Introduction The campaign to build more unity and win better conditions for Walmart workers is growing. Black Friday marks the next target date for a national series of strikes and solidarity actions across the Walmart chain to bring ever-greater public and economic pressure to bear against its mega-wealthy owners. Because labor laws are stacked against [...]
Archive by Author
Tired Old So-Called Leftists Give Same Old Excuses For Supporting Obama in 2012
Workers Action
Bruce A. Dixon Abject and unwavering support of President Barack Obama on the part of blacks and what used to be called “the left” has made them pretty much irrelevant since Obama emerged as a viable presidential candidate back in mid-2007. After five years of the Age of Obama, four of them as president, one [...]
“NO!” means “NO!” EDU response to Tentative Agreement
Workers Action
Workers Action Introduction The following statement was produced by Educators for a Democratic Union (EDU), a progressive caucus in the San Francisco teachers union, United Educators of San Francisco (UESF). After enumerating a series of concessions recently negotiated by UESF in bargaining a tentative agreement, the EDU caucus statement correctly urges all UESF members to [...]
Solidarity Statement Against the Raids and Grand Jury
Workers Action
Please sign the Solidarity Statement Speak out against FBI raids & Grand Jury repression in Oregon and Washington The Committee to Stop FBI Repression is circulating the following statement on FBI raids and grand jury repression in Portland, Oregon and in Olympia & Seattle in Washington. We urge all progressive organizations to sign on to [...]
Eye Witness to Labor Struggle Unfolding In Peru
Workers Action
Allan Fisher Allan Fisher teaches at the City College of San Francisco. He is a former president of his local, the American Federation of Teachers 2121 and is currently on its Executive Board. He represented the San Francisco Labor Council when he traveled to Honduras to investigate the recent coup. I am visiting Peru with [...]
Why Corporate Campaign’s Tactics Can’t Win Strikes
Workers Action
Introduction By Bill Leumer Jake Cooper (1916–1990), the author of the following essay, was a veteran of the Minneapolis Teamsters strike of 1934 and a lifelong revolutionary socialist. Like many other Socialist Workers Party leaders, he was imprisoned under the Smith Act in 1944 for opposing the U.S. involvement in the Second World War. Jake [...]
Republicrats Campaign About Jobs and Do Nothing About High Unemployment
Workers Action
John Leslie Recently, Mitt Romney made a stop on his “Jobs Tour” in upper Bucks County, Pennsylvania just outside of Philadelphia. His appearance was supposed to be, interestingly, at a local WAWA store (for those out-of-state, WAWA is a convenience store chain) Why is this interesting? Because WAWA, like so many employers these days, is [...]
Waiting for SCOTUS
Workers Action
Introduction by Mark Vorpahl The statement below from Labor for Single Payer Healthcare is evidence that a significant segment of the union movement continues to put workers’ health care needs above political maneuvers to gain influence within the Obama administration. It recognizes that even if the Supreme Court upholds the Affordable Care Act in its [...]
Obama Trade Document Leaked, Revealing New Corporate Powers And Broken Campaign Promises
Workers Action
Workers Action Introduction Not satisfied with the passage of the Korea, Panama, and Colombian Free Trade Acts (FTA), overriding the protests of Labor and environmental activists, the Obama Administration is secretly negotiating another FTA — the Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Pact (TPP). This FTA in the making involves not only the United States but Australia, Brunei Darussalam, [...]
Workers Action’s Recommendations for the California June Ballot Measures
Workers Action
Vote NO on Proposition 28 — Term limits Limit of 8 years (senate)/6 years (assembly) replaced with 12-year limit on combined service. Socialists approach the elections differently than liberals or conservatives, Democrats or Republicans. Under the electoral system we have today, big business rules the roost. The political system is stacked in favor of big business, [...]
NATO in Chicago: Protests Are Here to Stay, and the Warmakers are Afraid
Workers Action
Mark T. Harris The thousands gathered in Chicago this past weekend to protest the NATO summit and the G8 meeting in Camp David are another sign we are in a new era of social activism. The Occupy movement is not going away. What is disappearing from the American landscape is the old passive acquiescence to [...]
Perché i politici usamericani stanno zitti davanti alla catastrofe europea
Workers Action
Shamus Cooke Italian translation of Why U.S. Politicians Are Quiet About Europe’s Meltdown Dopo le elezioni greche, la paura ha colpito i cuori dei bankster globali, la ricaduta rimane incerta. Se le prossime elezioni greche (17 giugno) produrranno un governo anti-austerità, la Grecia quasi certamente intraprenderà una rapida uscita dall’euro. Se ciò accadesse – e questo [...]
