Stop the Layoffs: City Workers Protest Bloomberg’s Budget Madness

DC 37 Locals 1113 and 375 held an angry demonstration at City
Hall Park recently protesting the layoff of 129 Dept. of Finance
workers which is part of the 889 layoffs announced by Bloomberg
for this year. Recent forecasts by the NYC Independent Budget
Office and the City Comptroller say that NYC will have a budget
surplus in excess of $1 billion this fiscal year. Bloomberg’s
credibility has been further eroded by the $80 fraud in the
$800 million CityTime payroll contract which many speakers
mentioned as the tip of an iceberg of waste in the City’s $9 billion
budget for outside contracts and high paid consultants. They also
called for higher taxes on the rich to prevent layoffs and increase
NYC services.

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Georgia Prisoners, In Longest Strike In History Against US Penal System Say Enough Is Enough Is Enough!
with
Edward O. Dubose, The Georgia State Conference, NAACP

On December 9, thousands of men, from Augusta, Baldwin, Hancock, Hays, Macon, Smith and Telfair State Prisons went on strike to press the Georgia Department of Corrections (“DOC”) to stop treating them like slaves and institute programs that address their basic human rights. Some of their demands are: 1) a living wage for work; 2) educational opportunities; 3) decent health care; 4) an end to cruel and unusual punishments; 5) decent living conditions; 6) nutritional meals; 7) vocational and self-improvement opportunities; 8) access to families; and 9) just parole decisions. The Georgia prisoners refused to work, stopping all activities, in a peaceful protest for their human rights. This is a heroic act of resistance to inhuman prison conditions and racism.

Plus
Excerpts fromPrison Labor: Made in the U.S.A.
Produced by Free Speech Radio Newsreporter Karen Miller.

Prison labor is every US Corporation's dream: cheap labor, no sick
leave, no time off, no holidays and employees that can be easily
replaced. For human rights activists however, it's a nightmare for
the very same reasons - but on the other side of the coin: forced
labor, no unions, low pay and no protection for employees. The US
has used or currently uses prison labor for anything from holiday
coffee for Starbucks, cutting airplane components or Boeing,
Game Boys for Nintendo, equipment for war , shrink wrapping
mouses for Microsoft, making dentures, down to sewing lingerie
for Victoria's Secrets. It's a multi-billion dollar business.

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Wal-Mart/Sam Club’s Lawsuit Could Be A Game-Changer For Corporate Gender Discrimination
with
Stephen Tinkler, lead attorney for plaintiffs

Employers everywhere want to see whether the Supreme Court says a single class-action lawsuit can include as many as 1.5 million employees of Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club. Initially six woman filed suit accusing the retail giant of not providing its female workers with the same compensation and promotional opportunities as men. If the court rules this now class action suit can include all 1.5 million workers, it could set a new precedent for how broad class-action suits against businesses, particularly large employers, can become. The suit encompasses workers from nearly 3,400 stores nationwide. The scope of the suit could put tremendous pressure on Wal-Mart to settle and to remedy its offensive practices, as well as seriously affect other employers discriminatory gender behavior.

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Deny Waiver Coalition Rally at Tweed Shows Outrage over Appointment of Cathie Black as Schools Chancellor

The Deny Waiver Coalition gathered hundreds of parents, elected officials educators and community leaders at the Tweed Courthouse, Headquarters of the NYC Dept. of Education, in a broad based demonstration to denounce Bloomberg's appointment of millionaire publishing Executive Cathie Black as Schools Chancellor despite her lack of qualifications for the position. The Coalition, which will not accept Ms. Blacks appointment as a done deal, is filing a lawsuit to challenge the waiver by NYS Education Commissioner Steiner and is continuing demonstrations across the city. The protests, are evolving into a wider movement against Mayoral Control and the capture of educational decision making by business interests to the exclusion of parents and teachers. For 8 long years, NYC children have enduring the destructive education policies of the Bloomberg Administration and the time has come for a parent and educator led movement to fight for & protect the educational opportunities of NYC's 1.1 million public school children.
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Nine AIDS Activists Dressed As Bagels Arrested In Schmear Campaign Of Mayor Bloomberg
with
. Charles King, Pres. & CEO, Housing Works, a/k/a, an aggressive bagel
. Johnny Guaylupo, arrested baked goods

ACTing UpOn World AIDS Day—Police arrested nine Housing Works AIDS activists wearing giant bagel costumes outside Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s annual World AIDS Day Bagel Breakfast at the Brooklyn Public Library. “Mayor Bloomberg’s attitude to poor people with AIDS is ‘Let them eat bagels!’” said Charles “Sesame” King, president and CEO of Housing Works Bagels’ Schmear Campaign. “We bagels refuse to be implicated in the mayor’s World AIDS Day Bagel Breakfast hypocrisy.” The activists chained themselves together and blocked traffic at Grand Army Plaza to draw attention to Bloomberg’s relentless attacks on AIDS housing services for the poor. The brave bagels were cheered on by dozens of others, many wearing breakfast table costumes. AIDS activists are fed up with Bloomberg.
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Emergency Unemployment Protest
2 Million More Are Loosing Benefits in December
with
. Trudy Goldberg, Chair, National Jobs for All Coalition
. Bill Henning, Vice President of CWA, Local 1180
. Jon Bloom, Executive Director, Workers Defense League,
. Noreen Connell, Past Pres., NOW, NY State

The National Jobs for all Coalition held a protest demonstration in NYC to call for extension of unemployment benefits being held up in Congress by a Republican filibuster and to raise public awareness of the need for bold and decisive federal action to create jobs. The action came on the very day when the newly released monthly statistics reported that the unemployment rate increased to 9.8% highlighting the need for decisive action now. Over 5,000,000 workers have already exhausted their 99 weeks of extended benefits and if unemployment benefits are not extended by Congress beyond the basic 26 week limit over 2,000,000 more are loosing their benefits in December. The coalition will be holding vigils for jobs every first Friday of the month when the unemployment statistics are released, hoping to build grassroots support for jobs now!

