*** From The Archives-Honor The 79th Anniversary Of The Toledo Auto-Lite General Strike

Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Newsreel Footage Of The 1934 Toledo Auto-Lite Strike

Commentary

This year marks the 79th Anniversary of three great labor struggles that ended in victory in heart of the Great Depression(the 1930s version of what we, at least partially, confront today); the great General Strike in San Francisco that was led by the dockers and sailor unions and brought victory on the key issue of the union hiring hall (since then greatly emasculated); the great Minneapolis Teamster strikes that led to the unionization of truck drivers and allied workers in that labor-hating town and later to the organizing of over-the-road drivers that created one of the strongest (if corrupt) unions in North America; and, the Toledo Auto-Lite Strike whose key component was leadership by the unemployed workers. Does all of this sound familiar? Yes and no. Yes, to labor militants who, looking to a way out of the impasse of the condition of today's quiescent labor movement, have studied these labor actions. No, to the vast majority of workers who are either not organized or are clueless about their history. In either case, though, these actions provide a thread to how we must struggle in the future. Although 75 years seems like a long time ago the issues posed then have not gone away. Far from it. Study this labor history now to be ready to struggle when we get our openings.

*****
Guest Commentary

Toledo Auto-Lite Strike

Below is a speech given by Ted Selander on June 3, 1984 at an anniversary celebration of the 1934 Toledo Auto-Lite strike. Selander was a participant in the historic strike, the leadership of which shortly afterwards joined the Trotskyist movement. This article is reprinted from the March 1986 issue of Socialist Action newspaper. An expanded version appeared in the July 1984 issues.

Brothers and sisters, the key to an understanding of the magnificent Auto-Lite strike in 1934 is that it was a strike won on the picket line by a community uprising. I repeat: on the picket line by a community uprising.

Toledo was in the grip of a tremendous popular upsurge of anger at the greedy bosses who have to give their wage slaves a few cents more in their pay.

This was 1934 B.T. – B.T. meaning before television. As a matter of fact, it was before all the social gains when we fought for and won in the ‘30s – before unemployment pay, before food stamps, before social security, before the CIO, and before Medicare, etc.

After four years of depression, the Toledo workers were in an angry mood because of the bank failures, the idle factories, the over-stocked granaries, and the 15 million unemployed. For four years we had poverty in the midst of plenty. Even the establishment was losing confidence in themselves and their system.

Rank and file muzzled

I don’t think (as James P. Cannon once pointed out) there was any real difference between the Toledo Auto-Lite strikers and the workers involved in many of the lost strikes in the United States at that time. In practically every strike, the rank and file always displayed courage. The difference was in the leadership and their strategy and tactics. In nearly every strike the militancy of the rank and file was muzzled, many times snuffed out from the top.

The leaders are tricked by the courts, the labor boards, the mediators, the government, and the media to shift the fight from the picket line to the court and conference room. But all the while, the company keeps hiring scabs to take the strikers’ jobs.

In the Auto-Lite strike, the company was hiring scabs by the hundreds and claimed they now had 1800 workers. We understood what was happening. We knew that the strike was dying and doomed. Only some bold, dramatic action could revive it, and even then it would have to be followed up with plenty of action and support to give the company an all-out fight. And nothing short of an all-out fight would do.

As you probably know, we wrote a public letter to Judge Stuart telling him that we were going to violate his anti-labor injunction and call for mass picketing. By mass picketing we didn’t mean a few hundred, we meant thousands. Could we get thousands down to that picket line? Well, that was the $64 question.

We had spent the previous year organizing what some qualified observer said was the largest and most militant unemployed organization in the country – the Lucas County Unemployed League. We had held meetings and spoke in every section of the city and in the townships; organized countless marches, demonstrations, sit-ins; stopped evictions; won cash relief with a relief strike; and had held many, many other actions.

Because of this vast experience, we felt sure that we knew the temper of the Toledo workers. We felt we had a good chance to be the fuse that could ignite a spirit of solidarity with the Auto-Lite strikers to get union recognition and perhaps even win the first union contract in the auto plants of Toledo.

Workers violate injunction

On the first day that we violated the injunction, our mass picket line consisted of four individuals. That’s right – just four. We were arrested, jailed, convicted and let out on bail and warned not to return to the picket line. But we told the judge that we were going back. And we did – picking up some 50 pickets on the way.

After that, there were a series of arrests, each one with a greater amount of pickets – first 46, then 108, and in between many smaller numbers. Every time we went back from the courts and jail, the picket lines kept growing steadily until on May 23 there were 10,000 reported on the street in front of the plant.

Now when you have a mass picket line of thousands, it enables you to counter the company’s offensive moves. For example, they brought out a high-pressure hose and turned a stream of water on us. But it didn’t take very long for a couple of hundred pickets to take the hose away and turn the water on them.

Many times the police and deputies brutally clubbed the pickets; but before they could shove them into a patrol wagon enough pickets rushed in and grabbed the pickets away and often gave the cops a taste of their own clubs.

You know that every good union has two educational committees: one to arrange lectures of all kinds and the other to educate scabs who won’t attend classes.

Half the employees at the Auto-Lite were women who were among the very best strikers we had. A couple of days after the National Guard came in, the women grabbed a scab, took him into an alley, and stripped every bit of clothing off of him except his tie and shoes. Then they marched him, naked as a jaybird, up and down the downtown streets.

Next day the papers carried a large picture of him on the front page, but they had their artist broaden and lengthen the tie to hid the family jewels. You can bet that picture discouraged a lot of scabs, but it got a big round of applause from the unionists in Ohio.

Strikers fight National Guard

The Auto-Lite strikers battled first the police, then the company guards and deputies, and finally the National Guard. The first day the Guard came in they fired without warning at the unarmed strikers, killing two and wounding 25.

After those murders, the enraged strikers fought the guard for six days and nights – returning again and again to face tear gas and vomit gas, bayonet charges, and even rifle fire.

During the lulls in the battle, we stood on boxes educating the guardsmen about the issues in the strike and how they were being used against the workers. By the way, the casualties were not all one-sided. The hospitals were patching up not only strikers but police, deputies, and the National Guardsmen.

On June 4, the company surrendered and signed on the dotted line a union contract giving the strikers priority on jobs, a 5-percent wage increase, and other concessions; agreed to withdraw all court charges and to pay all court costs. The logjam in Toledo had finally been broken, and 19 auto plants were organized before the year ended. The road was cleared to make Toledo a union town.

As a participant in the Auto-Lite strike of 1934, I appreciate this opportunity to join with you in this 50th anniversary celebration. It is a credit to all of you who organized this anniversary to keep alive the memory of labor’s untapped strength as demonstrated in the Auto-Lite strike and all the other battles which prove that in unions we are strong.

Below is the letter that the Auto-Lite strikers sent to Judge R.R. Stuart to inform him of their intention to violate his injunctions against picketing.

May 5, 1934

His Honor Judge Stuart
County Court House
Toledo, Ohio

Honorable Judge Stuart:

On Monday morning May 7, at the Auto-Lite plant, the Lucas County Unemployed League, in protest of the injunction issued by your court, will deliberately and specifically violate the injunction enjoining us from sympathetically picketing peacefully in support of the striking Auto Workers Federal Union.

We sincerely believe that this court intervention, preventing us from picketing, is an abrogation of our democratic rights, contrary to our constitutional liberties and contravenes the spirit and the letter of Section 7a of the NRA.

Further, we believe that the spirit and intent of this arbitrary injunction is another specific example of an organized movement to curtail the rights of all workers to organize, strike and picket effectively.

Therefore, with full knowledge of the principles involved and the possible consequences, we openly and publicly violate an injunction which, in our opinion, is a suppressive and oppressive act against all workers.

Sincerely yours,

Lucas County Unemployed League
Anti-Injunction Committee
Sam Pollock, Sec'y

*Studs Terkel's "Working People"- The Classic Modern Look

Click On Title To Link To Stud Terkel's Web Site.

