eric Hanushek, who writes about education reform at the right-wing Hoover Institution at Stanford University. "U.S. achievement could reach that in Canada and Finland if we replaced with average teachers the least effective 8 to 12 percent of teachers, respectively," he predicts, giving "astounding benefits, increasing the annual growth rate of the United States by 1 percent of GDP ... over the lifetime of somebody born today ... an increase in total U.S. economic output of $112 trillion."

Hanushek sees firing teachers as the solution: "The previous estimates point clearly to the key imperative of eliminating the drag of the bottom teachers," although he cautions it would be "politically challenging in a heavily unionized environment such as the one in place today."

Hanushek testified before Treu, who then argued: "There is also no dispute that there are a significant number of grossly ineffective teachers currently active in California classrooms. Dr. Berliner, an expert called by state defendants, testified that one to three percent of teachers in California are grossly ineffective. Given that the evidence showed roughly 275,000 active teachers in this state, the extrapolated number of grossly ineffective teachers ranges from 2,750 to 8,250."

David Berliner, the Regents' Professor Emeritus of Education at Arizona State University, accused the judge of misquoting his testimony. "I never said that. I'm on record as saying I've visited hundreds of classrooms, and I've never seen a 'grossly ineffective teacher.'"

Fighting Back

In Silicon Valley the commodification of education is proceeding rapidly. But the takeover of privatized education isn't inevitable. This year the flashpoint was Morgan Hill, a rural town and increasingly a bedroom community at the southern end of Silicon Valley. About half the district's 9,200 students are Latina/o. Last fall, both Rocketship and Navigator applied to the school district and then the county to open charter schools in Morgan Hill. Instead of a rubber stamp, they ran into massive resistance.

Theresa Sage, president of the Morgan Hill Federation of Teachers, AFT Local 2022, says, "In some schools, poverty is a big issue - the poverty rate is 23 percent in our district." Morgan Hill schools only get $5,700 a year per student, one of the state's lowest rates, and the legacy of Proposition 13, a measure passed in 1978 that limits property tax increases, is accentuated by the area's poor rural past. "We have to address that, look at our own practice, and make a commitment to moving API scores [California's ranked "academic performance index," based almost entirely on standardized test scores]. That means working with the district and engaging our community. But a corporate takeover isn't the right answer."

The Morgan Hill district rejected the corporate charter petitions because of a strong mobilization by the union and other groups. "When the petitions were filed we had to act quickly," Sage says. Concerned community members wrote a petition contesting the charters and supporting neighborhood schools, and posted it on MoveOn.org; it ultimately collected nearly 1,500 signatures. The petition explained that Rocketship's plan would result in closing a neighborhood school and shifting large numbers of students and teachers to different school sites.

When the district rejected the two charter companies, they both appealed the decision to the Santa Clara County Board of Education. Morgan Hill teachers and parents packed the November meeting of the county board to speak out against the charter applications.

Then, in December, the union and the school district co-sponsored a speech by David Berliner, author of numerous articles analyzing high-stakes testing and the expert misquoted by the judge in the Vergara case. "He spoke about the effects of poverty on test scores," Sage notes, "which is a big issue in our district. We absolutely believe we need to address the opportunity gap. And to do that we need to bring people together behind our public education system."

A panel commenting on Berliner's speech included Mario Banuelos, a board member of the Morgan Hill Community Foundation and a district parent, as well as two teachers, two administrators, and another community member. The sense of the meeting was a strong commitment to public education. In January 2014, the Santa Clara County Board of Education denied the petition by Navigator Schools to open an elementary school there. A week earlier, perhaps seeing which way the wind was blowing, Rocketship Education withdrew its appeal. Sage charges that the charter wave seeks to exploit years of budget austerity. "We've had a cut of $22 million since 2008," she explains. "So this charter push has come in at the peak of the impact of those lean years, and it╒s been very aggressive."

Nevertheless, in the classroom, according to mentor teacher Gemma Abels, teachers and the district are committed to carrying out the mission of public schools to provide a rich education, beyond teaching to the test. "We want our students to know how to use technology in life, art, and music," she explains. "We've taken furlough days and even increased class sizes in order to keep programs so that kids have a wide range to choose from." As a partially rural district, Morgan Hill still has a Future Farmers of America program, which today teaches high-tech agricultural science to a diverse student body.

In 2012, the union and the district initiated a dual Spanish/English immersion program, covering culture as well as language, for kindergarten through 2nd grade. Every year, as students progress, a new grade is added. There are two new focus academies - one for science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics, and another for environmental science. Project Roadmap focuses on helping students who are their family's first generation bound for college, while the district also increases the standards needed for graduation.

"Our teachers always say that test scores don't truly measure a student's progress, and that we don't just teach to the test," Abels explains. "I think we're a progressive district, and pretty innovative." She, like Sage, emphasizes the need to increase parent involvement. "Maybe this is one good thing to come out of this experience. It's brought parents out to school board meetings and, if that continues, I hope we can engage people we don't normally hear from."

Photo: Randi Weingerten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, criticized court ruling against job protections for teachers. Public school advocates say that millionaire David Welch pumped so much money into a class action lawsuit that he was able to "buy" the Vergara v. California ruling against teachers. John Hanna/AP

Texans hope to change things on Election Day

Wed, 01 Oct 2014 16:08:00 +0000

In the Texas elections, the top of the ticket is generating hope and fear. The fear comes from the polls, which show Republicans from the far right - Gregg Abbott for Governor and Dan Patrick for Lieutenant Governor - maintaining solid leads. The hope is that Democrats Wendy Davis and Leticia van de Putte can come from behind, that they can bring out unprecedented numbers of women and Latino voters, and that the general rightward direction of Texas politics may finally come to an end.

Wendy Davis has drawn the most attention nationwide, but van de Putte's run for Lieutenant Governor may be the more important in Texas. The Lieutenant Governor has to ability to stop almost any legislation. He/she (it's never been a she) controls all the committee assignments in the Senate. He/she sets the agenda. No Texas officer who stands for office in a general election has as much power.

Van de Putte was able to get only one televised debate. It took place on September 29. It was easy to see why Patrick would not take more debates, having done very poorly in his first debate with Van de Putte.

Both are presently state senators and have long mirror-opposite voting records. Van de Putte strongly advocates for spending on education and on water. She stands strong for women's rights and for fair treatment for immigrants. Both top Democrats participated in recent Gay Pride parades.

Patrick argues that ultra-conservative government has made Texas the 12th largest economy in the world and the greatest job-creator in the nation. He doesn't mention the quality of those jobs, but Texas holds the record for the greatest percentage of minimum wage workers.

Davis was able to negotiate two televised debates with her opponent. The second one took place on September 30. Gregg Abbott has a far better television presence than Patrick, but he needs it to confront the well-prepared and lively debater, Wendy Davis.

The first question of the debate had to do with handling the first diagnosed case of ebola in the nation, which happened that day in Dallas. The candidates' answers were similar, but their general stance on health care has a wide divide. The hottest issue has to do with taking around $100 billion in federal money to expand Medicaid as part of the Affordable Care Act. Davis wants the money in Texas, and Abbott opposes it strongly.

The candidates differ on the use of standardized testing in schools. The Republican candidates try to tone down their long-time support of standardized tests, and both Democrats want standardized tests de-emphasized. Davis supports drivers licenses for undocumented immigrants on the basis of highway safety. Abbott didn't answer the question, but took the opportunity to repeat the theme of his campaign and what seems to be his life's work, deprecating the federal government.

Gregg Abbott accuses Wendy Davis of unethical behavior in having voted on issues that concerned clients of her private business. Davis responds that she has done nothing outside ethical guidelines, but that Attorney General Abbott has clearly made decisions that benefited his campaign contributors. The most recent scandal has to do with the Governor's Enterprise Fund. It was set up to create good jobs in Texas. Senator Davis sponsored a bill to audit the fund, and the audit showed that millions of dollars were granted to corporations that had made no commitments at all. The same corporations were big donors to Governor Perry and to Attorney General Abbott. Abbott was supposed to have been overseeing the fund.

The scandal over the Enterprise Fund came to light after the first governor's debate but before the second. Abbott's complicity in the scandal gave Davis an edge that she did not have before, and she used it to advantage.

Texas has some of the highest homeowner insurance rates in the nation. Attorney General Abbott ducked the issue, but Senator Davis aggressively said that she would replace the Insurance Commissioner "who is not doing her job." She went on to say that Abbott gets big donations from insurance companies.

