CSU Contract – What Happens Next Will Depend on What the Members are Ready to Do
The California State University (CSU) system found itself in a clash with the California Faculty Association (CFA), representing a diverse body of 28,000 faculty employees, including tenure-track and lecturers, counselors, librarians, and coaches. On January 22, the CFA launched a statewide strike, targeting all 23 CSU campuses. This coincided with the start of the spring […]
Argentina’s General Strike – Workers Stand Up Against President Milei’s Attacks
Last November, 55 percent of Argentinian voters elected the far-right “anarcho-capitalist” economist Javier Milei as president. Milei ran on a platform promising extreme measures to supposedly “fix” Argentina’s economy. The country has experienced record inflation, with the value of the peso dropping by 211 percent this year alone. Milei promised to “dollarize” the economy, removing […]
Neither Haley nor Biden Will Save Us
As the mainstream media has focused their attention on the horse race of the early Republican primaries in Iowa and New Hampshire, they and their talking-heads and opinion writers have desperately clung to the hope that someone will come along to save us from Trump. In recent months, wealthy Republicans and even many rank-and-file Republicans […]
Lenin: Lessons from the Past and Promises of Victory
V.I. Lenin (April 10, 1870 – January 21, 1924) was an activist, one of the essential organizers of the first victorious proletarian revolution. On the occasion of the centenary of his death, it is on this basis – that of action which combines revolutionary passion and scientific rigor – that we are devoting a series […]
East Oakland Residents Left In The Dark And Cold
On January 5, an electrical fire broke out in the basement of an 18-unit apartment complex in East Oakland. As a consequence, tenants who range from a newborn child, to a pregnant woman, to an elderly person in their 80s, have had to go over two weeks without electricity, gas, heating or hot water. With […]
France: Opposition to Racist Immigration Law
In France, numerous protests are taking place against the racist Darmanin law. Darmanin is the French Minister of the Interior. This new immigration law was passed on December 19 with the support of right and far-right politicians. The law extends the time before people are eligible to receive social benefits, like housing assistance and family allowances. […]
Abortion: Our Bodies – Our Rights – Our Choice!
Since the U.S. Supreme Court decision to remove federal protections for legal access to abortion, abortion access has declined nationwide. Currently, 14 states have complete bans, and eight have strict restrictions – almost half of all states. Some laws being enforced date back to the 1800s, and others criminalize people who travel for care or […]
Mass Strike in Quebec Shows Potential Power of Working Class
On November 23 of last year, the province of Quebec, Canada, saw the beginning of a wave of overlapping strikes of public sector workers that may be drawing to a close in the new year. The strike was brought on by a combination of factors: slow yet consistent budget cuts; intensifying pressures on public workers […]
The Fight for People’s Park Today
On Thursday, January 4, police invaded People’s Park in Berkeley, California, closing access to the area. Around midnight, residents of the park, students, and other community members were violently pushed out by hundreds of police – university police, Alameda County sheriffs, California state police and others. (University officials have refused to say how many police […]
People’s Park – A Legacy of Protest and Possibility
In 1969, a small plot of land near the University of California (U.C.) Berkeley became a site of symbolic protest against war and racism, a place where students and community members came together to imagine a better world, and to demonstrate their vision of the future they wanted to create. They took this small plot […]
Climate Crisis In Panama Threatens To Choke The Global Poor
The Panama Canal, which has historically connected commerce from the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans is facing a potentially serious crisis. In normal times, roughly 5 percent of all seaborne trade of the entire world passes through the Panama Canal. The Canal is one of the most important choke points in global trade. However, a prolonged […]
Taiwan Holds Elections As U.S.-China Tensions Rise
On Saturday, January 13, Taiwan held its presidential and legislative elections to determine who will replace the term-limited president Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), who has served two four-year terms. The presidential election, which was conducted using single-round plurality voting, resulted in the victory of the DPP’s Lai Ching-te, the current vice […]
Boeing Near-Disaster
On January 5, an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 nearly crashed when a door plug, a critical component designed to seal unused exit doors, ripped away from the fuselage. Fortunately, no one was injured, and the flight landed safely. Subsequent inspections of United Airlines’ aircraft revealed bolts too loose to hold door plugs on […]
Mississippi Cops Can Still Get Away with Anything
Police in Jackson, Mississippi, have been burying people in a mass graveyard next to a prison.
New Attack on Voting Rights
Voting rights are under attack again, after a federal judge ruled that individuals and groups do not have a right to sue to enforce voting rights.
Is It Genocide? Of Course It Is!