Studs Terkel’s Working People
BOOK REVIEW

Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day And How They Feel About What They Do, Studs Terkel, The New Press, New York, 2004

As I have done on other occasions when I am reviewing more than one work by an author I am using some of the same comments, where they are pertinent, here as I did in earlier reviews. In this series the first Studs Terkel book reviewed was that of his “The Good War”: an Oral History of World War II".

Strangely, as I found out about the recent death of long time pro-working class journalist and general truth-teller "Studs" Terkel I was just beginning to read his "The Good War", about the lives and experiences of, mainly, ordinary people during World War II in America and elsewhere, for review in this space. As with other authors once I get started I tend to like to review several works that are relevant to see where their work goes. In the present case the review of Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day And How They Feel About What They Do serves to reflect on a time a couple of decades ago when people may have been resigned about their working career but had a feeling that it did not express all of what they were. Given today’s uncertain economic climate and the wider fears about the effects of the long term trend “globalization” which particularly threatens many lower- skilled or easily transferable jobs I am not sure that such interesting reflections on their work experiences would be forthcoming from today’s working population.

Although Terkel has cast a wide net on the range of occupations and types of work that he presents here it is weighted toward blue collar working people: the waitresses, bartenders, service personnel and the like with whom he had such affinity. The most interesting aspect of this effort is that almost universally the work that people do does not reflect on their capacities. In short, the job is not the measure of the person. That said, I believe, intentionally or not, this little treasure trove of interviews is one of the great arguments for socialism: the creation of a society where an energetic waitress or a well-read steelworker, for example, could break out and become a leader of society. A place where every cook can take a turn at governing. That is the real message that these interviewees are trying, unsuccessfully for the most part, to articulate. How to successfully do that, however, is a separate and frustratingly hard political and organizational question that I have argues about elsewhere.

One thing that I noticed immediately after reading this book, and as is true of the majority of Terkel’s interview books, is that he is not the dominant presence but is a rather light, if intensely interested, interloper in these stories. For better or worse the interviewees get to tell their stories, unchained. In this age of 24/7 media coverage with every half-baked journalist or wannabe interjecting his or her personality into somebody else’s story this was, and is, rather refreshing. Of course this journalistic virtue does not mean that Studs did not have control over who got to tell their stories and who didn’t to fit his preoccupations and sense of order. He has a point he wants to make and that is that although most “ordinary” people do not make the history books they certainly make history, if not always of their own accord or to their own liking. Again, kudos and adieu Studs.

From SocialistAlternative.org-We Need A Party For Working People

Published by SocialistAlternative.org Read online at: www.SocialistAlternative.org/news/article10.php?id=1720

We Need A Party For Working People

Oct 27, 2011
Alan Jones

The explosion of the Occupation Movement demonstrated growing anger at the corporate policies coming from politicians in Washington. While many workers and young people were already clear about the role of Republicans, now more and more are seeing that the Democrats are also dedicated to the pro-corporate agenda.

Despite promises of change in this election campaign, Obama has not passed any meaningful reforms to help the millions of ordinary working people who can barely keep their heads above the rising floods of an enduring economic crisis. Instead, we’ve had a pro-big business, war president whose policies have been practically indistinguishable from those of the Bush presidency. The last straw for many was the debt deal made in August, which will include over $2 trillion in devastating cuts to needed social services.


Underlying all this, the so-called recovery has now come to a virtual standstill. The only things that have recovered are corporate profits and Wall Street speculation. Unemployment has remained intractable at an official 9.1% that now is widely agreed to be, in reality, closer to 14% of the workforce. Foreclosures are continuing, poverty has reached a new postwar record and a new study concluded that inflation-adjusted median household income plummeted by a staggering 9.8% since the beginning of the crisis in 2007.


It is this shattering of illusions about capitalism and the hypocrisy of the political establishment that triggered the wave of Occupy Wall Street protests that are sweeping the country (see articles page 6&7 and page 11). Unlike the corporate-funded right wing populist Tea Party movement, the occupations reflect a genuine, growing, mass anti-corporate mood that is correctly targeting the bankers and Wall Street speculators.


This has caused alarm in the political establishment. Democratic Party politicians who have presided over the policies of coddling the bankers and imposing austerity on the working class are now parading in the demonstrations in an effort to divert the occupation movement toward the Democratic Party.


Hypocritically, President Obama declared at a press conference that the Occupation Movement reflects a “broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.” Obama knows very well how the financial system works, as he was at the forefront of supporting the bankers’ bailout and he received the most campaign contributions from his Wall Street backers.


One of those who demagogically appeared at the protests is millionaire Harlem Representative Charles Rangel, who declared he was “mad as hell” – but not nearly enough to stop receiving huge campaign contributions from Wall Street.


The Democrats clearly intend to use the movement to energize their electoral base into the 2012 elections. Commenting on the occupations, Paul Krugman said that “Occupy Wall Street is starting to look like an important event that might even eventually be seen as a turning point.” But a turning point for what? Clearly, the Democrats and the leadership of the major unions want to harness this movement into the safe channels of the two-party system and the “lesser evil.”


Obama and the Democrats are already shifting into demagogic, populist electoral mode to mask their real policies that benefit the rich and Wall Street. This is in preparation for the 2012 elections amidst the worst economic downturn since the 1930s.


But Obama’s real agenda for a second term is clear. Despite cosmetic language about creating an insufficient jobs program that will not pass Congress, the real program was expressed in his call for a massive $4 trillion “deficit reduction” – not through stopping the wars or taxing the rich and big business, but overwhelmingly by cuts on social programs like Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security, mass unemployment and more cuts in living standards for workers and the poor.


Working-Class Political Alternative


If the Occupation Movement is to become a real “turning point” for working people and the youth then we need to start a campaign to build a mass working-class political alternative. This can start by organizing broad conferences of unionists, participants in the occupations, young people, workers, socialists and others activists in every major city across the country early next year to prepare to run independent working-class candidates in 2012. These campaigns can start with a program of opposition to all cuts and concessions, taxing the rich, a massive jobs program, ending the wars and cutting the Pentagon budget, single payer health care, etc.


Union activists should campaign in their unions to stop funding the corporate-sponsored Democratic Party and its politicians. The Occupy Wall Street Movement has shown how deep is the sympathy of the broad mass of workers and young people for a program to attack the privileges and corruption of the capitalist oligarchy.


The Democrats are fully complicit in the massive cuts that will come from the Super Committee deliberations. The opportunity will be there for serious labor-left and socialist candidates and campaigns to challenge the two corporate parties and lay the basis for a mass, independent workers party and democratic socialist policies to challenge the sick system of capitalism.

From The "Socialist Alternative" Website- Defend the Occupy Movement! — Build actions to put millions in the streets across the U.S.

Click on the headline to link to the Socialist Alternative website.

Defend the Occupy Movement!— Build actions to put millions in the streets across the U.S.

Nov 17, 2011
By Socialist Alternative

United mass mobilizations needed to protest police crackdowns, and stop the cuts, layoffs, foreclosures, and tuition hikes

In the last week the ruling elite have mobilized their police forces in an attempt to smash the Occupy movement, which they correctly see as a threat to their rule. Democratic and Republican Party mayors and city councilors have sent out their police to obediently do the dirty work. But tearing down tents and arresting protestors will ultimately fail to repress a movement that has broad support. They may evict some occupiers in this or that city, but they cannot contain the deep anger in U.S. society forever.

Occupy Wall Street has already changed U.S. society. It has ignited new struggles beyond the occupations themselves. Students are starting to organize against tuition hikes. Activists are fighting foreclosures. Teachers are fighting attacks on public education. Many of them are using some of the bold tactics and radical slogans of Occupy.

Working people and youth have already faced the most devastating onslaught to living standards, working conditions, and social programs seen in generations. Now the Congressional “Super Committee,” an un-elected commission of Democrats and Republicans representing the interests of the 1%, is expected to present trillions of dollars in cuts to social services that are essential to the 99%. Both parties have already agreed to over $400 billion in cuts to Medicare and deep cuts to Medicaid.

