Building Bridges Radio: Your Community & Labor Report

Protest NYC Police Kill Again; NYPD Anti-Islam Film Cover-Up

2012-02-13T08:22:00.000-08:00

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New York Police Dept. Kills Again - Over 1,000 in the Bronx Protest
With Jose,
Stop and Frisk Campaign, Occupy Wall Street

In 2011, at least 700,000 almost entirely African-American and Latinos
in NYC were subjected to the NYPD’s unwarranted stop and frisks.
Most recently, the Mayor’s and his police department’s policies and
practices further resulted in the killing of unarmed Rahmarley Graham,
18 years old in his own home, and the vicious beating of Jatiek Reed
and arrest on false charges. The discriminatory policies and practices
are the catalyst for the frightening explosion in incarceration. And then
for those dragnetted into the criminal justice system, upon their release
is the stigmatization and systemic disenfranchisement from virtually all
opportunities and benefits of the society – this is the new “Jim Crow”.
***********
COALITION CALLS FOR RESIGNATION OF NYPD COMMISSIONER
OVER ANTI-ISLAM FILM COVER-UP
With
Amna Akbar, An Attorney and a Representative of the Muslim
American Civil Liberties Union
Imam Al Hajj Talib Abdur-Rashid, Pres., The Islamic Leadership
Council of Metropolitan NY
Cyrus McGoldrick, Council on American Islamic Relations
Jumaane D. Williams, N.Y. City Council Member
bdeen Jabara, civil rights attorney

A Coalition of civil liberties groups came to NY City Hall to call for the
resignations of NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly & Deputy Commissioner
Paul Browne due to revelations that they covered up their roles in the
production of an islamophobic propaganda film “The Third Jihad” that
was shown to at least 1,500 NYPD officers and to law enforcement
around the country. "The Third Jihad" was produced by the shadowy
non-profit group the Clarion Fund that had produced an earlier
anti-Muslim propaganda film which was distributed to millions of voters
in swing states just prior to the 2008 election, apparently backed by a
$17 million donation from a "longtime contributor" to neo-conservatives.
The Clarion Fund also has links to theright-wing Israeli group Aish
HaTorah. The Clarion Fund's previous documentary attacking Muslims'
'war on the West' also attracted support from the casino magnate
Sheldon Adelson, a major supporter of Israel, who has helped
reshapethe Republican presidential primary by pouring millions of
dollars into a super PAC that backs Newt Gingrich. Both Kelly’s and
Browne’s participation in and coverup of their role in the film indicates
a total disregard for the civil rights of American Muslims and a complete
lack of respect for one of the city’s largest religious communities. The
NYPD’s Commissioner’s misrepresentations must also be seen in the
context of a recent series of investigative reports by the Associated Press
that revealed that undercover NYPD officers in a so-called "Demographics
Unit" spied on Muslim communities and houses of worship with the
assistance of individuals linked to the CIA.

Verizon Dodges All Taxes - 26:19

2012-02-07T11:30:00.000-08:00

TAXES, WE DON’T PAY NO STINKIN' TAXES SAYS VERIZON,
AS THE 99% CRIES FOUL!
With
The Tax Dodgers, OWS Occupy the Boardroom, United NY, Make
the Road NY, Strong Economy for All, NY Communities for Change,
Vocal New York, C.W.A., 99% NY, and other members of the 99%

Verizon Communications has been identified as one of the country’s
worst tax dodgers. Between 2008 - 2010, Verizon actually received
$951 million net in federal tax refunds, our public dollars, making their
effective federal tax rate average to 3% or less. So, an outraged
coalition decided to “occupy” Verizon headquarters to call attention
to the fact that corporations like Verizon, GE, Bank of America, and
others are not paying their fair share of taxes, juxtaposed with a time
when the minimum wage is too low to permit people to pay their bills
and feed their families. The occupiers came to say corporate
‘tax dodgers’ like Verizon, that made over $25 billion in pre-tax US
income, and paid $173 million in compensation to their top five
executives, with $56 million going to their CEO alone – and spending
$52 million for lobbying was obscene while at the same time, since
2008 laying off 20,000 employees.

Meanwhile, in the midst of the occupation, a new sports franchise,
the “Tax Dodgers” had the audacity to show up. One of the players,
claiming to be former Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg introduced the
“Tax Dodgers,” who he explained symbolized the lobbyists and other
groups who likely received a portion of the money that Verizon saved
in taxes, while the occupiers cried foul. Tune in to hear the response
of the 99%ers to Verizon and to the Tax Dodgers, who demonstrated
their agility at stealing bases!

http://www.archive.org/stream/VerizonPaysNoTaxes

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http://www.archive.org/download/VerizonPaysNoTaxes/VerizonTaxesntl2.mp3

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STOPPING the NYPD's Stop and Frisk

2012-01-31T07:42:00.000-08:00

STOPPING THE NYPD’s Stop and Frisk
With
Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow:
Mass Incarceration In The Age of Colorblindness
Jamal Mims, Occupy Wall Street
Mary Black, and Benita Rivera, parents
Leticia James, N.Y. City Council member

More than 700,000, according to NYPD documentation predominantly
African-Americans and Latinos have been profiled for stops and frisks,
as a result of what is now referred to as the “new”Jim Crow policies of
policing and inflicting state terror on communities of color. But, in
response to the increasing criminalization of communities of color is a
burgeoning movement prepared to, STOP Stop and Frisk as they say
no to the new Jim Crow.

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America Beyond Capitalism with Gar Alperovitz - 28'

2012-01-24T16:01:00.000-08:00

America Beyond Capitalism:
Reclaiming Our Wealth, Our Liberty and Our Democracy
With
Gar Alperovitz, Professor of Political Economy, University of Maryland
and co-founder of the Democracy Collaborative

As discontent with the economic and political status quo mounts in
the wake of the "great recession," Gar Alperovitz's “America Beyond
Capitalism” suggests a bottom-up effort currently already underway
in communities across the U.S., which point in the direction of,
among other things worker-owned cooperatives, and community
land trusts, supported by policies and resources from municipal,
state and federal government. Ongoing economic pain is likely to
continue to inspire such initiatives to demand further action to
democratize the ownership of capital, so that ownership goes to
the 99% in new ways rather than to the top 1%.”

http://www.archive.org/stream/AmericaBeyondCapitalismWithGarAlperovitz
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http://www.archive.org/download/AmericaBeyondCapitalismWithGarAlperovitz/garntl2.mp3
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Occupy Wall St. Stands With Indigenous Americans

2012-01-16T12:04:00.000-08:00

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“Un-Settling Occupation” OWS Stands With Indigenous Americans
With
Janice Richards, Oglala Sioux , activist and educator
Firewolf Nelson-Wong, Dine, AIM member and activist
Joseph, indigenous activist
Christopher Hedges, journalist, activist
Raymond Two Hawks, Narragansett Nation, Rhode Island
Territory

On the 121st anniversary of the massacre at Wounded Knee,
indigenous people connected the colonial occupation of Manhattan
to Occupy Wall Street - an occupation of already occupied land.
They gathered in order to initiate an open dialogue with OWS, to
raise local and national awareness of ongoing Native struggles,
and to recognize that the injustices and inequalities we currently
confront are the bricks and mortar of conquest and settler
colonialism. Un-settling “occupation” called upon OWS in its
yearnings to voice the experiences of the 99% to make space for
those most marginalized. As stated during the evening, let us
pass the mic, turn up the volume, listen to Native voices, and
break down the culture of domination – and find roads which we
can walk down together

Banking - Building a Public Option - 27:22

2012-01-10T14:11:00.000-08:00

2012 – We’re Overdue for a Public Banking System
With
Timothy A. Canova,
Betty Hutton Williams Prof. of International Economic Law
Chapman University School of Law

The federal government’s response to the financial crisis has been
a parade of bailout programs injecting public funds into the largest
banks and financial institutions, with precious little assistance for
everyone else. As in the 1930s, Depression failure to achieve a
strong and sustainable recovery should open the door to other
alternatives such as parallel public banking institutions, at both the
federal and state levels, to fill the unmet credit needs stemming
from the massive failures in private banking. In banks owned by
federal and state governments, there is far greater public
accountability in the bank’s oversight, direction, and lending
practices than in private institutions. This so-called “public option”
in banking has a rich tradition in American history which can serve
as models today including the 30's Reconstruction Finance Corp.
at the Federal level and the Bank of North Dakota which has been
successfully operating since the 1930’s and is the model for a number
of attempts today at the state level including California to duplicate its
success
**********************************
Plus "The Socialist Bank of North Dakota"
with
Dr. Rozanne Everson Junker, political scientist

North Dakota has long had a state bank which unlike private banks
has faithfully served the people and the state in good times and bad.
We've talked about a public option for health care, but why not for
banks? Thanks to Michael Moore for this case study.

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Justice for Jazz Artists, What No Minimum Wage & No Pension? 25:58

2012-01-01T15:29:00.000-08:00

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Justice for Jazz Artists, What No Minimum Wage & No Pension?
With
John O'Connor, Vice President AFM's Local 802
Keisha St. Joan, jazz vocalist

N.Y. City’s musicians’ union has been leafleting outside The Blue
Note, a major jazz club, in a campaign to gain pension benefits
and a minimum wage for jazz artists. The disagreement between
the union and club owners dates back to 2005, when union
leaders and the night clubs successfully lobbied the NYS
Legislature for a reduction in the sales tax on tickets with the
extra revenue to be used to pay for pension and health benefits
for the artists. While jazz has been recognized by the U.S.
Congress as “America’s National Treasure,” and clubs like the
Blue Note, Birdland, the Jazz Standard, Iridium and the Village
Vanguard are still filling seats and charging hefty prices, the jazz
players find themselves facing old age with no pension and little
in the way of Social Security, since much of their pay was in cash
and off the books. “It’s just a sin that we have no pension,” said
Keisha St. Joan, 72, a jazz vocalist who was distributing leaflets.
“I will not have a pension before I die.”

