Stand with the Calais Migrants!
Last Friday, the interior minister, Bernard Cazeneuve, went to Calais to announce the coming dismantling of the “jungle”. And on Monday, a snail operation is organized by shopkeepers and truck drivers to demand a rapid break up of the camp. There are probably close to 10,000 migrants trying to survive in the camp in unhygienic […]
Sitting or Standing for What’s Right
San Francisco 49ers quarterback, Colin Kaepernick, sat during the playing of the “The Star Spangled Banner” before a pre-season game. When asked why he didn’t stand, Kaepernick’s answer was straightforward: He said, “I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of […]
The Elections – The System Exposed
Every four years this system exposes itself through the presidential elections. The two major parties of the rich present their candidates with the expectation that people will fall behind one or the other. After a billion dollars was spent in primary campaigns over the past year and a half, it’s Trump vs. Clinton. Trump is […]
The government increases in-flight hours in the service of the employers
There was no summer break for government’s attacks against workers. As if forcing through the Labor Law in the Assembly on 21 July wasn’t enough, it struck again on August 8th, authorizing the dismissal of a CGT union delegate from Air France, implicated in the “torn shirt” episode. This was done against the advice of […]
The Olympics: Another Game Run By and For the Rich
The Olympics opened in Brazil on August 5. The Olympics is portrayed as an opportunity for international cooperation and a chance for the world’s athletes to display their skills and passion. The Olympics are an opportunity for athletes from all over the world to experience competition at the highest level. For many athletes, to compete […]
The Violence of This System Must Be Stopped
This week, two Black men had their lives taken from them. Police murdered Philando Castile and Alton Sterling in cold blood. These two killings are just the latest in an epidemic of police violence that has been sweeping this country. This violence is not new. The only reason these police murders are out in the […]
To Be or Not to Be in the European Union: That is Not the Question
Brexit has prevailed with 51.9% of the votes in the referendum that took place on June 23. For months, a nauseating campaign was dominated by reactionaries, nostalgic of the British Empire, and xenophobes of all kinds wanting to make migrants responsible for all ills. Surfing on these same ideas, Prime Minister David Cameron had made […]
OPD: Exposing a Corrupt Society
The sex scandal involving the Oakland Police Department has exposed the level of corruption throughout all of law enforcement. According to the East Bay Express, at least 28 police officers on multiple occasions had sex with a teenager who was working as a sex worker. The list of officers spans multiple agencies, including at least […]
Fracking – Another Sign of an Insane System
download a .pdf of this pamphlet updated Aug. 2018 Hydraulic fracturing, also known as “fracking,” is a highly polluting process used to extract oil or natural gas trapped in rock formations deep underground. Fracking has destroyed water supplies, sickened people and animals, and disrupted life in towns across the U.S. and other countries. Yet energy […]
Hollande and Valls Want to Silence the Protests – They Won’t be Able to!
Unable to silence dissent against the Work law, Hollande and Valls threatened to ban demonstrations due to the “violence acts” that happened. As if by chance… Didn’t the Euro football championship lead to much more violent excesses like the clashes in Marseille between Russian and English hooligans? Did Hollande, Valls or Cazeneuve threaten to ban […]
What Now? Don’t Give Up!
The massive success of the June 14 demonstrations is clear. The mobilization against the Work law has continued for more than three months and shows no sign of letting go. Different sectors went on strike: refiners, garbage collectors, railway workers… At the same time, in different regions, work stoppages or strikes have taken place in […]
The Orlando Tragedy – Product of a Violent Society
Omar Mateen shot and killed 49 people and wounded 53 more in the Pulse dance club, a club for lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgendered and queer (LGBTQ) people in Orlando, Florida. What do we know about Mateen, the 29-year-old man who carried out the attack? He worked as a security guard and as a guard in […]
All Together, We Will Make Them Back Down!
Gattaz, Valls and Hollande have tried all kinds of disinformation: they said the strikers take the population “hostage”, they used blackmail about “the image of France” with the arrival of the Euro Cup, or they called to end the strikes in solidarity with the victims of the floods… Nothing helped. The majority of the population […]
France: “They Have Billions — We Are Millions”
On June 14, hundreds of thousands of French workers went on strike and held demonstrations. This action followed three and half months of struggles and over a dozen days of strikes and demonstrations, by workers and their student allies against a new law that the French government is trying to impose on them. And this […]
Work Law, Competitiveness Agreements, Reorganizations: Reversing the Balance of Power Between Workers and Employers – Yes We Can!
Since last week, the mobilization against the Work law is not measured just in number of demonstrators but also in the number of sectors and companies on strike. This week, the RATP (Paris public transportation) should join the railway workers, refinery workers and electricians… Despite an intense campaign of disinformation, two-thirds of the population believe […]
Their Elections – No Real Choices For Us
Month after month we have been bombarded with the run-up to the presidential elections. When it all began, it was supposed to be business as usual. It was a done deal, run by Democratic and Republican Party insiders and pre-approved by the 1%. It was supposed to be a Bush vs. a Clinton. But something […]
Mobilization against the Labor law: A New Impulse
For two and a half months, anger has been expressed against this Work law that aims to legalize all kinds of blackmail by employers. Seven days of strikes and inter-branch events have already mobilized many workers and young people. While the media repeated that the mobilization was declining, the events of last Thursday, May 19, […]
After the 49.3, the Future of the Work Law Still Depends On Us!