Their proposals are due to be presented to Congress on November 23, after which Congress needs to vote on them by December 23. Also, education and essential social services are on the chopping block at a local level.

There is a major opportunity now to link together the fight against police repression, defending the occupations and our democratic rights, with the struggles developing against foreclosures and cuts to form a truly massive and united movement to make Wall Street pay for their own crisis. We need to take our movement into the schools and colleges, into our communities and workplaces. By demonstrating our willingness to fight for the concrete burning issues that affect the widest layers of workers, young people, and the poor, especially the most oppressed communities of color, we can bring millions out into the streets.

Building a dynamic and broader movement

The tactic of occupying parks and plazas has played an excellent role in the early stages of the movement, providing a clear and powerful gathering point for mass discontent in society. The widespread support we have won demonstrates the deep anger that already existed underneath the surface at the wealthy elite and the corporate politicians who serve them. It also shows that radical demands to change society combined with bold tactics, far from isolating and marginalizing the movement, has been the key to tapping into that anger and support.

Now it is time to take it a step further, going beyond the occupations and mobilizing millions into struggle. This is what is needed to push back the ruling elite and change the balance of power between the “1%” and the “99%”. If we are unable to reach out and build then there is a danger of the Occupy movement becoming too inward-looking, isolated, and exhausted from fighting police repression.

The massive mobilization in Oakland on November 2, with at least 20,000 in the streets, shut down the port for several hours in response to Occupy Oakland's call for a general strike against police repression of the movement. Though it was not a full-blown general strike, the call resonated among a broader layer of workers and union members. It clearly points a way forward as the movement was able to begin to tap into the massive power that lies with the broader working class.

The working class has enormous potential power. Through job actions and going on strike they can paralyze big corporations and banks, stopping their operations and their profits. Our biggest ally is the working class – those who work for a wage, blue collar or white; those who produce the wealth. That’s who we need to mobilize to stop the repression and defeat the bankers and their loyal servants in public office.

We saw a glimpse of the potential power of the working class on November 8. Ohio voters defeated the Republican governor’s right-wing agenda, when a landslide majority voted to repeal the latest piece of anti-union, anti-worker legislation passed earlier this year. To do so the unions distributed 4.1 million fliers to over 3,000 worksites, knocked on 1.1 million doors, sent 825,000 letters in the mail, spent $30 million and mobilized 17,000 volunteers over the weekend to get out the vote. Imagine that sort of effort to mobilize in the streets and not just at the ballot box.

The unions have provided support for the Occupy movement. Unfortunately, the mostly conservative leaders of the unions don’t want to upset their cozy relationship with the Democrats by mobilizing the power of the labor movement. Most union leaders don’t have any experience leading militant and dynamic struggles. Fortunately for our movement, the power of unions does not rest with their leaders, but their tens of millions of members. The Occupy movement can play a role in energizing unions by helping to mobilize their members into action. This is the way the unions can start to be transformed into activist organizations. An active membership can organize from below and pressure their leadership to mobilize and link up with the Occupy and student movements in mass mobilizations to build strength, solidarity, and confidence as a step to more decisive strike action.

Conferences to build a wider movement

We need to expand our Occupy movement into all layers of society, building from the bottom up. We need to spread Occupy committees into the workplaces, schools, and local communities. Most workers can't attend the general assemblies at the occupations due to work hours, family, or distance of travel. Setting up Occupy committees in the workplace will give workers a chance to discuss and debate how to organize and fight back. Occupy committees or assemblies should also be spread to the working-class and poor neighborhoods and colleges.

The general assemblies have played an important role in bringing people into political activity. Along with the various committees, they have been an arena to help train new activists. But we now need to go further. We need to develop wider structures to organize a bigger movement. To allow the widest possible participation and ensure a coordinated and united fightback we need to look to develop structures which can bring together assemblies of all the occupations, unions, student groups, and various struggles which are developing. They could send elected delegates to local and national meetings and conferences.

We need to organize conferences to allow discussion on different views to draw out the lessons so far and to take the movement forward. We can unite around immediate actions to organize truly massive demonstrations in the streets as the next step. Given the deep anger in society there is no reason why we can't put millions in the streets across the U.S. in opposition to the policies of the ruling elite if we have a united and coordinated all-out effort.

Demands and an independent voice

The conferences could also decide the key demands and message of any future actions. In order to mobilize the full power of working people and youth, we have to raise demands that are understandable to the millions affected by cuts and the myriad other injustices in our society, like foreclosures, layoffs, and discrimination, to name a few. Clear demands can mobilize new layers of people by providing real solutions on jobs, education, and healthcare that the majority can rally behind.

Raising clear demands will also allow the movement to define itself. If it does not, the corporate media will pick any particular sign, activist, or idea to mis-characterize the movement. Corporate politicians will make all kinds of rhetorical gestures in support of a movement if it doesn't raise clear anti-corporate demands, such as making the banks pay for the crisis, not workers and youth.

There is a serious danger that the Democratic Party, as it has done time and time again, will attempt to co-opt the energy and message of this movement for electoral gain by making empty promises and then betraying the movement. That’s why it’s necessary for the movement to create its own political voice, first by running independent candidates in 2012 that speak out against the 1%. Imagine the eruption of anger that would now develop if they banned candidates representing the 99% from official debates as they did to Ralph Nader and other left candidates in the past. Running radical candidates is a great way to expose the interests of the 1% in front of the 99%. This could be a step toward building a new party for workers and youth - one that takes no corporate money, is independent of both corporate parties, and that helps lead the struggle for the interests of the vast majority.

Break the power of Wall Street and their corporate politicians

It is possible to build a force strong enough to fundamentally change U.S. society. To challenge the power of the 1% and open the door to ending the dictatorship of Wall Street and the whole capitalist system, the movement can aim to fight for these concrete ideas:

We won't pay for their crisis! Make bankers, corporations, and the rich pay for the misery they and their system has caused. For major tax hikes on the super-rich and big corporations.

Cancel all student debt. Free education! Make the banks take the losses.
No evictions, no foreclosures! For the right of all people and families to stay in their homes.

For a massive job creation program to rebuild infrastructure, paid for by taxes on the profits of big business.

An emergency plan to develop clean energy and create jobs. A plan to create jobs in education, health care, and other areas of social necessity can show a way out of this crisis. This plan needs to be democratically discussed and based on worker and community control and management.

End the wars. Slash the military budget.

Break the power of Wall Street. Put the financial institutions and banks that dominate the U.S. economy into public ownership under the democratic management of elected representatives of workers and the public. Compensation to be paid on the basis of proven need to small investors, not millionaires.

Wall Street and the 1% have two parties; we need one of our own! Run independent candidates in 2012 to create a real voice for this new anti-corporate movement, as a step towards building a mass workers party which fights for the interests of workers, youth the poor and the vast majority.
Fundamentally transform society along democratic socialist lines to replace the rotten system of capitalism with a society based on democratic planning to meet human need.

Socialist Alternative:

This system, capitalism, is the root cause of poverty, war, racism, sexism, and environmental destruction. We need an alternative where the resources of society are controlled and managed democratically by working people. In order to achieve a new system, democratic socialism, we need to build an organization and movement here and around the world for fundamental change. Socialist Alternative is part of the international struggle against capitalism and supports the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI). For analysis, articles and reports of the CWI and the sister organizations of Socialist Alternative see www.socialistworld.net.

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The Class Struggle Heats Up, A Victory For Our Side For Once-Public unions win in Ohio referendum on Gov. John Kasich restrictions on bargaining

Markin comment:

After last week’s Oakland General Strike and the closing down of the Port of Oakland I thought we were on the offensive, finally. And I was not wrong. The molecular process that has been going on down at the base of society after years of being beaten down in the one-sided class struggle has finally gotten some push back, if ever so slightly just now.

