The current struggles of public sector workers rights in Wisconsin and around the country has renewed interest in 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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The Real Deal: A Green State of the NYS State Message 
  
Howie Hawkins, the recent Green Party candidate for NY Governor, responds to Governor Cuomo’s proposed budget and State of the State address.  Hawkins will also discuss the recent arrest of Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and the culture of corruption that dominates the state Capitol.  In addition to the need for ethics reform, Hawkins will discuss Cuomo’s education agenda and attacks on teachers; energy; taxes and fiscal relief for local governments, minimum wage and poverty.

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350,000 Member Strong Union Leader at Forefront of Organizing United Front Against South Africa’s Class Inequalities and “Colonialism of a Special Type”
with 
Irvin Jim, Secretary General, National Union of Metal Workers South Africa (“NUMSA”) 


           “NUMSA, in line with the Freedom Charter demands, has demanded that nationalization of the Reserve Bank, mines, land, strategic and monopoly industries without compensation must take place with speed, if we are to avoid sliding into anarchy and violence as a result of the cruel impact of the continuing Colonialism of a Special Type which breeds poverty, unemployment and extreme inequalities in South Africa today…,” NUMSA General Secretary Irvin Jim  

Jim talks about NUMSA’s advocacy for its members interests against the corporateocracy and the exciting developments with the  Preparatory Assembly of the United Front in South Africa, a possible forerunner of the formation of a workers party, socialist in its orientation, with an eye on 2016 local government elections. NUMSA leadership has criticized the ruling majority party, the African National Congress for failing to take responsibility for South Africa’s growing inequality and the fact that infrastructure, education, water resources and health systems remain unfairly distributed across the societies of South Africa.  

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Greece’s Syriza Party: The Antidote to Europe’s Austerity Disease
with
Kostis Karpozilos, Dept. of History, Columbia University
and
Eric Poulos, Greek-American activist

Greece's parliament has failed to elect a president, which means it must hold a new election a little over two years since the last, which will take  place Jan. 25, with the prospect of a victory for the Syriza party, a political party formed of a coalition of hundreds of left groups, which has emerged as the country's second largest political party.   An upsurge of support for Syriza flows from the economic       turmoil in bankrupt Greece, which received emergency loans from the Troika: The European Union (EU), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) – and under the terms of the bailout loans the Greek government has cut back on its public spending, which had propped up much of its economy.  Greece now has an unemployment rate that has surpassed 27 percent, with youth unemployment hovering at around 60 percent, and hundreds of thousands of Greeks have been forced to migrate abroad to survive.  The social state is in shambles, and the government is in the process of selling off key state industries, public lands and utilities.  Kostis Karpozilos , the leading light of a nonsectarian left-wing Greek web site, was interestingly a featured commentator in a recent movie on the 100th anniversary of the Ludlow massacre and the writer and commentator in a movie about the history of Greek American radicals and Eric Poulos, Greek-American activist joins us to talk about the destruction of the Greek economy, the Eurozone and alternative examples of economic development, with an eye towards the Greek anti-austerity Syriza party winning the upcoming general election

Plus
An update with Alexis Tsipras, leader of the left-wing Syriza party in an interview with ch 4 reporter Paul Mason. Tspiras says he wants to renegotiate the Greek bailout and might even be prepared to pull the country out of the eurozone if push comes to shove - so usual terms of politics may not apply.

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Rejuvenating the Workers’ Movement – The Road Forward
featuring 
Prof. Stanley Aronowitz,  In the 1950s, Aronowitz was a factory metalworker. In the 50s and 60s, he directed organizing with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers and the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers.   He is currently a professor of sociology, cultural studies, and urban education at the CUNY Graduate Center and has written dozens of books on the U.S. working class. His recent book is The Death and Life of American Labor: Toward a New Workers’ Movement

Prof. Aronowitz reminds us that the use of strikes and other militant strategies was what built the labor movement, and how they are essential to revitalizing the faltering, organized labor organizations.  The strategies and tactics to rekindle 
the growth of the workers’ movements are based in workers banding together across workplaces, across occupations and building bridges from the workplace to linking with community-based  struggles for housing, education, health-care and for human rights and against all forms of discrimination.   
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Workers Demand N.Y.S. Department of Labor (DOL) Enforce Law
featuring 
National Mobilization Against Sweatshops (NMASS)

Yes, the minimum wage went up in N.Y.S. to $8.75/h, but that’s not enough to live on says NMASS and furthermore, too many of N.Y.S’s workers will see no change in Governor Cuomo’s DOL failure to enforce the labor laws. NMASS took their complaints to the DOL and is  threatening to sue  Cuomo and the DOL to enforce minimum wage laws and to process wage theft claims timely.