Gregg Abbott, even more than other Republicans, opposes abortion, even in cases of rape and incest. Wendy Davis made her national reputation by filibustering a bill that cuts deeply into women's health care.

Not every liberal in Texas is completely happy with the information being shared in the debates. Neither top Democrat says they would raise any taxes, nor find any new revenues, to accomplish the social progress they espouse. They don't oppose the current governor's sending the National Guard to the Mexican border. Both tend to duck any association with President Obama.

When the campaign began, Democrats said that their only hope was better turnout, but the candidates have focused on negative attacks, which do not bring out new voters. Big turnout is our great hope, but our great fear is that it may not come.

Photo: Leticia van de Putte, Democrat, campaigns for post of Lt. Governor in Texas. Andrew Brosig/AP

High Court to tackle cases affecting millions

Wed, 01 Oct 2014 14:59:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - It's the first Monday in October, and that means the U.S. Supreme Court comes back on the job, with cases - from pregnancy discrimination to whether retirees get health care - that will affect millions of workers.

As the justices' rulings in 2013-14 showed, their decisions have a strong effect on workers' rights. In the most-obvious example, the full 5-member National Labor Relations Board is now re deciding through hundreds of worker-boss conflicts a prior board handled.

That's because the court's GOP-named majority ruled that President Obama illegally named two "recess appointees," thus throwing out all that board's decisions.

There are no NLRB cases, yet, in the 2014-15 Supreme Court term that runs from October through June. But there are several cases with vast implications for workers, and more could be added. Issues important to workers that the court will handle include:

Does federal law let a firm discriminate against pregnant women if its disability policy is "gender-neutral?"

UPS argues the answer is "yes," against driver Peggy Young, all the way to the Supreme Court. The justices will hear the case on Dec. 3.

When Young, a UPS driver in Maryland, became pregnant in 2006, she got a doctor's note and a midwife's certificate barring her from lifting more than 20 pounds during the first five months of her pregnancy and 10 pounds thereafter. UPS requires its drivers to lift up to 70-pound packages and be able to push 150-pound packages on a dolly.

Young's union, the Teamsters, went to bat for her. Its shop steward argued that federal law required the company to accommodate her disability. UPS retorted the union contract - which was silent on the issue - overrode the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA). UPS put Young on unpaid leave, where she stayed until two months after her baby was born.

Young sued under the pregnancy law. The lower courts sided with UPS, saying its disability policy was "gender neutral," as federal disability law requires. Young counters that the PDA extends "disability" to pregnancy.

"UPS provides temporary accommodated work to three sizable classes of drivers with work restrictions: Those with on-the-job injuries, those with Americans with Disabilities Act disabilities, and those with conditions that render them ineligible for DOT certification. But it does not provide accommodated work to drivers who experience similar work restrictions due to pregnancy," Young and her lawyers say.

"That disparity violates the PDA's requirement that 'women affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions shall be treated the same...as other persons not so affected but similar in their ability or inability to work," Young's brief said. "The PDA's import is plain: The employer must not give any lesser accommodation to the pregnant workers than it gives to the non-pregnant workers."

AFSCME, the Teachers, the National Education Association, the United Food and Commercial Workers and the Service Employees filed a joint friend-of-the-court brief backing Young. All five unions are between 56 percent and 64 percent female. "A robust PDA is key to protecting these workers from pregnancy discrimination in employment," their brief says.

"UPS' claim that collective-bargaining agreements are 'controlling' over the PDA's substantive protections is baseless," the five unions add. "Quite to the contrary, an employee's protections under the federal civil rights laws, including those secured by the PDA, are not forfeited or supplanted simply because the employees exercised their rights to form and join a union for purposes of collective bargaining.

"In fact, it can easily be the case that benefits a union negotiates for one group of workers must also be extended to women affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions since, by operation of the PDA's plain terms, those workers must be treated the same as other workers who are similar in their ability or inability to work."

When do union contract health care benefits cover retirees?

Some federal circuit courts say only if the language is extremely specific, others disagree. A case pitting the Steelworkers against M&G Polymers of West Virginia, which the justices will hear on Nov. 10, will give the High Court a chance to sort it out.

The 6^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals says the only way union contracts' health care benefits can cover the retirees is if the contract says, in clear and plain terms, that it does. Two other circuit courts say the retirees are covered if the contract has language "that can reasonably support an interpretation that health-care benefits should continue indefinitely."

M&G's current owner, a Luxembourg-based firm, continued retiree health care benefits negotiated with Steelworkers Local 644 under prior owners. But that included a $10,500 lifetime cap on past retirees' health care benefits that the last prior owner, Shell, pushed onto the union in the mid-1990s. In 2007, M&G started applying the cap to current retirees, too.

The cap is so tight, USW retiree Herbert Tackett, the lead retiree, told lower courts, that 88 of the 238 current retirees hit it in their first year. And after they hit the cap, each retiree must pay his or her own medical bills. (The cap is also $4,200 for retirees' family members.)

The Employee Retirement Income and Security Act bars firms from such unilateral changes in pensions and benefits, the Steelworkers and Tackett say, so they sued. They added the cap on current retirees violated the union contract between M&G and Local 644.

"When read in context of all related agreements and" the union's and company's performance, "traditional rules of contract interpretation require only the language be 'reasonably susceptible' to the asserted meaning" of the section involved, in this case retiree health care benefits, they said. "Under traditional rules, the agreements were reasonably interpreted to provide that retiree health benefits were promised for life.

"Courts should employ traditional rules of contract interpretation, to the extent consistent with national labor policy, to resolve this question, just as they employ them to resolve other questions that arise under collective bargaining agreements. Applying those rules, the (Supreme) Court should affirm the judgment" for Local 644 and the retirees, the Steelworkers say.

Should low-paid warehouse workers get paid for time spent in security screenings?

In a year when low-paid workers nationwide - Walmart workers, fast food workers, warehouse workers and others - have marched by the millions for a $15 hourly living wage, it is fitting the justices will hear a case involving warehouse workers, on Oct. 8.

Federal law says hourly workers must get overtime pay if they toil more than 40 hours a week, including time for "principal activities" related to the job, such as donning or doffing protective work clothes. Now workers at Amazon.com warehouses demand they get paid for the time they take going through anti-theft security checks, which lasted at least 25 minutes each, at the end of their workdays. A class of those workers sued Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc., a contractor who hired them to toil in Amazon's Nevada warehouses.

"During the search process, plaintiffs and other employees 'were required to remove all personal belongings from their persons such as wallets, keys, and belts, and pass through metal detectors before being released from work and allowed to leave the facility,'" Jesse Busk and Laurie Castro said in their lawyers' brief. "Integrity violated" federal law "because it did not pay them overtime for the time spent waiting for and during the search process."

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco sided with the workers, but the staffing firm took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. "Integrity and the (federal) government appear to contend employer-required pre- and post-shift activity is not compensable (payable) unless the employer ordered the worker to do something directly or closely related to that worker's shift work," Burk and Castro point out. "If an employer requires a worker to engage in pre- or post- shift activity for the benefit of the employer, that activity is work within the scope of" federal overtime pay law "even if it is wholly unrelated to the employee's shift work."

"Because of the close relationship between Integrity Staffing's interest in deterring theft and employees' primary job duties handling merchandise, the anti-theft screenings constitute a compensable principal activity," the AFL-CIO added in its pro-worker friend-of-the-court brief.

Other cases:

Public pension funds, led by Mississippi and including Detroit and Los Angeles, want to sue the financiers that caused the 2008 crash for fraud, but fear the statute of limitations has run out. The justices will hear that case on Oct. 6. Former Mississippi worker Albert Brown's employer - the state - broke the law against him. He won back pay and hundreds of thousands of dollars damages, and says employers should also be on the hook for additional taxes he owes on the sums. The justices must decide if they'll hear the case.

Photo: AP

Bruce Rauner: of, by, and for Illinois’ richest 1 percent

Wed, 01 Oct 2014 13:03:00 +0000

It's an election year and we are quickly approaching the time when working families will have the opportunity to go to the polls and vote against a whole host of extreme candidates who support policies that limit rights, make it even harder to afford a middle-class life and pad the pockets of their corporate buddies. Candidates like Bruce Rauner in Illinois.

Bruce Rauner has made it clear he wants to be governor for the richest 1 percent of people in Illinois. Rauner has made millions outsourcing America's jobs and firing workers. He denied workers' benefits while profiting off pensions. Here are the details.

