Today's
Stories
April 20, 2006
Justin E.H. Smith
Doctors and Lethal Injection
April 19, 2006
P. Sainath
More Kids? Pay More for Your Water
Norman
Solomon
When Diplomacy Means War: Bait-and-Switch
on Iran
Anthony Papa
When Justice Isn't Blind: Double Standards
for the Rich and Poor in New York
Mike
Ferner
Movement Blues
Stanley Heller
The Massacre at Qana, 10 Years Later:
Still No Justice
Rifundazione
"We Defeated Berlusconi"
Christopher
Reed
Secrets of the Garden of Bliss
Alexander
Cockburn
The Pulitzer Farce
Website of
the Day
Bunker
Busters: the Movie
April 18, 2006
Paul Craig Roberts
How Safe is Your Job?
Eric
Wingerter
Washington Post vs. Venezuela
Juan Santos
What Immigrants Need to Learn from
the Black Civil Rights Movement
Greg
Weiher
The Zarqawi Gambit Revisited
Sam Bahour
Is Hamas Being Forced to Collapse?
Behzad
Yaghmaian
In the Gaze of New Orleans
Website of
the Day
The
FBI and the Jack Anderson Files
April 17, 2006
Kevin Zeese
An Interview with the First Arab-American
Senator: Jim Abourezk on Bush's Lies and the Dems' Complicity
Uri Avnery
Olmert the Fox
Norman Solomon
Why Won't Moveon.Org Oppose the Bombing
of Iran?
John Ross
A Real Day Without Mexicans?
Laila al-Haddad
The Earth is Closing in on Us: Dispatch
from Gaza
Jeffrey Blankfort
A Tale of Two Members of Congress
and the Capitol Hill Police
Website of the Day
Dixie
Chicks: Not Ready to Back Down
April
15 / 16, 2006
Jeffrey
St. Clair
How Star Wars Came to the Arctic
Ralph
Nader
Remembering Rev. William Sloan Coffin
Thaddeus
Hoffmeister
The Ghost of Shinseki: the General Who Was Sent Out to Pasture for
Being Right
Kevin Prosen
/ Dave Zirin
Privilege Meets Protest at Duke
Thomas
P. Healy
Taking Care of What We've Been Given: a Conversation with Wendell
Berry
Kristoffer
Larsson
Are 40 Percent of All Swedes Anti-Semitic?: Anatomy of a Statistical
Flim-Flam
Fred
Gardner
Continuing Medical (Marijuana) Education
Edwin Krales
New York's Katrina: the Hidden Toll of AIDS Among Blacks and the
Poor
Brian
Cloughley
Don't Blitz Iran: Risking the Ultimate Blowback
John Holt
Walking Off Vietnam with Edward Abbey's Surrogate Son
Seth
Sandronsky
What Billionaires Mean By Education Reform: Oprah, Bill Gates and
the Privatization of Public Schools
Rafael Renteria
Making It Plain About New Orleans
Michael
Ortiz Hill
In the Ashes of Lament: an Easter Meditation
William A.
Cook
An Israel Accountability Act
Gideon
Levy
Shooting Nasarin: a Story About a Little Girl
Andrew Wimmer
Stopping the Bush Juggernaut: a New Citizens Campaign
Madis
Senner
Talking Points for Easter Weekend: Jesus Didn't Lie, Mr. Bush
Michael Kuehl
The Sex Police State: Women as "Rapists" and "Pedophiles"?
Mark
Scaramella
When Even God Can't Follow His Own Commandments: the Timeless Scarcasm
of Mark Twain
Nate Mezmer
187 Proof: Living and Dying Hip-Hop
Jesse
Walker
Playlist
Poets' Basement
Engel, Laymon and Subiet
Website
of the Weekend
Pink Serenades Bush
April
14, 2006
Col.
Dan Smith
Candor or Career?: Why Few Top Military Officials
Resign on Principle
Saul Landau
Ho Chi Minh City Moves On Without Regrets
Stan
Cox
The Real Death Tax
Kevin Zeese
Hersh vs. Bush on Iran: Who Would You Believe?