Occupy Wall St. Bid to Reclaim Space, OWS Jobs For All - 28'

2011-12-26T13:15:00.000-08:00

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OWS Undaunted By Dozens Of Arrests In Bid To Reclaim Space,
Continues Its Work
With
The 99 Percent

Celebrating its 3rd month of existence OWS came to take back The
Commons, a space owned by Trinity Church, to assert freedom of
expression and the right to assemble as fundamental freedoms.
While more than 50 arrests ensued still through creative, bold
actions OWS has renewed a sense of hope, revived a belief in
community and awakened a sprit of resistance. “To Occupy”,
the word has been repurposed by OWS to mean to come
together in a resistance movement with people of many colors,
genders and political persuasions who can no longer tolerate the
greed and corruption of the 1% and their governmental shills.
*********************************
Demands For Jobs For All Grows
With
Connie Kaplan, 99er, activist
Eric Lernerl Cindy Klumb
Tony Perkins

The Labor Outreach Committee, of OWS, POP, OWS en Espanol,
The Jobless Working Group OWS and Occupy Harlem are among
an expanding chorus advocating for a democratically controlled
public works and public service program, with direct government
employment, to create tens of millions of new jobs at good union
wages. The new jobs will go to meeting the needs of the 99%.
The program would be funded by raising taxes on the rich and
corporations and by ending U.S. wars and would be open to all,
regardless of immigration status or criminal record.

Occupy West Coast Shuts Down Ports, While NYC Targeted Goldman Sachs - 28'

2011-12-19T08:36:00.000-08:00

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Occupy West Coast Shuts Down Ports,
While NYC Targeted Goldman Sachs
With
Maria Cardenas, Occupy Oakland
Michael Novick, Occupy LA
OWS demonstrators, NY at Goldman Sachs

The Occupy movement in West Coast port cities called for
shutdowns of their ports. In solidarity OWS, NY targeted
Wall Street giant, the owner of half of one of the world’s
largest transportation and shipping outfits, Goldman Sachs.
The ports were targeted because of the firing of port truckers
organizing at SSA terminals in LA, owned by Goldman Sachs
and the attempt to rupture ILWU union jurisdiction in
Longview, WA by EGT, an exporter led by Bunge Ltd, owned
by 1% bankers which reported a $2.5 billion profit last year
while impoverishing workers in Argentina and Brazil.
These economic blockades were in response to the nationally
coordinated attacks on the Occupy movement.
******************

Newark Unemployment Protest in 6th Month is a Model for the Nation 28'

2011-12-13T17:15:00.000-08:00

Newark Unemployment Protest in 6th Month is a Model for the Nation
with
Larry Hamm, Chairman, People's Organization for Progress, Newark, N.J.

The U.S. economy is struggling, but in many black communities
Americans are in the throes of a depression. With unemployment
exacting an outsize toll on African-American men and women, a
coalition initiated by the People’s Organization for Progress has
been demonstrating daily for over 6 months in a busy intersection
in Newark flanking a statue of Abraham Lincoln outside the Essex
County Courthouse. This persistent and visible protest in one
location has received widespread attention throughout the City
and support from labor, student, religious and other community
groups including Occupy Newark who see unemployment as a
crucial civil rights issue emerging from the country’s economic
woe. "We are more than a half-century away from the Montgomery
bus boycott, but we are dealing with issues just as pressing,"
said Larry Hamm, chairman of the People’s Organization for
Progress. Hamm and like-minded activists started the 381-day
protest modeled after one of the most famous battles of the
Civil Rights era — the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955-56.
They are calling on President Obama and Congress to institute
a jobs program akin to the Works Progress Administration of
the Great Depression, that employed millions of unskilled
Americans in public works jobs. Unemployment is 16 percent
among black Americans, a rate rivaling those of the 1930s.
Newark’s jobless rate hovers around 15%, while the national
rate is 8.6 percent.

http://www.archive.org/stream/BuildingBridgesNewarkUnemploymentProtestIn6thMonthIsAModelForThe
play stream

http://www.archive.org/download/BuildingBridgesNewarkUnemploymentProtestIn6thMonthIsAModelForThe/hammdecemberntl.mp3
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Occupy City Univeristy of NY Students and Faculty Protest - 27'

2011-12-06T08:20:00.000-08:00

NYC Students Stand Firm After CUNY Police Bully Them During Occupy
City Univeristy of NY (CUNY) Protest Over Tuition Hikes
With
Occupy CUNY Student Members Hector Agredano & Emma Francis-Snyder Barbara Bowen, President of CUNY Professional Staff Congress

Students, faculty, Occupy CUNY and OWS demonstrated outside
Baruch College to protest the Board of Trustees' meeting, where the
Board passed measures to further squeeze the public out of CUNY.
Even though these meetings are legally obligated to be open to the
public, Baruch's president announced that the Vertical Campus would
be closed to almost everyone by 3pm. However, protestors reclaimed
CUNY on the outside, and exposed the Board's illegitimate actions inside.
Police violence has already occurred at Baruch, in response to protests
about tuition hikes, and unfair labor practices targeted toward adjunct
and other faculty, and the privatization of the public CUNY system. But,
like pro-democracy movements from UC-Davis to Occupy Wall Street
the protestors stood firm - our schools and communities are not for sale,
and we will not give up our rights to free speech and assembly.
FREE CUNY!

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Vanishing Safety Net; Domino's Pizza Slavery 27:35

2011-11-29T10:29:00.000-08:00

The Vanishing Safety Net:
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program (TANF) at 15 Years
with
Tim Casey, attorney, Legal Momentum and longtime welfare advocate

In Aug.1996, Pres. Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and
Work Opportunity Act, replacing Aid to Families with Dependant
Children with TANF as the national welfare program for needy
Americans. 15 years later, the truth is that TANF has shredded
the safety net. It has been a disaster for poor families, most
of whom are headed by single mothers. Benefit receipt has fallen
from three-fifths of poor children pre-reform to just one-fifth of
poor children post-reform, and benefit amounts have plummeted.
The shriveled safety net condemns millions of women & children
to poverty so extreme that many are deprived sufficient food,
housing, and utility services. As TANF turns 15, we'll look at the
necessity to restore and extend adequate benefits and surmise
what is likely to happen to the reauthorization of TANF which
will be before the Congress.
*******************
Domino’s Pizza Delivers Slavery With A Smile
With
Pastor Robert Brashear, Sweatshop Free NY
Carlos Rodriquez, Justice Will Be Served
Vincent Cao, Justice Will Be Served

Domino’s moguls giddily reap profits off the backs of workers,
watching their corporate sales surge to $1.57 billion in 2010.
Patrick Doyle, President raked in $5.7 million in 2010 and
Dave Melton, NYC franchise had $4 million in yearly sales.
Meanwhile Domino’s workers work up to 78 hours a week,
but many are paid for only half of these hours at $4.40
an hour. Now that Domino workers are organizing Domino
who refuses to comply with labor laws is retaliating against
the workers. But, Justice Will Be Served!

http://www.archive.org/stream/BuildingBridgesVanishingSafetyNetDominosPizzaSlavery

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http://www.archive.org/download/BuildingBridgesVanishingSafetyNetDominosPizzaSlavery/welfarentl.mp3

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Building Bridges Radio: NYC's OWS Occupies the Brooklyn Bridge - 27:22

2011-11-21T10:18:00.000-08:00

Occupy Wall Street Occupies The Brooklyn Bridge As Tens Of Thousands Say
We’re Here To Take Back The Wealth We Created And They Covet And Control!
With
The 99%

Angry and reeling from the horrific military attack which Bloomberg
perpetrated on peaceful, sleeping protestors fighting for economic justice
in our increasingly unjust and undemocratic country, in a National Day of
Action both to celebrate the 2-month birthday of Occupy Wall Street, and
protest the outrage of the eviction, an incredible, diverse group, poured
into the streets – “all day, all night Occupy Wall Street”! The 99%
delivered a powerful message that the domination of society by a tiny
elite of super-wealthy individuals and corporations, harnessing government
to do their bidding was unacceptable. The days protests were capped off
by a rally and march over the Brooklyn Bridge by tens of thousands
determined to take back and redistribute the wealth of this country to those
who created it – the 99%.
********************

http://www.archive.org/stream/NycsOwsOccupiesTheBrooklynBridge

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http://www.archive.org/download/NycsOwsOccupiesTheBrooklynBridge/BklynBridgentl.mp3

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Greek Tragedy, Europe’s Achilles Heel?; OWS Sotheby Workers Rally at $500 Million Auction 27:53

2011-11-14T10:10:00.000-08:00

Greek Tragedy, Europe’s Achilles Heel?
with
Leo Panitch, Professor of Political Science at York
University, Canada and Editor of the Socialist Register.

As the G-20 economic summit met austerity was sweeping Europe,
the future of the Eurozone was in doubt and then the Greek
government collapsed over its proposed new debt agreement with
the European Union. The deal was reached by European leaders to
stabilize the Euro and to avoid Greek default on its debt to the banks
or its leaving the euro currency zone. Anger among Greek citizens
stems from the proposed agreement’s focus on more austerity to
repay the bank loans leading to increased unemployment. A new
world recession may be drawing closer after the G-20 failed to
agree on fresh financial help for distressed countries.
***************
Hey Union Busting Is Disgusting! -
Joining the Sotheby Workers Protest with OWS

Some 400 protesters in NYC greeted Sotheby's $500 million
auction with a high-spirited, very high-decibel demonstration in
solidarity with its locked-out workers. Despite making record
profits last year, the auction house is demanding wage and benefit
cuts, and the replacement of skilled, union workers with unskilled,
non-union temporary workers.Several unions, including other
Teamster locals, UAW, CWA, LiUNA, TWU, SEIU and UFT were
represented at the demonstration, together with Hunter, NYU
and Columbia University students and faculty, and of course
Occupied Wall Street activists six of whom were arrested in an
act of civil disobedience.

http://www.archive.org/stream/GreekTragedyEuropesAchillesHeelOwsSothebyWorkersRallyAt500

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http://www.archive.org/download/GreekTragedyEuropesAchillesHeelOwsSothebyWorkersRallyAt500/panitchntl.mp3

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Unemployment Insurance Cuts and Goldman Sachs Protest Arrests - 27:25

2011-11-08T06:52:00.000-08:00

Unraveling the Unemployment Insurance Lifeline
with
George Wentworth, Staff Attorney, National Employment Law Project