He has outsourced American jobs. Rauner co-founded a company that outsources America's jobs and assists corporations with dismantling operations in the United States [Polymer Group, S-4A, 9/3/97, SEC filing 424B4, 5/10/96; Chicago magazine, 6/3/11; VeneFone Holdings, SEC 424B4, 9/20/05; H-Cube press releases, 4/4/06; AP, 6/6/14]

Rauner supports the stripping of collective bargaining rights. Rauner believes union contracts are "corrupt" and wants to end collective bargaining for public employees. [Chicago Tribune, 11/1/12]

He supports cutting both pensions and jobs. Rauner wants to shut down the state government to cause massive layoffs of public employees. He is also on the record saying recent cuts to pensions for teachers and public employees didn't "go far enough." [International Business Times, 8/14/14; WJBC, 12/6/13.

If you're in Illinois, text IL to 235246 for important reminders and updates.

The above article by Mike Hall is reprinted form the AFL-CIO Now Blog.

Photo: Bruce Rauner. AP

I shared a cab with Sen. Barry Goldwater

Tue, 30 Sep 2014 15:03:00 +0000

I dashed out of the National Press Building on my way to Capitol Hill to cover a House hearing. I heard a voice behind me. "Hey, Tim. Going to the Hill? Let's share a cab."

It was Mike Kraft, Capitol Hill correspondent for the Reuters News Agency. Just then someone charged past us and grabbed the front door handle of our cab. It was Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona. He jumped into the front seat and slammed the door.

Not intimidated, Mike said, "Excuse me, Senator, do you mind if we ride with you?"

Goldwater snarled, "I don't give a s......"

So we piled in. All the way to the Hill, Goldwater poured out a stream of obscenities unprintable in a family newspaper. "Those stupid sons-of a bitches," he snarled, his face purple with rage. "The Soviets are full-speed ahead on their SST! It's a race and we're going to come in dead last."

The "stupid sons-of -bitches" were his esteemed colleagues in the Senate, famous for its gentility and courtesy. Yet Goldwater could not contain his fury, even against his Republican brethren, 18 of whom, a day earlier on March 25, 1971, voted 51-46 to kill the Boeing Supersonic Transport. Sen. Henry M. Jackson, "the gentleman from Boeing," represented the Democrats in seeking to win passage of legislation to fund the SST. After the vote Jackson glumly announced, "The program is dead."

When we reached the Senate office building, Goldwater pulled out a hundred dollar bill. The cabdriver threw up his arms. "Senator, I can't make change for that." Goldwater crossed his arms and sat glowering in silence.

Mike glanced at me with a faint smile. He shrugged and reached for his wallet. "I'll cover it." Goldwater got out and slammed the door without even thanking Mike. The cabdriver then drove us over to the House side of the Capitol. "That's how he got to be a millionaire," Mike said, "Making other people pay his way."

As we pulled up to the House office building, I reached for my wallet. "No no, put it away," Mike said. "I paid Mr. Capitalism's way. I might as well pay Mr. Communist's way too."

I waited until Goldwater died to write up that encounter with the Republican Party's 1964 presidential standard bearer. "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice," he famously snarled in his acceptance speech.

He lost to Democrat Lyndon Johnson in a landslide. Yet Goldwater in many ways gave birth to the modern Republican Party dominated by tea party extremism and all manner of bigotry and hate. Goldwater was filled with a venomous hatred toward organized labor and the movements for African American, Latino, and women's equality. And, as it turned out, he was filled also with a venomous hatred of moderates in his own party. Goldwater personified the attitude of tea party Republicans: "My way or the highway."

Those moderate Democrats and Republicans proved they were on the right side in voting down funding for the Supersonic Transport. They spared us from wasting tens of billions of tax dollars on an airborne Edsel. The Soviets junked their TU-144 SST. And the French-British consortium mothballed their fleet of SSTs after squandering billions in trying to keep the Concorde alive.

I will always remember what I learned from that cab ride to Capitol Hill: Millionaires get rich by arranging for other people to pay their way.

Photo: A protester holds a sign ('Barry Loves Bombs') at one of the late senator's campaign rallies. PBS.org

Kucinich appeal to vote your conscience ignores the big picture

Tue, 30 Sep 2014 11:19:00 +0000

I was shocked to receive by email a sharp, even strident analysis of the Congressional vote to side with President Obama and enter the war against ISIS. Much of the analysis I agree with-imperialism, arms getting into the wrong hands, the military industrial lobby, and so forth.

But former Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who sent it under cover of his own organization, has, I am afraid, fallen into a huge sinkhole. He pins his analysis of the vote, and everything that's wrong with it, to a campaign to vote against, and to vote out of office, all those who voted for the resolution. Conveniently, he attaches a list of all who voted for and against. This is what the philosophers calls "reductio ad absurdum," reducing an argument to such an absurd point that every larger issue is forgotten, abandoned, and lost.

Kucinich is representative, alas, of a kind of ultra-left "idealism" and "perfectionism" that leads us into blind alleys, and I replied to him in protest. In that regard he's no different from our right-wing voters who go to the polls obsessing over one thing - guns, gays, or abortion.

Now, please understand, I am someone who voted for Kucinich in Democratic primaries when he was trying to secure the nomination for president. I contributed to his campaigns, and attended his speaking engagements in California, where I live. I had no illusion that he would actually become the Democratic nominee, but I wanted to encourage his progressive line of thinking, and to have his ideas enter the dialogue, perhaps forcing other candidates to take them up in the debates.

Now that he's out of office, he is unaccountable to anyone. Vote against those who voted for war? I am sorry, but disastrous and lamentable as that vote was, I will not cast my vote against Karen Bass, my very liberal Congresswoman, because of her misguided yes on war. It smacks of "single-issue" voting which, if effective in this case, would bring even more disastrous results, putting into office someone who might well vote the same way and who on a myriad of other issues would be far, far worse.

Kucinich's proposal is punitive, unproductive, even destructive, and frankly immature. I want to wake up on November 5th with the best possible Congress we can elect on many, many issues, not just the war on ISIS. Need I spell them all out? Women's and LGBT rights, labor, climate change, voting rights, foreign policy, education, finance reform, judicial appointments, and on and on. Expressing my rage at this one vote in such a loose, undisciplined manner is just stupid politics. That one vote is not going to dominate my every thought about what this country needs going forward.

I don't know how influential Kucinich's voice is right now, but overnight it seems to me he has diminished his credibility. A lot of people must be thinking strategically like me: We simply cannot afford to flail about in a tantrum. What better way to isolate the antiwar community from every other progressive force in the country and make us all impotent?

Voters, be smart, be realistic. Yes, vote your conscience. Hold your nose if you have to! But please consider the big picture and everything we're up against in these critical midterm tossup elections, where turnout, turnout, turnout is the key.

Photo: Former Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Kevin Wolf/AP

Communist reporter on Capitol Hill and other adventures

Mon, 29 Sep 2014 16:13:00 +0000

In 1984-1985 the National Press Club decided to drastically revamp the old National Press Building (NPB) where the People's Daily World had its modest one-room office. One reason for the existence of the NPB was to provide affordable office space for struggling newspapers like ours. But the media moguls had decided on a policy of ruthless consolidation, the giant fish gobbling up the small fry. Our office was to be demolished. The space we had once rented for about $500 monthly would rent for well over $1,000 monthly.

We decided to close the office. I would move to the House Press Gallery on Capitol Hill. I was sorry to lose the office a five-minute walk from the White House. But there were many pluses. The space in the House Press Gallery was free. It eliminated the last leg of my commuting. When I rolled into town every morning on the commuter train from Baltimore, I simply strolled over to the Capitol and there was my office crowded with other reporters like myself searching for a hot story.

Soon after that move, I got a surprising telephone call in the Gallery. It was Portia Siegelbaum who had worked with us on the staff of the Daily World. She had married a Cuban man and was now living in Havana. She was calling me from there. She worked for Radio Havana Cuba (RHC). Would I agree to serve as an RHC stringer, sharing my stories with RHC listeners?

I was thunderstruck. "Portia," I replied, "I don't speak Spanish."

"That's O.K.," she said. "We will call you once or twice each week. All you need to do is read your story aloud to us over the phone. We will record it and broadcast it on our English Language Service to our North American audience."

I told her I would check with our editors in New York.

They agreed to Portia's suggestion. It lead to a mutually agreeable arrangement that lasted for several years.