The Ohio referendum vote was a sweet victory to put the breaks on this “in your face” right-wing slide that we having been dealing with for a long time. While, in the final analysis, hard struggles, hard street struggles, still lie ahead we will take our victories, small or large, wherever we can. I don’t think that the bourgeoisie is ready to make reservations to some island and let us take over yet but I would think that some of the more far-sighted elements might be checking their frequent-flyer mileage status. Nor am I so intoxicated by Ohio that I would raise the propaganda slogan to build workers councils now. But I will raise right here, well in advance of the 2012 bourgeois electoral fist-fight, the need to fight for a workers party that fights for a workers government. And I am not wrong on that.

P.S. Anytime anybody anywhere says labor and its supporters need to spent union dues to elect bourgeois "friends" like Obama just point to Ohio. That is the way to spend our dough-and not have it wasted. That, and putting a ton of money into organizing the unorganized.
******
Post by Peter Callaghan / The News Tribune on Nov. 8, 2011 at 6:47 pm | November 8, 2011 6:47 pm

This from the Associated Press:
COLUMBUS, Ohio The state’s new collective bargaining law was defeated Tuesday after an expensive union-backed campaign that pitted firefighters, police officers and teachers against the Republican establishment.

In a political blow to GOP Gov. John Kasich, voters handily rejected the law, which would have limited the bargaining abilities of 350,000 unionized public workers.

Labor and business interests poured more than $30 million into the nationally watched campaign, and turnout was high for an off-year election.
The law hadn’t taken effect yet. Tuesday’s result means the state’s current union rules will stand, at least until the GOP-controlled Legislature determines its next move. Republican House Speaker William Batchelder predicted last week that the more palatable elements of the collective bargaining bill Ñ such as higher minimum contributions on worker health insurance and pensions Ñ are likely to be revisited after the dust settles.

Kasich and fellow supporters promoted the law as a means for local governments to save money and keep workers. Their effort was supported by the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Business-Ohio, farmers and others.

We Are Ohio, the largely union-funded opponent coalition, painted the issue as a threat to public safety and middle-class workers, spending millions of dollars on TV ads filled with images of firefighters, police officers, teachers and nurses.

Celebrities came out on both sides of the campaign, with former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and singer Pat Boone urging voters to retain the law and former astronaut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn and the Rev. Jesse Jackson urging them to scrap it.

Labor and business interests poured more than $30 million into the nationally watched campaign, with the law’s opponents far outspending and outnumbering its defenders.

Opponents reported raising $24 million as of mid-October, compared to about $8 million raised by the committee supporting the law, Building a Better Ohio.

Tuesday’s result in the closely divided swing state was expected to resonate from statehouses to the White House ahead of the 2012 presidential election.

Ohio’s bill went further than a similar one in Wisconsin by including police officers and firefighters, and it was considered by many observers to be a barometer of the national mood on the political conundrum of the day: What’s the appropriate size and role of government, and who should pay for it?

Kasich has vowed not to give up his fight for streamlining government despite the loss.

For opponents of the law, its defeat is anticipated to energize the labor movement, which largely supports Democrats, ahead of President Barack Obama’s re-election effort.

***Hard Times In Babylon- Growing Up Among The Working Poor In The 1950s- A Cautionary Tale

Click on title to link to my original post of Hard Times In Babylon- Growing Up Working Poor In The 1950s for a link to some "golden age" facts of life

Hard Times In Babylon- Growing Up Among The Working Poor In The 1950s

COMMENTARY

GROWING UP DIRT POOR IN THE 1950’S

Several years ago I wrote a personal commentary about a childhood friend from back in the old neighborhood in North Adamsville where I grew up in the 1950’s who had passed away.(see An Uncounted Casualty of War,, May 8, 2007 archives). I had also at that time been re-reading the then recently deceased investigative journalist David Halberstam’s book, The Fifties, that covers that same basic period. Halberstam’s take on the trends of the period, in contrast to the reality of my own childhood experiences as a child of the working poor that missed most of the benefits of that ‘golden age,’ rekindled some memories, a few painful. It is no exaggeration to say that those were hard times in Babylon. Not so much for individual lacks like a steady (and reliable) family car to break out of the cramped quarters, house on house, where we lived once in a while. Or the inevitable hand-me-down clothes (all the way through high school, almost), or worst the Bargain Center bargains that were no bargains (the local “Wal-Mart” of the day to give you an idea of what I mean). Or even the always house coldness in winter (to save on precious fuel even in those cheap-priced heating oil times) and hotness in summer (ditto, save on electricity so no A/C, or fans).

They, and other such lacks, all had their place in the poor man’s pantheon, no question. No, what, in the end, turned things out badly was the sense of defeat that hung, hung heavily and almost daily over the household, the street, the neighborhood at a time when others, visibly and not so far away, were getting ahead. Some sociologist, some academic sociologist, for, sure, would call it the death of “rising expectations.” And for once they would be right, or at least on the right track. Thinking back on those times has also made me reflect on how the hard anti-communist politics of the period, the “red scare” left people like my parents high and dry, although they were as prone to support it as any American Legionaire. The defeat and destruction of the left-wing movement, principally pro-communist organizations, of that period has continued to leave a mark, and a gaping vacuum on today’s political landscape, and on this writer.

There are many myths about the 1950’s to be sure. However, one cannot deny that the key public myth was that those who had fought World War II and were afterwards enlisted in the anti-Soviet Cold War fight against communism were entitled to some breaks. The overwhelming desire for personal security and comfort on the part of those who had survived the Great Depression and fought the war (World War II just so there is no question about which in the long line of wars we are talking about) was not therefore totally irrational. That it came at the expense of other things like a more just and equitable society is a separate matter. Moreover, despite the public myth not everyone benefited from the ‘rising tide.' The experience of my parents is proof of that. Thus this commentary is really about what happened to those, like my parents, who did not make it and were left to their personal fates without a rudder to get them through the rough spots. Yes, my parents were of the now much ballyhooed and misnamed ‘greatest generation’ but they were not in it.

I will not go through all the details of my parents’ childhoods, courtship and marriage for such biographic details of the Depression and World War II are plentiful and theirs fits the pattern. One detail is, however, important and that is that my father grew up in the hills of eastern Kentucky, Hazard, near Harlan County to be exact, coal mining country made famous in song and story and by Michael Harrington in his 1960s book The Other America. This was, and is, hardscrabble country by any definition. Among whites these “hillbillies” were the poorest of the poor. There can be little wonder that when World War II began my father left the mines to join the Marines, did his fair share of fighting in the Pacific, settled in the Boston area and never looked back.

By all rights my father should have been able to take advantage of the G.I. Bill and enjoyed home and hearth like the denizens of Levittown (New York and elsewhere) described in Halberstam’s book and shown on such classic 1950s television shows as Ozzie and Harriet and Leave It To Beaver. But life did not go that way. Why? He had virtually no formal education. And moreover had three young sons born close together in the immediate post-war period. Furthermore he had no marketable skills usable in the Boston labor market. There was (and is) no call for coal-miners here. My father was a good man. He was a hard-working man; when he was able find work. He was an upright man. But he never drew a break. Unskilled labor, to which he was reduced, is notoriously unstable, and so his work life was one of barely making ends meet. Thus, well before the age when the two-parent working family became the necessary standard to get ahead, my mother went to work to supplement the family income. She too was an unskilled laborer. Thus, even with two people working we were always “dirt poor.” I have already run through enough of the litany of lacks to give an idea of what dirt poor meant in those hard times so we need not retrace those steps.

Our little family started life in the Adamsville housing projects, at that time not the notorious hell-holes of crime and deprivation that they later became but still a mark of being low, very low, on the social ladder at a time when others were heading to the Valhalla of the newly emerging suburbs. By clawing and scratching my parents saved enough money to buy an extremely modest single-family house. Hell, why pussyfoot about it, a shack. The house, moreover, was in a neighborhood that was, and is, one of those old working class neighborhoods where the houses are small, cramped, and seedy, the leavings of those who have moved on to bigger and better things. The neighborhood nevertheless reflected the desire of the working poor in the 1950’s, my parents and others, to own their own homes and not be shunted off into decrepit apartments or dilapidated housing projects, the fate of those just below them on the social ladder. This is social progress?