At a time when U.S. corporations are stockpiling cash, it’s outrageous
that state lawmakers have the audacity to make jobless workers pay
for decades of irresponsible business tax breaks that ultimately
undermined state unemployment insurance finances. But, corporate
lobbyists have ushered through legislative measures, behind closed
doors and with no public debate, of cuts to state unemployment
insurance programs when more people are out of work for longer
than any other period in generations. We have better wakeup and
smell the coffee, realize the consequences of what will be drastic
measures before our unemployment benefits are no longer there
when we need them.
**************
Plus

Occupy Wall Street Protesters including Pulitzer Prize winning
author Christopher Hedges arrested at Goldman Sachs headquarters
in NYC as they chant “Crooks & Thieves, Protected By Police!
The Criminals Are Inside"

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Black, Latino, Asian American Unionists March for Occupy Wall Street 27:56

2011-10-30T16:10:00.000-07:00

Neither Rain Nor Snow Stop Black, Latino, Asian American
Unionists March for Occupy Wall Street

Despite the rain and snow of the season’s first big storm hundreds
in NYC braved the weather to hail Occupy Wall Street and vowed
to help protect the protesters from the increasingly inclement
weather as winter approaches and the increasing attacks by the
city governments nationwide. The rally at City Hall and march to
the Occupy site at Wall Street’s Freedom Square was organized by
the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, the Labor Council for Latin
American Advancement, the NAACP and the Asian, Pacific
American Labor Alliance all representing workers who have been
particularly hard hit by the recession. This Rally and March signaled
the increasing movement of people of color both in support and
joining the Occupy Wall Street movement.

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Building Bridges: Occupy Wall St. Protests - Sotheby's, Stop & Frisk, Verizon - 27:58

2011-10-23T13:52:00.000-07:00

All Day, All Week – N.Y.C. Occupy Wall Street Actions
atSotheby’s Auction Lockout,
Harlem Protest Against Stop and Fisk
andVerizon Workers Contract Protest

It’s been a busy week for NYC’s Occupy Wall Street protesters.
Building Bridges brings you coverage of three of the multitude of
actions the've joined with community and labor activists. First we
went to NYC’s posh Upper East Side where Teamster Local 814
art handlers have been locked out for months in a contract dispute
over cutbacks and outsourcing demands by Sotheby’s Auction house
which caters to the 1%. Then uptown to Harlem where hundreds
demonstrated in front of the Harlem 28th Precinct where 33 activists
led by noted author, activist and Princeton Prof. Cornel West and
veteran revolutionary fighter Carl Dix were arrested protesting the
N.Y. Police Department’s racist, illegal, illegitimate stop and frisk
policy which is on track to impact over 700,000 people, mostly Black
and Latino youth, in 2011. Then downtown to Wall Street to protest
for a fair contract for 45,000 Verizon workers whose negotiations are
not going well. Like Sotheby, Verizon is an extremely profitable
company whose demands include cutbacks and outsourcing.

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Occupy Wall Street Wins, Then Celebrates with Citywide Protests - 28:55

2011-10-16T18:05:00.000-07:00

Occupy Wall Street Wins, Then Celebrates with Citywide Protests

Following a huge and rapid public outcry that included hundreds of
thousands of online petition signatures and phone calls to New York
City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's office, a threatened clean-up/eviction
of Occupy Wall Street's home base at LIberty Square was postponed
just before the 7 AM deadline on Friday, October 14 as thousands of
99%ers massed at Liberty Square to defend Occupy Wall Street.

The next day saw a sea of protests starting at Liberty Square when
thousands marched around Wall Street targeting Chase Bank which
leads all others in predatory foreclosure evictions. It moved to college
protests at Washington Square Park featuring numerous issues including
health care. Tens of thousands of protesters then converged on
Times Square culminating a day in solidarity with protesters around
the country and the world in a new mass movement which is now
just one month old.

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Occupy Wall Street plus Labor and Community Support = 28:06

2011-10-08T15:36:00.000-07:00

“Occupy Wall Street” Creates a Movement
with Labor & Community Support Despite Police Repression.

Occupy Wall Street, the movement whose organizational forms & demands
are evolving continues to pick up support including organized labor.
Transport Union Local 100, hospitals Local 1199, city workers' DC 37
AFSCME, UAW Local 2110, Teamster Local 814 and building service
workers Local 32-BJ and the United Federation of Teachers were just
some of the unions which pledged solidarity at a massive support rally
in NYC which drew tens of thousands. An earlier rally saw thousands
march from the newly named “Liberty Square” on Wall Street to Police
Plaza over what they view as excessive force and unfair treatment by
the police. The foundation of “Occupy Wall Street” is recognition the
richest 1% own more than half of this country’s wealth while 1 in 5 in
New York City live in poverty. Instead of bailing out people and helping
them get jobs, government bailed out the same institutions that had
created the economic crisis, giving them trillions of dollars. "Occupy
Wall Street” continues to grow and represent the 99% of the have
nots against the have mores and more as they march and rally
and gain more adherents across the city, the nation and the world.

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Building Bridges Radio: Abolish the Death Penalty - in memoriam of Troy Davis

2011-10-06T17:18:00.000-07:00

Building Bridges Radio: Abolish the Death Penalty - in memoriam of Troy Davis

Abolish the Death Penalty - in memoriam of Troy Davis - 28:04

2011-10-04T20:26:00.000-07:00

Do you know what it says on the death certificate for anyone
who’s executed?
with
Stephen Bright, President and Senior Counsel of the Southern
Center for Human Rights, law professor who twice argued and
won cases before the United States Supreme Court, involving
racial composition of the juries. He has testified on many
occasions before committees of both the U.S. Senate and House
of Representatives. His and the Center's work has been the
subject of a documentary film, "Finding for Life in the Death Belt",
and two books, "Proximity to Death" and "Finding Life on Death
Row".

When they say cause of death, do you know what the word is?
“It’s homicide”. Homicide! It certainly felt like murder watching the
TroyDavis hashtag tick away the last minutes of aman’s life. The
death penalty is the ultimate denial of human rights. It is the
premeditated and cold-blooded killing of a human being by the state.
While, this cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment is done in the
name of justice it violates the right to life as proclaimed in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Building Bridges opposes
the death penalty in all cases without exception regardless of the
nature of the crime, the characteristics of the offender, or the method
used by the state to kill the prisoner. This show, in memoriam of
Troy Davis (9/21/2011), Stan “Tookie” Williams, (12/13/2005),
Dominque Green (10/26/2004), and Gary Graham a/k/a Shaka
Sankofa (6,22/2000) to name but a few victims of state executions,
Stephen Bright makes the case for abolishing the death penalty

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or
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Obama's Jobs Plan - So Where's the Beef? 27:50

2011-09-25T14:22:00.000-07:00

Speaker Boehner’s Adds His Jobs Pitch To Obama’s, So Where’s The Beef?with
Timothy Canova, professor of international economic law and author of The Federal Reserve We Need and the Legacy of the Clinton Bubble

House Speaker John Boehner added his two cents to the pot of job creation
plans when he called for a total reform of the tax code, fewer federal
regulations and an expansion of infrastructure projects and domestic energy production. Boehner’s plan targets the employer side by lowering the
corporate tax rate and rolling back environmental and labor regulations.
Meanwhile, Obama’s plan focuses partially on the employee side of the
equation, with payroll tax breaks and extended unemployment insurance, infrastructure projects and aid to the States for Education Jobs. We’ll
dissect the respective proposals, see the prospects of either plan to put
America back to work and comment on Obama’s deficit reduction proposals. ************
Plus
The Socialist Bank of North Dakota
with
Dr. Rozanne Everson Junker, political scientist

North Dakota has long had a state bank which unlike private banks has
faithfully served the people and the state in good times and bad. We've
talked about a public option for health care, but why not for banks?
Thanks to Michael Moore for this case study.

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40th anniversary of the Attica Rebellion and Massacre and the Struggle Today Against the New Jim Crow - 27:56

2011-09-18T09:49:00.000-07:00

40th anniversary of the Attica Rebellion and Massacre & the Struggle TodayAgainst the New Jim Crow
with
. Dhoruba Bin-Wahad, Consultant , Inst, for Development of Pan African
Policy (Ghana), a 43 year veteran of the Black Liberation and Pan-African Movements
. Joseph "Jazz" Hayden, Campaign to End the New Jim Crow
. Dr. Cornel West, Prof. Princeton Univ., public intellectual, author & activist

Forty years ago, September 9, 1971, inmates in New York's Attica Prison
began a protest against jail conditions that ended on September 13, as
one of the bloodiest days in the 20th century in the U.S. Troopers shot indiscriminately over 2000 rounds of ammunition, and 29 prisoners and
10 state personnel would die. After the shooting stopped, police beat
and tortured scores of prisoners, 90 of the surviving prisoners were
seriously wounded but were initially denied medical care. The state
would originally claim that all of the guards had died at the hands of the
inmates. The New York Times reported on its front page that the throats
of all of the guards were slashed. But it was lies, the guards as well as
the prisoners who were deemed expandable had been shot dead during
the raid.

The Attica uprising is an under-commemorated historic event. Millions,
watched the drama, from interviews with the inmate leadership all the
way to the climactic helicopter gunship assault, which was as ruthless
and one-sided as anything that was coming out of Vietnam. While the
legacy of the Attica uprising, includes the establishment of Prisoners
Legal Services, and the Prisoners Rights Project, it also includes the
Rockefeller Drug Laws. The lasting lesson of Attica is that little will
change until current and former inmates, many times more numerous
than in 1971, again take their destinies into their own hands, as many
are doing, and continue to organize themselves and we in our
communities follow suit in a political fight to roll back the prison state
in our lifetimes, inspired by the sacrifice of the heroic Attica Brothers.