It was a cause for some amusement in the House Press Gallery because RHC would call the Press Gallery switchboard. The telephone receptionist would then announce over the public address system in the Press Gallery: "Tim Wheeler...Havana calling."

I would take my copy to one of the old-style phone booths that lined the wall. I would close the folding door and dictate my story. I should say I tended to bellow my story into the phone thinking that a loud voice was necessary for the message to reach Havana. The result is that everyone in the Press Gallery heard every word.

Those were wonderful days. Soon, I was on a first-name basis with many other reporters. And I was a regular at the House Speaker's daily news briefing. I remember especially House Speaker Jim Wright of Texas.

He was a courtly gentleman and he was very friendly to me. He defied President Reagan by meeting with Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, seeking to end the deadly contra-war that Reagan had instigated and armed through his secret, illegal Iran-contra conspiracy. The rightwing extremists terminated Wright's political career with a phony real estate scandal that forced Wright to retire.

My routine was to sit beside other reporters at the long, narrow counter with a telephone in front of me and my Tandy-200 laptop. I would gather material for my articles, compose them, and transmit them over the phone line to our office in New York.

One morning I was sitting beside Tom Kenworthy, the Washington Post Capitol Hill correspondent. His phone rang. It was Dale Russakoff, a Washington Post columnist who penned a popular column called "Federal Diary." Her modus operandi was to call Post correspondents on Capitol Hill and all the various agencies in all three branches of government to ask them for tips on a good story for her column.

So she asked Tom: "Do you have any tips for me?"

And I heard Tom reply, "Gee, Dale. I don't know. I can't think of anybody you can interview."

Then he happened to turn in my direction. His eyes lit up. "Why don't you interview Tim Wheeler? He's the only U.S. Communist reporter here on Capitol Hill. It would make a great story."

A second later, Tom thrust the phone over to me. "Dale Russakoff wants to talk to you."

She asked for an interview. I agreed on the spot.

We met in the gallery and went down to the little cramped coffee shop in the basement of the Capitol so she could ask me questions undisturbed.

We hit it off immediately. She had grown up in Birmingham Alabama and was strongly sympathetic to the Civil Rights movement. She was witty, smart, and irreverent.

She was greatly amused by my story that I was regularly summoned to the phone in the Gallery with the message "Tim Wheeler.... Havana calling."

Her story appeared in the March 8, 1990 edition of the Washington Post under a headline, "Fidel's Man in Washington" and the subhead, "Rowing Against Anti-Communist Tide."

I was inundated. My fellow reporters in the Press Gallery slapped me on the back, praising the story. I received calls asking for interviews. Just hours after the story appeared, I was summoned to the Gallery phone. "Tim Wheeler.... Sam Donaldson calling."

Donaldson was White House correspondent of ABC News. I lifted the receiver. "Is that you, Wheeler? I'd like an interview?

"Well.... When?

"The sooner the better."

"Where?"

"You name it. I'll be there."

I told Donaldson I was headed downtown to interview people picketing a department store demanding higher wages. I was leaving immediately.

"I'll meet you there," Donaldson said.

So I rode the subway downtown and walked to the picketline. As I was interviewing workers on the picketline, a black, Cadillac stretch limousine rolled up. Out jumped Donaldson, holding a microphone.

The workers were chanting as they marched in a circle. Donaldson pulled me aside. "The Soviet Union is collapsing. Isn't this the end of Communism?"

"No, I don't believe so. It is the end of the Cold War. The contradictions of capitalism are sharper than ever. The Cold War blinded people to the class struggle here in the U.S. Now they will see clearly who their real enemy is."

Donaldson grew more and more agitated as I spoke. "You'll never give up!" he exclaimed.

"That's right! We'll never give up."

Sam pumped my hand, leaped back into the limousine and roared off.

The crowd on the picketline had been listening in amazement to this mini-drama and were shaking my hand and congratulating me on my excellent interview. I promised them I would write up the story of their struggle.

When I got back to Capitol Hill, reporters were waiting to hear how it had turned out. I told them I thought it went fine. I was waiting for Donaldson's story to air and so were my fellow reporters in the House Press Gallery.

When the story didn't appear at the promised hour, I telephoned Donaldson. I detected a crestfallen note in his voice as he told me they had decided to scrap the interview in exchange for a full interview with Gus Hall at his home in Yonkers New York.

And sure enough, a week or so later, ABC News aired a full story about Gus Hall emphasizing how old he is. The interview with me ended up on the "cutting room floor."

Photo: A Tandy 200, shown next to a 21st-century Windows-based laptop. Wikipedia

November elections a chance to reverse backsliding in Ohio

Mon, 29 Sep 2014 15:31:00 +0000

Ohio's highly-skilled workers have shown a keen ability to produce products and services for the needs and use of our state's consuming public. Our work-force has an amazing 66.9 percent increase in productivity over the last 25 years (1979 to 2014). Having produced so much more product for every hour worked, one would expect that wages and benefits for these workers would also increase.

Not so! Income for Ohio workers actually dropped over this period, falling behind the income level in many states, and well behind the national average.

Instead of an increase in income for the workers who have produced the massive wealth created by their labor over the last 25 years, those in the top 1percent income bracket, the billionaire corporate owners and financiers, have seen a 70.7 percent increase in their income. (State of Working Ohio/Policy Matters Ohio).

Working families have not only suffered from falling income, but nearly 20 percent of the available workforce in Ohio have given up looking for jobs that have not been available for these many years. Add to that the fact that there has been a 10 percent increase in part time work, and that 34.8 percent of college educated workers are earning $10.00 or less on the jobs they have been able find, and you have to conclude that Ohio's economy is bordering on disaster for working families, the middle class, small business, and farmers.

Gov. Kasich and the Ohio Legislature had cut graduated income taxes 20 percent by the year 2005, claiming this would create more jobs. The facts show that Ohio actually lost 2.5 percent of the jobs available at that time, and at the same time, millions of dollars were added to real estate and sales taxes, to "make up for the loss in income taxes!" (farmers and home owners, take note). Added to this, the state budgets passed took millions of dollars from school funding and local governments, with the resulting losses in essential public services. (For example, a $10,878,309 loss to Ashtabula).

This last year, 70 percent of school districts said they were laying off teachers, getting rid of aids, increasing class sizes. Local communities have been laying off firefighters, safety forces, and bus drivers. ( a loss of 40,000 public sector jobs).

We need a change! We need programs that will rebuild our economy by creating jobs, putting our work-force on jobs paying a living wage, thereby enabling working families to purchase needed food, clothing, and shelter at a level which will bring prosperity to our business people and farmers.

There are a number of essential job-producing projects, such as the need to upgrade our electrical grid and increase our production of clean energy, vast improvement and expansion of public transportation, as well as restoring funding for education, kindergarten through job training and college. Unfortunately, Ohio is well behind many other states and the national average for these vital job-producing projects.

The November elections provide Ohio voters with a great opportunity to elect candidates to state office who believe in and will create and pass the necessary legislation to get these projects started.

Photo: Demonstators in the town of Strongsville, Ohio, by Debbie Kline.

Helen Thomas comes to my rescue

Fri, 26 Sep 2014 12:46:00 +0000

The telephone rang in my office in the National Press Building. On the line was Gus Hall, national chairman of the Communist Party USA. This must have been sometime in 1977 or 1978.

Luis Corvalan, the exiled leader of the Communist Party of Chile had applied for a visa to visit the U.S. and had been rejected. "Is there anything you can do to help out?"

I was at a loss for words. "Well Gus, I can go to the White House press briefing today and ask President Carter's press secretary. That's about the only thing I can think of."

So I did. My White House Press Pass entitled me to attend the daily briefings and Presidential news conferences. Yet the White House was hardly my favorite destination.

It was so stage-managed. Each of the seats in the Press Briefing room had a brass plate attached to it with the name of the correspondent and the newspaper, news agency or network he or she represented. At that time, the White House press corps mostly sat around waiting for the Press Office to distribute a press release.

Yet I was conscious of the ordeal Luis Corvalan had endured. His Party---and Corvalan personally---were part of the broad coalition that elected Salvador Allende as the first socialist president of Chile in 1970.

Gen. Augusto Pinochet and his minions overthrew Allende's democratic election in 1973 with the full connivance of President Richard Nixon, National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Corvalan went into hiding. The fascists arrested and tortured Corvalan's son, Alfredo, who died of the wounds.