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Austerity & Lockout Threats Roil NFL & NBA
with
Dave Zirin, author of "Bad Sports: How Owners are Ruining the Games we Love"

The former Indiana guard A.J. Moye starts rehabilitation after having a stroke following a head-on collision with a teammate. There has been an avalanche of media coverage of the helmet to helmet hits, and the cover of Sports Illustrated is about concussions. Meanwhile the response of the owners has been to sue 262 players over their workers compensation, and it still takes at least a 3 year NFL career to get any health care after retirement, and oh yes the League seeks to extend the playing season and threatens drastic cuts or elimination of health benefits to the players.

Plus
Host of Edge of Sports Radio Dave Zirin and former NBA guard Laron Profit speak with NFL Players Association Executive Director DeMaurice Smith about the players standing strong against the league's attempts to break their will. Smith also reveals that the NFL owners share the same legal representation as
the ownership groups in the NBA, MLB, and the NHL. All of these leagues are in labor talks as 2011 marks the year in which the four major sports' collective bargaining agreements expire.

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Emergency Unemployment Protest
2 Million More May Loose Benefits in December
With
Trudy Goldberg, Chair, National Jobs for All Coalition
Bill Henning, Vice President of CWA, Local 1180
Jon Bloom, Executive Director, Workers Defense League,
Noreen Connell, Past Pres., NOW, NY State

The National Jobs for all Coalition held a protest demonstration in
NYC to call for extension of unemployment benefits being held up
in Congress by a Republican filibuster and to raise public awareness
of the need for bold and decisive federal action to create jobs. The
action came on the very day when the newly released monthly
statistics reported that the unemployment rate increased to 9.8%
highlighting the need for decisive action now. Over 5,000,000
workers have already exhausted their 99 weeks of extended
benefits and if unemployment benefits are not extended by
Congress beyond the basic 26 week limit over 2,000,000 more
will loose their benefits in December. The coalition will be
holding vigils for jobs every first Friday of the month when the
unemployment statistics are released, hoping to build grassroots
support for jobs now!

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NYC Unemployed Arrested Protesting Benefits Termination
With
Members of Flashmobs4jobs

Workers who have exceeded the 99 week maximum limit on unemployment benefits (called 99ers) were arrested for blocking traffic on Varick Street at a demonstration outside the NYS Dept.of labor. They were demanding that Congress, in the lame duck session, immediately pass a bill granting benefits to those workers who have passed the 99 week limit. They also called for the reauthorization unemployment benefits extensions set to expire on November 30 and new legislation to create jobs. There are currently 4.5 million 99ers with an additional 50,000 jobless losing their benefits each week - this is an emergency!
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A Fair Wages Act Is A Matter Of Faith For Coalition of Religious Leaders

Clergy members across NYC recently led a procession of congregations, community groups and union members to demand that the City Council pass the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act. Every year NYC spends approximately two billion dollars, to subsidize development and create jobs. Too often the jobs created with these public subsidies pay poverty wages with no benefits -- whether it's retail and stockroom jobs at shopping centers, mailroom jobs in office buildings, or food service jobs at stadiums. When public dollars are used to promote private enterprise, the public has the right to expect jobs with good wages and benefits.

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Robin Hood In Reverse: Presidential Commission Outlines $3.8 Trillion Theft From The Workers, Seniors, The Disabled, And The Sick
with
Dean Baker, co-director, Center for Economic and Policy Research

A presidential commission’s leaders outlined a $3.8 trillion deficit-cutting plan that would trim among other things Social Security and Medicare, reduce income-tax rates and eliminate tax breaks including the mortgage-interest deduction, the child tax credit and the earned income tax credit. Deficit reduction would also make it harder to emerge from the recession, causing tax revenues to fall further setting the stage for further budget cuts. The Social Security retirement age would rise to 68 in about 2050 and 69 in about 2075. AFL-CIO Pres. Richard Trumka said the panel chairmen “just told working Americans to ‘drop dead.’” In an e-mailed statement, Trumka said, “The very people who want to slash Social Security and Medicare spent this week clamoring for more unpaid Bush tax cuts for millionaires.” While the Commission’s Allan Simpson said the plan was designed to give members of the panel something to “chew on” for further discussions, it’s enough to choke the rest of us.

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Election 2010: The Best Defense Was a Fair Trade Offense"
withTodd Tucker, Research Dir., Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch

That Democrats and the GOP alike ran against the trade policy status quo, highlights the intensity of public ire about our job exporting trade policy -- a phenomenon also seen in national polls. It also reveals the trouble that the White House and GOP leaders should face if they try to pass the leftover Bush trade pacts with Korea, Colombia and Panama. Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, just released a report illustrating that House Democrats that ran on fair trade platforms in competitive and open-seat races were three times as likely to survive the GOP tidal wave than Democrats who ran against fair trade. We’ll discuss the findings of the report “Election 2010: The Best Defense Was A Fair Trade Offense”.
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Rally to Defend Mumi Abu-Jamal in Philadpehia

On Nov. 9 in Philadelphia, hundreds of supporters of Mumia Abu-Jamal rallied outside a hearing at the federal Third Circuit Court of Appeals where his attorney argued against the reimposition of his death sentence. We go to the Press conference with Mumia's new lead counsel , Judith Ritter, Professor of Law and Director of the Criminal Defense Clinic at Widener University School of Law, Delaware campus and then to a Statement by Professor Johanna Fernandez, of Baruch College; she is the producer of the new documentary "Justice on Trial" about Mumia's case.