Brian
McKinlay
Bad Times for Bush's Buddies
Howard Meyers
Dwarves, Knives and Freedom: Bush, Jr. is No LBJ
Ishmael
Reed
The Colored Mind Doubles: How the Media Uses Blacks
to Chastize Blacks
Website of
the Day
Asshole: a Film Strip
April
13, 2006
CounterPunch
News Service
Powell's "Bitch"?
Norman
Solomon
The Lobby and the Bulldozer
Stanley Heller
Time to Shake Up the Peace Movement
Jeff
Birkenstein
Bush and Freedom of Speech
Evelyn J.
Pringle
Not So Fast, Mr. Powell
Michael
Donnelly
The Week the Bush Administration Fell Apart
Kamran Matin
Synergism of the Neo-Cons: What's Going On In Iran?
Website
of the Day
"Don't Be Afraid of the Neo-Cons"
April
12, 2006
Vijay Prashad
Resisting Fences
Alan
Maass
The Suicide of Anthony Soltero
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Insane First Strike Policy: If You Don't Want to Get Whacked,
You'd Better Get Your Nation a Nuke ... Fast
Ron
Jacobs
Resistance: the Remedy for Fear
Ramzy Baroud
The Imminent Decline of the American Empire?
Randall
Dodd
How a Wal-Mart Bank will Harm Consumers
Missy Comley
Beattie
The Boy President Who Cried "Wolf!"
P. Sainath
The Corporate Hijack of India's Water
Website of
the Day
"The System is Irretrievably Corrupt"
April
11, 2006
Al
Krebs
Corporate Agriculture's Dirty Little Secret: Immigration
and a History of Greed
Lawrence
R. Velvel
The Gang That Couldn't Leak Straight
Sonia Nettinin
Palestinian Health Care Conditions Under Israeli Occupation
Willliam
S. Lind
The Fourth Plague Hits the Pentagon: Generals as Private Contractors
Robert Ovetz
Endangered Species in a Can: the Disappearance of Big Fish
Pratyush
Chandra
Nepalis Say, "Ya Basta!"
Grant F.
Smith
The Bush Administration's Final Surprise?
Laray
Polk
Loud, Soft, Hard, Quiet: Marching Through Dallas for Immigrant Rights
Francis Boyle
O'Reilly and the Law of the Jungle: How to Beat a Bully on His Home
Turf
José
Pertierra
A Glimpse into the Mindset of Terrorists: Posada Carriles, Orlando
Bosch and the Downing of Cubana Flight 455
Website of
the Day
The Dead Emcee Scrolls
April
10, 2006
Ralph
Nader
Tinhorn Caesar and the Spineless Democrats
Heather Gray
Atlanta and the Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Uri
Avnery
The Big Wink
Joshua Frank
Big Greens and Beltway Politics: Betting on Losers
Seth
Sandronsky
Immigration and Occupations
Michael Leonardi
The Italian Elections: "Reality is No Longer Important"
Evelyn
Pringle
Did Bush Pull a Fast One on Fitzgerald?
Tom Kerr
FoxNews Does Ward Churchill
Lucinda
Marshall
The Lynching of Cynthia McKinney
Website of
the Day
Brown Berets
April
7 -9, 2006
Alexander
Cockburn
If Only They'd Hissed Barack Obama
Jeffrey
St. Clair
The Saga of Magnequench: Outsourcing US Missile
Technology to China
Patrick
Cockburn
The War Gets Grimmer Every Day
David Vest
The Rebuking and Scorning of Cynthia McKinney
Dave
Lindorff
The Impeachment Clock Just Clicked Forward
Gary Leupp
"Ideologies of Hatred:" What Did Condi Mean?
Elaine
Cassel
The Moussaoui Trial: What Kind of Justice is This?