The fascists tracked Corvalan down. He was tried and convicted of "high treason" but a worldwide outcry forced Pinochet to back off from executing him. In 1976, the Pinochet regime released Corvalan in exchange for the Soviet release of dissident, Vladimir Bukovsky.

Corvalan went into exile in Moscow and it was there that he applied for a visa to tour the U.S.

As I walked along Pennsylvania Avenue to the West Wing of the White House, I turned over in my mind Nixon's instigation of fascist coups around the world, not to speak of the Watergate coup right here in Washington. President Jimmy Carter's pose as a champion of democracy, lecturing the Soviet Union and other socialist countries on their alleged abuse of "human rights," was hypocrisy at its crudest.

When I entered the Press Briefing Room, I stood at the back, behind all the assigned seats.

Press Secretary Jody Powell was in his usual smart aleck mode, kidding the reporters, one wise crack after another.

The press corps asked all their questions often the same question asked in a dozen different ways. The session was coming to an end.

I raised my hand. Powell called on me. "Luis Corvalan, leader of the Communist Party of Chile has applied for a visa to visit the United States and has been rejected by the State Department. In light of the President's call for upholding human rights, can you explain why the visa was denied?"

Powell listened to my question with a bored expression and then snapped, "When Brezhnev stops persecuting Dr. Andrei Sakharov and hounding Alexander Solzhenitsyn we'll have an answer for you."

The press corps broke into embarrassed giggles at Powell's witticism.

"You haven't answered my question," I replied.

"Well, I've given you as good as you're going to get," Powell replied. There were more titters from the reporters.

Then at the front of the room a woman spoke up in a loud, commanding voice. "He's right, you haven't answered the question."

It was Helen Thomas, dean of the Press Corps, White House correspondent for United Press International who had covered every president since Dwight Eisenhower.

Powell turned ashen white and the smirk disappeared from his face. The briefing room fell silent.

In a polite voice, Powell told me, "I don't know the answer. But I will take your question."

In press corps jargon, it meant that Powell was promising to get an answer, and call me back. (He never did, despite my repeated calls to the White House).

I pushed my way to the front of the Press Briefing room and leaned over and whispered to Helen Thomas. "Thank you."

I ran into Helen Thomas many times in the years that followed. Often she was dining with a coterie of cub reporters at a nearby table in a modest restaurant in Georgetown or some other neighborhood. I would congratulate her for her sharp questioning during presidential press conferences. By tradition, she asked the first question. She was of Lebanese background and sometimes asked pointed questions on why the U.S. gave billions of dollars in military aid to Israel, no questions asked.

On that day, Helen Thomas proved herself a defender of freedom of the press, and a defender as well of democracy in Chile.

Photo: The iconic late Helen Thomas on the job. Ron Edmonds/AP

Holder resigning: Attorney general brought change

Thu, 25 Sep 2014 16:58:00 +0000

WASHINGTON (AP) - Eric Holder, who served as the public face of the Obama administration's legal fight against terrorism and weighed in on issues of racial fairness, is resigning after six years on the job. He is the nation's first black attorney general.

The White House said that President Obama would announce Holder's departure later Thursday and that Holder, one of Obama's longest serving Cabinet members, planned to remain at the Justice Department until his successor was in place.

Holder's decision comes in the midst of a high-profile Justice Department civil rights investigation into the use of force by police in Ferguson, Missouri, where a young black man was shot by a white law enforcement officer last month.

The news of Holder's resignation came as civil rights leaders and the families of the Ferguson man, Michael Brown, and Eric Garner, who died in a New York City police chokehold this summer, were appearing at a news conference in Washington.

Holder has become the point man in the federal response to the shooting, which has sparked racial tension in the St. Louis suburb.

White House officials said Obama had not made a final decision on a replacement for Holder, who was one of the most progressive voices in his Cabinet. A Justice Department official said Holder finalized his plans in a meeting with the president over the Labor Day weekend.

White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Obama's team has already been thinking through candidates and naming one would be a high priority for the president.

"The president accepted his decision without putting up much of a fight simply because it's clear to anybody who's been paying attention that Gen. Holder has confronted a large number of issues, many of them very complicated, some of them even controversial, over the course of the last five and a half years," Earnest said. "So he has certainly put in his time in a way that he can be proud of and a way that the country is appreciative of."

Some possible candidates who have been discussed among administration officials include Solicitor General Don Verrilli, Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Cole and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a former Rhode Island attorney general. Others mentioned are former White House Counsel Kathy Ruemmler; Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Jenny Durkan, a former U.S. attorney in Washington state.

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, sometimes mentioned as a possible Holder successor, took himself out of consideration. "That's an enormously important job, but it's not one for me right now," Patrick said.

Holder, a 63-year-old former judge and prosecutor, took office in early 2009 as the U.S. government grappled with the worst financial crisis in decades and with divisive questions on the handling of captured terrorism suspects, issues that helped shape his tenure as the country's top law enforcement official. He is the fourth-longest serving attorney general in U.S. history.

He also took on questions of racial fairness, working to improve police relations with minorities, enforce civil rights laws and remove disparities in sentencing. Most recently he has been at the forefront of the administration's reaction to the police shooting in Ferguson last month of Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old.

In a recent interview with The Associated Press, Holder said he hoped the local and federal investigations would be concluded sooner rather than later.

"We would not be well served as a nation to have this drag out," Holder said of the investigation. "There's a great deal of anticipation, and I'd say apprehension, on the part of the people in Ferguson, and many people in this nation, about how this is going to be resolved."

The Rev. Al Sharpton urged the White House to meet with civil rights representatives before appointing a replacement. "There has not been an attorney general with a civil rights record equal to Attorney General Eric Holder," Sharpton said.

In his first few years on the job, Holder endured a succession of controversies over, among other things, an ultimately abandoned plan to try terrorism suspects in New York City, a botched gun-running probe along the Southwest border that prompted Republican calls for his resignation, and what was seen as failure to hold banks accountable for the economic near-meltdown.

But he stayed on after Obama won re-election, turning in his final stretch to issues that he said were personally important to him. He promoted voting rights and legal benefits for same-sex couples and pushed for changes to a criminal justice system that he said meted out punishment disproportionately to minorities.

Stung by criticism that the department hadn't been aggressive enough in targeting financial misconduct, Holder in the past year and a half secured criminal guilty pleas from two foreign banks and multibillion-dollar civil settlements with American banks arising from the sale of toxic mortgage-backed securities. Even then, critics noted that no individuals were held accountable.

A former deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration, Holder was pulled away from private practice to reshape a Justice Department that had been tarnished by a scandal involving fired U.S. attorneys and that had authorized harsh interrogation methods for terrorism suspects.

He immediately signaled a new direction for the incoming administration by declaring that waterboarding was torture, contrary to the George W. Bush administration's insistence that it wasn't.

In the first year of his tenure, Holder was widely criticized by Republicans and some Democrats for his plan to try professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other alleged co-conspirators in New York. The plan was doomed by political opposition to granting civilian criminal trials to terrorist suspects, who arguably would have had greater legal protections in civilian courts than in military commissions. The attorney general gave up the effort, but he continued to maintain that civilian courts were the most appropriate venue. He argued that his original plan was vindicated by the successful prosecution in New York of Osama bin Laden's son-in-law.

Under his watch, the Justice Department cracked down on news media reporting on national security matters. The department secretly subpoenaed phone records from Associated Press reporters and editors and used a search warrant to obtain some emails of a Fox News journalist as part of a separate leak investigation.

On matters of policy, Holder spoke frankly about how his upbringing - his father emigrated from Barbados and his sister-in-law helped integrate the University of Alabama - helped shape his thinking. He referred to America in 2009 as a "nation of cowards" in its discussions of race. He later lamented that "systemic and unwarranted racial disparities remain disturbingly common."

Associated Press writers Eric Tucker, Pete Yost and Jesse Holland in Washington and Steve LeBlanc in Boston contributed to this report.

Photo: Attorney General Eric Holder arrives in St. Louis before making his way to Ferguson. (The Department of Justice)

Teaching Tolerance hosts webinar with “New Jim Crow” author Michelle Alexander

Thu, 25 Sep 2014 16:21:00 +0000

Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, in conjunction with author Michelle Alexander, author of "The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness," is developing an innovative teachers guide to direct lessons on racism and social justice. Part of a two-part webinar, the first broadcast to introduce the curriculum was held on Sept. 23. The second part will be broadcast Oct. 29.