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Where The Right to Join a Union Can Make the Difference
Between Life and Death
With
Cecil Roberts, President, United Mineworkers of America
Ricky Polk, Member, United Mineworkers of America

With the deadly explosion in the Massey’s Upper Big Branch Mine in West
Va. which killed 29 miners last April still fresh in their minds, Ricky Polk and
Cecil Roberts blast the Republicans in Congress who have held up mine
safety legislation. Both also make the point that the safest mines are union
mines because of collective bargaining safety provisions but because of
employer intransigence to unionization, we also need Legislation to make
it easer for workers to form unions. We talked with them at the One Nation
Working Together Washington, DC March and Rally.
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Prostrated at the Altar of the Balanced Budget - Sacrificing Economic
Recovery, the Unemployed, Social programs, and Social Security,
with
James Galbraith, Chair in Gov't/ Business Relations, at the School of
Public Affairs, at the University of Texas at Austin

Budget deficit mania is hobbling Washington’s response to economic
recovery. Having a balanced budget is more important they say than
implementing an economic stimulus to create our real bottom line – jobs, and
more jobs. To cut federal budget deficits without first rebuilding the economy
is a sure path to stagnation, to a double-dip recession – possibly to a second
Great Depression!
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NYPD's Crime-Tracking Method, CompStat, Pressures Police To Frivolous Arrests, But Ignores Serious Crime Reports To Doctor Statistics
with
Graham Rayman, reporter Village Voice

Two years ago, police officer, Adrean Schoolcraft in Brooklyn’s 81st precinct, in Bedford Stuyvesant became gravely concerned about how the public was being served. To document his concerns, be began carrying around a digital sound recorder, secretly recording his colleagues and superiors. Graham Rayman, staff writer for the Village Voice reports on the NYPD officer who was told to distort crime statistics and what the revelations in his series hasled to for the public.

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PACIFICA NETWORK SPECIAL:

"Fighting for Jobs, Jobs, and Green Jobs! "
a 58 minute SpecialA production of
Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Report, WBAI-Pacifica, New York City
Produced by Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg

Building a Movement for Green Jobs to Re-industrialize the U.S.
with
Leo Gerard, President of the United Steelworkers

We feature the voice of a labor leader who is building bridges between workers internationally and sees the ties that bind the labor and environmental movements in the U.S. Leo Gerard, President of the United Steelworkers with 850,000 members in the USA and Canada is a co-founder of the Apollo Alliance, whose goal is developing efficient energy alternatives to fossil fuels and jobs, jobs, jobs. Labor & environmental activists are pressing for the creation of green jobs as the way to re-industrialize the U.S., and are fighting to make sure that U.S. trade relations change so that jobs are kept in the U.S.. The Steelworkers recently filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization(WTO), which the Obama administration is investigating, which accuses China of violating the WTO free-trade rules by subsidizing exports of clean energy equipment like solar panels and wind turbines.

President Gerard spoke recently at a forum sponsored by the organization Rekindling Reform and by the Murphy Institute for Worker Education and Labor Studies at the City University of New York.

And then building more bridges

The One Nation Working Together March on Washington

We present excerpts from the One Nation Working Together March on Washington, which brought hundreds of thousands of men and woman from the working class
sponsored by the AFL-CIO, NAACP, La Raza and hundreds of diverse organizations,
to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC to continue the call 47 years earlier of the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King for jobs, jobs, jobs and justice.
with
Van Jones, Author, The Green Collar Economy
Mary K. Henry – Pres., Service Employees Intl Union (SEIU)
Arthur Cheliotes, President, Local 1180, CWA
Harry Belafonte, a remarkable call for Jobs, Peace and Justice from the great actor, singer and social justice activist

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Still Fighting for Their Forty Acres And A Mule: The Plight Of Black Farmers
with
. Gary Grant, Pres., Black Farmers & Agriculturalists Assn., N.C.
. Eddie Carthan, Pres., Mississippi Family Farmers Association
. Hezekiah Gibson, Pres. United Farmers, USA , S.C.

It’s been more than a decade since Black farmers filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture, because of decades of discrimination. Thousands of farmers have not yet had their day in court or been allowed to file a claim even though the second phase of the suit (known as Pigford v Vilsack) was settled in February 2010. The reason for this is that Congress has not provided the $1.25 billion for farmers, who through no fault of their own, suffered discrimination from the same government that now denies them relief.
********************
Alice Walker Remembers Her Parents:
The Plight of Black Sharecroppers

Recently, author Alice Walker accepted an award from the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund. Her brief but insightful remarks convey a sense of the real value of life and what we work for, as we continue to build bridges. Alice Walker talks about her parents who were sharecropers, their struggles and the sacrifices they made for her.