Save the Millionaires Tax: Rally/Press Conference
Workers Action
Save the Millionaires Tax: Rally/Press Conference March 20, Tuesday, 4 pm State Building, 1515 Clay, Oakland The fight to pass the Millionaires Tax this November continues. Occupy Education — the coalition responsible for the March 1 Day of Action, the 99 Mile March, and the March 5 Occupy the Capitol action — calls for a [...]
Why do CTA’s leaders oppose taxing millionaires to fund education and essential services?
Workers Action
California Federation of Teacher’s response to falsehoods about the Millionaires Tax. We regret that the California Teachers Association (CTA) leadership has issued a flier filled with misinformation about the Millionaires Tax to its members and the public. This effort to confuse and mislead is a grave disservice to everyone seeking new revenues for schools and services. The flier is factually inaccurate, both about the Millionaires Tax and the governor’s proposal. Here’s the truth about just two falsehoods.
Support the Millionaires Tax!
Workers Action
“CFT is proud to be standing side by side with you here today, and proud to be working with a statewide alliance of community and union partners to promote the Millionaires Tax for the November 2012 ballot.
The Millionaires Tax will raise taxes only on the wealthiest Californians, people who make more than a million dollars a year. The Millionaires Tax will permanently generate around $6 billion per year to begin to restore funding to schools and services.”
We Need to Pass the Oil Extraction Tax to Fund Education (Prop. 1522)
Workers Action
“Our response to this economic war on the people is to ensure that public education be supported by a stable, rational and democratic system of taxation and we believe a good way to accomplish that is to pass the Oil Extraction Tax To Fund Education (Prop 1522), which would impose a 15% tax on the extraction of oil and gas: finite resources that belong to the people. That tax would generate $3 to $3.5 billion a year for the 9-10 million students in K-12, Community Colleges, CSU and UC. California is the only major oil-producing state that has no oil extraction tax. Even Texas and Alaska have an oil extraction tax.”
Workers Action: Who We Are
Workers Action
Our aim above all is to encourage working people to unite and put up a fight in order to defend and improve our standard of living and to create a far more just, rational, and economically viable economy to replace capitalism, which has thrown billions of people into poverty and is destroying the planet. This [...]
March 1 Day of Action: Defend Education and Social Services
Workers Action
Thursday, March 1, 2012 4:00 – 6:00 pm San Francisco Civic Center (Polk Street and Grove Street)
New Features of the New Website
Workers Action
If you have been visiting Workersompass.org, you’ll notice many new features on our redesigned site. Here’s a quick tour of them. If you have questions or comments or complaints, please let the webmaster, Adam, know by sending a message click here. 1. Re-post or email any article. You can automatically repost any of our articles onto Facebook, [...]
Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break the Silence
Workers Action
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Introduction by Workers Action Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered this speech at a Clergy and Laity Concerned meeting at the Riverside Church in New York City on April 4, 1967. In it he stressed the connection between the U.S. wars abroad and the economic and racial injustice here at [...]
Condemn Use of U.S. Military to Escort Scab Grain Ship
Workers Action
San Francisco Labor Council Resolution Adopted January 9, 2012 by Unanimous Vote Whereas, EGT, a joint venture led by multinational grain giant Bunge, agreed to hire union Longshoremen when accepting millions in taxpayer funds to build a huge new grain exporting terminal at the Port of Longview WA, but once the terminal was built has [...]
A Call to Action: From the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum (Washington) Central Labor Council
Workers Action
“We are imploring all able working class people willing to take time out of his or her own lives, to come to Longview, Washington for a historic protest. …. The class struggle never really goes away. Right now the rich and the ruling class are attempting to deal a blow that labor might never recover [...]
VOTE NO on Proposition C and D: San Francisco
Workers Action
San Francisco voters are being urged to vote for so-called pension reform proposals. The labor union officials, Mayor Lee and the Chamber of Commerce have been promoting Proposition C, which will increase the amount of money workers contribute to their pensions. Meanwhile, Jeff Adachi, a prominent city official, has placed a competing measure on the ballot that [...]
Declaration of the Occupation of New York City
Workers Action
As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.