But enough of all that. Where in this story though is there a place for militant left-wing political class-consciousness to break the trap? Not the sense of social inferiority of the poor before the rich (or the merely middle class). Damn, there was plenty of that kind of consciousness in our house. A phrase from the time, and maybe today although I don’t hear it much, said it all “keeping up with the Jones.’” Or else. But where was there an avenue in the 1950’s, when it could have made a difference, for a man like my father to have his hurts explained and have something done about them? No where. So instead it went internally into the life of the family and it never got resolved. One of his sons, this writer, has had luxury of being able to fight essentially exemplary propaganda battles in small left-wing socialist circles and felt he has done good work in his life. My father’s hurts needed much more. The "red scare" aimed mainly against the American Communist Party but affecting wider layers of society decimated any possibility that he could get the kind of redress he needed. That dear reader, in a nutshell, is why I proudly bear the name communist today. And the task for me today? To insure that future young workers, unlike my parents in the 1950’s, will have their day of justice.

*Labor's Untold Story-The Class War In The Kentucky Coal Fields- Bloody Harlan In Song

Click on title to link to a YouTube film clip of the song You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive. There will be much more on this subject later in September. The Kentucky coal country and its history are personal in these quarters.

Every Month Is Labor History Month

This Commentary is part of a series under the following general title: Labor’s Untold Story- Reclaiming Our Labor History In Order To Fight Another Day-And Win!

As a first run through, and in some cases until I can get enough other sources in order to make a decent presentation, I will start with short entries on each topic that I will eventually go into greater detail about. Or, better yet, take my suggested topic and run with it yourself.

The Struggle For The Labor Party In The United States- 1930s American Socialist Workers Party Leader Max Shachtman-Footnote for Historians(1938) (How Not To Build A Labor Party, Part I )

Click on the headline to link to a Max Shachtman Internet Archives online copy of Footnote for Historians

Markin comment on this series:

Obviously, for a Marxist, the question of working class political power is central to the possibilities for the main thrust of his or her politics- the quest for that socialist revolution that initiates the socialist reconstruction of society. But working class politics, no less than any other kinds of political expressions has to take an organization form, a disciplined organizational form in the end, but organization nevertheless. In that sense every Marxist worth his or her salt, from individual labor militants to leagues, tendencies, and whatever other formations are out there these days on the left, struggles to built a revolutionary labor party, a Bolshevik-style party.

Glaringly, in the United States there is no such party, nor even a politically independent reformist labor party, as exists in Great Britain. And no, the Democratic Party, imperialist commander-in-chief Obama's Democratic Party is not a labor party. Although plenty of people believe it is an adequate substitute, including some avowed socialists. But they are just flat-out wrong. This series is thus predicated on providing information about, analysis of, and acting as a spur to a close look at the history of the labor party question in America by those who have actually attempted to create one, or at to propagandize for one.

As usual, I will start this series with the work of the International Communist League/Spartacist League/U.S. as I have been mining their archival materials of late. I am most familiar with the history of their work on this question, although on this question the Socialist Workers Party's efforts run a close second, especially in their revolutionary period. Lastly, and most importantly, I am comfortable starting with the ICL/SL efforts on the labor party question since after having reviewed in this space in previous series their G.I. work and youth work (Campus Spartacist and the Revolutionary Marxist Caucus Newsletter inside SDS) I noted that throughout their history they have consistently called for the creation of such a party in the various social arenas in which they have worked. Other organizational and independent efforts, most notably by the Socialist Workers Party and the American Communist Party will follow.
*********
Markin comment on this article:

Max Shachtman knew how to "speak" Marxism back in the 1930s and believe it. Later he could speak that language only at Sunday picnics and the like as he drifted back into the warm embrace of American imperialism.

Economic End Times - by Stephen Lendman

Economic End Times
by Stephen Lendman

Economic End Times - by Stephen Lendman

Despite a deepening global depression, establishment economists are in denial. On June 9, the Wall Street Journal said those surveyed expected slow, steady growth through 2011, despite high US unemployment, a housing depression, European sovereign debt in crisis, and the unreported insolvency of major French and other banks.

On June 8, testifying before the House Budget Committee, Fed chairman Bernanke fantasized about 3.5% US growth through 2011, stopping just short of ruling out the possibility of recession he called "unlikely."

And in 2007, when equity and housing bubbles peaked, neither he or Greenspan expressed alarm, destroying their credibility in the process.

Based on an early August survey, establishment (in bed with Wall Street) economists now put the chance of "another" downturn at 30%, compared to 15% in May, expecting 2.5% growth over the next year.

Some, in fact were sanguine, calling America's economy strong, attributing negative views to a crisis of confidence, not hard reality, signaled by the August 4 shot across the bow market rout.

Despite a predictable rebound, it signified much worse to come because conditions are dire getting worse. Even manipulated data show enough to sound alarms, highlighted by economists like David Rosenberg.

On August 15, he expressed surprise about so "little reaction to the shocking US consumer sentiment data that were released on Friday - the worst since the tail end of the Jimmy Carter recession era in 1980."

Moreover, consumer spending is weak even with suspect upward revisions. In addition, "(n)ew mortgage and refinancing loan volumes fell 19% in Q2 to" a three-year low. Further, auto buying plans declined to a decade low, likely headed much lower as economic conditions deteriorate. Other big ticket buying plans also dropped to 2008-09 depths when the economy falling off a cliff seemed possible.

In fact, growth indicators overall are rapidly heading south at a time they're already woefully weak. There's no end to decline in sight. Remarkably, negative household assessments of government policy hit record lows, surpassing the depths of the early 1980s recession and Watergate.

As a result, Rosenberg called the US economy "recession-bound, expecting" even manipulated data to show negative Q 3 growth, followed by greater contraction in Q 4 and 2012 Q 1.

"(P)ractically every major variable is" negative. "We are past the point of no return....I can understand the innate need to be hopeful," he said, but it's impossible to dispute reality.

Weakness and imbalances are extreme. American and European sovereign debt are overextended and troubled. "Anyone who thinks this gets contained (especially in Europe) slept through the last financial crisis after Lehman failed."

And when weak economies beg for stimulus, austerity is force-fed, assuring far greater economic pain. It's coming, will deepen and persist because policy measures are opposite of what's needed.

Commenting on the August 4 market rout, Rosenberg said nearly always it signals downturns. Western economies are fundamentally weak. Unlike earlier times when the Fed could cut interest rates, it now relies on "untested methods to underpin investor confidence and the economy."

And if America's economy plunges, so do others even deeper. Hunker down believes Rosenberg and independent economists believing the worst is yet to come.

Other Respected Views

Economist Michael Hudson is unequivocal explaining a debt deflation caused Depression. The game is over. The global ponzi scheme ran its course. Papering over conditions only works so long before hitting a wall. Tunnel vision assures trouble. Wrecking economies to save banks is lunacy, and forced austerity when stimulus is needed guarantees disaster. It's not a matter of if, just when, how deep and protracted.

Economist Paul Craig Roberts, trends analyst Gerald Celente, and others worry whether Washington will choose greater war to distract public attention from economic distress. In 2009, in fact, Celente warned about the oldest trick in the book, saying:

"Given the pattern of governments to parlay egregious failures into mega-failures, the classic trend they follow, when all else fails, is to take their nation to war."

In 2011, he called it a worrisome wild card, perhaps preceded by a major 9/11 type false flag to enlist public support.

Bet on it, in fact, if conditions become bad enough, public anger grows, and Obama's approval rating crashes ahead of the 2012 election. War based on heightened fear is how to raise it perhaps high enough to win.

