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 […]
We Are All Goodyear Workers
Hollande announced a “state of economic and social emergency”. Consequences: on one side, 9 month jail time for eight Goodyear employees who, during 30 hours, held accountable two directors of a deceitful multinational that had just laid off 800 workers; on the other side many more billions in gift to the bosses, under cover of […]
Imagine What A Happy New Year It Would Be If…
We were not forced to choose between having time or having money. If everyone had a job – no one would have to work long hours – even 40 hours is too much. Everyone would have time to do what we want. Imagine if… Our health was a priority and healthy food was not produced […]
2016: Back to the Future
Hollande gave his best wishes for the new year in a festive way, but he was not very convincing: at war against terrorism alongside Obama, Putin and a new ally, Assad – who’s regime is responsible for 300,000 deaths since 2011. Let’s not forget Saudi Arabia – 47 executions last week – which is such […]
Trump Recycles the Racist Divide and Conquer Message
Donald Trump sank to a new low this past week with his call to temporarily prevent all Muslims from entering the U.S. in the wake of the shootings in San Bernardino. He even referred to the shameful chapter of history where the US government put Japanese-Americans into concentration camps during the World War II as […]
Electoral Circus and Social Front
Finishing first in six regions, the National Front (FN) comes out the winner of the first round of the regional elections. By choosing the FN, an openly racist and xenophobic party, one quarter of the voters who did not abstain have, in fact, followed the path opened by the Hollande-Valls government, which differs in no […]
Paris Climate Talks – The Future is Not Theirs to Decide
Leaders of countries from all over the world are in Paris, France at the U.N COP21 meetings to discuss the problem of global warming. Up to 30,000 people are participating in the conference and hundreds of thousands more have been demonstrating around the world for real action. Following the terrorist attacks in Paris, the French […]
Millionaire Water Wasters
The East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) recently released a list of 1,100 names of customers who were the largest water wasters in the Bay Area, those who used more than 1,000 gallons of water per day. The majority of the biggest water wasters are from some of the wealthiest households in the Bay Area. […]
Stephen Hawking is Right
Recently in an on-line question and answer forum, the famous physicist, Stephen Hawking, was asked a question about the connection between using robots and unemployment. This is what he replied: “If machines produce everything we need, the outcome will depend on how things are distributed. Everyone can enjoy a life of luxurious leisure if the […]
French Imperialism – The Origin of the Terror
On the 13th of November, Paris was struck by terrorist attacks. For many people this seemed like a random act of evil. Certainly, those who carried out these attacks have nothing but cynical goals. But leaving it at that does not account for why the attacks happened. For all of the focus on ISIS, the […]
University of Missouri Students Fight Racism
This fall, students at college campuses and high schools organized to confront the racism they face at their schools. These protests have often been followed by little response and minimal support for Black students from school administrations at majority white schools. Until, of course, the actions at the University of Missouri. Since then, student protests […]
Paris Climate Talks – A Useless Ritual
From November 30 to December 11, The United Nations 2015 Paris Climate Conference (also known as COP21) will bring together so-called world leaders from nearly 200 countries, along with scientists, environmental groups, and the heads of many corporations, some of which are in the fossil fuel industry. The stated goal of this conference is to […]
No to Their Emergency State to Silence Anger
Everyone to their action stations, during the Cop 21: 150 heads of state, 40,000 people gathered at le Bourget, supposedly to curb global warming. It is above all an opportunity for François Hollande and his staff of Ministers to lead a parade, not to say “Welcome to those coming to save the planet” as displayed […]
You Cannot Stay Quiet in a Barbarous World
The attacks on November 13 in Paris, sponsored by the Islamic State (IS), blindly killed 130 people and injured more than 300 among people who were at a concert, a football game, or a restaurant terrace… Since then, another Islamic terrorist group killed 19 people in a hotel in Bamako, the capital of Mali, while […]
Terrorist Attacks in Paris – No Excuse for War
On Friday the 13th, Paris was hit with a terrorist attack claimed to have been carried out by ISIS (the Islamic State in Syria). Coordinated attacks by terrorists killed 129 people and injured 352 in the middle of Paris. It was a terrible, brutal attack on innocent people. Immediately French politicians went into motion. Within […]
South African Students Struggle and Win
This month the South African government announced an increase in public university student fees of six or more percent. Outraged students protested, beginning a campaign called “Fees Must Fall!” The minister of education Blade Nzimande laughed when he heard about the protest and said, “If the students don’t accept this we’ll start our own movement […]
Hollande: A Friend (of Finance) Who Wishes You Well…
Between them, “there is something strong”, there is “mutual trust”, a “special relationship”… During his official trip to Greece, Hollande had only sweet words towards Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. This “friendship” had been formed last July, when the French president and the German Chancellor had dictated their terms to Greece by imposing a third draconian […]
We Are All Air France Employees!
Interviewed October 19th on RTL, François Hollande had to concede, about the early morning arrests of four Air France employees, as if they were dangerous mobsters, that “I think there are other methods”, before claiming that the government was not responsible. But when Valls himself calls the angry Air France demonstrators “thugs”, when Macron calls […]
What Does It Look Like When The Working Class Takes Power?
We are already being bombarded by constant news about the 2016 elections. We are supposed to believe that the political circus of the Democratic and Republican parties should determine our future. But, if we want to change our conditions, it will depend on our organization, our struggles as well as our understanding that those parties […]
Turkey: “Erdogan, Murderer”
Thousands of people expressed their anger, this Sunday, in major cities of Turkey, against the attack that claimed one hundred dead and more than 500 injured in Ankara. They denounced the responsibility of Erdogan’s government. The emotion is intense. The Turkish unions, with the exception of the one linked to the government, called for two […]
Killed By Cops
In 2015, there have been 791 people killed by the police. Of those people, 103 of them were killed in the month of August alone. The youngest was 12 years old, while the oldest was 65 years old. They include Freddie Grey whose spine was severed while riding unrestrained in a Baltimore police van. They […]