Released in 2010, "The New Jim Crow" outlines the use of the justice system in the United States as a form of racial control that especially impacts young African American males. There are more Black men in jails today in America than were enslaved in 1850, and explosion of incarceration that has taken place over the last 30 years. Alexander's studies have pinpointed the disproportionate effect of the War on Drugs on communities of color as the cause of mass incarceration.

Exploring "The New Jim Crow" with students in the classroom can be a critical tool in undoing the oppressive systems. Teachers can participate in the "undoing" by leading discussions on race with young people, said Alexander. "Students need to view teachers as change agents," she said.

Alexander acknowledged that teachers could be reluctant to open the subject of racism with young people, fearing they will get something wrong or cause offense. However with an "open mind, open heart, and willing to take risks," teachers can facilitate necessary conversations in the classroom.

Societal change will not come with just ending harsh punishments and changes to rules and laws, Alexander said, but it is important to bring about a shift in consciousness around the subject of race, because until that happens, society will still produce oppressive systems.

It is more important to listen to what people closest to the problem are thinking and feeling about race and how they are responding with movements, said Alexander, than to simply leave solutions up to politicians.

Among the questions taken from the webinar participants was the question of how mass incarceration affects young women of color. Alexander said that her thesis centered on young Black men, but it is critically important to also focus on young women, as there has been a recent increase in young Black and Latina women imprisoned. Women are often jailed for non-violent crimes, like drug possession, as a result of the war on drugs.

Young women of color often receive harsher punishments for refusing to inform on the men in their lives them to police, etc.

Men missing from families as a result of long, harsh jail sentences have an impact on women and children. There are far more single women of color trying to raise children and be the breadwinners as a result of fathers being in jail, or being barred from gainful employment and full rights as a result of felony post-incarceration restrictions.

Despite this, the number of young Black women in college is growing in number, while the gap for young Black males is still wide. The disappearance of industrial work in cities had a greater impact on Black men in the United States.

Alexander said her next book will be about building a transformative movement for justice.

Photo: Michelle Alexander speaks at the Miller Center Forum, Dec. 3, 2011. (CC)

State of Florida itself at stake on November 4

Wed, 24 Sep 2014 16:06:00 +0000

TAMPA, Fla. - The past four years have been rough for Floridians. Millions are still left uninsured, women's rights have been curtailed, the environment continues to deteriorate, and the education system continues to underperform.

Florida's governor, Rick Scott, has either stood by and let this degradation of the state occur or has actively contributed to it. Floridians must do whatever they can before the election in November to assure that Scott will not maintain his access to the governor's office. We can't take four more years of this.

Despite some lip service, Rick Scott has done nothing to expand Medicaid in the state of Florida. His inaction and unwillingness to push the state legislature to expand Medicaid has been a huge detriment to Floridians who are unable to access the medical care they deserve and badly need.

According to the Washington Post, an estimated 1.3 million Floridians were set to finally receive health insurance through the expansion. Because of inaction by the legislature and no movement from Rick Scott, however, they continue to slip through the cracks. Additionally, the White House estimated earlier this year that Scott and House Republicans' unwillingness to expand Medicaid will also cost Florida 63,000 jobs. That's what happens when your governor and state legislature leave $66.1 billion in funding on the table due to their own inaction and willful attempt to make progressive policies fail.

What Rick Scott has taken action on, however, are measures to drug test recipients of public assistance. This is despite the fact that there is no evidence that drug use among recipients of public assistance is a widespread problem. In fact, only 2.6 percent of all tested recipients tested positive for drugs. Florida saved no money by implementing these drug tests: the program ended up costing more than it saved. However, there is money to be made in the drug testing business for some, including by Solantic, a company previously owned by Rick Scott but which was conveniently placed in the hands of his wife in 2010. So not only does Rick Scott demean Florida's impoverished population, his family gets to profit from it as well.

Rick Scott is also the governor of a state barely above sea level. Surrounded by seawater, Florida is the most vulnerable state in the United States when it comes to climate change. The governor clings to the delusion that climate change doesn't exist despite 13,926 peer-reviewed scientific articles that beg to differ. Scott's delusional attitude toward climate change probably explains why Scott's Environmental Protection Agency has no specific program to deal with climate change. Do we need a governor that says "I'm not convinced that there's any man-made climate change"? Another problem with Rick Scott's administration: he has monetary ties to companies like Schlumberger Ltd., the world's largest oil service company that was recently involved in fracking operations in South Florida.

Women across the state have suffered under Rick Scott's leadership. Scott slashed funds for rape crisis centers in the state - and he did this during Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Scott has also pushed a harmful anti-choice agenda that leaves Florida's women with limited ability to exercise their right to bodily autonomy. In 2011, he signed a bill requiring costly and emotionally manipulative ultrasounds for women seeking abortion procedures. Just this year he signed another harmful anti-choice bill that prohibits abortion procedures after 24 weeks gestation unless the woman's life is at risk. These slights will only continue if Rick Scott is re-elected as governor, and that's something Florida women just cannot afford.

Florida's children have been short-changed under Rick Scott's administration. In 2011, Scott proposed a budget that included $1.75 billion in cuts to K-12 education. The governor has recently been touting supposed "record funding" for education after approving $18.8 billion for education for 2014-15. However, this change of heart isn't fooling anyone. Funding for education is still lower per-pupil than it was under former governor Charlie Crist.

Same-sex couples have been thrown under the bus by Scott and his Attorney General Pam Bondi as both are fighting to maintain Florida's same-sex marriage ban.

The state of Florida itself is at stake in this upcoming election. Floridians cannot let leadership fall into the hands of someone like Rick Scott for another four years!

Photo: Volunteer passes out "Medicaid Matters" signs to attendees at the start of the kickoff for "Moral Monday" March 3, in the Capitol Courtyard in Tallahassee, Florida, over concerns about health care and Medicaid expansion (AP Photo/Phil Sears)

Red and green at People's Climate March

Tue, 23 Sep 2014 15:27:00 +0000

NEW YORK - The Communist Party USA joined with hundreds of other organizations Sept. 21 - labor, youth, peace, justice, clergy, political organizations and international groups - in the largest climate march ever. Some 400,000 marched here just prior to the UN summit this week, a gathering of more than 120 world leaders tasked with developing a planet-wide approach to drastic reduction of greenhouse gases

The lively and diverse CPUSA contingent, wearing bright red t-shirts picturing a small blue earth and the words "Too Big To Fail," marched behind a colorful banner that read, "People and nature before profits" and "Green jobs, living wages." There were younger, new members (many of whom were Young Communist League members) and veterans of many social and labor struggles marching - a compact version of the great global majority demanding protection of our environment. Party members came from Georgia, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, Washington State, New York State, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Ohio with a large presence from Connecticut.

The party's table at 65^th St. and Central Park West attracted attention almost immediately after it was set up early in the morning. As the hours passed people working the table gave out literature and engaged in extensive discussion with many who were interested in the party program.

People signed up to receive, by email, People's World headlines. Among the most popular items were CPUSA peace stickers.

Party members made sure the November midterm elections were not forgotten by climate activists. They distributed thousands of Too Big To Fail post cards urging people to come out and vote for progressive candidates on November 4. "Hold the Senate and flip the House," was the idea they tried to convey - keeping right-wing Republicans from gaining control of the Senate and ending their majority in the House.

"I'm walking in a march for climate change. I think it's great, I hope it makes a difference. I think it's good that a lot of young people are here, it's important that they understand that this problem this world has is our problem and the struggle for life is ours to fight," said one YCLer.

The march came at a time that environmental issues are taking center stage both internationally and locally.

As world leaders gather at the United Nations this week for the Climate Summit greenhouse gas emissions are increasing, California is in the middle of a drought emergency and 95 percent of Alaska's glaciers are melting at an unnatural and unprecedented pace.

New York City officials took the opportunity to highlight steps to cut global warming emissions. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that he is committing the city to an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050. In a city hard-hit by Hurricane Sandy, NY City Council is also addressing the issue. Donovan Richards Jr., co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, represents the council district in Far Rockaway Queens that was devastated by Hurricane Sandy. His caucus, now the majority, is a major voice for the city and champions the call to rebuild the city sustainably.

Marching with the contingent, John Bachtell, chair of the CPUSA, was exuberant about the huge People's Climate March turnout and said given the nature of the crisis - not a moment too soon. "This movement has the potential to embrace the overwhelming majority of humanity," he said, "crossing class, race, gender lines and national boundaries. Solutions to the climate crisis inevitably collide with the capitalist system and its inherent need for endless drive for maximum profit. The system's existence is incompatible with a planet of finite resources and ecological balance."