In the end, Manuel Valls drew the 49.3 to impose his made-for-the-bosses law. During a pitiful parliamentary show, the conservatives were embarrassed to be in agreement with the Socialist Party while pretending to fight a legislation that they actually dreamed of passing. The SP “rebels” were not rebellious for long, as they did not make […]
What Would a Real Education Look Like? Not What Our Kids Are Getting!
Another school year is ending and soon the kids will be coming home from schools. Those schools are overcrowded and underfunded, with teachers under attack, and the poorest students get the worst of it. It’s no wonder that the end of school feels like a jailbreak to these kids. They’re free for a short time, […]
Valls Draws His 49-3…But We Have the Bigger Weapon
Having barely started, the debate on the Work law and its 5,000 amendments was stopped. Just before 4:00 pm today, the Prime Minister announced that he would use the 49-3 article of the constitution, allowing him to enact the law without any debate or vote. Following the announcement, tear gas was used against protesters outside […]
Health Care That Can Kill You!
A new study published in the British Medical Journal identifies medical error as the third leading cause of death in the United States (with 251,000 deaths per year), only behind heart disease (with 611,000 deaths per year) and cancer (with 585,000 deaths per year). The report estimates about 700 deaths per day due to medical […]
Racism – A Cancer of This Society
We live in a society based on divisions. The main division, which is hardly ever discussed, is the division between those who control the wealth and productive forces of society, and those who do the work. Those in control of the economy determine what to produce, who will produce it and who it is produced […]
To Repel the “Labor” Law…Act Now!
Last week, once again, Pierre Gattaz (the head of Medef, the bosses’ union) pretended to oppose the new version of the Work law: “the first version of the bill was going in the right direction, the new one is unbearable” Really? Nothing has changed of the fundamentals of the El Khomri Act. Company agreements will […]
May Day – The Fight To Reclaim Our Lives
May 1st, International Workers’ Day, is a day to recognize the struggles of the working class. It is honored by people all over the world. Although May Day is celebrated all over the world, most workers in the United States have never heard of it and have no clue that it started in the United […]
Night and Day: Workers, Standing!
Hollande’s appearance on TV last Thursday attracted fewer people than the crime series Falco… Anyway, all he said of the work Act is that it is maintained. Those who did not watch the presidential contortions have therefore not missed much! There is plenty of money, just look in Panama. They are not ashamed, after the […]
Climate Change? No! We Need a System Change!
For decades scientists have warned us of the dangers and the causes of climate change, but those who are in control of society, both politically and economically, refuse to respond. Year after year they hold conferences to discuss the problems and meanwhile the Earth’s temperature increases, creating environmental crises around the world. Why hasn’t there […]
The Panama Papers: Their Whole System is Corrupt!
Last week journalists released “The Panama Papers,” the largest leak in history, containing millions of documents exposing the secret financial practices of thousands of top government officials, corporations, and the ruling elite from around the world. For over a year, about one hundred journalists from around the world, part of the International Consortium of Investigative […]
Women Hold Up Half the Sky – But Don’t Have Half the Power or Half the Wealth
The claim that the division between the sexes today is natural, or has always been this way, is not true. For most of human existence humans lived in small groups, worked together, shared the resources and took collective responsibility for the young and the old. There was no exploitation by a group that ruled over […]
EU – Turkey : The Deal of Shame
Following the agreement reached last Friday in Brussels with the Turkish government, most migrants landing on the Greek islands will be sent back to Turkey. This is how the Europe of the barbed wire disposes of men, women and children fleeing war and misery. For Hollande, Merkel and others, it does not matter that the […]
March 9, March 17, March 24, March 31… Spring 2016, This is Just the Beginning!
The demonstration against the Work Act of March 17, called on by young people, was a success: the university and high school students, joined by many workers, gave a follow-up to March 9 and laid the groundwork for the next demonstrations on March 24 and 31. The government’s small edits to the El Khomri Act […]
Trump’s Racist Divide and Conquer Campaign
From the very beginning of Trump’s presidential campaign he has made an appeal to white voters by attacking just about everyone else. Such strategies on the part of politicians and bosses are nothing new. What is new is the fact that a billionaire like Trump is willing and able to openly say what many politicians […]
Spring is in the Air: This is Just a Start…
Between 224,000 and 500,000 protesters were in the streets across the country on March 9! 1.2 million online signatures have been gathered against the Work Act. In less than three weeks, anger has been expressed, organized, demonstrated. A specter haunts the bosses, the government, the left and the right: that of having to abandon this […]
Get Rid of the Labor Act!
