Los Mineros and Steelworkers ‘Enhance’ Solidarity, Strategic Alliance

A most encouraging development! These borders are not for your protection, they are the prison walls of global solidarity. Citizenship isn't an entitlement, it's a branding iron. If we are ever to have peace and justice it will require a linking of hands across frontiers. As long as dissent is penned up within national boundaries there will always be two classes of people: those who own, and those who are owned.



http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/11856/los_mineros_-_steelworkers_sign_enhanced_solidarity_agreement/

Trouble In Paradise: National Park and Forest Employees Fight Power with Passion

Nice piece.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/11850/park_and_forest_service_employees_fight_power_with_passion/

Cops and Firefighters: The Public Sector’s New Untouchable Upper Class?

The ploy of excluding the police from cuts is an old one. The state needs the police to keep the rest of us in our place. If they cut the cops, the latter might side with the people during a mass labor uprising and that will be the end for capital.

Worth a read.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/11840/cops_and_firefighters_the_public_sectors_new_untouchable_upper_class/

Frustrated Chicago Teachers Union Grapples With Restrictive Strike Rights

Talks were stalled over the terms of a 4-percent cost of living increase that was rescinded in June by the Chicago Board of Education due to budget concerns. Officials said it would save $100 million from the $712 million deficit at the time. The board, selected by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, approved six-figure salaries for five Chicago Public Schools executives a week later, which drew protests from union members.

The union pulled out of negotiations this week after school officials rejected an offer of a 2-percent increase in addition to other proposals.

Following the stalemate, Chicago Public School system officials on Tuesday went ahead and announced unilateral plans for a longer school day for the 2012-13 year, including a possible raise if teachers agreed to begin the longer hours this year. CPS officials' ability to act unilaterally—i.e. without union agreement—stems from an education reform law signed in May by Democratic Governor Pat Quinn. The plan would extend the school day for an extra 90 minutes and an additional two weeks. Emanuel advocated extended school hours and days on the campaign trail, criticizing the country’s third largest education system for having one of the shortest school days compared to other metropolitan areas.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/11858/chicago_teachers_union_grapples_with_longer_school_days_restrive_strik/

NYT’s Norcera Gets Boeing Case Wrong

Nocera starts by claiming that he is “mildly obsessed” over the issue. I’d suggest that he make the obsession stronger, because it’s apparent that he hasn’t taken the time to read the complaint, read the NLRB’s statements on the complaint, talk to anyone who knows the law, or even spent five minutes on the NLRB website to determine its basic structure and function.

Typical.

http://talkingunion.wordpress.com/2011/08/24/norcera-boeing/

Poster O' The Day, 23 August

Sacco and Vanzetti: Two Good Mens A Long Time Gone

On this day in 1927 two innocent men were executed by the state of Massachusetts because they were anarchists. Nothing new here, the US government had been killing anarchists and other radicals for decades by this point. But this case was different in that it attracted global attention, and almost caused a revolution in Italy.

The case was also notable in that the trial was a scandal. The judge had been overheard to say that he was going to "get those anarchist bastards," and he did.

Not that this wasn't enough to make this case noteworthy, but the grace and dignity with which the condemned men faced the ordeal, and the beautiful things they said and wrote about it, also served to focus public scrutiny upon the infamy.

There's no need to rehash the details. It would be a familiar saga of speaking truth to power and the lethal consequences which often pertain.

Power determined to destroy these two brave men, and did, but the two revolutionaries still inspire modern activists the world around, myself included. I have a lot in common with the two men, including having lived a good deal of my life in Massachusetts. I was present when then Governor Mike Dukakis granted them a posthumous pardon. He delivered quite a moving speech, rare in its candor, particularly for a politician with great ambition.

Are they still relevant? As long as justice is they will be. Their work is unfinished. There's an Italian saying with which I'm sure they would have agreed: "He who lives by hope, dies in despair." In other words, you must do something before it's too late. They devoted their lives to acting in the interests of justice and humanity. I will not want to draw another breath should the day come when such things are no longer relevant.