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Today part 2 of our special program coverage with speeches and interviews from the Massive Demonstration on Saturday, October 2nd at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC

The One Nation Working Together March on Washington sponsored by the AFL-CIO, NAACP, La Raza and 100’s of progressive organizations to demand the jobs to put people to work, and back to work.Jobs, economic security, comprehensive immigration reform, safe and renewable energy policy and a reversal of national priorities from making wars to meeting human needs - that’s the message!

featured on todays program are:

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, Pres., Rainbow Push Coalition
with immigrant righs activist Yves Gomes
Members of the NAACP
Ellie Flores – youth activist
Mary K. Henry – Pres., Service Employees Intl Union (SEIU)

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Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Report
National Edition
Produced by Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg
****************************
We present a special program with speeches and interviews from the Massive
Demonstration on Saturday, October 2nd at theLincoln Memorial in Washington, DC

The One Nation Working Together March on Washington

sponsored by the AFL-CIO, NAACP, La Raza and 100’s of progressive organizations to demand the jobs to put people to work, and back to work.Jobs, economic security, comprehensive immigration reform, safe and renewable energy policy and a reversal of national priorities from making wars to meeting human needs - that’s the message!
Featured on today’s program are AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, U.S. Representative Luis Gutierrez, and a remarkable call for Jobs, Peace and Justice from the great Harry Belafonte along with thevoices of American workers for Jobs with Justice.
*************************
to play go to:
http://www.archive.org/download/BuildingBridgesOneNationWorkingTogetherMarchOnWashington/BuildingBridgesOneNationWorkingTogetherMarchOnWashington_vbr.m3u

to download go to:
http://www.archive.org/download/BuildingBridgesOneNationWorkingTogetherMarchOnWashington/onenationntl.mp3

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Bloomberg To FDNY Vulcans, “Burn Baby Burn”
with
Paul Washington, Past President, Vulcan Society, FDNY
Richard Levy, attorney for Vulcan Society

Rather than complying with a Federal court order to choose among five plans to increase hiring of African American and Latino candidates for the NYC Fire Dept. to reverse long standing discrimination, Mayor Bloomberg choose to suspend hiring for the next class of 300 firefighters. This will result in short staffing in the Department and an expensive increase in overtime pay. The class action lawsuit was initiated in 2002 by the Department of Justice and the Vulcan Society, the fraternal organization of NYC Black firefighters, against NYC’s discriminatory hiring practices.
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Laundry Workers Rally To Protest Privatization & Save Union Jobs

In the battle against filth, the workers at the Brooklyn Central Laundry in East Flatbush are stalwart foot soldiers. Union workers wash the dirty sheets, towels and uniforms for most of New York City’s hospitals, folding more than 10 million pounds of laundry a year. Employees say the linens sometimes hold body parts. They nearly always contain blood. But under a proposed reorganization plan announced in May by the Health and Hospitals Corp. (HHC), which runs the laundry, the service would be taken over by an undetermined private company. The city says private companies can beat the laundry’s price per pound, which the union estimates at $1.30. Privatization will cause the loss of 120 living wage union jobs. So while HHC says get back, the workers fight back.
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Social Security Under Attack
With
Eric Kingson, Prof. of Social Work, Syracuse University’s
School of Social Work & Co-Dir., Social Security Works

It’s the Social Security program, which in large part keeps
older people from poverty and destitution. But, the program is
under attack from the Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction
Commission established by the President, The attack is
dressed up in the fallacious rhetoric of the necessity of
deficit reduction, it’s really a raid on the social security
trust fund to help balance the federal budget deficit. They
will call for deep benefit cuts, probably in the form of
another rise in the retirement age.
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2nd Jury Nullification in Tyson Discrimination Suit
With
U. W. Clemon, Alabama's first African-American Federal
judge, who also served as chief judge of the U,S. District
Court for the Northern District of Alabama. Before his
notable career on the federal bench, he was a distinguished
civil rights activist, a lawyer, and state senator.

For the second time a federal appeals court panel rejected jury
awards in favor of African-American plaintiffs who alleged
discrimination against the poultry company Tyson Foods. In a
2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
found that a Tyson manager's use of the word "boy" to address
an African-American man, did not amount to evidence of racial
discrimination.

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We Need Jobs, Jobs and More Jobs
With
. Avis Jones-DeWeever, Exec. Dir., Ntl. Council of Negro Women
. Heidi Shierholz, labor market economist, Economic Policy Institute
. Catherine Singley, Policy Analyst, Economic Employment Project,
National Council of La Raza

Persistent high unemployment & lackluster job growth are having a profoundly
damaging impact on millions in America. The Jobs Report for August
documented 54,000 jobs lost and the unemployment rate increasing to 9.6%.
The underemployment rate is 16.7 %. The ranks of the unemployed are
continuing to swell. These adverse effects are not limited to the unlucky ones
who have lost their jobs. This is also creating shock waves among those who
are still employed, lowering wages and benefits. We are creating a new layer
of poverty on top of the old for the foreseeable future unless we decide to
make fighting unemployment priority job1 and implement a stimulus big
enough to get that job done
*****
99ers Protest at Unemployment Demonstration

Heeding a call to put New Yorkers back to work, hundreds rallied at Federal
Hall in lower Manhattan to build for the October 2nd One Nation Working
Together Washington demonstration to demand that city, state and federal
government representatives make getting people back to work their number
one priority. Let’s go to the rally and hear what members of the United
Workers Action Group, an organization of 99ers who have exhausted their 99 week limit on unemployment benefits, had to say.

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One Nation Working Together
With.
. Arlene Holt Baker, Executive Vice President, AFL-CIO
. George Gresham, President of 1199SEIU

This October 2nd, triggered by the AFL-CIO, SEIU Local 1199 and the NAACP, now joined by hundreds of organizations we’re headed, to a mass demonstration in Washington D.C. to demand the jobs to put people to work, and back to work. Jobs, economic security, comprehensive immigration reform, safe and renewable energy policy and a reversal of national priorities from making wars to meeting human needs - that’s the message! We’re going to march to demand the change we voted for when Barack Obama was elected. That’s right - create jobs and stop moving money out of education and into wars and prisons. Plus sound from Wall Street Jobs Rally.