Highly respect analyst Jeremy Grantham began his August letter to investors headlined, "Danger: Children at Play" with a "Stop Press Addendum," saying:

"My worst fears about the potential loss of confidence in our leaders, institutions, and 'capitalism itself' are being realized. We have been digging this hole for a long time. We really must be serious in our attempts to resuscitate the 'average (number of) hour(s) worked' and the fortunes of the average worker."

"Walking across the Boston Common this morning, I came to realize that the unpalatable (to me) option of some debt forgiveness on mortgages looks increasingly to be necessary as well as tax changes" he discussed in his report.

"To go further, if we mean to prosper long term, I am sure we need to act to make debt less attractive to everybody: it really is a snare and a delusion" to think otherwise.

Calling America's Congress "dysfunctional," he said it has to decide between two bad choices:

-- austerity to kill demand when the economy is on its knees; or

-- do nothing, risk default, compromise the integrity of the dollar and send "a powerful signal to the world that the US, at least for now," is past its prime.

In fact, growing numbers acknowledge that reality. "Come to think of it," said Grantham, "the choice was between a technical default and looking like a Banana Republic (or) technical blackmail and looking" like the same thing. "Just different bananas perhaps."

Overall he sees hard times, "lean years." Any pretense otherwise "is beyond wishful thinking or weak math skills. It is either childish or gross and cynical politics: that is to say, even worse politics than usual."

With balanced budgets mathematically impossible without major politically unpalatable policy changes, the alternative is "kicking an enormous can down the road" for even greater predictable disaster.

It's the equivalent of not dealing with a metastasizing cancer until the patient dies or is too far gone to save.

Adding his own grim assessment, Grantham said if we keep "drift(ing) around rudderless, if we don't develop some real (nowhere in sight) leadership soon, then seven lean years may be the least of" America's woes.

Commenting on the August 4 market rout, he added that it "always (has a) disturbing habit of ignoring the obvious and ignoring it some more, until, in the blink of an eye, it doesn't."

On August 4, it blinked, making "risk avoidance....a good idea," Grantham believes that may be his polite way of saying watch out! I warned you! There's no visible light at the end of this tunnel, getting increasingly darker. Watch out indeed.

In fact, a deepening global Depression just began. It'll last years before ending, and cause grave harm to billions worldwide, not responsible for their leaders' malfeasance, especially those domiciled on Wall Street, complicit with political puppets in Washington they own.

Moreover, the greater pain caused, the more they benefit like their Western counterparts, wrecking their economies for personal gain.

No wonder astute analysts like Grantham expressed lack of confidence in America's leaders, disgust with a "dysfunctional Congress," and questioned "capitalism itself," perhaps self-destructing as he wrote.

For billions of global victims, it can't happen a moment too soon, if it isn't already too late to help.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen (at) sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/.
See also:
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com


This work is in the public domain

The Struggle For The Labor Party In The United States- American Socialist Workers Party Leader James P.Cannon-Early Years of the American Communist Movement-Origin of the Policy on the Labor Party

Click on the headline to link to a James P. Cannon Internet Archives online copy of Early Years of the American Communist Movement-Origin of the Policy on the Labor Party

Markin comment on this series:

Obviously, for a Marxist, the question of working class political power is central to the possibilities for the main thrust of his or her politics- the quest for that socialist revolution that initiates the socialist reconstruction of society. But working class politics, no less than any other kinds of political expressions has to take an organization form, a disciplined organizational form in the end, but organization nevertheless. In that sense every Marxist worth his or her salt, from individual labor militants to leagues, tendencies, and whatever other formations are out there these days on the left, struggles to built a revolutionary labor party, a Bolshevik-style party.

Glaringly, in the United States there is no such party, nor even a politically independent reformist labor party, as exists in Great Britain. And no, the Democratic Party, imperialist commander-in-chief Obama's Democratic Party is not a labor party. Although plenty of people believe it is an adequate substitute, including some avowed socialists. But they are just flat-out wrong. This series is thus predicated on providing information about, analysis of, and acting as a spur to a close look at the history of the labor party question in America by those who have actually attempted to create one, or at to propagandize for one.

As usual, I will start this series with the work of the International Communist League/Spartacist League/U.S. as I have been mining their archival materials of late. I am most familiar with the history of their work on this question, although on this question the Socialist Workers Party's efforts run a close second, especially in their revolutionary period. Lastly, and most importantly, I am comfortable starting with the ICL/SL efforts on the labor party question since after having reviewed in this space in previous series their G.I. work and youth work (Campus Spartacist and the Revolutionary Marxist Caucus Newsletter inside SDS) I noted that throughout their history they have consistently called for the creation of such a party in the various social arenas in which they have worked. Other organizational and independent efforts, most notably by the Socialist Workers Party and the American Communist Party will follow.

The Struggle For The Labor Party In The United States-American Communist Party Leaders James Cannon and William Z. Foster On Labor Party Policy (1923)

Click on the headline to link to a James P. Cannon Internet Archives online copy of James Cannon and William Z. Foster On Labor Party Policy


Markin comment on this series:

Obviously, for a Marxist, the question of working class political power is central to the possibilities for the main thrust of his or her politics- the quest for that socialist revolution that initiates the socialist reconstruction of society. But working class politics, no less than any other kinds of political expressions has to take an organization form, a disciplined organizational form in the end, but organization nevertheless. In that sense every Marxist worth his or her salt, from individual labor militants to leagues, tendencies, and whatever other formations are out there these days on the left, struggles to built a revolutionary labor party, a Bolshevik-style party.

Glaringly, in the United States there is no such party, nor even a politically independent reformist labor party, as exists in Great Britain. And no, the Democratic Party, imperialist commander-in-chief Obama's Democratic Party is not a labor party. Although plenty of people believe it is an adequate substitute, including some avowed socialists. But they are just flat-out wrong. This series is thus predicated on providing information about, analysis of, and acting as a spur to a close look at the history of the labor party question in America by those who have actually attempted to create one, or at to propagandize for one.

As usual, I will start this series with the work of the International Communist League/Spartacist League/U.S. as I have been mining their archival materials of late. I am most familiar with the history of their work on this question, although on this question the Socialist Workers Party's efforts run a close second, especially in their revolutionary period. Lastly, and most importantly, I am comfortable starting with the ICL/SL efforts on the labor party question since after having reviewed in this space in previous series their G.I. work and youth work (Campus Spartacist and the Revolutionary Marxist Caucus Newsletter inside SDS) I noted that throughout their history they have consistently called for the creation of such a party in the various social arenas in which they have worked. Other organizational and independent efforts, most notably by the Socialist Workers Party and the American Communist Party will follow.

The West Coast Longshore Workers Union Local 10 Is Under Attack- All out to defend the ILWU in San Francisco on April 25, 2011!

From the pages of Workers Vanguard:

Flash—The Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) is suing ILWU Local 10 and the local’s president, Richard Mead, for the action taken by union members who overwhelmingly did not work on April 4, shutting down the ports of Oakland and San Francisco that day. The San Francisco Labor Council unanimously passed a resolution calling on Bay Area labor councils and the California AFL-CIO to protest this attack at the PMA’s SF headquarters on Monday, April 25. All out to defend the ILWU!

The First Stirrings Of The 2012 American Presidential Campaign- Everybody Who Is Smarter Than Sarah Palin Raise Your Hand

Markin comment:

I swear I had a vision, I swear I heard a voice call to me to make a comment on the 2012 American Presidential elections right now, today. I know that we are all materialists, men and women of science, and some of us are historical materialists to boot so the siren call for some comment on my part for these bogus bourgeois elections should be the last thing that I call up as the subject of a vision. Still, remember the Ides of March and all of that. Can I, under the circumstances, afford to defy the portents?

Yes, I know, I supposedly fore swore comment of the bourgeois election cycles forever a couple of years ago once I realized that such activity was a waste of precious cyber-ink for a commentator who wanted to bring that house of cards down. But remember this. Can a man who in his jaded youth, long before the Internet brought instant results (and a bewildering onslaught of instant commentary better left for later reflection), stayed up into the wee hours wondering whether the Democrats would win the 23rd Congressional District in Texas or the 34th in California really ever truly be trusted to break the habit even if he is "recovering?"