Photo: Earchiel Johnson/PW

Voter registration, just a click away

Tue, 23 Sep 2014 14:47:00 +0000

Today is National Voter Registration Day and while volunteers around the country will be on street corners, outside of groceries stores, at bus and subway stops and elsewhere to help people register, you can get started right now, right here with just one click.

If we're going to beat back the attack on working families by the likes of Mitch McConnell, Scott Walker, the Koch brothers and other extremists, all of us-you and your family and friends-must be registered to vote. (continued after the video)

The AFL-CIO has teamed up with TurboVote to make voting easy for you and for your friends and family. Not only can you register or update your registration, but TurboVote will help you with absentee ballots, vote-by-mail information, finding your polling place and even sending reminders by email and text so you won't forget to vote.

In the past few years, 22 states have passed new laws restricting the right to vote and changing voter registration rules. So even if you're already registered, you should double check that you and the people most important to you are prepared to vote this year. Have you moved since last Election Day? Make sure you're registered to vote at your new address. Maybe your friends have moved recently and need to update their voting information.

It's easy. Click here to get started.

Reposted from AFL-CIO NOW blog.

Virginia congressional race focuses on women's issues

Mon, 22 Sep 2014 16:20:00 +0000

Virginia has been a key swing state in several recent national elections. In 2008, it went with Obama and elected three new Democratic congresspersons (it has 11 congressional districts). In the 2010 congressional midterms, the Republicans gained back three House seats. The difference could mostly be explained by the lower turnout in 2010 among the Democratic Party's base demographic of workers, minorities, women, young people and lower income people-demographics that turned out en masse in 2008 and stayed home in 2010.

So in this year's November 4 midterms, the question is once more whether the Democrats can turn out enough voters.

The 10^th district may flip from the Republicans to the Democrats. The incumbent, Republican Frank Wolf, was first elected in 1980. In 2012 he beat Democrat Kristin Cabral by 58 percent to 39 percent. Wolf had been right wing on all issues including abortion, which he thinks should be illegal, and birth control. He has been a shrill critic of the People's Republic of China, to the extent of making a fool of himself by claiming that human fetuses are a delicacy in China. Evidently he fell for an Internet hoax.

After a hot internal fight, the Republicans chose Barbara Comstock, currently a member of Virginia's lower house, as their candidate. Comstock is a political hack who got her start investigating Hillary Clinton.

The Democrats chose as their candidate John Foust. Of working-class origin, Foust put himself through college by working in steel mills and railways. Eventually he earned a law degree, and was elected to a local government body.

The 10^th Congressional District has been gradually changing with the entry of more minorities into the area. Naturalized citizens are likely to want to punish the Republican Party and Barbara Comstock for their harshly anti-immigrant positions. In recent elections, Democratic Party candidates for other offices have beaten the GOP in the 10^th Congressional District, while Wolf's opponents have generally been trounced. And the number of minority and naturalized citizen voters in the district is now substantial.

Comstock comes across as hard right. A couple of years ago she supported legislation in the Virginia House of Delegates that would have required all women seeking an abortion to undergo a vaginal probe. This created a national-level scandal, and eventually a milder bill was passed. When asked why she had voted against a transportation bill that was supported by both Republicans and Democrats, she explained that it had language in it that implied expansion of Medicaid. Comstock is an opponent of the ACA ("Obamacare").

Foust has been cautiously progressive in his campaign positions and statements, but on basic issues such as women's rights, immigrants' rights, the economy, the environment and health care, he has clearly distinguished himself from Comstock. For this reason, Foust can boast of a list of candidacy endorsements that start with the AFL-CIO and include most major unions as well as organizations concerned with reproductive rights.

Comstock is backed by the usual Republican and Conservative PACs. A major contributor is Elliot Associates, a hedge fund you have read about on these pages because of their aggressive campaign against Argentina. Her endorsements are mostly from Republican politicians and officials, as well as right-wing notables like Sean Hannity and Tim Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity.

Three of the state's 11 House districts are currently held by Democrats, the other eight by Republicans. Both U.S. senators are Democrats, and one of them, Mark Warner, is up for reelection. Polls show Warner 22 percentage points ahead of his Republican opponent, Ed Gillespie, who has been an advisor to George W. Bush and Mitt Romney.

One incumbent House Republican, Eric Cantor of Virginia's 7^th District, lost his primary to a tea party hotshot, David Brat. The Democratic Party candidate, Jack Trammel, will have an uphill struggle to win in this conservative district.

Two incumbents are stepping down: Jim Moran, a Democrat, who represents the overwhelmingly Democratic 8^th District which includes the Washington, D.C., suburb of Arlington, and Frank Wolf, R, who represents the 10^th, which is roughly divided between Fairfax and Loudon counties in Northern Virginia.

In the 8^th District primaries, the Democrats elected Ed Beyer, a former ambassador, to replace Moran, and the Republicans chose small businessman Micah Edmunds. Beyer is heavily favored.

The last day to register to vote in Virginia is Tuesday, October 14. Voters should be aware that there are new rules on acceptable voter ID on Election Day in Virginia. You can consult the website of the Virginia Department of Elections here to check your voter registration, find your polling place and find out what kind of ID to bring. Since turnout is key, voters should not take the chance of delaying looking into these things.

Photo: Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., waves to the audience at the conclusion of the 2014 U.S. Senate Candidates Battleground Forum, Sept 19, in Herndon, Va. Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post/AP

As elections approach, unions rev up fight for Social Security

Mon, 22 Sep 2014 14:39:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - Diane Fleming had a challenge for the crowd.

As she gazed out at a throng of hundreds of unionists and senior citizens, massed on a lawn north of the U.S. Capitol on a sunny day with the structure's great dome as their backdrop, the retired Machinist declared: "You've been given a lot of facts here. Now we need to get out there with them.

"Get your children, get your friends, get everybody you can to make a difference. Get them to register if they haven't," and then cast ballots on Nov. 4 for - and work beforehand for - only those politicians who will protect Social Security and Medicare, she declared.

Fleming, now a member of the labor-backed Alliance for Retired Americans, was the windup speaker at the rally, which attracted ARA members along with Bricklayers, AFSCME members, Communications Workers, Teamsters, Teachers and Service Employees.

All the unionists, and the parade of prominent Democrats who preceded Fleming, came to defend the two large, popular programs for the elderly from what they called a looming threat of future cuts if Republicans hold the U.S. House and take the Senate this fall.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., provided many of the facts the crowd needed: That the number of workers whom traditional "defined benefit" pensions cover has dropped by 50 percent in the last decade, that the median Social Security recipient gets $1,200 in monthly benefits, that household debt has soared by 83 percent since 2001 "and that we're $6.6 trillion short in savings" for retirement.

"And when you ask them (the Republicans) how they would replace cuts" in Medicare, "their answer is to push costs off onto already hurting families," Warren added.

Put all those facts together with the fiscally healthy Social Security program, and with increasing fiscal health of Medicare, Warren said, and you see that Social Security, which workers earned over the years, is often their only retirement lifeline.

The Democratic speakers emphasized their party has supported Social Security since its enactment by FDR and a Democratic-run Congress in 1935 and Medicare even before its enactment by LBJ and a Democratic-run Congress in 1965, while Republicans opposed both.

Speakers also jabbed at Social Security privatization plans by former GOP President George W. Bush, which unions and Democrats defeated in 2005, and a Medicare voucher scheme that House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, D-Wis., advocates.

No Republicans spoke. GOP "opposition research" trackers filmed the event. "If they think they can get fodder" for campaign ads, "they're crazier than I thought," the emcee said.

But as a result, before Fleming's remarks, the rally resembled a Democratic campaign event. That, too, was understandable: The election is 50 days away and traditionally off-year elections see a higher turnout share from Republican-oriented voters.

The rally also pointed up a problem that ARA, unions and their allies face: Seniors vote in larger numbers than other electoral blocs, and they've trended Republican for most of the last few decades. An education campaign, Fleming and the others insisted, can change minds, however.

"The tea party Republicans want to turn Social Security over to Wall Street," said Rep. Richard Nolan, D-Minn., one of the politically most-endangered House Democrats. "We can't let them do that."

"People are still scared and people don't share our values" of protecting the two programs, added House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. "They want to take us back to the failed policies of the Bush administration," including the pro-Wall Street policies that led to the Great Recession, she added. "The question is: 'Whose side are you on?'"