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Puerto Rican Political Prisoner Carlos Alberto Torres Free After 30 Years In Prison
with
Carlos Alberto Torres

A discussion with Carlos Alberto Torres, free from behind bars after 30 years. He was convicted of seditious conspiracy - conspiring to use force against the lawful authority of The United States over Puerto Rico. Torres was punished for being a member of the armed clandestine organization the FALN (Armed Forces of National Liberation), which had taken responsibility for bombings that resultedin no deaths or injuries. He was not accused of taking part in these bombings, only of being a member of the FALN. Torres will also discuss the legacy of the recently departed Lolita Lebron, a Puerto Rican nationalist heroine who blazed her way to notoriety as she led three other Puerto Rican nationalists in an attack on the United States House of Representatives on March 1, 1954.

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Judging for Dollars The role of Citizens United in Judicial Selection
With
Adam Skaggs, Counsel in the Democracy Program,
Brennan Center for Justice, NYU School of Law

Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, (2010), was
a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court
holding that corporate funding of independent political
broadcasts in candidate elections cannot be limited under the
First Amendment. Skaggs discussses the likely impact of
corporate and special interest money on judicial elections as
a result of the Citizens United decision including its impact
on eroding confidence in the judicial system.

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Prostrated At the Altar of the Balanced Budget: Sacrificing Social Security, Medicare, and Economic Recovery
with
James Galbraith, Lloyd M. Bentsen, Jr. Chair in Gov't/ Business Relations, Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin

The Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction Commission established by the president, will deliver an attack on Social Security and Medicare dressed up in the sanctimonious rhetoric of deficit reduction. The Obama spending freeze is another sacrifice to the deficit gods. But, the deficit phobia of Wall Street, the press, some economists and practically all politicians is one of the deepest dangers that we face. It's not just the old and the sick who are threatened; we all are. To cut federal budget deficits without first rebuilding the economy is a sure path to stagnation, to a double-dip recession--even to a second Great Depression.
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It's Time to Play "Social Security Survivor"
with
Gerald W. McEntee, Pres., American Federation of State, County
and Municipal Employees

A broad coalition of groups has been formed to defend Social Security. Of all the ideas proposed this one comes from AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee: A new reality show starring the people who want to cut Social Security. He suggests having John Boehner, billionaire
benefit-cut advocate Peter G. Peterson, and Deficit Commission chairs Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles live for a year on the average Social Security benefit of $14,000.

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Arizona, the Anti-Immigrant Testing Ground
with
Isabel Garcia, Director, Pima County Legal Defender's Officeand Co-chair, Coalition de Derechos Humanos

Arizona While a federal judge blocked key controversial provisions of Arizona's new immigration legislation, one of the harshest anti-immigrant laws ever passed in the United States still went into effect on July 29 in that state and the injunction imposed on part of the legislation will be appealed. Eighteen other states are poised to enact similar legislation – pending the outcome of the Arizona litigation. We’ll head to Arizona to analyze the confluence of the immigration, military, border, and economic policies that has made it the country's primary laboratory forimplementing draconian immigration policies.
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PlusBoycott Arizona

The Urban Nomad covers the first press conference of the Sound Strike movement, led by Zack De La Rocha and Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine and Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes. They are organizing a large group of musicians, from Kanye West, to NIN to boycott playing in Arizona, in defiance of their newly enacted immigration law, SB1070. And, in protest of AZ anti-immigrant law, Outernational featuring Tom Morello & Cuéntame have produced a moving version of Woody Guthrie’s song “Deportee” that highlights the struggles and lives of migrants and "deportees" across the country today.

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Fed Up Hyatt Workers Protest Nationwide – Hundreds Arrested
with
. Jessie Ham, Hyatt Regency, Indianapolis where workers are in an organizing drive
. Chris Saez, Shop Steward, Hyatt McCormick, Chicago
. Annemarie Strassel, National Spokesperson, UNITE HERE Hotel Workers Rising Campaign

Facing layoffs and cutbacks, thousands of hotel workers in 15 cities across North America held demonstrations recently, protesting Hyatt and its billionaire ownership family, the Pritzkers—one of the wealthiest and most politically influential families in America. As part of these actions, hundreds of workers and supporters took arrest in coordinated acts of non-violent civil disobedience to express their outrage at how the company is trying to make the recession permanent for workers by outsourcing, slashing jobs and workers' hours at its hotels across the country, despite significantly improving industry conditions and Hyatt's rising share value.

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Another Blow To Democracy :
Defense Attorney Lynne Stewart Given A 10 Year Prison Sentence

Seventy-year old attorney Lynne Stewart, was resentenced to ten years in prison by Manhattan District Court Judge John Koeltl, after an appeals court ruled that her original twenty-eight month prison term was too light. As the 120 month sentence was pronounced attorney Stewart’s supporters, who packed the large overflow courtroom gasped in disbelief and dismay, sobs were audible. Attorney Stewart, visibly shaken rose slowly “I’m somewhat stunned, Judge, by the swift change in my outlook,” she said. “We will continue to struggle on to take all available options to do what we need to do to change this.” She added: “I feel like I let a lot of my good people down,” to which her numerous supporters responded by calling out their belief in her and pledged ongoing support. The sentence was the latest grim chapter where the government has used attorney Stewart to send a chilling message to the legal community to be wary of representation of defendants whom it distains the views of. We’ll bring you excerpts of the reactions to the resentencing with Stewart’s attorney, family and supporters – who vow to intensify their efforts to Free Lynne Stewart.