And that bring us to the subject of that vision, or rather the subject that brought on this vision. This may seem trivial after all the build-up but here is the story. I recently ran into an old acquaintance out on the street in Boston. I noticed that he had on a Sarah Palin for President in 2012 button. Naturally I had to make comment on that political advertisement. And here is what I said, “Why would you support someone who is not as smart as you are for President?” Now I know, because I know him from way back in the day, that he is very smart so it gave him cause for pause.

Of course, when it comes to bourgeois politicians, being smart is not always relevant either way. (Witness Bush, Junior, Yalie and all, for the dunce proposition, or the other way Obama, Harvard Law and all, for the wizard proposition). So based on my further conversation with him do not be surprised if you see an announcement that unknown smart guy, Michael Mackey, is throwing his hat into the ring for the Republican nomination for President in 2012. In fact everyone smarter than Sarah Palin should consider it their duty to do so. That is my first piece of “wisdom” for the 2012 political season. Meanwhile those of us who are serious about changing the world, for the better, will continue our work to build a workers party that fights for a workers government. So everyone can have a shot at being smart, if nothing else, okay?

From "The Workers Press"- On Union Organizing

Thursday, November 11, 2010

You know what's disgusting? Union-Busting!

My fiance stumbled upon something this week when asked by her supervisor at work to check the company email for a pending order. The owner of the business where she is employed - who knows Julie's political association and my history working with unions and helping organized membership in St. Louis' SD MNEA SEEA - has been receiving email offers to attend an online "webinar" course on how to identify and squash union organizing drives in the workplace.

This is nothing new, of course, as the bosses have been keeping each other up to speed on the best tactics to counteract workplace unionism since the beginning of the organized Labor Movement. The link to this particular training course, however, reveals a network dedicated to the purpose of busting workers unions and allowing management to maintain and tighten their dictatorship over the average worker and thereby increase exploitation of labor.






This is just one more concrete example of why legislation like The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is absolutely ESSENTIAL reform legislation, one which workers and their unions ought not compromise on, under any circumstance. Also, ongoing oppression of workers and ever shrinking workers' unions in the private sector and the continued reliance of Organized Labor upon the "democratic" Party for struggle on the political front further necessitate that Labor break cleanly away from the Dems and found a party of our own, truly of, for, and by the vast Working Class majority; a mass Party of Labor. Only thus can we build the sort of grassroots, local campaigns to build a mass basis for a strong national campaign for legislation like EFCA and to fight uncompromisingly for the REAL interests of America's Working Class majority.

The link to this "webinar" is posted below. I think I just found my next project, investigating and exposing the networks employers and management use to prevent workers from organizing and establishing even the faintest hint of workplace democracy or collective bargaining.

Here is the link:

http://www.businessmanagementdaily.com/glp/34507/index.html?campaigncode=268BWN
Posted by PaulJosephPoposky at 1:17 PM Email This BlogThis! Share to Twitter Share to Facebook Share to Google Buzz

*Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By-Harry McClintock's "Big Rock Candy Mountain"- Fight For "The Big Rock" Dream- Fight For A Workers Party!

Click on the title to link a YouTube film clip of Harry McClintock performing his classic Big Rock Candy Mountain.

In this series, presented under the headline Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By, I will post some songs that I think will help us get through the “dog days” of the struggle for our communist future. I do not vouch for the political thrust of the songs; for the most part they are done by pacifists, social democrats, hell, even just plain old ordinary democrats. And, occasionally, a communist, although hard communist musicians have historically been scarce on the ground. Thus, here we have a regular "popular front" on the music scene. While this would not be acceptable for our political prospects, it will suffice for our purposes here. Markin.

************

Big Rock Candy Mountain- Harry McClintock

One evening as the sun went down
And the jungle fires were burning,
Down the track came a hobo hiking,
And he said, "Boys, I'm not turning
I'm headed for a land that's far away
Besides the crystal fountains
So come with me, we'll go and see
The Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains,
There's a land that's fair and bright,
Where the handouts grow on bushes
And you sleep out every night.
Where the boxcars all are empty
And the sun shines every day
And the birds and the bees
And the cigarette trees
The lemonade springs
Where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains.

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
All the cops have wooden legs
And the bulldogs all have rubber teeth
And the hens lay soft-boiled eggs
The farmers' trees are full of fruit
And the barns are full of hay
Oh I'm bound to go
Where there ain't no snow
Where the rain don't fall
The winds don't blow
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains.

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
You never change your socks
And the little streams of alcohol
Come trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats
And the railway bulls are blind
There's a lake of stew
And of whiskey too
You can paddle all around it
In a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains,
The jails are made of tin.
And you can walk right out again,
As soon as you are in.
There ain't no short-handled shovels,
No axes, saws nor picks,
I'm bound to stay
Where you sleep all day,
Where they hung the jerk
That invented work
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains.
....
I'll see you all this coming fall
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

*Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By-Woody Guthrie's "Pastures Of Plenty"- Fight For A Workers Government!

Click on the title to link a YouTube film clip of Arlo Guthrie performing his father's Pastures Of Plenty.

In this series, presented under the headline Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By, I will post some songs that I think will help us get through the “dog days” of the struggle for our communist future. I do not vouch for the political thrust of the songs; for the most part they are done by pacifists, social democrats, hell, even just plain old ordinary democrats. And, occasionally, a communist, although hard communist musicians have historically been scarce on the ground. Thus, here we have a regular "popular front" on the music scene. While this would not be acceptable for our political prospects, it will suffice for our purposes here. Markin.

**********

Markin comment:

Woody's words were written long ago but they resonate today. We better get to the task at hand- Fight for a workers party that fights for a workers government. And pronto.

********

Pastures Of Plenty

It's a mighty hard row that my poor hands have hoed
My poor feet have traveled a hot dusty road
Out of your Dust Bowl and Westward we rolled
And your deserts were hot and your mountains were cold

I worked in your orchards of peaches and prunes
I slept on the ground in the light of the moon
On the edge of the city you'll see us and then
We come with the dust and we go with the wind

California, Arizona, I harvest your crops
Well its North up to Oregon to gather your hops
Dig the beets from your ground, cut the grapes from your vine
To set on your table your light sparkling wine

Green pastures of plenty from dry desert ground
From the Grand Coulee Dam where the waters run down
Every state in the Union us migrants have been
We'll work in this fight and we'll fight till we win

It's always we rambled, that river and I
All along your green valley, I will work till I die
My land I'll defend with my life if it be
Cause my pastures of plenty must always be free

*The Problems Of The American Organized Labor Movement - Victory To The Shaw's Supermarket Strikers!

Click on the headline to link to a "Boston Sunday Globe" article, dated April 11, 2010, concerning the decline of strike action by organized labor and the use of consumer boycotts as an alternative to such actions.

As the above linked “Boston Globe’ article indicates the current condition of the organized labor movement is in perilous straits. And, by extension, the unorganized working class is in even more desperate straits. Not only was the year 2009 the nadir of strike action nationally, the lowest since 1984 and by some other indicators ever, but there was a continuing long term decline in the number of organized union members, especially in the core industrial sector. Now no one expects that in hard economic times there would be a rush of strike activity. This is a defensive time when holding onto work and not losing benefits is the short term goal. However, as history has shown, the fate of the organized sector of the labor movement reflects on the rest of the class. That fate is particularly important to note today as the atomization of the class economically portends problems with organizing the unorganized later. We militants are duty-bound to fight against the atomization of the American working class, as well as internationally.

The central focus of the above article is on the current strike by some 300 warehouse workers, organized in the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), at the Shaw’s Supermarket warehouse. The upshot of this action was a lockout by Shaw’s and the hiring of replacement workers (aka, scabs). The union workers are currently conducting a consumer boycott campaign to get shoppers to shop elsewhere and put “pressure” on Shaw’s to come to terms. Labor militants, of course, support such actions. However one should also note that such ephemeral actions aimed at the general public are seldom successful. And that strategy pursued by the UFCW (and many other unions) is exactly one of the reasons that the atomization of the working class proceeds apace.