"They scare people," AFT President Randi Weingarten said of the Republicans. "They divide the country. Scaring people is not standing up for people...They try to make it a race to the bottom, not lifting all boats to the top.

"If we want to keep Social Security and Medicare, what do we have to do on Nov. 4?" she asked. "Vote!" the crowd chanted. "And who do we have to vote for?" "Democrats."

Taking up Fleming's theme, Weingarten stated both seniors and unionists "will knock on every door and make every phone call" to help pro-Social Security-and-Medicare candidates.

Even so, it'll be an uphill battle from now through the election, warned the AFL-CIO's representative at the rally, James Gilbert, executive director of the federation's Veterans Council. He noted 40 percent of Social Security recipients are veterans or their families.

"We know it'll not be easy, but you don't fight just the fights you know you can win," Gilbert declared. "You fight the ones you need to fight."

Photo: Put Seniors First Rally, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, Facebook.

Some 400,000 climate marchers paint New York green

Mon, 22 Sep 2014 11:37:00 +0000

NEW YORK -- From all over the U.S. and around the world, people flocked to the People's Climate March here on Sept. 21. They came to stand up for the environment, oppose those who would continue to jeopardize the planet, and show New Yorkers that the grass is always greener...when you fight to make it that way.

Some 400,000 people showed up for the event, in a bold campaign to wake the world up to the dangers of climate change, especially ahead of world leaders meeting on Sept. 23 to debate environmental action at the UN Climate Summit.

This was no small demonstration with event organizers calling it the largest climate march in world history, much larger than the Forward on Climate rally held in Washington, D.C. last year (an impressive event in and of itself). Among the hundreds of thousands filling the streets of Mid-town Manhattan there were celebrities, of course, including 350.org's Bill McKibben, actor Leonardo DiCaprio, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. Generating some of the most excitement, however, were activists from other nations who stood in solidarity with their peers.

They came from both richer and poorer nations alike, with the visitors from the poorer countries, however, underlining how it is their countries that often suffer first and foremost from the drastic effects of climate change.

From Jaitapur, Maharashtra State, India was Dr. Vaishali Patil, head of the anti-nuclear group Forum Against Disastrous Projects in Konkan and president of the Forum for Demanding the Rights of Indigenous People. She is currently leading the charge in the fight to stop Jaitapur Nuclear Power Plant, which would become the largest nuclear power plant in the world, from being built in her country. "Nuclear energy can never be clean energy," she said. "It can never be safe energy. And pursuit of these types of dirty energy are examples of violence against nature and against the planet. Many people are angry about my country's development of nuclear power, but no one else from India is participating here today - so I am here to stand with everyone in the fight to save the environment. I am here with a message of peace - for animals, nature, and human beings."

Hailing from Vanuatu, Pacific Islands, Isso Nihmel, a coordinator with 350.org, said he was also here to stand in solidarity with everyone, and to call to attention the environmental havoc that occurs in his own homeland. "When we talk about climate change in the Pacific Islands, we are very serious. For us, it is the biggest issue. We're facing pollution of our sea water, pollution of our drinking water, and other climate disasters due to our reliance on dirty coal and Big Oil. Nothing is being done, and this is a serious matter for our young people. This is our future, and it's being taken away from us. So I became part of a 350 group called Pacific Climate Warriors, and we came here today to let people know that we plan to do something about the fossil fuels that threaten us."

Just what they intend to do will occur this October, when the Pacific Climate Warriors, all from the Pacific Islands, will sail to Australia's Port of Newcastle, the world's largest coal port, which is responsible for most of the coal pollution that drifts over into their homeland. They will cross the Pacific on traditional handmade canoes in what could become the most creative mass demonstration of all time, in order to draw attention to their plight.

Union members were among the hundreds of thousands of Americans at the march. Saying they see climate change as a labor issue, they pointed to the fact that climate disasters like Hurricane Sandy here in New York often hurt their members - workers, the poor, youth, women, immigrants and people of color - the most and that that green jobs could be good-wage jobs that can't be shipped overseas.

Among the marchers were members of the Communications Workers of America, the Teamsters, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the Service Employees International Union, the United Auto Workers and many others.

Shane Red Hawk, a member of the Sicangu Lakota tribe from Ring Thunder, South Dakota, was here to talk about a danger more close to home - one which could further exacerbate environmental degradation and burden his people: the Keystone XL pipeline. "We need all the help we can get," he said. "Once they start building this pipeline, that's it. This is going to hit us and hurt us on many levels. They're tearing up an important and precious land. And my Lakota people, we call water our first medicine, and it's very important - vital - to us, like oxygen. It's something that's so important it's sacred, so if a pipeline leak were to contaminate it, it's a lot more than the pollution part of it; you're affecting everything that relies on that water, from vegetation to human beings. We consider it to be a terrible desecration."

The level of diversity of the people attending the march was incredible, but also ironic, because while oceans separate their nations, the problems of climate change and environmental chaos seemed to have drawn them closer together than ever before.

"Our traditional resources are slowly being depleted," said 350's Nihmel. "Some of our colonies are being forced to relocate. What is happening to us is wrong." However, he concluded, echoing his group's slogan, "We are not drowning. We are fighting."

Photo: People's Climate March NYC, September 21, Shadia Fayne Wood, http://peoplesclimate.org/media/

Activists gather for the Green line to the climate march

Sat, 20 Sep 2014 10:03:00 +0000

CHICAGO - On Sept. 18, an otherwise business-as-usual evening in Union Station was punctuated by a large group of environmental activists from all over the U.S., waiting to board the People's Climate Train. Their destination? The People's Climate March in New York on Sept. 21, a mass action that will coincide with the UN Climate Summit taking place in the days that follow. It was difficult to pick out the activists from amongst the crowd, as almost anyone could have been a climate marcher; and almost anyone was.

"This march represents an incredible diversity of people, all realizing that this is the same fight," said Bobby Wengronowitz, emphasizing the large and varied presence of activists. "I think there are about 60 people just getting onto this train from Chicago alone," he added - though another woman I spoke with said it was closer to 100. "It's all about the people," said Wengronowitz. "People who are ready for serious change, 'cause we know it has to happen."

Wengronowitz is a student from Boston College and organizer with BC Fossil Free, a group that encourages his university to divest from the fossil fuel industry, and educates students there on how they can do the same thing. For him, the problem of climate change isn't even an issue of mere science. "It's about justice," he said. "It's an issue of simple morals. People are dying. Natural disasters are getting worse. We can spend a trillion dollars a year on the military, but we can't put money toward stopping carbon and methane from pumping into the atmosphere?"

Becky Romatoski, an organizer with Fossil Free MIT - another fossil fuel divestment group - told the People's World, "Our organization tries to bring a lot of people who are concerned about the climate together. We do a lot of advertising around the campus trying to get students to commit to divestment and shifting toward renewable energy." The march, she suggested, will present an even broader avenue for her to do that. Though she wasn't counting on the event being as bold as it could have been (original plans to gather at the UN Building were scrapped due to route disputes with New York police), she still remained hopeful. "It'll be peaceful," she said. "Family friendly. But this one is going to be the last straw. If things don't change, the next climate march will be much more confrontational."

As passengers lined up to board the Amtrak train, Rick Herbert, a member of Quaker Earthcare Witness, a group focused on stewardship of the earth and unity with nature, gave his own thoughts on the importance of the march: "It's all about bridging the left-right divide, and we're gaining ground. I hope to see that same bipartisan solidarity at the event."

As for the rich ultra-right who deny climate change, said Wengronowitz, they can only continue to do so for so long. "Sooner or later," he said, "the people on the top are going to feel the effects. Everything is tied together, and climate change thus also becomes an issue of politics and economics." Capitalism, he acknowledged, isn't built to withstand global warming. "In fact, we're going to have a big, 300-foot banner at the march, which says, 'Capitalism equals climate chaos.'"

The conductor called everyone aboard, and the marchers prepared for a night of environmental discussion, educational workshops, and even extensive debate, with activists from all parts of the political spectrum ready to exchange viewpoints. The People's Climate Train, unlike the travelers, seemed set to be anything but average.

"There's plenty of work to be done," Wengronowitz concluded, "and it's just not enough to buy an eco-friendly lightbulb or drive a hybrid. These are baby steps, and we have the power to do more. And the Climate March is going to be a great venue to express that."

Photo: Becky Romatoski (center) discusses divestment from fossil fuels during a workshop on the People's Climate Train. Roberta Wood/PW