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The State, Racism & Matters of Black Life
Featuring 
GLEN FORD, executive editor, Black Agenda Report. Ford has been a journalist and political activist – a provider of "information for liberation," as he puts it for over 40 years. Ford created the first syndicated Black radio news magazine, Black World Report, the first syndicated Black news interview program on commercial TV, America’s Black Forum. Ford has served as a White House, Capitol Hill and State Department correspondent and Washington 
Bureau Chief, for Mutual Black Network, was national political columnist for Encore American and Worldwide News. Ford was a founding member of the Washington Association of Black Journalists and a member of the executive committee of the National Alliance of Third World Journalists.
and
TIM WISE, is one of the country’s leading anti-racist writers and activists who lecturers on issues of comparative racism, race and education and racism in the labor market. Wise is the author of six books, including Dear White America: 
Letter to a New Minority. His new book is The Culture of Cruelty: How America’s Elite Demonize the Poor, Valorize the Rich and Jeopardize the Future.

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Congress Lets Big Banks Resume Risky Trades  Rolling Back Financial Reforms Enacted To Prevent Another Financial Crisis
Featuring
Timothy A. Canova Professor of Law and Public Finance, Shepard Broad Law Center, Nova Southeastern University


The big banks attached a measure to must-pass Congressional spending legislation which halts a restriction on the kinds of risky derivatives trading that blew up the US economy in 2007. It allows the banksters to gamble not only with other people’s money but with taxpayer guarantees for their losses. This is only the  beginning of  their planned roll back of financial reforms passed to prevent another financial crisis. Liberal democrats responded by calling for the breaking up the “too big to fail” banks, but is this really enough? Do we need to nationalize banks?           

Plus
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders' Senate speech railed against the big banks' Congressional maneuver easing restrictions on risky derivatives trading and called for breaking up the "too big to fail" big banks. 

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New Yorkers Carry The Torch Lit By The Flames of Ferguson Protests: Rising Up Against Racist Policing!  
featuring 
The families of victims of police murder who tell their stories, expressing our feelings at New Yorkers historic march
plus 
commentary from Dr. William Barber, founder Moral Mondays & North Carolina Chair, NAACP 

Hundreds of thousands, “we the people” across the country, led by families of victims of police murder, Black and Brown youth most vulnerable to racist policing, and a really diverse group of supporters marched against the governmental 
policies, their implementation and the internalized racist attitudes at the heart of the license to kill people of color!  Amidst the anguish felt by the participants over the most recent deaths of people of color, at the hands of  the police the crowds gave promise to pulling together, nationally in a sustained effort to confront racist police policies that give police “the license to kill” Black and Brown!  
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Nationwide, Across Industries, Low-Wage Workers STRIKE, also Calling for Justice for Victims of Police Murder!

Fast-food workers are on the move and they've sparked other low-wage workers to strike for their just deserts.  Fast-food employees in 190 cities, went on strike and they were joined by convenience, dollar store, airport service workers, and home care workers. Low-wage workers across the country are forging bonds and rising up in a mass movement for economic justice.  The workers, on strike for higher wages, better working conditions and to unionize also raised their hands high, chanting "Hands Up, Don't Shoot," "I Can't Breath, I Can't Breath," to show their support for victims of racist police murders.

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Sparked by Police Impunity for Racist Killings, New Yorkers Chanting "Hand Up Don't Shoot" and "I Can't Breathe" with Mock Coffins Held Aloft Take It To The Streets!

Thousands of New Yorkers took to the streets, expressing their anguish over racist police killings of people of color and their anger over police officers Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown and Daniel Pantaleo for the choke-hold strangulation of Eric Garner and their impunity from prosecution. Building Bridges brings you the sounds of protest - from the "die ins" to the blockades of travel arteries all over this city - listen to the stories of family members, thirsting for "justice" for loved ones killed, as a result of racist 
police policies and practices and hear from the broad array of New Yorkers, we the people who are prepared to challenge them.

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Walmart and Ferguson Protests Spread Across the Country
This Holiday season. 
With special guest Dr. Jamal Bryant with the Empowerment Movement’s Hand’s Up, Don’t Spend Campaign a new dimension in the Ferguson protests, speaks to us from a Walmart protest in Chicago building bridges between the two mass movements

Mass protests also fanned out across the nation in the aftershock of the grand jury decision to not indict patrolman Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown who was 18 years old and unarmed in Ferguson, MO. Protesters are making the connection to the long standing epidemic of police killings of unarmed people of color throughout the U.S. , the most recent of which also include the 12 year old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, Eric Garner in Staten Island and Akai Gurley in Brooklyn. 

There were also demonstrations, marches and sit-in strikes at 1,600 
Walmart stores across the country, calling on the company to pay workers a minimum of $15/hour, provide full-time work with health care and union rights.  The country’s largest employer and the Waltons —Walmart’s majority owners—are abusing their power and hurting American families by allowing Walmart to violate workers’ rights. While the majority of Walmart workers are paid less than $25,000 a year, Walmart brings in more the $16 billion in 
annual profits; and the Walton family has built up nearly $150 billion in wealth.