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Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Report
National Edition
Produced by Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg
****************************
South and North of the Border
with
Mark Weisbrot, Co-Director, Center for Economic & Policy Research, Pres. of Just Foreign Policy, & screen writer of the new Oliver Stone documentary “South of the Border”

Producer Director Oliver Stone and screenwriters Mark Weisbrot and Tariq Ali celebrate the new reality of the independence won by most of the countries of Latin America from U.S. hegemony. They shed new light upon the exciting transformations in the region. We’ll also speak with Mark Weisbrot about developments north of the border and how the U.S. is imposing at home the kind of austerity blood letting that it once reserved for poor indebted countries, including the looming attack on the Social Security Trust Fund which will come when Pres. Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform makes it’s recommendations after the elections.
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Latin American President Responding To International Economic Crisis Advocates Abolition of the International Monetary Fund
with
Rafeal Correa, President of Ecuador

Continuing on our theme of exploring the growing independence ofLatin America from U.S. dominance, Building Bridges brings you high-lights of Ecuadoran President Correa’s presentation on the crisis of global capital, to a packed chamber at the UN at a Conference on economic development. Correa sharply criticized the policies of the International Monetary Fund and went so far as to advocate its abolition. He then proceeded with a sharp critique of capitalism’s relentless drive for profits,

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Fixing A Broken Immigration System: Latino Immigrants Rights Leadership Respond To Obama
with
Oscar Chacon, Executive Director, National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities (NALACC)
and
Benita Jain, Co-Director, Immigrant Defense Project, New York Univ.

Following the major speech by President Obama on immigration, and in the wake of rising xenophobic and racist attacks against the immigrant populations, immigrant rights advocates critique what is at the core of our current policy - that today’s immigrants pose a threat to the nation, and discuss what a new U.S. immigration law that is humane, fair & visionary should look like.
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Mott’s Applesauce Management Is Rotten To The Core
with
Mike LeBerth, President, Local 220 RWDSU
and
Fred Acevedo, Mott's Worker, Member Local 220

More than 300 workers were forced to strike after being treated like a bunch of rotten apples by overpaid executives like CEO Larry Young who made $6.5 million last year in total compensation. The workers’ contract at the Williamson, N.Y. plant owned by Dr. Pepper Snapple expired April 16 and the company demanded a $1.50 per hour wage cut for all workers, a pension freeze for current employees and elimination of a pension for future employees, decreased employer contributions to the company’s 401(k) retirement plan and increased employee contributions toward health care premiums and co-pays.

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Que Viva Puerto Rico Libre!
with
Dylcia Pagan, former Puerto Rican political prisoner, who spent nearly 20 years in prison for her involvement in the Puerto Rican Independence Movement
and
Jan Susler, attorney, distinguished for her work with the Puerto Rican Independence Movement, having represented Puerto Rican political prisoners for over two decades. Served as lead counsel in the efforts culminating in the 1999 presidential commutation of the sentences of 16 Puerto Rican nationalist prisoners

Puerto Rico has endured over 100 years of colonialism by the US. Today it is still a colony that continues vehemently to ask for its basic democratic right of self-determination. Susler discusses the recent hearings on the status of Puerto Rico at the UN Decolonization Committee Hearings on Puerto Rico and Pagan evaluates the status of the Independence Movement and events on the Island now especiallyhighlighing Governor Fortuño's reneging on the deal made with student protesters at the University of Puerto Rico.

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A Mavi Marmara Survivor - The Next Steps Toward Victory
with
Rev. Herbert Daughtry, Pastor House of the Lord Pentecostal Church
and
Kevin Ovenden, a representative from Viva Palestina

When Israeli naval commandos stormed a Turkish ship loaded with humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza. They murdered 9 unarmed passengers. The oldest, Ibrahim Bilgen, was 61. the youngest, Furkan Dogan, a U.S. citizen born in Troy , N.Y., was just 19. Kevin Ovenden, international organizer working to break the blockade of Gaza was an eyewitness to this horror and spoke at a packed meeting in Brooklyn’s historic House of the Lord Pentecostal Church, pastured by the Rev. Herbert Daughtry. He spoke not only about the horror he witnessed butabout the next strategic steps forward to ending the blockade and freeing Palestine.

On June 14, City Council speaker Christine Quinn, Reps. Jerry Nadler, Anthony Weiner, Carolyn Mahoney, Charles Rangel & Manhattan BoroughPresident Scott Stringer gathered in Times Square at the behest of the "Jewish Community Relations Council." They shamelessly demanded that the State Department investigate Kevin Ovenden and the other invited speakers for "ties to terrorism." As a result, another witness to the atrocity a former Turkish parliament member and human rights activist Ahmet Faruk Unsal, was not allowed to board a plane from Turkey to join the event at the House of the Lord Church. This was a clear attempt to not only deny the passengers' right to speak but to deny the people of the United States theright to hear their words.

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Selections from Building Bridges Live Coverage
OF MASS RALLY OF NYC PUBLIC WORKERS
AGAINST THE CUTS!

With
. Michael Mulgrew, Pres., United Federation of Teachers
. Judy Wessler, Dir., Commission on the Public’s Health System
. John Samuelsen, Pres. , Transport Workers Union, Local 100
. Ed Ott, Distinguished Lecturer, Murphy Inst.of Workers Studies,
CUNY; former Executive Director, NYC Central Labor Council
. David Jones, Pres. & CEO of the Community Service Society

A coalition of municipal labor unions, turned out tens of thousands of
workers and community activits to protest job losses and service cuts
that will permanently alter the lives of NYC workers and residents.
Mayor Bloomberg is sharpening his carving knife and on the chopping
block are thousands of civil service jobs: educators, transit workers,
public health, social service workers, and library workers. The loss of
these jobs mean reduced transit services, education, healthcare, fire
services, and the myriad services provided by public sector workers.
And, as the city hemorrhages public sector jobs and services, it
aggressively advances the privatization of public sector jobs and the
services they provide. It’s an all out attack on public sector unions and
the workers, and benefits those unions fought for. So in the fight for its
life, public workers and their unions say hell no to pro-corporate
policies that serve the wealthy at the expense of the majority.