Letter from a Reader: The ILWU Fight in Longview, Washington
Workers Action
We received the letter below in response to Mark Vorpahl’s article titled The ILWU Rises to the Challenge. It is a vivid account of the impact the struggle in Longview, Washington is having on personal lives and has not appeared in the corporate media. Dear Mark, As a wife of a ILWU Local 21 member [...]
Living in the Wasteland of the Free
Workers Action
Iris Demint watch?feature=player_embedded&v=hhgb9hYjX3g Living in the wasteland of the free… We got preachers dealing in politics and diamond mines and their speech is growing increasingly unkind They say they are Christ’s disciples but they don’t look like Jesus to me and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free We got [...]
Who is James Johnson? By David Brooks, with an Introduction by Workers Action
Workers Action
The following op-ed article by David Brooks appeared in The New York Times, June 17, 2011. Brooks’ description of the corruption behind the demise of Fannie Mae, a government-backed lending institution that has since been nationalized, is based on a recent book, “Reckless Endangerment,” by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner. The striking element of Brooks’ analysis is his repeated equation of this specific act of corruption, in which Representative Barney Frank is implicated, with business as usual in Washington. As he puts it: “The scandal has sent the message that the leadership class is fundamentally self-dealing.” And he adds: “The final message is that members of the leadership class have done nothing to police themselves. The Wall Street-Industry-Regulator-Lobbyist tangle is even more deeply enmeshed.”
Open Letter to the Labor and Antiwar Movements
Workers Action
New National Assembly to Bring the Troops Home Now Antiwar groups across the country have called for massive protests against the wars this coming October. Actions in different cities and nationally are slated for October 1, 6, 7, 15 and perhaps other dates. Some are local or regional in scope, at least one is focused [...]
Hail to the Egyptian People
Workers Action
A Statement by Workers Action We stand in awe and admiration at your historic victory, as you removed one of the world’s worst U.S.-sponsored dictators. You liberated yourselves and at the same time liberated the imagination of ordinary working people around the world. We just have a few requests. As you know better than anyone, [...]
Workers Action: Join Us!
Workers Action
Capitalism divides people into two fundamental classes: (1) the very rich who own businesses and produce to maximize their profits and (2) working people who comprise the vast majority of the population and who struggle to survive by working for those who own businesses. Capitalists compete against one another, and in order to succeed, each [...]
Open Diplomacy 1917: Lenin and Trotsky Comment
Workers Action
How the Russian Revolution Ended Imperialist Secret Treaties As Wikileaks continues to release the U.S. documents labeled “secret,” “confidential,” etc., embarrassing governments around the world, the following statements by Trotsky and Lenin, made shortly after the Soviets took power, gain particularly keen relevance. As both illustrate, the Bolsheviks denounced secret diplomacy. Nor could they do [...]
James P. Cannon: The New York Unemployed Conference (1933)
Workers Action
James P. Cannon Introduction by Workers Action The following short essay is a transcript of a speech by James Cannon, a leader of the Communist League of America, at a March 1933 conference on unemployment, organized by the Communist Party. The conference represented a rare opportunity for Cannon, since the Communist Party generally excluded Trotskyists [...]
Superman is Already in the Classroom
Workers Action
Kyle Cooke As a 4th and 5th grade teacher, I was told to watch an episode of the Oprah Winfrey show that dealt with the controversial documentary Waiting for Superman (September 20, 2010). One comment from the show really stood out to me: “… We set them [the students] up for failure.” I completely agree, [...]
The American Federation Of Teachers At The Crossroads
Workers Action
Allan Fisher The 1.5 million member American Federation of Teachers (AFT) can be a powerful force in opposition to the corporate agenda that has gripped this nation. Tensions over the direction of AFT have been brewing and the 2010 National Convention reflected these philosophical and political divides. The 2010 convention featured a challenge to AFT’s [...]
Articles of Interest
CORE slate re-elected in landslide in Chicago Teachers Union
Richard Trumka: The 'grand bargain' is a dead end
On the Impotence of the Progressive Movement
Revealed: how the FBI coordinated the crackdown on Occupy
Bradley Manning is off limits at SF Gay Pride parade, but corporate sleaze is embraced
Cutting Social Security–More than a Bad Idea
The Forgotten Radical History of the March on Washington
Freedom Rider: Obama and the Class War- Hong Kong Dockworkers Strike Attracts Huge Solidarity
Understanding the Venezuelan Presidential Election Outcome