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Joe Hill's Legacy: A New Biography with Author Bill Adler 27:59

2011-09-10T17:52:00.000-07:00

"The Man Who Never Died: The Life, Times and Legacy of Joe Hill -
American Labor Icon"
with
author William Adler

Labor Day, marked the day for the release of "The Man Who Never
Died". This book presents new evidence of Joe Hill's innocence of
the murder for which Utah executed him in 1915. It also names the
likely perpetrator of that murder: a career criminal who went on to
work for Al Capone. The Man Who Never Died, Joe Hill is a narrative
history of Joe Hill's life and the rise of the Industrial Workers of the
World, the IWW, the Wobblies. It seeks to put Joe Hill’s martyrdom,
his organizing, his music in the radical context of his times. What
better cultural icon to inspire and move us than Joe Hill, the man
who never died. We speak with author Bill Adler who keeps Joe Hill
alive.

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Newark Jobs Protest; AFL-CIO's Trumka Challenges Obama on Jobs Crisis 28:38

2011-09-04T18:18:00.000-07:00

Newark Activists In Fifty-Fourth Day Of Protest Calling on U.S. Government To Institute Jobs Program
with Larry Hamm, Chairman, People's Organization for Progress, Newark, N.J.

The U.S. economy is struggling, but in many black communities Americans
are in the throes of a depression. With unemployment exacting an outsize
toll on African-American men and women, a coalition of community groups
sees it as a crucial civil rights issue emerging from the country’s economic
woe. "We are more than a half-century away from the Montgomery bus
boycott, but we are dealing with issues just as pressing," said Larry Hamm,
chairman of the People’s Organization for Progress. Flanking a statue of
Abraham Lincoln outside the Essex County Courthouse, Hamm and like-
minded activists started a 381-day protest modeled after one of the most
famous battles of the Civil Rights era — the Montgomery bus boycott in
1955-56. They are calling on President Obama and Congress to institute
a jobs program akin to the Works Progress Administration of the Great
Depression, that employed millions of unskilled Americans in public works
jobs. Unemployment is 16 percent among black Americans, a rate rivaling
those of the 1930s. New Jersey’s jobless rate is 9.5 percent, while the
national rate is 9.1 percent.
******************************
AFL-CIO Pres. Trumka:
History Will Judge Pres. Obama If He 'Nibbles' at the Jobs Crisis

At a recent forum sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, AFL-CIO's.
Richard Trumka urged President Obama to “propose bold solutions on the
jobs crisis,” and not nibble around the edge of the issue and that, “history
will judge him and I think working people will judge him. on what he
proposes on the jobs crisis. Trumka said that, in a conversation with
Pres. Obama “I urged him to propose what was necessary to solve the
problem” as opposed to what the president thought was politically possible
given Republican control of the House of Representatives. Mr. Trumka
added, “I said to him,'Do not look at what is possible, look at what is
necessary. The American public wants solutions and just because [of] the Republicans, you think this is the only thing that is politically possible, that
doesn’t mean you should propose that. That means they control the agenda.' ”

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NYC's Central Park Boathouse Strikers Swimming For Their Lives 26:07

2011-08-27T19:39:00.000-07:00

Central Park Boathouse Strikers Swimming For Their Lives
with
Julia Rybak, lead organizer, New York Hotel and Motel Trades Council
andBoathouse strikers Alejandra Betancur and Chrissy Makris

The landmark Boathouse Restaurant in Central Park has become almost as
famous for its long history of ugly labor disputes as for its fine dining and
views. Now, the Boathouse workers are on strike to protest management's
firing of workers who exercised their right to join the Union. Since the
organizing effort began in January, nearly 70% of the regular 100-member
workforce have signed authorization cards to join the union and 38 workers
have been illegally fired for union activities. Thefirings and more than 20
charges of unfair labor practice have been filed with the N.L.R.B. by the
union. Last June, six women - current and former employees - filed sexual harassment complaints with federal and state agencies. An audit of the
Boathouse found that management unlawfully confiscated over $3 million
in banquet gratuities from its employees. The Boathouse is operated by
restaurateur Dean Poll under a contract with the city, which owns the iconic
eatery but has not taken any responsibility for the illegal and reprehensible
actions of Boathouse management.

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Recession & Prison Labor; Medicare is the Answer, Not the Problem 27:17

2011-08-22T19:09:00.000-07:00

Corporations Say, Why Bargain With Free Labor When There’s A Captive Labor At Our Disposal?
with
Rania Khalek, independent journalist, AlterNet

Prison labor is every Corporation's dream - cheap labor, no sick leave, no
time off, no holidays and employees that can be easily replaced. Of course,
for human rights activists however, it's a nightmare, because the other side
of the coin is forced labor, no unions, low or no pay and no protections
whatsoever for the workers. Corporations have used or currently uses
prison labor for anything from holiday coffee for Starbucks to cutting
airplane components for Boeing, making Game Boys for Nintendo,
producing equipment for the war in Iraq, shrink wrapping mouse devices
for Microsoft, making dentures, down to sewing lingerie for Victoria
Secrets. The use of slave labor and now the use of prison labor is
a multi-billion dollar business.
********************
Medicare Is the Answer, Not the Problem
with
MARGARET FLOWERS, M.D., Congressional Fellow for the
18,000-member Physicians for a National Health Program.
Sara Somers, Senior Attorney, National Health Law Program

Both Democrats and Republicans are missing the point by putting the
emphasis on controlling Medicare and Medicaid costs without effectively
addressing the reasons for our rising health care costs. Rather than
embracing the Republican rhetoric which blames our public insurances,
Democrats would do well to call out the real reason for our health care
spending crisis: our current fragmented and profit-driven model, and
advocate for a national improved Medicare for all. Watching the actions
in D.C. is like watching the same political theater we have seen for each
issue. The crisis, manufactured, or real, becomes an excuse to pretend
to fight over the solutions, all the while continuing to move towards greater
austerity measures for necessities such as health care, housing, education,
jobs and pensions. We must address the root causes of the direction
this country is headed, corporatism and militarism, through unity and mass
acts of resistance. We will not email or elect ourselves out of this situation.

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From Deficit Deals to Double Dip Recession - 27:59

2011-08-14T16:10:00.000-07:00

America's 4-D Economy:
From Deficit Deals to Double Dip Recession
with
Jack Rasmus, author of "Epic Recesssion: Prelude to Global Depression"

First, we were frightened by politicians proclaiming that the
economic ceiling will fall in if the deficit wasn’t cut by trillions.
Then the politicians insisted that in order to raise the debt ceiling
we needed to endure, guess what cuts, cuts, cuts. But, the U.S.
manufacturing sector has collapsed, the public sector is
hemorrhaging jobs, and consumer spending is plunging, and
the jobs that were jobs created, may have kept the recent
unemployment figures from shooting up, but they were hardly
enough to keep pace with those about to enter the workforce and
certainly don’t effect those living on extended unemployment
benefits, those who simply can’t find work, and those who are
underemployed and really can’t support their families. The real
economy is accelerating its slide toward a double dip recession
and the deficit reduction deal approved by Congress will make it
harder to fight the coming re-recession. We’ll discuss why and
what really needs to be done to stimulate the economy.
*************************
Recesssion and Militarism
with
Vijay Prashad, George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut

At a recent lecture at NYC’s Riverside Church, Prashad explored
the boom and bust of the capitalist cycle. Even in boom years
people do not have enough to spend so the economy declines.
But if the people are not strong, even then capitalism resists
spending for social services, preferring to stimulate the economy
with spending on domestic repression and war. Prashad places
this in the context of globalization.

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Hiroshima Decisions Revealed - 27:39

2011-08-06T10:42:00.000-07:00

From Here To Eternity:
U.S. Nuclear Policy From Hiroshima & Nagasaki Through Today
with
Professor Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, Director of Cold War Studies, University of
Southern CA. at Berkley

Discussing his book “Racing the Enemy”, Professor Hasegawa argues that
there wasn’t any moral or political imperative to drop nuclear bombs on Japan
which was already determined to surrender and why we did. The issue with
Japan had to do with Japanese resistance to U.S. insistence that Japan
abolish their imperial system. The bombing schedule was also moved up to
prevent the entry of the Soviet Union in the War against Japan. Professor
Hasegawa demonstrates that it was the Soviet declaration of war, not the
atomic bombs, that forced the Japanese to surrender unconditionally.

and
Greg Mitchell, co-author of "Hiroshima in America" & Adviser to the Award-
Winning Film "Original Child Bomb"

The U.S. engaged in suppression of the film footage following the atomic
bomb attacks on Japan, and for decades afterward suppressed all film shot
in Hiroshima & Nagasaki. Now, a portion of that footage will finally reach
the American public so they will be able to judge for themselves why the
authorities felt they had to suppress it, and what impact their footage, if
widely aired, might have had on the nuclear arms race -- and the nuclear
proliferation that endangers us today.

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Withering the American Dream and Unemployment - 28'

2011-07-31T16:48:00.000-07:00

Conyers on Jobs:
"We've Had It." Lays Out Obama, Calls for Protest at White House
With
Representative John Conyers, Founding Member and
Dean of the Congressional Black Caucus

Michigan’s U.S. Representative John Conyers brings us back to
fundamentals, The real crisis in this country is that of unemployment,
the recession &cutbacks. It’s time to explode the myth that budget
deficits are the imminent danger that pervades the rhetoric of Washington
from Obama to the Tea Partyers. The cure is to educate and pressure
them by mobilizations and demonstrations to do the right thing.
***********
The American Dream is Dying
With
Heather McGhee,Director of Demos' Washington office.

Amongst her many writings, McGhee is the co-author of a chapter on
retirement insecurity in the book "Inequality Matters: The Growing
Economic Divide in America and its Poisonous Consequences" .
Heather McGhee speaks to youth, at a national teach-in, with alarm
that they face potentially less opportunity and greater wealth deprivation
than their parents and the imperative for them to organize, organize,
organize for their interests.

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Nurses Prescribe Tax Wall Street to Heal America 26:08

2011-07-23T17:06:00.000-07:00

Nurses Say Lady Liberty Is Sick,
But A Wall Street Financial Speculation Tax Could Heal Her

The Statue of Liberty apparently got “sick” over what’s happening to this country’s working class so, the nation’s nurses rushed to N.Y.C. to try and heal her. One by one, members of National Nurses United (NNU) attempted to diagnose what was making Lady Liberty ill. They concluded her malady was because of the foreclosures spawned by Wall Street’s greed, because of the broken health care system and joblessness.