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Play 3-5 pm

Play 5-6pm

Above are links to the
WBAI (99.5FM) Live coverage of June 16 labor rally
against budget cutbacks at City Hall.
Hosted by Ken Nash and Mimi Rosenberg, co-hosts of
"Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Report,"
regularly heard Mondays at 7pm.

You can also download sound by going to the WBAI archives
http://archive.wbai.org/allshows.php
for June 16 3-6 pm

A coalition of municipal labor unions, are fed up and can’t take it anymore –
they’re saying that job losses and service cuts will permanently alter the lives
of City workers and the city’s residents. The Mayor is sharpening his carving
knife and on the chopping block are thousands of civil service jobs, educators,
transit workers, public health and social service workers, and library workers.
The loss of these jobs mean we are all faced with reduced transit services,
education, healthcare, and fire services, and the myriad services provided
by public sector workers. And, at the same time the city hemorrhages public
sector jobs and services, it aggressively advances the privatization of public
sector jobs and the services and resources they provide. Hey, it’s an all out
attack on public sector unions and the workers, and benefits those unions
fought for. So in the fight for its life, public workers and their unions say hell
no to pro-corporate policies that serve the wealthy at the expense of the
majority of New Yorkers.

The broadcast included the voices from the demonstration including
speeches, special interviews, and analysis of recent budget decisions
of Mayor Bloomberg, the City Council, and Governor Paterson, and the
State Legislature in Albany.

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Domestic Workers Urge NYS Pass Fair Labor Standards In 2010
with
Barbara Young, Domestic Workers United, Ed Ott, labor activist, Hector Figueroa, Sec. Treasurer Local 32BJ, George Gresham, 1199 SEIU Pres., Esther Cooper Jackson, civil rights activist, State Senator Diane Savino, N.Y. City Councilwoman Gale Brewer

Legendary Civil Rights-era activist Esther Cooper Jackson, distinguished labor activists alongside of cheering nannies, housekeepers, and elderly caregivers raised their voices in tribute to domestic workers and demanded basic benefits, such as paid leave, and notice, & protection from discrimination by passage of Senator Diane Savino’s andAssemblyman Keith Wright's Domestic Workers Bill of Rights which would make it the first, and hopefully not the last state to give justice to domestic workers.Recently both the NYS Senate and Assembly passed differing versions of the domestic workers bill of rights. The bill is in conference committee and then goes to Governor Patterson for his signature or veto.

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An Israeli In Palestine: Resisting Dispossession
with
Jeff Halper, Founder, Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions

The actions of the brave band of activists from the Freedom flotilla
to break Israel’s blockade of gaza has resulted in worldwide
condemnation of the blockade and the suffering it has caused. But
what of the wider apartheid policies of the state of Israel towards
the Palestinian people both within Israel and in the occupied
territories? Drawing on his many years of directly challenging Israel’s
treatment of the Palestinians, Jeff Halper offers one of the most
insightful analyses of the occupation you’ll hear. Halper discusses
how Israel can not maintain its exclusive Jewish character without
imposing on the Palestinian population policies of ethnic cleansing,
occupation and discrimination, expressed most graphically in its
ongoing demolition of thousands of Palestinian homes, both inside
Israel and in the Occupied Territories. His voice cries out to be
heard as does the plight of the Palestinian people.

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Israel, Palestine and US
With
George Galloway, former British Parliament Member
and founder Viva Palestina

We present a wide ranging interview with George Galloway on the
key role of the U.S. maintaining Israeli apartheid policies towards the
Palestinians. Galloway talks about the recent challenges to the Israeli
blockade of Gaza, possible changes in U.S. public opinion and the
Obama Adminstration’s views on Israel and Palestine as well his
evolving views on a one state solution.

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The State of Working America
with
. Avis Jones-DeWeever, Director of Research & Public Policy,
National Council of Negro Women
. Juan Cartagena, General Counsel & Vice Pres. of Advocacy,
Community Service Society,
. Robert Pollin, Co- Dir., Political Economy Research Institute
& economics professor, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

The United States is experiencing its worst jobs crisis since the
Great Depression. Nearly 16 million Americans, our family, friends,
and neighbors are out of work. This national crisis demands a bold
plan to put people back to work. We must understand why there’s
a jobs crisis, and create a plan that would create millions of jobs
each year, every year. We do the analysis of the jobs crisis and
discuss what must be done to put America back to work.

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TWU Local 100 – Keep America Moving - Fighting Layoffs
FeaturingJohn Samuelsen, President, TWU, Local 100
Rev. Jesse Jackson, President, Rainbow PUSH Coalition
Larry Hanley. ATU International Vice President

2500 Transit workers and supporters rallied at NYC’s Penn Station in an event timed to coincide with other actions taken around the nation to protest the insufficiency of federal funding for mass transit. The Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke as part of the Keep America Moving Coalition, an alliance of transit workers, advocates for workers and the poor, and environmentalists. For Local 100, the event was not only about Keep America Moving, but also about the immanent layoff of hundreds of Station Agents with threats of many more layoffs in other titles including bus drivers. Union members expressed their profound anger over the firings, which are seen as unnecessary because of the availability of $140 million in federal stimulus funds which could be used to cover operating expenses.
***********************************************
The Greek Meltdown
with
Prof. Costas Panayotakis, Professor of Sociology,NYC College of Technology, CUNY.