So to Nando and Bartolo, on the occasion of the 84th anniversary of their executions, I say mille grazie.[1]

[1] Paul Avrich's book on the two men is the only one worth reading.

Keiser Report: Bankers & Aliens

The first five minutes of this are a bit tiresome, but the rest is pretty interesting, not just satire but lots of info' too.

Financial Meltdown: The Case Against the Ratings Agencies

Another great piece from Michael Hudson.

http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?llr=o8b4necab&v=0010LjSV1Qsdb-M0x8m5Z0basJaMUqxhNXmyHg6cvfI-2-UUISgULdlc1tvI1iEQeLbMupulYI7N31k5XGvS-RhPugGWpRI_T1YarnuhtpkeQ0gL7QPve3BCQ%3D%3D

GAO Audit of Federal Reserve No Bid Contracts Fails to Finger Geithner, Baxter, Dimon, Immelt and Friedman in Suspicious BlackRock Contract

http://english.economicpolicyjournal.com/2011/07/gao-audit-of-federal-reserve-no-bid.html

Remember the Audit the Fed bill that was supposed to bring the financial system to its knees if Congress dared pass it? Remember the toothless, watered down version that finally made it into Dodd-Frank and at the time was itself controversial?

Pursuant to direction under Dodd-Frank, the Government Accountability Office today released a 266 page report detailing its findings after a review of the numerous emergency programs instituted by the Federal Reserve from 2008 to 2010. Among the many findings was that the bulk of over half billion dollars in service contracts were awarded without bid. While the report is a step in the right direction, its failure to mention the most suspicious contract (about which we know only because of Congressionally subpoenaed email records of the New York Fed), suggests the review was either facile or compromised. In other words, we cannot rely on even the simplest of half measures when it comes to providing Fed accountability.

http://english.economicpolicyjournal.com/2011/07/gao-audit-of-federal-reserve-no-bid.html



And here's a follow-up piece.

http://english.economicpolicyjournal.com/2011/08/more-on-how-gaos-phony-fed-audit-failed.html

Israel's War On Gaza

Follow this link to photos. They are gruesome.

http://english.alresalah.ps/?action=showdetail&seid=635

Pander Alert: The South Africa Front

South Africa's Zuma says NATO campaign cost lives in Libya

Johannesburg - Lives could have been saved in Libya had NATO allowed the African Union (AU) to take the lead in the troubled country, South African President Jacob Zuma said Tuesday.
'Those who have the power to bomb other countries have undermined the AU's efforts and initiatives to handle the situation in Libya,' said Zuma, after talks with the visiting president of Ghana, John Atta Mills.
'We could have avoided a lot of loss of life in Libya,' Zuma was quoted as saying by the SAPA news agency.

Here posits himself as anti-Western when in fact they own him. He has become quite unpopular with his people because of it and is currently conducting a reign of terror to suppress the ever-growing opposition to him and his policies. The comments above were made for public consumption, he doesn't mean a word of it. He's facing protest marches, strikes, and calls for revolution, and he's doing everything he can to stave it off.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/africa/news/article_1658613.php/South-Africa-s-Zuma-says-NATO-campaign-cost-lives-in-Libya

Wikiganda Alert: Wiki war: 3500 Unpublished Leaks Destroyed Forever as Assange Hits Out

This is political theater folks. Wikileaks is an American intelligence operation and has been from day one. The former [?] White supremacist Assange was behind the bogus climategate e-mails, has made a "deal" with Israel not to release any info' harmful to its interests, and his releases always seem to cleave nicely with US foreign policy.

Do you believe that the US government cannot prevent the publication of its documents on a specific website when the release is announced weeks in advance? If so, see a doctor. I hate to break the news, as I know this charlatan is a hero to many, but Wiki is a psy-op. Get over it.