Part of the problem with the current labor movement is that there has been a serious breaking of continuity with the labor struggles of the past, especially those labor actions in the 1930s that helped to organize the basic industries like steel, auto, and the truck drivers. By every known indicator the working class, and its sons and daughters, are worst off today than they were a generation ago. That situation cannot be blamed solely on the trials and tribulations of “globalization”, privatization or other factors. Some of it is directly attributable to the actions, or rather inactions, of the national labor organizations and federations. Thus, the call for new labor leadership and a new labor strategy of organizing the unorganized starting with Wal-Mart and the South is merely the beginning of wisdom.

That, obviously, is no mean task with the enormous resources that the international corporations and their agents can bring to bear. However, it is a “no-brainer” that not to fight will only further erode the slight consciousness of the working class as a class and will not even solve the most minimal solutions such as health care, working conditions, and runaway shops. Seemingly the day of the great social-democratic labor unions, like the United Auto Workers, or even the traditional merely trade union-oriented business-like unions, like the Teamsters, are past but that is merely an illusion. At least it is an illusion if one does believes that the working class can be organized to fight for its immediate concerns, and eventually for its own workers government. I do, don't you?

*For The Nationalization Of The U.S. Coal Mines Under Workers Control- For A Workers Party That Fights For A Workers Government

Click on the headline to link to a National Public Radio (NPR)broadcast of "On Point" with host Tom Ashbrook for April 8, 2010 dealing with the question of the West Virginia killer coal mine disaster.

Markin comment:

This latest, tragic killer coal mine disaster down in West Virginia brings up for the nth time the question of who controls those dangerous sites, and whose rules should govern the way that the mines are worked. Clearly, the continued domination of the mines by greedy, profit hungry private energy conglomerations, abetted by slack governmental oversight has, to any rationale mind, had its day. But here I am preaching to the choir. I hope. However, with that thought in mind here is a chance at a ‘teachable’ moment, for our side.

I am, as I have mentioned in a number of previous posts, the son of a coal miner, one in a family line of Hazard, Kentucky coal miners. Or at least I am a son of a coal miner who, as I have also mentioned before, when having a choice between continuing in the mines and volunteering for the Marines at the start of World War II grabbed the latter with both hands. And despite what ever sorrows and privations loomed ahead for him never looked back. Yes, it is that kind of dirty, dangerous work that no one really willingly wants to do. But if you are from small town Appalachia, let’s say, the mines are the only game in town, at least for those who want to get ahead. And that is the point I want to emphasize here.

For now we fight, or rather our brothers and sisters in the miners unions and those greater numbers who remain unorganized, especially in the Western mines, for greater safety measures and control over working conditions, especially health issues. Things like black lung, other respiratory problems and the like. Those have been, and continue to be, historic fights in this industry. That battle will go on unevenly for our side until working people have their own government.

However, even under the early stages of a workers government, assuming that fossil fuel extraction is still a source of energy, coal miners will still face the natural hazards associated with going deep down in the earth. It will still be a dirty, dangerous job that will require extra incentives, including huge wage increases, to make the work attractive to stout-hearted workers. The difference, however, will be that workers will control the flow of work under conditions of their own choosing in coordination with the outlines dictated by a central plan for the industry and for society as a whole. And there is the rub. The nationalizations mentioned in the headlines are under workers control to be sure. This is not, however, some scheme like in Great Britain after World War II when the bankrupt coal industry was nationalized under capitalist control. And as we know since the mid-1980s that is no longer even the case as former Prime Minister Thatcher broke the British miners union and effectively closed the mines. So the teachable moment is that the two ideas presented here have to be linked- nationalizations under workers control created in the wake of the victory of a workers party (or, perhaps, parties) that has fought for and won a workers government. Let’s get going on that dirty, dangerous task.

* Studs Terkel Potpourri

Click On Title To Link To Studs Terkel's Web Site.

BOOK REVIEW

My American Century, Studs Terkel, The New Press, New York, 1997

As I have done on other occasions when I am reviewing more than one work by an author I am using some of the same comments, where they are pertinent, here as I did in earlier reviews. In this series the first Studs Terkel book reviewed was that of his “The Good War”: an Oral History of World War II".

Strangely, as I found out about the recent death of long time pro-working class journalist and general truth-teller "Studs" Terkel I was just beginning to read his "The Good War", about the lives and experiences of, mainly, ordinary people during World War II in America and elsewhere, for review in this space. As with other authors once I get started I tend to like to review several works that are relevant to see where their work goes. I have thus read and reviewed individually the six oral histories that make up this book elsewhere. In the present case My Century serves rather nicely to put in one place the best of Terkel’s interviews, or at lest the ones of continuing interest. Thus from the approximately one thousand interviews that have seen the light of day in those six books here we have about fifty to marvel at again.

As part of my reflecting what to write for this review I was struck by the range of subjects, although in some places tied together and repeated, that interested Studs. Most famously, that of the what makes people tick and get out of bed each day of “Working”; the strong sense of social solidarity that binds those who fought World War II in “The Good War”; that same sense of solidarity and grit for those who survived the Great Depression in” Hard Times”; the unstated but ever present sense of class that animates “Division Street”; the not so unstated sense of race that clouds the fight for a just society in “Race”; and, the sense of longing and lost of his fellow survivors of the Depression and World War II expressed in “Coming Of Age”. What a mix and what a masterful job of having the ear and eye to put it together.

As always, the one thing that I noticed immediately after reading this book, and as is true of the majority of Terkel’s interview books, is that he is not the dominant presence but is a rather light, if intensely interested, interloper in these stories. For better or worse the interviewees get to tell their stories, unchained. In this age of 24/7 media coverage with every half-baked journalist or wannabe interjecting his or her personality into somebody else’s story this was, and is, rather refreshing. Of course this journalistic virtue does not mean that Studs did not have control over who got to tell their stories and who didn’t to fit his preoccupations and sense of order. He has a point he wants to make and that is that although most “ordinary” people do not make the history books they certainly make history, if not always of their own accord or to their own liking. Again, kudos and adieu Studs.

*The Chickens Come Home To Roost, Part 2- Obama's Iraq War Policy

Click on title to link to "New York Times" article on the ugly (Markin's assessment and comment)details of one Barack Obama's Iraq troop withdrawal "plan" (my quotation marks).

Commentary

Jesus is there no end to the duplicity of bourgeois politicians? Recently, on February 26, 2009, United States President Barack Obama announced his long-awaited plans for de-escalation of American involvement in Iraq. Noticeably, that so-called de-escalation included the continual presence of some 50,000 troops until further notice (of course, given the legal fictions of the situation, with the proviso that this is as long as the Iraqi government ‘wants’ them to remain). That this is a long way off from both Obama’s stated campaign positions and from any meaningful end to the American occupation has not gone unnoticed by the anti-war left wing parliamentary Democrats like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority leader and Massachusetts Congressman James McGovern (used here as an example of a parliamentary anti-war rank and file stalwart). Well, you reap what you sow. This is just one more of the ten thousand reasons why thoughtful political militants have to start, if they have not already done so, to think about fighting for a non-capitalist alternative- a workers party that fights for a workers government. And as I have mentioned on prior occasions we better make that pronto.

Note: Today’s main commentary “What I Am Not Running For President In 2012”, a seemingly tongue-in cheek piece on the question of principled opposition to radicals and revolutionaries running for the executive offices of the capitalist state was written several days ago before Obama’s Iraq announcement. Apparently, Mr. Obama is going to be something of an unwitting foil for my ‘campaign’. I, in any case, offer his latest policy twist as prima facie evidence for my position. That said; let’s not forget the important present point. Obama- Immediate Unconditional Of ALL U.S./Allied Troops From Iraq!