Over the past three months, the world has watched in horror the massive slaughter carried out against the Palestinian people by the State of Israel, with the full backing of the United States. Since October 7th, over 23,000 people in Gaza have been killed with more and more bodies being dug out of the rubble […]
“No Production Is Worth A Life!” – Indonesian Nickel Plant Workers Demonstrate Against Deadly Conditions
On December 23rd, an explosion took place at the PT Indonesia Tsingshan Stainless Steel nickel processing plant on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, killing 18 workers and hospitalizing 41 more. According to an initial investigation, a flammable liquid leaked during routine maintenance work on a smelter furnace, caught fire, and then set multiple oxygen tanks […]
Newark Penn Station: A Symptom of the Larger Problem
Two years ago we published an article on the human misery in Penn Station in Newark, New Jersey. Sadly, but not surprisingly, the situation today remains nearly precisely the same as two years ago. In Penn Station at least dozens of unhoused people still sleep, roam about, talk to themselves, beg, urinate, defecate, and wash […]
Should Trump Be Removed From Ballots?
In recent weeks two states, Colorado and Maine, have ruled that former President Donald Trump is ineligible to be on their presidential primary election ballots. Needless to say, some Democrats and progressives rejoiced, believing that something has saved them from the possibility of him becoming president again. But while these rulings (one by the Colorado […]
Striking Flint
Remembering the 1936-37 General Motors Sit-Down Strike, Genora Johnson
The Climate Conferences of the Rich Will Not Save Us
On December 13, the 28th annual Conference of Parties (COP28) drew to a close marking the end of another negotiation for global action on climate catastrophe. The conference’s final agreement is filled with empty words, as it asks countries to transition “away from fossil fuels in energy systems.” The result is an agreement that makes […]
All Powerful AIPAC, or Just U.S. Imperialism?
It has recently made the news that AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, has put a political hit out on a few members of Congress who have been outspoken critics of the state of Israel and of U.S. government support for Israel’s decades-long occupation and oppression of Palestine and its people. AIPAC spent $50 […]
Oakland School Communities Hold Teach-In for Palestine
In response to the state of Israel’s horrific, genocidal brutality against the Palestinian people, hundreds of thousands people around the world have expressed their outrage. People have poured into the streets in mass demonstrations, occupied government buildings, marched on freeways, pressured city councils to pass resolutions, and more. In Oakland California, teachers, staff, students, and […]
No Court Can Save Us; Only We Can!
Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother, is the latest victim of Texas’s near-total abortion ban. After she made multiple emergency room visits and her health worsened, Cox and her attorneys requested she be provided a legal abortion, and won a district court’s approval. Within hours, the Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton warned hospitals against performing the procedure, and […]
United States Government – Brazen Accomplice In Genocide
The most recent episode of mass slaughter against Palestinian people continues into its third month, with over 18,000 people killed, overwhelmingly women and children. Those who are still alive are fighting for their lives. Some 85% of the Gaza population has been internally displaced. Much of Gaza has been completely leveled to the ground. Over […]
The UAW announces plans to organize non-union auto companies
During September and October, the UAW took 50,000 of its members who work for the Big Three – Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis (which owns Chrysler and Jeep) out on strike. The contracts the UAW negotiated include a 25% wage increase and cost of living payments to counter inflation. Most importantly, the new contract no […]
California State University Faculty Go On Strike
California State University faculty went on strike for better working and learning conditions.
BART: Updates from the Frontlines
The following articles are reprinted from Speak Out Now’s workplace newsletter at Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) in the San Francisco Bay area. Walking the Tracks The recent incident in the Transbay Tube drew attention to an all-too common problem – people on the trackway. Unfortunately, it can go beyond delayed trains. It can lead […]
The First Intifada and the Rebirth of the Palestinian National Movement
December 1982 seemed like the beginning of a turning point in Palestinian history. In 1982, it seemed that the fortunes of the Palestinian people were at a low point. After decades of Zionist intrusion from the late 19th century on, the 1947 United Nations Partition, the earth-shattering 1948 Nakba (the mass displacement and dispossession of […]
The Bloody and Wealthy Legacy of Henry Kissinger
This past November 29, the war criminal Henry Kissinger died at age 100. Former U.S. Secretary of State and National Security Advisor under Richard Nixon, and for more than 40 years head of Kissinger Associates consulting, he left behind a foreign policy legacy full of blood and violence. His work led to the unnecessary extension […]
Young People See through Democratic Party Hypocrisy on Palestine
Long before the ugly October 7 attack on Israel and the Israeli-generated carnage that has followed, many who usually vote Democrat, and specifically many younger voters, were moving away from the Democratic Party’s wholehearted support for Israel. But the past two months of death and destruction have pushed many more to have sympathy for the […]
Refinery Fires In Martinez, CA
In Martinez, a small suburb of the San Francisco Bay Area, two separate fires broke out at the Marathon oil refinery over the last month. In a fire on November 19, refinery worker, Jerome Serano, suffered third-degree burns on more than 80 percent of his body, which has left him currently fighting for his life. […]
Argentina: Milei’s Electoral Victory: Neither Laugh nor Cry, but Understand
Nov. 20, 2023 by Juan García of Prensa Obrera (Workers Press), newspaper of the Argentine revolutionary socialist Partido Obrero (Workers Party), translated by Speak Out Now. Some readers may need additional background information on Argentine politics. We are providing links to other articles that may help to address that need. This maxim (“Neither Laugh nor […]
Highland Workers Hold Daily Vigils
This article is reprinted from the Speak Out Now healthcare newsletter at Kaiser and Highland Hospitals in Oakland, CA. For the past few weeks, workers at Highland Hospital have been commemorating the lives of the children killed in the ongoing attacks on Gaza. What started as a one time action on World Children’s Day (November […]
Millions Strike in Bangladesh
On October 31, approximately four million textile workers in and around Dhaka, Bangladesh, began what they called a boycott of the garment producers and their factories, and have since then been effectively on strike against the multibillion-dollar industry. The strikes started with the demand for better wages. The workers, the majority of them women, earned […]
The COP28 Climate Conference is Part of the Problem
COP28 – the 28th annual meeting of the United Nations “Conference of the Parties” to discuss progress towards stopping the climate crisis, starts November 30. This year COP is being hosted by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the 7th largest oil-producing country in the world – this is just the beginning of the farce that […]
Against All Racism, Against All Divisions, the Unity of the Working Class
As the French government condemns protesters against the war in Gaza as “anti-Semites”, it is working with right-wing anti-Semites to pass a xenophobic immigration bill.
