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Written by Matt Wylie
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Monday, 17 March 2008 |
We are all too familiar with the horrible injustices committed by the Mexican Government and its police force. Members of the Asamblea Popular del Pueblo de Oaxaca (APPO) have suffered from the brutality of the infamously corrupt Mexican Federal Preventative Police (PFP). Many have been unjustifiably imprisoned while others have been “disappeared” and are now feared to be dead. Falsified drug charges are so common among political prisoners that they have become the fingerprints of the “long arm of the law” in Mexico. Armed with the knowledge of the counter-revolutionary tactics being used, we will take a brief look at the “Merida Initiative,” also known as “Plan Mexico,” due to its similarity to the infamous “Plan Colombia.” |
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Written by Brad Forrest
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Thursday, 13 March 2008 |
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The old home of the U.S. machine tool industry, producing about 13 percent of national machine tool output and employing about 15,000 workers, Cincinnati today is blighted by “deindustrialization” and has evolved into a services and financial center with large disparities in wealth and growing levels of unemployment, drug abuse and crime, as jobs have shifted into retail and related “services.”
A recent socioeconomic study by Dan La Botz of Cincinnati Studies, entitled “Who Rules Cincinnati,” has given us a vivid look at the nuts and bolts of capitalist democracy in America through the prism of that city’s politics. The study found that the political and cultural life of the city is dominated by just 7 large corporations: Procter & Gamble, Kroger, Macy’s/Federated Department Stores, Fifth Third Bancorp, Western and Southern Financial, American Financial Corp, and E.W. Scripps. These corporations have a combined revenue stream of $19,781,709.2 million. |
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Written by Karl Belin
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Wednesday, 12 March 2008 |
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The teachers and other professionals at Pittsburgh Public Schools, who we reported on in issue 36 of Socialist Appeal, have attained a number of concrete gains in a new three-year contract with the school district. The agreement comes after a year of hard-fought struggles by Pittsburgh’s teachers.
The Pittsburgh Federation of Teachers (PFT) first announced that a tentative agreement had been reached with the district on the evening of January 16 in a letter from the union’s president, John Tarka. Tarka’s letter is available on the the PFT website (www.pft400.org). In the letter, he notified union members that the bargaining unit had reached an agreement which would then be sent to the PFT Executive Board, which would decide whether or not to recommend ratification to the membership. The Executive Board subsequently voted unanimously in favor of ratification. |
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Written by Socialist Appeal
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Tuesday, 11 March 2008 |
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A new WIL leaflet based on the article Build a United Anti-War Movement. Print copies and help build unity in the anti-war movement. If you agree with this perspective, be sure to contact us. You can download the leaflet here. |
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Written by A.B. Blunt in Providence, RI
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Tuesday, 11 March 2008 |
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Bitter denunciations of monopolistic greed poured from the podium at a public hearing in Providence on January 17th. Subscribers in the “direct pay” class of Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Rhode Island hoped these words would block a rate-increase request filed with the state Health Insurance Commissioner in November, 2007. If the commissioner approves the request, as many fear he will, subscribers will face an average rate increase of 12.7 percent in their monthly premiums.
Rhode Islanders traveled on one of the coldest nights of the winter to attend the hearing in downtown Providence. Following opening arguments from the Blue Cross attorney and then the assistant state Attorney General, a Blue Cross subscriber and attorney by profession was the first to speak. Testifying on the excessive costs of health care for himself and his family, as well as the rising cost of food, gasoline, and heating oil, the speaker demonstrated the hardship he and his family would suffer if rates were to increase. The men and women who followed him testified to the same troubles, and in words of desperation, disgust, and outrage, implored the commission to deny the rate increase. |
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Written by Mid-Tennessee WIL
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Tuesday, 11 March 2008 |
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On Saturday, January 12, nearly twenty people gathered near Middle Tennessee State University for the region’s first “Marxist Day School.” The event, organized by the Workers International League, consisted of vibrant discussions on how Marxism remains relevant in the 21st century and how working people around the world are fighting to make socialism a reality. As the meeting opened, everyone was welcomed and thanked for attending. The comrades and guests then introduced themselves, setting a friendly mood for the rest of the day. |
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Written by Ed Riley
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Sunday, 09 March 2008 |
The U.S. Department of Labor recently reported that 311,000 more workers joined unions in 2007. While in 2006, 12 percent of wage and salary workers belonged to unions, 12.1 percent are in unions as of 2007. This growth in unionization took place in spite of the fact that many unionized industrial jobs were eliminated in the automobile and related sectors. The report showed that 35.9 percent of public sector workers are in unions, while only 7.5 percent of the private sector was unionized. As recently as twenty five years ago, 20.1 percent of the labor force was unionized. How did we go from strong powerful unions to where we are today? |
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Written by Josh Lucker
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Friday, 07 March 2008 |
According to the historians of the ruling class, “progressives” in the early 20th Century developed the primary system in order to counteract the control of political parties by the “party bosses.” In order to do this (so it is claimed), they removed control of the selection of candidates from the hands of the parties themselves and placed it in the hands of the states. But far from removing control from the party bosses, this merely gives the two-party system the states’ stamp of approval. In most other countries, the nomination of candidates is the responsibility of parties and their members. |
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Written by Shane Jones
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Tuesday, 04 March 2008 |
Polls continue to reveal the deep and widespread dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq. For example, a Washington Post-ABC News poll, conducted in January, showed 61 percent in opposition to Bush’s “surge.” A more general CNN poll carried out in February, which asked, “Do you favor or oppose the U.S. war in Iraq?” found that 64 percent of those polled opposed the war. But for all the polls, which shine light on the stance of millions in the U.S., there is an glaring absence. March 19, 2008 marks the fifth anniversary of the war on Iraq, and yet there will be no unified mass mobilization, as demanded by tens of thousands of activists nationally. |
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Written by By Alan Woods
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Tuesday, 04 March 2008 |
Alan Woods' introduction to the latest book from Wellred USA. The book includes four Marxist classics: the Communist Manifesto, Socialism: Scientific and Utopian, State and Revolution, and the Transitional Program. It is intended to introduce readers in the USA to the most fundamental aspects of Marxist theory. Available from Wellred USA. |
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