After weeks of massive, tumultuous worker protests over the austerity measures being forced on the Greece as part of the EU rescue package, the measures were approved by the Greek Parliament and the leaders of the European Union. The $146 billion three-year package would indirectly bail out the European banks that hold most of the Greek debt.by attempting to solve the crisis on the backs of ordinary Greeks. It raises taxes as well as imposes deep cuts in public sector wages and pensions in both public and private sectors. If it indeed works as intended, it will intensify the Greek recession, unemployment and poverty. This may exacerbate the very debt crisis it is supposed to solve

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Taking the Bull by the Horns: Labor Takes on Wall Street

Thousands of people marched on Wall Street April 29, in a major protest of financial sector greed and lending practices by big banks. Taking to the streets of downtown Manhattan, 10,000 labor and community groups shouted and jeered at the offices surrounding them, demanding three major changes to Wall Street culture. The first is to call off the lobbyists fighting regulatory reform. The second is to stop the incessant focus on market speculation over business lending. The third is to tax Wall Street to fund job creation The rally, was one of the largest in recent memory to take place at the epicenter of finance capital Wall Street.
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The Socialist Bank of North Dakota with Dr Rozanne Everson Junker, political scientist

We’ve talked about a public option in health careBut what about for the banks?
Thanks to Michael Moore we have this case study.

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Thousands Gather For May Day, Immigrant Rights Rally In Arizona
with
Isabel Garcia, Director of the Pima County Legal Defenders and Co-chair of the Coalition de Derechos Humanos, Arizona
and
Leilani Clark, Youth Organizer, Coalition de Derechos Humanos

Immigrants rights organizers report on the tens of thousands of immigrant rights demonstrators who rallied on May Day in Arizona to protest the tough new immigration law 1070, and state and federal law enforcement harassment of Arizona’s immigrants, as they demand that stalled legislative reforms in Congress proceed.

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Will Obama Stop The Supreme Court’s Gallop To The Right
with
Theodore Shaw, former Director-Counsel and President of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, where he litigated civil rights cases at the US Supreme Court, and former trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division, US Department of Justice

On the retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens we’ll look at the myth and reality of his legacy, possible nominees to replace him and the current and seemingly continuing drift to the right of the US Supreme Court and whether the Obama Administration is likely to or can move beyond appeasement of the center-right.

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Massey Energy Company Flaunts Power, Evades Regulation and Miners Die
with
. Tony Oppegard, Former General Counsel, Kentucky Dept. of Mine Safety
. Wes Addington, Mine Safety Project, Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center

PLUS
Mine Workers Pres. Roberts:
Massey’s Blankenship Should Be Jailed

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Massey Energy Company Flaunts Power, Evades Regulation and Miners Die
with
. Tony Oppegard, Former General Counsel, Kentucky Dept. of Mine Safety
. Wes Addington, Mine Safety Project, Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center

Owners of the Upper Branch Mine were warned over two years ago about a pattern of violations, which would have allowed far stricter federal oversight of the mine. But, while it continued to amass violations, the Mine Safety & Health Administration allowed Massey Energy Co.to avoid meaningful discipline, and the question as 29 miners die is what must be done to beef up mine-safety enforcement?

PLUS
Mine Workers Pres. Roberts:
Massey’s Blankenship Should Be Jailed

In a speech at the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO convention, Mine Workers
(UMWA) President Cecil Roberts says that Massey Energy Co.’s
continued inaction on safety violations at its Upper Big Branch Mine,
should send Massey CEO Donald Blankenship to jail.

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Don’t Mourn Organize:
The Loss of & Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
with
Dr. Clayborne Carson, African American professor of history at Stanford University, and Director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research & Education Institute. Since 1985 he has directed the Martin Luther King Papers Project, a long-term project to edit and publish the papers of Martin Luther King, Jr.
and
Dr. Vincent G. Harding, African American historian and a scholar of religion and society. An activist as well, he is best known for his work with Dr. King (Harding drafted King's 1967 anti-Vietnam War speech) and his writings about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

April 14, 1967 Dr. King delivered a troubled speech, The Other America, made against the background of urban rebellions, pleas for black power, and the Vietnam War. The speech was masterful, and riveting expounding on the threats of militarism, racism, and economic degradation and wealth disparity – the promise of American and the reality of its duality based on race and class. Dr. Clayborne Carson and Dr. Vincent Harding discuss Dr. King, the context for the Other America then and now.

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Hundreds of Thousands Continue The March For Immigrant Rights
with
Amy Sugimori, Executive Director La Fuente
and
Laura Vasquez, Legislative Analyst, Immigration Policy Project, La Raza

There are more than 11 million immigrants in the country, and efforts to fix the current immigration system have failed in recent years. Liberals have sought a path for citizenship for undocumented workers, while conservatives have been just as adamant in opposing what they have called plans for amnesty. Both the Democrats and the Republicans do support efforts to secure the border with Mexico, albeit with some tactical differentiation and degree of militarization. But, what is the agenda of the masses of protestors carrying banners as they massed in Washington recently to march for immigration reform, & what are the prospects for their achieving progressive legislation?

Plus
REV. JESSE JACKSON'S SPEECH AT THE MASSIVE IMMIGRATION REFORM MARCH IN WASHINGTON D.C. ON MARCH 21, 2010

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