Saul Landau
Vietnam Diary: Hue Without Rules
James
Ridgeway
"This is Betty Ong Calling": a Short Film
Ron Jacobs
Why Iran was Right to Refuse US Money
John
Walsh
Kerry Advocates Iraqization: Too Little, Too Late
Ramzy Baroud
The US Attitude Toward Hamas: Disturbing Parallels with Nicaragua
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush Finds Democracy Has Its Limits
Todd Chretien
What the Pentagon Budget Could Buy for America
Jonathan
Scott
Javelins at the Head of the Monolith
John Bomar
What They're Saying About Bush in Arkansas
Michele
Brand
Iran, the US and the EU
Ronan Sheehan
Remember When the Irish First Met the Chinese?
Mickey
Z.
Let Us Now Praise OIL
Don Monkerud
March of the Bunglers
Michael
Dickinson
The Rich Young Man: a Miracle Play
Website
of the Weekend
The Case Against Israel and Munich: Compare and Contrast
| April
20, 2006
As Crisis Deepens ...
Is Labor Finally
Showing Signs of a Comeback?
By CHRIS KUTALIK
As
labor activists from around the country and world converge on Dearborn,
Michigan in early May for the Labor Notes Conference, it’s
worth reflecting back on a year that has brought back hopes for
a revitalization of the labor movement.
Several
months ago, the Wall Street Journal described an increase in strikes
in the United States. But the modest revival of grassroots activity
in the U.S. labor movement at the end of 2005 has largely been missed
by the mainstream press.
STRIKES
UP
According
to the Bureau of National Affairs there were 271 work stoppages
in the first three quarters of 2005 as compared to 227 in all of
2004. And the BNA’s numbers do not include many of the high-profile
strikes at the end of 2005 which involved roughly 70,000 workers:
Northwest Airlines mechanics and cleaners, Boeing aircraft manufacturing
workers, California hospital workers, Philadelphia and New York
City transit.
What’s
prompting all this activity? Emboldened by four years on the attack
since 9/11, many employers used aggressive bargaining tactics in
unprecedented ways in 2005. Proposed wage and health care cuts were
far deeper than in previous years--in some cases, unions were faced
with the near-to-total loss of retiree health care, pensions, and
at times the near-destruction of the unionized jobs themselves.
Caught
off-guard by employers’ intransigence at the table, a number
of unions found themselves in last-minute “desperation strikes”:
badly prepared, yet seen as necessary for survival of the union.
Even
if these strikes didn’t produce the contractual gains that
workers wanted, they did have some positive effects. Striking workers
at Boeing and New York transit strikers, for instance, described
seeing new excitement and participation from fellow workers following
their successful, high-profile attempts to shut down their employers.
Many
activists involved in strike support for the Northwest Airlines
mechanics’ strike saw striking mechanics and cleaners move
month by month into greater militancy and awareness of the broader
labor movement. Indeed, rank-and-file strikers from AMFA Local 5
in Detroit formed their own Solidarity Committee that attended other
union’s pickets, Jobs with Justice events, and various social
movement events in the Detroit area.
SURGE
IN REFORM
Strikes
were only one example of increased activity. Auto part manufacturer
Delphi’s announcement of bankruptcy—and plan for 63
percent wage cuts and massive layoffs—unleashed a wave of
rank-and-file organizing.
While
the UAW leadership remained paralyzed, unable or unwilling to mount
even a desperation fight, UAW members launched a new dissident organization:
Soldiers of Solidarity (SOS). SOS successfully organized a highly
publicized picket of several hundreds at the Detroit Auto Show,
another large picket at Delphi’s headquarters, and has been
organizing trainings for UAW members in how to use work-to-rule
strategies to fight the company inside the plants.
Outside
of auto, reformers in the East Coast longshore union, the International
Longshoreman’s Association, continue to build the dissident
Longshore Workers Coalition. In January, transit workers in New
York followed up their three-day strike by voting down the concessionary
contract pushed by union leaders.
In
Los Angeles, reform-minded teachers swept elections in the second-largest
teacher union in the country, United Teachers of Los Angeles.