In order to protect its agent and operation, it's concocted this smokescreen about Assange's rival being responsible for the destruction of the BofA documents (if Wiki ever had them in the first place). There is not a word of truth in the following article.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article28920.htm




And in case we have forgotten, Assange took credit for the Tunisian Revolution even though his leak exposing Ben Ali's corruption was released two days after he had fled the country.

In a moment of obscene megalomania, he also took credit for the Egyptian Revolution. An event over which he exerted no influence. Follow the link to the execrable video.

http://saveourcola.blogspot.com/2011/07/that-wikicreep.html

Help Fight Discrimination Against the Unemployed

Unbelievable!

http://www.todaysworkplace.org/2011/08/23/help-fight-discrimination-against-the-unemployed/

Long-Awaited Wikileaks Secret Bank Of America Files Have Been Destroyed

Agent Assange doing his duty.

http://dailybail.com/home/long-awaited-wikileaks-secret-bank-of-america-files-have-bee.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheDailyBail+%28The+Daily+Bail%29

Plutocracy 101

The Banksters And US Servicemen

JFK once said that there are three things for which this country should rightly be ashamed: the treatment of the indigenous American, The African American, and the immigrant American. He missed one: the American servicemen.

This ugly history goes back to the Revolution, and continues to this day. After every conflict, every one, this country has broken its promises to its warriors, denied them benefits, and occasionally refused to pay them. On one particularly despicable occasion, it has even opened fire on them. This latest attack upon them is nothing new.

Just for the record, I am not buying into the Elizabeth Warren charade. A naive few believe that she is the anti-bankster messiah who will deliver America from plutocracy. They should take a closer look.

Every election cycle the oligarchy creates a countercandidate (last time it was Obama) to soak up all the angst and be the repository for those who aspire to change. If there is enough discontent the "people's choice" gets swept into office by public acclaim. Slowly but surely the public then comes to realize that their champion was no reformer at all. Warren is Wall Street through and through, she is this year's model.

Obummer Working For The Man

Nothing our prez won't do for capital. I'm trying to figure out what kind of deal he's swung for that "consultation" gig reward he's going to get from the Rothschilds or Rockefellers or whoever after he leaves office in five years. After all he's done for them, I can imagine they are going to make him a very rich man indeed: all the wars the banks could hope for, no regulatory hurdles thrown in their path, zealous protection from prosecution from Obummer's DoJ, and, lest we forget, a no-limits, 24/7, drive-through, discount window at the Fed. Who could ask for anything more?

http://dailybail.com/home/ny-attorney-general-facing-intense-pressure-from-obama-admin.html

Criminality At The Top: US Stealing Libya's Money.

http://www.voltairenet.org/Washington-tried-to-snatch-1-5

Thierry Meyssan and Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya under death threat in Tripoli?

The following came to me via the newsletter of the Voltaire Network website, which Meyssan edits. He has been a tireless debunker of government lies and was the first to see through the 757-demolished-the-Pentagon charade.

If the below is true, it says a good deal about how much the US government fears "wacko conspiracy theorists."

Thierry Meyssan and Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya under death threat in Tripoli
VOLTAIRE NETWORK | TRIPOLI (LIBYA) | 22 AUGUST 2011
In Tripoli, the bombings resumed around 10:20 this morning. They are directed against certain objectives, under relentless NATO pounding.
The fighting also resumed around the Rixos Hotel where certain Libyan leaders and foreign journalists are still entrenched.
From the Rixos, the order was given by so-called "journalists" from the United States (*) to bring down Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya and Thierry Meyssan.
Three states have offered diplomatic protection to the Voltaire Network team.
However, trapped in the city, they have no way of reaching the respective embassies.
(*) These individuals have been identified and their names will be released in due course.

Here's more from the website.

http://www.voltairenet.org/Tripoli-Voltaire-Network-concerned