But, Lady Liberty perked up when one person pointed to the Stock Exchange
across the street and said the nation needs a financial speculation tax to
make Wall Street pay its fair share to heal America. The NNU used street
theater as the centerpiece of its huge protest its members and supporters
converged on Wall Street to demand that the same financial market
speculators who plunged our economy into the recession pay to rebuild the
nation. They rallied as part of a global day of action for a financial speculation
tax.

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The Chronic Black Unemployment Crisis - 27:46

2011-07-16T16:09:00.000-07:00

What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Jobs:
How Racism, Global Economics, and the New Jim Crow Fuel Black
America's Crippling Jobs Crisis
with
Andy Kroll, Assoc. Editor, TomDispatch and reporter at Mother Jones magazine

The Labor Department released the latest figures on unemployment and payrolls - the unemployment rate rose to 9.2 percent, and employers added only 18,000 jobs last month, below the 150,000 threshold that economists say is needed to prevent the unemployment rate from increasing. The figures were dismal for the working class, however what isn’t delineated & probed within that general dilemma is the unemployment rate for black workers, almost double the percent rate for the rest of the population - it's twice the 8% white jobless rate. Since the 1940s, the jobless rate for blacks in America has held grimly steady at twice the rate for whites. The question of why has divided economists, historians, and sociologists for nearly as long.

Plus
The acclaimed public intellectual and author of "Democracy Matters" and "Race Matters", Cornel West, as he spoke recently at a youth teach-in continues to stir us to organize – forward ever, backward never!

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America’s Not Broke. Tax the Rich! 26:12

2011-07-09T09:52:00.000-07:00

America’s Not Broke. Not Even Close. Tax the Rich!

Overall average individual wealth in the United States has risen 23 percent
since the year 2000, to $236,213 per American adult. But, wealth has
become incredibly more concentrated. We are taxing the dollars that go to
our ever-richer rich at levels far below the tax rates that America levied just
a few decades ago. Now, both an analysis of our current predicament and
a series of proposals that can help open our eyes to a far more equitable —
and brighter — future,

with
Meizhu Lui, Director of Closing the Racial Wealth Gap Initiative,
Insight Center for Community Economic Development
and
Chuck Collins, a senior scholar, Institute for Policy Studies (IPS)
and Director of IPS’s Program on Inequality and the Common Good.
Co-author of the recent report, Unnecessary Austerity, Unnecessary
Government Shutdown.

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Wisconsin Blues: Don't Mourn, Organize! -28'

2011-07-02T16:38:00.000-07:00

Wisconsin Blues: Don’t Mourn, Organize
With
Eric Cobb, Exec. Dir. South Central Wisconsin Building Trades Council
Peter Rickman, Teaching Asst., LaFollette Law School , Univ. of Wisc. member of Teaching Assistants’ Assn., AFT Local 3220
LaTaunya Johnson, Pres. Wisconsin Childcare Providers Together,
Local 502, AFSCME

The Walkerville protest tents and encampment came down at Wisconsin’s
state capital after Gov Scott Walker’s budget victory slashing education,
health and other services in the state budget while increasing tax breaks for
the wealthy. He even attacked child labor laws. A week earlier the State
Supreme Court narrowly approved Walker’s union busting measures
stripping civil service unions of most of their effectiveness and eliminating
the dues check-off. While Walker and the Republicans may loose control of
the State Senate in the recall elections scheduledin July, that will come too
late to reverse much of the major damage that has been done. We’ll talk with
key organizers in the struggle as to what lessons have been learned and
what is to be done to organize for future victories.

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Gov. Christie & Democrats Attack Jersey Labor plus Bloombergville 28:24

2011-06-25T15:45:00.000-07:00

During the Great Depression The Homeless Created Hovervilles, Now
Mayor Bloomberg’s Budget Cuts Are Responsible For Bloombergville!
With
New Yorkers Against the Budget Cuts

Students, labor, and communities united against the Mayor’s proposed
budget cuts occupying downtown Manhattan near City Hall for the past
week, in symbolic encampments they’ve called Bloombergville in a campaign
to defeat the mayor's cutbacks and layoffs. The campaign against
Bloomberg's poverty budget has resulted in arrests of some of the protesters
and the NYPD has threatened arrests on several other occasions, but
Bloombergville is still alive -- and growing.
******************
Key Democrats Join Gov. Christie Cutting Public Worker Bargaining Rights
and Balancing the Budget on the Backs of the Workers
With
Barbara Keshishian, President, New Jersey Education Association
Hetty Rosenstein, Area Dir., Communications Workers of America N.J.

Despite a massive outpouring of protesters at the State Capital at Trenton, Democratic leaders of the State Senate and Assembly, Stephen Sweeney
and Sheila Oliver, joined with bombastic bully Governor Chris Christie to
get approval for a measure to strip health care benefits from collective
bargaining rights for state public workers. This could triple health care
costs to workers while the millionaires tax went down in defeat. Combined
with so called New Jersey public worker pension reforms this will lead to
lowering workers pay by 5 -10% while reaping big profits forthe insurance
industry who charge high commissions for public worker health care
insurance.

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A Conversation with Isabel Allende - 28:28

2011-06-18T18:49:00.000-07:00

A Conversation With Best-Selling Author Isabel Allende

Building Bridges had a rare opportunity to sit down with one of the most
widely read writers in the world, Isabel Allende, on the occasion of the
paperback release of her bestseller “Island Beneath The Sea”. Allende
discusses her novel, which powerfully evokes historical events that
rocked the late 18th century. She discusses the enthralling, blood-chilling,
and heart-breaking story that connects the links between the American
Revolution, the French Revolution, the revolt of the Haitian slaves led by
Toussaint Louverture , the sale of Louisiana to the U.S, & the rising
influence of the Abolition movement. Allende provided insight into her
politics & its creative expression through her writing. She juxtaposes slave
rebellion & the quest for self-determination of past decades with the
continuing reality of various nation’s imperialist designs, and the still
catastrophic results for the world’s peoples.

Allende also spoke of her painful recollections the death of her cousin ,
Chile’s socialist Pres. Salvador Allende, who died in a coup engineered
by General Augusto Pinchot, leading to years of fascist rule which deeply
influenced the core of her writings. Similarly her desire for the exhumation
of Salvator Allende to determine the exact manner of his death, as are her
writings, are a quest for historic reclamation & social rectification.

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Target Union Drive; Queens Library Budget Disaster - 28:29

2011-06-11T16:29:00.000-07:00

Workers Aim at Target Unionization
With
Tashawna Green – Member Union Organizing Committee
Sonia Williams – Member Union Organizing Committee
Aly Wady – Special Projects Dir., Organizing Dept., UFCW, Local 1500
Diana Robinson – Food Policy Coordinator, UFCW, Local 1500

Target workers at the superstore’s Valley Stream location are furious that
their hours have been cut sometimes to just one or two days a week while
new workers are being hired. So they don’t have enough income to survive
forcing many to rely on food stamps and Medicaid. A majority of workers have
already signed cards supporting unionization with Local 1500, UFCW. Target
is fighting back by threatening union workers with firings, disciplinary actions
and closing the store. Workers have been prevented from discussing their employment on social networking sites, interrogated about their union activity
and have been told their union activity was under surveillance. If the workers
vote to join Local 1500 in the June 17 election, the Valley Stream store would
be the first Target in the country to be unionized but probably not the last
especially in the NYC area.
*******
Bloomberg’s Budget to Decimate Queens Public Library
With
John Hyslop, Pres., Queens Library Guild, Local 1321 , DC 37 AFSCME

Library workers are fighting Mayor Bloomberg's proposed $25.3 million in
budget cuts to the Queens Public Library. Since 2008, over 200 jobs have
already been lost through attrition and layoffs. The current proposed 30% cut
will result in library hours being at their lowest level ever, less than in NYC’s
budget crisis of the 1970s. These cuts would slash library services; close
branches 2-3 days a week; end free computer and Internet services; destroy
the materials budget; and force 234 Library employees to be laid off.
Local 1321 is sponsoring a demonstration outside the Central Library on
Merrick Blvd.

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Building Bridges: Live Broadcast DC 37 Fightback Rally 6-14

2011-06-11T08:25:00.000-07:00

WBAI Radio’s Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Reports
Produced & Hosted by Mimi Rosenberg and Ken Nash Special Live Broadcast Of

District Council 37's Massive Fightback Rally at New York City Hall
No Layoffs, No Contracting Out and No Service Cutbacks
Tuesday, June 14th 4 – 6 pm

DC 37 rocked NY City Hall with its biggest demonstration ever.On June 14,
DC 37 union members, joined by allies of the working class stood up for
their union rights & economic needs, fought back against the fiscal assault
on our public schools & public health care, the shredding of public services
that prevent child abuse &keep rats from running wild in New York City, and
raised their voices against the drive to crush public employees' rights from
coast to coast. They stood in solidarity to protect the libraries where so
many immigrants enhance their language skills, where so many of the
unemployed use free computers to search for jobs, and where so many
children -especially the city's record 43,000 homeless children - do their
homework. They will spoke out for the public parks and pools, the only
free recreation available for working families.

By letting the state “millionaires’ tax” expire in December, the Mayor and
the Governor are cutting taxes on the wealthy by $5 billion a year. Mayor
Bloomberg has squandered taxpayer money by throwing away
three-quarters of a billion dollars on the CityTime payroll project (where
the contractor is also accused of stealing $80 million from the city), failing
to collect business taxes that are owed to the city, and continuing to waste
some $10 billion on 18,000 private contracts for work city employees could
perform. If his administration can waste that kind of money, then the Mayor
can afford to cancel the service cuts & layoffs, stop the attacks on public
employee benefits and get real about raises for workers. The right-wing
effort to destroy union rights and drive workers hard fought for wages and
benefits further down the economic ladder is a cancer that will spread
unless we stop it.