Already more than one million people have signed the petition against the Work Act of Myriam El Khomri. And the demonstrations planned for March 9 will be massive. So suddenly, Hollande and Valls started speaking of “dialogue” with the unions, to coax us. But workers and young people are not fools. Gattaz dreamed it, Hollande-Valls […]
Donald Trump: Overflowing With Hate
Donald Trump continues to win in the primaries in spite of his racist and violent outbursts, including calling for the killing of family members of terrorists, the open use of torture, and refusing to distance himself from the Ku Klux Klan. But now the Republican Party leadership has openly denounced him. Following Trump’s recent wins, […]
No Coal Trains to Oakland!
Burning coal is one of the most polluting forms of energy production and one of the greatest contributors to global warming. What could be more insane than destroying the environment with massive coal mining operations, and then loading the coal onto a mile-long string of open coal cars, then sending them more than 750 miles […]
The U.S. Supreme Court: Judicial Servants of the Ruling Class
Following the death of Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia, on February 13, 2016, the empty Supreme Court seat has become a political battleground between Republicans and Democrats. This has been painted as a decisive struggle for civil rights. But most of the time the Supreme Court does little more than serve the interests of the […]
French Workers and Youth Prepare a Massive Fightback
This week in France, young people and workers are preparing a massive fight against attacks coming from the Socialist Party government of Francois Hollande. March 9th has been set in France as a day to take to the streets in strikes and demonstrations against the “Khomri Law,” named after Labor Minister Myriam El Khomri. The […]
Movie Review: “Where to Invade Next?”
If you’re looking for a good laugh and want to see what the quality of life for an average person is like in other countries, see Michael Moore’s new film: “Where to Invade Next?” Slovenia, Tunisia, Finland and Portugal are some of the countries he visits. Once you see what’s normal for them, you realize […]
Goodbye, Labour Act
It’s our job to make them stop their attacks on workers! The Work Act of Myriam El Khomri is the reform of the Labour Code that the Medef (bosses union) and the big stockholders have been demanding for a long time. Sarkozy and Chirac had never dared fulfill these demands, but Hollande and Valls are […]
Reform of the Labour Code: Pity the Bosses!
Poor bosses! Who could imagine their worries, their anxieties, their nightmares? Fortunately, Hollande is here, at their bedside, holding their hands. He sympathizes… And here is the Bill of his Minister of Labour, El Khomri: an overhaul of the Labour Code dreamed of by the right and the Medef (the bosses’ union). This is the […]
Flint – No More Sacrifices For the Rich!
The people of Flint have been poisoned for more than a year and a half by the water they have been drinking! Nearly all the children under the age of six have been poisoned by lead, which can cause serious mental and physical impairments. And lead is just one of the poisons they have been […]
Shame on the Europe of the Barbed Wire! (part 2)
Five months ago, Europe was seized by a wave of emotion after discovering the photo of little Avian, a Syrian boy found dead on a beach in Turkey. Since then, three hundred children have died in the Mediterranean, and ten thousand wander, isolated, on our continent, delivered to the mafias, for lack of a proper […]
When The Super Bowl Comes To Town
The Super Bowl is approaching and for people living in the Bay Area, it has been difficult to ignore because it will be played in Santa Clara. Many people are excited to see the matchup of the Panthers against the Broncos. But unless we had thousands of dollars saved away for a ticket, we are […]
Lessons From the Civil Rights Struggle
The struggle against racism in the U.S. has involved millions of people, starting with the first person to resist slavery. Today this history is often told with the tactic of nonviolence being opposed to self-defense. The truth is that the two were not opposed during the movement. Both tactics were used to fight against institutional […]
Shame on the Europe of the Barbed Wire
Sweden and Finland are preparing to expel a large part of the migrants they hosted in 2015: because fleeing poverty and hunger is not a valid reason to be welcomed into the world’s richest continent… As for Hollande’s France, that is not even a question since the French Government had committed to host only 24,000 […]
This is Your Brain on Football
Whether you’re a football fan or not, everyone should see the movie “Concussion,” starring Will Smith and Alec Baldwin. It is a gripping story, one that is unfolding every day in on real-life football fields. Concussion is about an epidemic that’s taking the lives of a growing number of football players, and the National Football […]
Film Review: “The Big Short”
“The Big Short” is a film about the 2008 economic crash that ultimately sent the U.S. and the global economy into a massive economic crisis, caused the eviction of millions of families from their homes, and led to the layoffs of millions of workers. The film tells the true story of a group of Wall […]
When Trump is Your Boss
In his campaign, Donald Trump continues to try to paint himself as the outsider who attacks the elite. But the fact is, Donald Trump is one of the richest men in America, and he did not get that way by fighting for the little guy, as he likes to pretend. Trump makes racist statements about […]
Disaster – Just a Part of Doing Business: The California Gas Leak and Flint Water
It’s the same kind of story in every major industry across the country: profits come first, and everything else comes last. This economic system is based on ruining people’s lives in order to make a profit. Banks will throw millions of people into the streets. Corporations will throw people out of work. Governments will make […]
We Are All Goodyear Workers (part 2)
So Hollande went to India to act as a sales representative with 50 bosses around him, and tried his best to sell Dassault’s Rafale fighter plane… Dassault thanked the President. Some Ministers went to Davos, to show themselves among the largest multinationals and Emmanuel Macron, who pushes for the end of the 35-hour week, proclaimed […]