Rank-and-file
work has also seen an uptick in the Teamsters as that union heads
towards its 2006 elections. Teamster reformers have mounted the
Strong Contracts/Good Pensions slate with Tom Leedham as their candidate
for General President.
The
2006 campaign began with reform victories in local elections in
Atlanta, Milwaukee, Louisville, and elsewhere. The grassroots campaign
gathered over 50,000 member signatures in two months and received
election accreditation in December.
IMMIGRANT
WORKER VICTORIES
Some
of the biggest labor success stories of 2005 were made by predominantly
immigrant farm workers. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers’
successful Taco Bell boycott and the Farm Labor Organizing Committee’s
5,000-worker organizing victory in North Carolina broke new ground
for immigrant labor organizing.
Both
groups won by organizing in the fields and communities at the same
time--building successful national campaigns that mobilized faith-based,
student, and other community-labor groups, while maintaining internal
member-driven education.
On
the waterfront, wildcat strikes at ports and inter-modal yards over
the last two years have won victories on both coasts for mostly
immigrant workers. Wildcat strikes at the Stockton, California inter-modal
yard in the spring and summer of 2005 were organized from a Sikh
temple, for example.
The
massive immigrant marches that sprang up around the United States
in early 2006 give further evidence of a growing, vibrant immigrant
rights movement. On April 10—the second round of protests—an
estimated two million or more people marched in 140 cities.
INDUSTRIAL
UNITY
2005
also saw the emergence of new rank-and-file groups advocating an
old vision: industrial unity. These cross-union formations have
evolved in the strategically important transportation industry,
where union members face myriad challenges.
The
Teamsters’ absorption of two major rail craft unions (the
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and the Brotherhood of Maintenance
of Way Employees) has sparked interesting organizing among rank-and-file
activists in the rail industry. Frustrated by a century of craft
division and feuding, union members began reaching out to other
members across the craft and union divide last year by forming Rail
Operating Crafts United.
In
the embattled airline industry, union members and supporting activists
have built a new cross-union, cross-craft group: Airline
Workers United. AWU emerged in response to ongoing problems
made clear by the Northwest Airlines strike--the collapse of solidarity,
the unresponsiveness of many airline union leaderships, and the
lack of an industry-wide union strategy.
AWU
is currently made up of flight attendants, mechanics, gate workers,
and customer service agents from a number of airline unions at Northwest,
but it has also begun spreading to pilots and mechanics at United
and American.
SOCIAL
MOVEMENT UNIONISM
Beyond
traditional union reform, labor groups fought for democracy and
social justice in new and exciting ways in 2005 (labor’s participation
in the above-mentioned immigrant marches is one example of this).
Unions
and other labor organizations continue to oppose the war in Iraq,
with U.S. Labor Against the War (USLAW) playing the biggest role.
USLAW is reaching out to veterans and military families, sponsoring
public events with Military Families Speak Out, Iraqi Veterans Against
the War, and other veterans groups.
In
2005 USLAW also organized a successful tour of Iraqi labor leaders
and an intervention at the AFL-CIO Convention. Due to pressure from
USLAW, the AFL-CIO passed a resolution against the war in Iraq at
its convention, a groundbreaking moment for the federation.
Responding
to the disaster of Hurricane Katrina, Community Labor United (CLU)--a
Jobs with Justice-like community-labor coalition in New Orleans--stepped
up its own regional organizing. CLU has already been involved in
a number of local fights around Gulf Coast reconstruction, and continues
to demand that the people of New Orleans determine the future of
their city.
For
all these positive developments, this remains a difficult period
for U.S. labor. Union membership has hit historic lows, and employers
(along with the government) continue their assault on workers’
living and working conditions.
But
precisely because this period looks so bleak, it is important to
examine these victories, small and large, and learn what we can.
In hard times we need the lessons these victories provide, and we
also need inspiration.
Chris Kutalik is co-editor of Labor
Notes magazine in Detroit. He can be reached at: chris@labornotes.org
|