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Unemployment, Poverty and the “Great” Recession

2011-06-07T11:07:00.000-07:00

Unemployment, Poverty and the “Great” Recession
with
Avis Jones-DeWeever, Exec. Dir., National Council of Negro Women,
Marc Morial President & CEO of the National Urban League, and
former Mayor of New Orleans,
Dean Baker, Co-director, Center for Economic and Policy Research

Signs of economic recovery, well, maybe for Wall Street, and the banksters,
but what about our street? Where’s the beef, where’s the jobs? The United
States is still experiencing its worst jobs crisis since the Great Depression.
Officially in of May 2011 the unemployment rate increased to 9.1%. In 2009
there were 43.6 million people living in poverty, the largest figure in the 51
years for which poverty estimates are available, and the numbers have been
climbing. This national crisis demands a bold plan to put people back to work
and to prevent those wielding the ax from chopping more jobs and cutting
further holes in the safety net and jeopardizing entitlement programs.

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Aronowitz, Baker & Lynd - What Is To Be Done? 28:09

2011-05-31T15:13:00.000-07:00

What Is To Be Done?

In this period of intensified class warfare against the working class and the
poor, what will it take to mobilize the people for the mass movement it will
surely take to win? Many have been heartened by the fightback in Wisconsin
and many of the frontline states. But is the predominately electoral strategy
that is currently being followed sufficient to win? What is the role direct action,
strikes, including general strikes, and cross union and community solidarity?
We talk with:

General Baker has been called the most important 21st century American
revolutionary. He was a leader of the Detroit wildcat strikes in the 1960s, a
founder of the legendary League of Revolutionary Black Workers, the Dodge Revolutionary Union Movement (DRUM), & the first American to refuse
induction to fight in Vietnam. The book, "Detroit: I Do Mind Dying" (about the
worker revolts of that era) calls Baker the "soul of the Dodge Revolutionary
Union Movement (DRUM)." An autoworker for 30 years, he remains a
champion of the unemployed and unorganized workers.

Stanley Aronowitz is a Professor of Sociology at the Graduate Center of the
City University of New York, where he studies labor, social movements,
science and technology, education, social theory and cultural studies. He is
author or editor of 25 books including: Left Turn: Forging a New Political
Future; How Class Works; The Jobless Future (with William DiFazio); and
False Promises: The Shaping of American Working Class Consciousness.

Staughton Lynd has dedicated his life to activism & social change as a
historian, lawyer, and labor activist. He helped direct the Mississippi
Freedom Schools. In April 1965 he spoke at the first march on Washington
against the Vietnam War and became an early leader of the anti-war
movement. Subsequent to becoming an attorney he spent years focusing
on labor and prison issues. He wrote the definitive history of the 1993 Ohio
prison uprising at Lucasville as well as the ever popular “Labor Law for the
Rank and Filer” and “Rank and File” oral histories of the 1930’s .

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The Freedom Riders and Lessons for Today - 28'

2011-05-23T12:51:00.000-07:00

The Freedom Riders and Lessons for Today
With
The Rev. Dr. James Lawson , helped coordinate the Sitdown
strike in 1960, Freedom Rides in 1961, the Meredith March in
1966. While working as a pastor at the Centenary Methodist
Church in Memphis, he invited Dr. King to Memphis & played
a major role in the sanitation workers strike of 1968. Dr. King
called Lawson "the leading theorist and strategist of
nonviolence in the world.”

and
Diane Nash, a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee (SNCC) who participated in the sitdown strikes in
Nashville & rode the freedom buses into Alabama and Miss.
where she endured mob violence & imprisonment. Later, she
was hired by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference
(SCLC) & was a major organizer for the 1963 Birmingham
campaign.

The movement by African-Americans, in the 60’s to desegregate interstate
travel facilities throughout the South was pivotal in challenging & ultimately eradicating the most onerous Jim Crow laws and breaking the back of what
were the police states of the South. The Freedom Rides, along with efforts
to integrate public accommodations, & educational institutions and the voter registration campaigns coalesced as a mass movement that triggered the
conscience of a nation and spurred it to action. Risking life and limb to
confront white supremacy, the civil rights activists forced major changes
in the power relationships of the nation.

Fifty years after the freedom rides, on this anniversary Building Bridges
looks back at & learns anew how the freedom riders organized and
mobilized to dramatically alter the very functioning of the state and what
e can emulate today in the face of increasing repression, by undemocratic
forces who seek to unravel fifty years of gains, ushered in by the freedom
riders.

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Coup in Benton Harbor, Michigan - 27:59

2011-05-15T08:20:00.000-07:00

The People versus the Corporations in America’s Rust Belt
The Coup in Benton Harbor, Michigan
with
Rev. Edward Pinkney, Community Activist & Leader in the Fight
Against The Takeover of Benton Harbor

For the residents of Benton Harbor, Michigan the question is will America
have prosperity and democracy, or live in poverty under the heel of open
corporate power. There’s been a coup in Benton Harbor, First, Whirlpool
controlled Benton Harbor and now the City of Benton Harbor has become
the battleground for Michigan’s new emergency financial management law.
The law gives an accountant, Joseph Harris, dubbed an emergency manager
the right to tear up labor contracts. And, in Detroit district wide layoff
notices hit every one of its Public Schools. The 5,466 unionized employees
called the move the largest “one fell swoop” firing of teachers in union
memory. Additionally, the Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb’s
concurrent announcement that he plans to unilaterally modify the Detroit
Federation of Teachers’ collective bargaining agreement is the first test
of a sweeping new state law.
*************
Fighting Back
with
Frances Fox Piven, Professor of Political Science and Sociology,
The Graduate Center, City University of New York

Frances Fox Piven, a distinguished professor, legendary activist, and writer
for more than a year has been accused by Fox news host Glenn Beck, who
employees a graphic of a tree to do so of being an advocate of violence
and plotting since 1966 to overthrow the system. Well Piven now closes
our programming, with our support, respect and affection as she addresses
a national youth audience Teach-In. You’ll hear Piven reference the tree
and rather use the metaphor to advocate organizing movements for peace
and justice.

Protecting Reproductive Freedom- 13:04

2011-05-11T11:02:00.000-07:00

In Brief- Produced by Mimi Rosenberg
presents
Protecting Reproductive Freedom

with
Jennifer Dalven, Director of the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom Project

Since the start of this year, 916 measures seeking to regulate reproductive
health had been introduced in 49 states. And by the end of March, 15 laws
had been enacted in seven states. Is this death by a thousand cuts, has state
law and new federal legislation affectively aborted, literally the right of choice ensconced in Roe v. Wade.

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Egyptian Workers Breaking Free - 27:59

2011-05-07T07:39:00.000-07:00

Inspiration From Egypt: A May Day Message
with
Hossam el-Hamalawy,
Historian, Activist Reporter,Blogger, from Cairo

The events in Egypt, were a catalyst throughout the Middle East
for the yearnings for democracy and working class empowerment.
And, as well the aspirations & activism of the Egyptians has given
inspiration to us here, in the face of a full court press against the
working class. The current renaissance of unionism in Egypt should
likewise give us inspiration. Hossam el-Hamalawy provides an
insightful report on the May Day celebrations in Cairo detailing
the continuing conflict between the newly formed independent
unions and the state unions which were still being supported by
the military on May Day celebrations. He provides a fascinating
history of unions in Egypt culminating in their present emergence
of a free trade union movement independent of the state with
demands for dissolution of the state unions, higher wages and renationization of substantial parts of previously privatized
industries.

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Bay Area Dock Workers Under Attack-27:03

2011-05-03T14:50:00.000-07:00

Port Workers In Bay Area Turn Out To Say An Injury To One Is An Injury To All
with
Clarence Thomas, Former Secretary Treasurer of Local 10, and rank
& file activist Local 10

The Bay Area’s International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 10is under attack by the Pacific Maritime Association, after the rank and file dock workers’ voluntary action in solidarity with the national “We Are One” action, for the Wisconsin public workers. The PMA is suing the ILWU Local 10 because the members shutdown the ports in support of other workers. This is a serious attack on the right of workers to withhold their labor to support other workers, and alongwith support from the 87,000 member San Francisco Labor Council Local 10 workers continue to demonstrate their solidarity with workers fighting the attacks on collective bargaining rights.

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Shredding The Child Labor Safety Net - 26:58

2011-04-23T19:04:00.000-07:00

Shredding The Child Labor Safety Net
with
Susan F. Feiner, Prof. of Economics & Prof. of Women
& Gender Studies, University of Southern Maine, Portland.

Republicans in Utah, Ohio, Minnesota, Maine and Missouri are
proposing sweeping changes to child labor legislation including
expanding the use of sub-minimum wages for workers up to
the age of 20 & permitting teens to work till 11pm on school
nights. Missouri is taking the lead in the race back to the 19th
century, by drastically cutting back on enforcement & inspection
of child labor protections, including those protecting child
workers' health and safety on the job.

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Holding Women's Health Hostage; Money for Jobs, Not for War Rally - 28:58

2011-04-19T15:40:00.000-07:00

Holding Women’s Health Hostage
with
LisaLyn Jacobs, Vice President of Government Relations, Legal Momentum (formerly NOW LDF)

House Republicans threaten to shut down the government over federal funding for Planned Parenthood. After weeks of federal budget negotiations, the focus shifted from economic issues to a particular rider that would eliminate all gov't funding to Planned Parenthood through the Title X family planning program. Conservatives are targeting PlannedParenthood because some of its clinics provide abortions, even though those abortions make up less than 3% of Planned Parenthood's services and federal money is not used to pay for abortion services. What was proposed by the House of Representatives is to say that women can no longer go to Planned Parenthood to get their cancer screenings, to gettheir birth control, to get any kind of services through federal programs.
*********************
Highlights From The Money for Jobs, Not for War Rally

Thousands of protesters attended the largest national antiwar protest inyears. The rally juxtaposed the Democrats and Republicans haggling over budget proposals that in any event slashed billions in life-sustaining programs. As the rally organizers stated Head Start, Medicare and Medicaid are being threatened -- but there is always money for another war – but, if we brought the troops home now, the deficit could be wiped out in a heartbeat. Saturday’s demonstration represented a renewal ofthe antiwar movement and we will bring its highlights.