Baltimore: Nurses at Saint Agnes Hospital Win Union Recognition
Nurses at Saint Agnes Hospital in Baltimore have won union recognition.
In The Face of Global Crisis, What Did Biden and China’s President Xi Accomplish?
Biden and Xi met at APEC, but their meeting was more for optics than action.
Thankful For What?
Many happenings around the world are not things to be thankful for.
Millions of Children Lose Medicaid Health Coverage
Since April, at least 2 million children have lost Medicaid health insurance throughout 21 U.S. states. The reports by researchers at the Georgetown Center for Children and Families and KFF, a health policy organization, sound the alarm of the declining health protections available for children in poverty. States are taking away Medicaid as the poverty rate for children doubled since 2022. Children and […]
Fed Up With Politics? Whose Politics?
Recent reports in the New York Times are verifying what most of us already knew: millions of people in the United States, likely the vast majority, are fed up with politics and politicians. They are sick of the perceived drama, disfunction, unkept promises, conflict, and outright ineffectiveness of political institutions on all levels. This phenomenon […]
Fossil Fuel Production Increases as Earth Burns
A new study by the Copernicus Climate Change Service calculates that 2023 will go down in history as the hottest year on record, and the hottest year in 125,000 years! Not only did the earth experience its hottest consecutive days ever this July, but this October has now been found to have been the warmest […]
The Israeli State, Armed Wing of the Imperialist Powers against the People
November 13, 2023 editorial of the New Anti-capitalist Party (NPA) in France, translated from French Unable to continue banning demonstrations in support of the Palestinian people, (French President) Macron attempted a counter-fire by having his underlings launch a call to demonstrate “against anti-Semitism.” For days, all the media relayed the call. As did almost all […]
Baltimore: Racist Sentencing of Teen Squeegee Worker
In July of 2022, a group of Black teens was washing windshields, known as “squeegeeing,” at a busy downtown Baltimore intersection. A 48-year-old white man got out of his car and threatened the youths with a baseball bat, swinging the bat at at least one of them. One of the teens pulled a gun and […]
APEC: Who is Prioritized?
These articles are reprinted from Speak Out’s workplace newsletter at Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) and focus on the impacts of this conference which happen at the expense of BART workers and ordinary people in the San Francisco community. Priorities Top executives of major corporations and politicians, including President Biden, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Ferdinand […]
Governments and the Extreme Right Support the Massacres in Gaza — The People Denounce Them in the Streets!
November 6, 2023 editorial of the New Anti-capitalist Party (NPA) in France, translated from French. The Israeli army is now in the very heart of Gaza City, striking on the ground as indiscriminately as it did from the air. Half of all homes have been razed to the ground. More than 10,000 people have already […]
Mike Johnson: Another Reactionary Speaker of the House
On October 25th, the Republican Party finally elected a new Speaker of the House of Representatives after weeks of internal wrangling. The new Speaker is Mike Johnson, who has been a member of Congress since 2016. And he is now second in line to the presidency. But who is Mike Johnson? And what can we […]
Access to Reproductive Rights Depends on Us
The November 7 elections affirmed something we already knew: a solid majority of people in the United States support people’s right to an abortion and the larger right to make their own decisions about their bodies and their healthcare. In the typically “red” states of Virginia, Kentucky, Pennsylvania and Ohio, voters either voted against the […]
Air Quality Nightmare in Delhi
Delhi, India, one of the largest cities in the world, was blanketed in the first week of November by some of its worst air quality ever. The city and its surroundings, a metro area home to nearly 28 million people, have become notorious in recent decades for their unhealthy air pollution, especially at least a […]