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Bloomberg Seeks To Eliminate Subsidized Day Care

2011-04-19T13:33:00.000-07:00

Just A Cutting & A Slicing:
Bloomberg Seeks To Eliminate Subsidized Day Care
with
G.L. Tyler, Political Action Director, DC 1707

Mayor Bloomberg, is attempting to eliminate nearly 17,000 infants and toddlers from safe, quality and affordable day care. The “Education Mayor” is prepared to devastate subsidized daycare. Once again, Bloomberg has exposed himself to be not the protector of working families but ready to turn his back on working families needing public day care. The Mayor has a $2 billion “Rainy Day” fund that he does not wish to share with New Yorkers in need. He cannot take this money, our money, and give it to the millionaires and billionaires while cutting the jobs of day care providers and forcing working parents out of the work force if they don’t have child care.

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Dr. King’s Economic Justice Agenda - From Memphis to Wisconsin - 27:07

2011-04-10T10:41:00.000-07:00

Martin Luther King’s Economic Justice Agenda From Memphis To Wisconsin Forty three years ago, a struggle by 1,300 sanitation workers for economic justice brought Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to Memphis. On the eve of his death, hours after marching with the AFSCME sanitation workers, being denied the right of collective bargaining & facing down the armed forces of a city & state, Martin Luther King, Jr. declared: “work that serves humanity…It has dignity and it has worth.” WE ARE ONE Today in Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida and more than a dozen other states, well-funded, corporatist politicians are trying to take away the union rights Dr. King gave his life for. This year, to commemorate his sacrifice, the AFL-CIO called for nationwide events and actions to link the struggle of 1968 to the challenges we face today, We Are One. ***** Carrying On The Legacy Of Dr. Martin Luther King with Dr. Vincent Harding, an associate of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, has written numerous books, including "Martin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero". On this 43rd year since the death of Dr. King, speechwriter, confidante Dr. Harding discusses Dr. King’s economic justice activism and its relevance for us today as workers battle for the survival of their labor organizations, against give backs, stagnating wages and unemployment **** From Ground Zero Of the War on the Workers: Reports from Wisconsin and Ohio with Peter Rickman, Teaching Asst., LaFollette Law School , Univ. of Wisconsin, & member of Teaching Assistants’ Assn., AFT Local 3220 and Joseph Rugola, Exec. Dir., Ohio Assn. of Public School Employees, AFSCME The Ohio legislature just passed Gov. Kasich’s union busting bill which nullifies public employee rights. Meanwhile, Gov. Scott Walkers’ rush to cut public sector worker benefits, and bust their unions in Wisconsin has been stymied by court action. But the workers in both states aren’t taking the assaults lying down, we found out how they’re carrying on the legacy of Dr. King by going live to the We are One demonstration in Madison Wisconsin. stream or download

Building Bridges: From Egypt to Wisconsin, Is New York Next? - 28:23

2011-04-03T17:15:00.000-07:00

From Egypt to Wisconsin, Is NY Next?: Breaking the Silence, NYC’s Protests Against Budget Cuts Buoyed by the new spirit of rebellion flowing from Egypt to Wisconsin, thousands of students, workers & community members from a wide coalition of organizations rallied at City Hall Park, followed by a march on Wall Street to demand higher taxes on the rich, to prevent budget cutbacks. This was the first major NYC demonstration, in an otherwise muted budget debate despite the grim consequences of the State & City proposed cuts. **** Arrests Up The Ante On Albany Budget Negotiations with Barbara Bowen, President, Professional Staff Congress, CUNY and James Parrott, Deputy Director & Chief Economist, Fiscal Policy Inst. While Albany budget negotiators are reaching agreement, the real question for the public is how much pain and suffering are legislators prepared to hit us with. We’ll analyze the budget and especially, it’s likely impact on NYC, where Mayor Bloomberg,while sitting on a $3 billion budget surplus is threatening major cutbacks, & thousands of layoffs. Bloomberg, like the Governor refuses to consider a millionaires or a securities transfer tax to prevent a slash and burn policy. In otherwise subdued budget protests this year, the Professional Staff Congress of CUNY led an Albany protest in which 33 people were arrested. They sat down and blocked access to the New York State Capitol's Executive Chamber demanding that Albany not pass an austerity budget that pays for a hefty tax breaks for the wealthy. stream or download

War on Unions in Ohio; NYC Union Rally Blasts Bloomberg and Cuomo - 28:28

2011-03-15T13:42:00.000-07:00

The New Class War on Unions Spreads to Ohio
with
Joseph Rugola, Exec. Dir., Ohio Assn. of Public School Employees, AFSCME

Following Gov. Walker’s union busting lead, Ohio Gov. Kasich proposes to nullify public employee unionization rights by taking away impartial arbitration of disputes, the right to strike of “non-emergency public employees” and protections against privatization of government jobs. Despite the demonstration by over 20,000, it was politics at its worst, Republican leaders rammed this bill through by kicking opposing members of their own party off key committees.
************************
NYC Union Rally Blasts Bloomberg and Cuomo Attacks

District Council 37 Locals 375,154, 768 & 1549 demonstrated at City Hall Park in support of the resistance of workers & their unions under attack in Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana and other states. On the NYC front, they railed against proposed layoffs by Mayor Bloomberg, despite projections of a multibillion dollar budget surplus and a plethora of costly and often corrupt outside contracts. Both the Bloomberg and Cuomo Administrations oppose continuing the millionaires’ tax to enhance revenue rather than cutting public services and layoffs.

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Building Bridges: Triangle Shirtwaist Fire and Its Legacy - 55:04

2011-03-12T10:29:00.000-08:00

A Women's History Month Special

Out of the Flames, From The Ashes: TheTriangle Shirtwaist Fire & Its Legacy

Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Triangle Fire - March 25, 1911

Tune into our tapestry of archival sound, re-enactments – a docudrama of the “flowering girls” who lost their lives in the Triangle Fire, on this hundredth anniversary, of one of the most important events in the history of the labor movement. Threaded through the sound tapestry are the haunting voices from the fire intermingled with the poetry and songs that arose in the wake of the tragedy. Another thread of the tapestry are the voices of scholar/activists who deliberate on the legacy of Triangle for today - to organize and unionize, to regulate the workplace and create a safe, decent life for working people, to attend to the problems today sadly echoing the conditions at the time of the Triangle Fire. This is a drama of the dilemmas faced by working women, their pathos, & the importance of the fire, in the annals of workers’ history - “not to mourn, but to organize.”

A fire broke out on the top three stories of a relatively new building just east of
Washington Square Park, which housed the Triangle Shirtwaist Company, a
large manufacturer of women’s clothes (a building which today houses New York University classrooms). Though the building was modern and advertised as fire-proof, the cramped layout of the factory space, large piles of flammable materials, locked doors by the employers, an inadequate fire escape, and the inability of New York City fire truck ladders to reach high enough to rescue the people trapped by the flames led to a staggering loss of life. All told, 146 workers died that day, mostly women workers, many still in their teens, some as young as fourteen, killed by the fire or their desperate leaps to the ground to escape the suffocating smoke, the heat and flames. It is the largest industrial tragedy in the history of New York City.

After the fire, & the outraged voices of community residents, workers, labor activists, New York State passed a series of new laws regulating factory safety which, along with unionization,gradually eliminated the worst conditions workers faced. These efforts would reach fruition in the New Deal, in many respects the creation of the coalition of forces that came togetherin the aftermath of the TriangleFire.

If Triangle is an old story, one about a century ago, it is also a very current story. While the U.S. was successful, at least for a while, in eliminating the worst abuses of the sweatshop era and improving the lives of its working people, there are millions of workers today who face conditions not unlike those faced by the Triangle workers. What people sometimes refer to as the global sweatshop is a vast archipelago of workplaces, in many of which young female workers toil long hours in dangerous conditions, very often without union representation or any rights.

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New Class War in Wisconsin plus Belafonte on Protest - 27:28

2011-03-08T10:38:00.000-08:00

The New Class War in Wisconsin
with
Frank Emspak, Dir.Emeritus, School For Workers, University Of Wisconsin and Exec. Dir. Workers Independent News

In the face of massive protests, Wisconsin Gov. Scott
Walker’s “budget repair bill” proposes limiting collective
bargaining powers of public employees only to base pay
tearing the guts out of the union.The bill also mandates
increases in workers' pension & health care contributions.
And next come the layoffs. We’ll explore Walker’s capital
supported initiative to break the back of organized labor.
What are the politics behind it and forces pushing this
Republican juggernaut? Is this a blueprint for union
busting in other states? And, oh yes, we’ll discuss what is
to be done?
************
See You On the Picket Line
With
Harry Belafonte, the Great Actor, Singer and Social Justice Activist

In his recent speech at City College in NYC, Belafonte
decries what has been the passivity in the U.S. in face of
massive attacks on civil rights and workers rights but
welcomes the recent protests against tyranny in Tunisia
and Egypt and extending to Madison Wisconsin to protect
workers rights.

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Teamster Protest at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx - 27:58

2011-03-01T16:11:00.000-08:00

Woodlawn Cemetery Alive with Union Protests
With
Chris Silvera, Secretary Treasurer Local 808, Teamsters
And
Local 808 Woodlawn Members - the Band of Brothers
. Todd Brown
. Alex Coss
. Enrique Coss

Landscapers at the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, where
six Mayors & jazz legends like Celia Cruz, Miles Davis & Duke
Ellington are buried, protested at the cemetery with union and
community allies from throughout NYC . Management plans to
contract their jobs out to a private landscaping firm unless they
take a 35% pay cut. Local 808 Secretary-Treasurer Chris Silvera
called the proposed outsourcing “an act of vengeance against
the workers for choosing a fighting union to represent them.
” It's the latest battle for the workers, "The Band of Brothers",
who for several years have lodged complaints about racism by
supervisors. Then in October, the workers voted over-
whelmingly to switch their union affiliation to Local 808.

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Dr. King and Public Workers: Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike - 26:24

2011-02-22T16:48:00.000-08:00

The current struggles of public sector workers rights in Wisconsin and
around the country has galvanized public and worker sentiment and
support to an extent not seen since the battle to organize the Memphis
City sanitation workers in 1968. This was part of the upsurge of the civil
rights movement of the 1960’s and also of the mass unionization of
public workers in that decade.

“Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King’s Last Campaign”
with
Michael K. Honey, Prof. of Ethnic, Gender, and Labor studies, University of Washington, Tacoma

Martin Luther King was in Memphis to add his voice to protests in support of striking sanitation workers – the civil rights movement paralleled with the struggles of organized labor. Professor Honey details the daily evolution of the strike and what it meant to Memphis and the larger civil-rights movement. He chronicles the events that led up to that fateful day at the Lorraine Motel, and to larger social change. Honey’s analysis of King’s role is particularly telling. “King,” he writes, “had qualities that allowed him to lead a mass movement that joined working-class people to the middle class through the black church” until his “Crucifixion.”

Plus Taylor Rogers, a past Pres. of the Memphis Sanitation Workers
Union talks about the 1968 Strike which was Dr. King's last struggle and a selection from King's speech at a strike rally.

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Lincoln Cantata -28'

2011-02-13T18:57:00.000-08:00

Earl Robinson’s Cantata, Lonesome Train

The Riverside Church in NYC presented the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, The NYC Labor Chorus and The Riverside Inspirational Choir in Earl Robinson’s cantata The Lonesome Train in honor of the birthday of the great emancipator Abraham Lincoln. The work had not been heard in its entirety for more than 50 years.

The performance featured theatrical direction by LorcaPeress,a narrator played by acclaimed actress Ruby Dee (American Gangster, Steam), a chorus led by a balladeer, Michael Mark (I Love My Wife, Cotton Patch Gospel), barn-dance caller David Amram (composer/Author/Jazz musician), banjo soloist Eric Weissberg (Dueling Banjos, Deliverance) and Sam Waterston (Law and Order) as President Lincoln. The four join gospel preacher Tyrone Aiken and his choir, a barn dance caller and fiddler to honor Lincoln’s message of “a new nation conceived in liberty.”

The Riverside production was introduced by Pete Seeger.

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NYC Schools Closings - Another Bloomberg Snow Job - 28:24

2011-02-08T13:37:00.000-08:00

Bloomberg Stop The Snow Job On Public Schools Closings!
with
. Stefanie Siegel, teacher, Paul Robeson High School
. Lowena Howard, teacher, Paul Robeson High School
. Letitia Ingram-Brown, teacher, Paul Robeson High School
. Lizabeth Cooper, student, Paul Robeson High School
plus
Highlights from the Stop Schools Closing Rally

Bloomberg's Department of Education (DOE) plans to close 26 more schools this year. Despite the DOE's claim that these school closings are aimed at reforming schools, they have instead opened the door to privately-run charter schools and have limited school options for those affected. According to the accounts by parents, students and teachers, DOE policies have had the effect of undermining the schools that are slated to be closed, not "fixing" them. Bloomberg has played a shell game with our most vulnerable children, shuffling them around from closing school to closing school. This process has disproportionately affected students of color, only serving to further perpetuate a separate and unequal school system in New York City. A discussion about and sounds from a rally for quality resources and support for our public schools, not closings and privatization!

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An Israeli Campaigner For Justice For Palestinians with Jeff Halper - 27:38

2011-02-01T17:17:00.000-08:00

Jeff Halper, An Israeli Campaigner For Justice For Palestinians
with
Jeff Halper, famed author, and Coordinator, Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD)

Since 1967, more than 24,000 Palestinian homes have been demolishedin the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Gaza by the Israeli forces, bringing untold misery to countless Palestinians. Jeff Halper has led a campaign against this abuse through the organization ICAHD. As ICAHD witnessed the brutalities of the Occupation, it expanded its resistance activities to other areas – land expropriation, settlement expansion, by-pass road construction, policies of “closure” and “separation,” the wholesale uprooting of fruit and olive trees, the Separation Barrier/Wall, the siege of Gaza and more. Building Bridges hosts, in studio ICAHD’s Jeff Halper, an Israeli Jew who fearlessly criticizes the state of Israel and has, as a result, been arrested many times, including recently after he sailed into Gaza on a relief boat, for a discussion of ideas & international advocacy to end the Occupation altogether & for a “Free, Free Palestine.”

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Stiglitz: Deficits, Unemployment & Economic Growth - 27:20

2011-01-24T09:26:00.000-08:00

The State of the Union
Deficit Reduction and Common Sense:
Invest in the Economy, Reduce the Military Budget & Tax the Rich
with
Joseph Stiglitz, University Professor Columbia University,
Recipient Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics

The ink was hardly dry on the massive compromise federal tax bill
when Republican leaders restarted their call for spending cuts in
the new Congress to close the deficit. But Nobel Prize winning
economist Joseph Stiglitz sets the record straight in his speech
before the Roosevelt Institute. He says that the main cause of the
deficits is the recession which premature deficit reduction would
cause to deteriorate further. He also offers us a way to rebuild our
economy which would also fight the increasing mal-distribution of
wealth in this country by taxing the rich, reducing the military
budget and investing in our cities, our infrastructure and new
technologies to increase our productive capacities to increase
economic growth.

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Bloombergs NYC: Snow Job, Layoffs, Contracting Scandal - 28:29

2011-01-19T09:37:00.000-08:00

Bloomberg’s Snow Job and
The NYC Council Inquiry Into The Blizzard Fiasco
with
NYC Councilmember Jumaane Williams, Chairman, Oversight and Investigations Committee

The NYC Council held hearings into how the mayor's administration took nearly a week to clear city streets after a holiday weekend snow storm and we’ll go inside the hearings with Jumaane Williams. Specifically on the agenda, was determining what made the mayor say that streets were plowed while everybody was telling him they weren’t. While, the media blamed the sanitation workers, we know the buck stops with the mayor and the managers he appointed and we dig out their negligence and incompetence and find out why.
********************
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 partof 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 million fraud in the overbudget $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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The New Jim Crow with Michelle Alexander - 27:30

2011-01-11T15:04:00.000-08:00

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
with
Michelle Alexander, civil rights advocate and litigator, author

Alexander offers a bold and innovative argument that mass incarceration amounts to a devastating system of racial control. “Jarvious Cotton’s great-great-grandfather could not vote as a slave. His great-grandfather was beaten to death by the Klu Klux Klan for attempting to vote. His grandfather was prevented from voting by Klan intimidation; his father was barred by poll taxes and literacy tests. Today, Cotton cannot vote because he, like many black men in the United States, has been labeled a felon and is currently on parole.” In this incisive critique, former litigator-turned-legal-scholar Michelle Alexander argues that we have not ended racial caste in America, we have simply redesigned it. Alexander shows that, by targeting black men and decimating communities of color, the U.S. criminal justice system functions as a contemporary system of racial control, even as it formally adheres to the principle of color blindness.

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Falk on Palestine Occupation and Adalah-NY Protests Lev Leviev - 28:30

2011-01-04T13:34:00.000-08:00

Israel’s Building Boom Threatens Palestinian State
with
Richard Falk, prof. of international law emeritus, Princeton University and Special Rapporteur on Occupied Palestinian Territories for the United Nations Human Rights Council.

We’ll explore the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967. And, we’ll examine the implications for Palestinian statehood of the Israeli settlement-building boom in the West Bank, in the months since the Palestinians were forced to withdraw from peace talks, and the construction of predominantly Jewish housing in East Jerusalem, where the Palestinians hope to make their future capital.
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Tell Israeli Diamond Merchant Lev Leviev, Financing Israeli Settlements Has Got To Go!
with
Adalah-NY

The heck with “chocolate” diamonds, there’s blood on Lev Leviev’s diamonds, the profits from which go to financing the expansion of Israeli settlements on Palestinian land. Leviev also continues to support human rights abuses in the diamond industry in Angola. So international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement activists against Israel led a protest against this international merchant of death, at Leviev’s diamond flagship store on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
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Stop the Layoffs: City Workers Protest Bloomberg’s Budget Madness - 19:33

2010-12-28T17:19:00.000-08:00

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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Building Bridges: Georgia Prison Labor Strike -28'

2010-12-28T09:32:00.000-08:00

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 Discrimination Lawsuit Goes to Supreme Court 27:27

2010-12-21T14:46:00.000-08:00

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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AIDS Activists Arrested; Deny Waiver Coalition; Unemployment Emergency

2010-12-21T14:16:00.000-08:00

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.
***********************
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.
***********************
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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NFL Lockout Threat with Dave Zirin - 26:33

2010-12-14T13:17:00.000-08:00

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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Unemployment Crisis NYC Demonstration -27:46

2010-12-06T10:24:00.000-08:00

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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or
download

Emergency Unemployed Civil Disobedience in NYC; Living Wage Protest by Clergy - 27:35

2010-11-28T18:31:00.000-08:00

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!
*******************
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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Deficit Commission Nightmare with Dean Baker - 27:16

2010-11-23T13:17:00.000-08:00

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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Fair Trade Votes; and Mumia Update from Philadelphia - 27:07

2010-11-16T10:19:00.000-08:00

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”.
************
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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Mineworkers Pres. Cecil Roberts; Plus James Galbraith on Budget Deficit Mania - 27:46

2010-11-09T15:27:00.000-08:00

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.
****************************
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 Doctors Crime Stats - 27:58

2010-10-27T16:01:00.000-07:00

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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Green Jobs: Steelworkers Fight to Reindustrialize America - 57;59

2010-10-22T20:07:00.000-07:00

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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Black Farmers Speakout for Justice with Alice Walker - 27:19

2010-10-19T11:23:00.000-07:00

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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Pt 2 - One Nation March on Washington - 27:28

2010-10-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

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 Radio: One Nation March on Washington - 27:03

2010-10-05T14:19:00.000-07:00

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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Building Bridges: NYC Fire Dept Discrimination; NYC Hospital Laundry Privatization Protest - 28'

2010-09-28T13:58:00.000-07:00

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.
**********
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 Attacked; Tyson Discrimination Suit - 27:52

2010-09-21T15:07:00.000-07:00

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.
**********************
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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Jobs, Jobs and More Jobs - The Real Bottom Line - 27:57

2010-09-14T11:50:00.000-07:00

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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March on Washington - One Nation Working Together -28'

2010-09-04T12:25:00.000-07:00

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 -27:32

2010-09-04T12:19:00.000-07:00

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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Corporate Power in Elections: The Citizens United Supreme Court Decision - 27:27

2010-08-31T13:52:00.000-07:00

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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Balanced Budget Madness Hits Social Security with James Galbraith -27:43

2010-08-14T08:42:00.000-07:00

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.
***********************
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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