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Walmart Arrests Dozens Who Sit-Down 
For $15/h Wage and Full-Time Hours

Martha Sellers and Maria Camarena, Walmart employees talk about the workers and their supporters arrested outside a Walmart store calling on the company and its owners—the Waltons—to end the illegal threats to and retaliation against workers calling for $15 an hour and consistent, full-time work at the country’s largest private employer. Hundreds of 
supporters rallied outside the store in Pico Rivera, California the site of the first Walmart strikes in 2012 to buoy the strikers – meanwhile the Walmart behemoth brings in $16 billion in annual profits and its  owners build on their $150 billion in wealth, the majority of Walmart workers are
paid less than $25,000 a year.  
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The Fire Next Time: Ferguson & Beyond Communities Organize  

Even were there to be an indictment of police officer Wilson in Ferguson, or of officer Pantelo for the strangulation of Eric Garner justice would remain elusive.  As long as police have license to kill Black and Brown men and women, and as long as people of color are economically marginalized, 
and state policies that intimidate, harass, criminalize and result in the imprisonment of targeted Black and Brown people persist there is no justice, no peace!   Thenjiwe McHarris discusses the significance of the protest movement in Ferguson and of UN Hearing she recently attended 
in Geneva where Ferguson was being discussed by The United Nations Committee Against Torture which heard testimony by Michael Brown’s parents.

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Four for Four...Even in "Red States" 
the Electorate’s Push to Raise the Minimum Wage“

Peter Davis, campaign activist for Time for a Raise campaign, 
a project of Ralph Nader's Center for the Study of Responsive Law 
and 
Paco Fabián , with the Good Jobs Nation an organization of low-wage workers employed by government contractors who are joining together to urge President Obama to use Executive Orders to give them a living wage and a voice on the job.  The Good Jobs Nation campaign is supported by a coalition of national faith and advocacy organizations, including the NAACP, Demos, Interfaith Worker Justice, Change to Win.

After last week’s election disaster, there’s some good news, in the 
minimum wage wins through ballot initiatives are sending a clear message: Americans across the political spectrum want to raise the minimum wage.  Now the electorate along with congressional progressives and allies are demanding more Presidential action to help low-wage workers and boost the economy.  Buoying this message in support of a rise in the minimum wage Peter Davis and Ralph Nader just co-wrote a letter to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi which states: "Buried underneath the coverage of the Democrats’ second midterm 'shalackin' in a row is a stark public sentiment 
that provides a path forward for your caucuses during the upcoming lame duck session... a minimum wage raise passed in every state in which it was on the ballot.

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Poverty, Racism & Policing, Mass Incarceration, Resistance 
and Social Transformation
featuring
Christopher Hedges, author of twelve books, including the best seller “Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt,” New York Times 
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, the recipient of Amnesty International's Global Award for Human Rights Journalism, Truthdig columnist, educator behind the walls of the US prison system, and activist. This important public intellectual, and activist Chris Hedges gives a rousing analysis of increasing poverty and how our racist system has used policing and mass incarceration, but as well the resistance of those targeted and the struggle for social
transformation.

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BP May Be Fined Up to $18 Billion 
for “Willful Misconduct” for Spill in Gulf
featuring
Antonia Juhasz, an oil and energy analyst, author, journalist and activist. She has authored several books, including Black Tide: the Devastating Impact of the Gulf Oil Spill, Juhasz is currently writing a feature article for Harper's Magazine on the impacts of the disaster on the deep ocean following her participation in a submarine dive to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico at the site of the spill

Federal Judge Barbier held that BP routinely put profit over prudence, people, safety, and the environment and the result was and remains catastrophic in the four years since the blowout on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig which killed 11 workers and sent millions of barrels of oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.

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Celebrating Sonia Sanchez on her Eightieth Birthday
featuring 
Sonia Sanchez
and
Jessica Care Moore, internationally renowned poet, publisher, 
playwright, performance artist,

Now, a tribute to the beloved world renowned poet, humanitarian, scholar, and activist Sonia Sanchez on her eightieth birthday with Jessica Care Moore, and a special message to all of us from Sonia Sanchez  

Poet, playwright, mother, scholar, lecturer and peace activist, Sonia Sanchez is a renowned force of nature respected in literary and activist communities all over the world and by people of all races, identities, ages & backgrounds. In 2011, Sanchez was selected as the first poet laureate of Philadelphia. She is the author of more than 20 books, and has been awarded countless awards and honors, including the 1985 American Book Award for Homegirls and Handgrenades.  She is also the Poetry Society of America’s 2001 
Robert Frost Medalist. She was the first Presidential Fellow at Temple University and she held the Laura Carnell Chair in English at the university. She came of age in NYC during the Black Arts and Black Power Movements of the 1960s and ’70s. Currently based in Philadelphia, the former Harlemite is regarded as the Godmother of the Black Arts Movement. The late Maya Angelou heralded her as “a lion in literature’s forest.” Today’s poets, writers, hip-hop artists, grassroots activists, and public servants alike point to her work as their guiding light. “She opened the door for everything we do,” says hip-hop artist Talib Kweli.

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Beyond the Climate March - Flood Wall Street 
with
Anne Petermann,  Exec.  Dir., The Global Justice Ecology Project, just released the report "Green Shock Doctrine" and runs the climate-connections.org blog

Petermann said : The Global Climate  "march brought together a diverse mix of constituencies from anti-capitalists to Indigenous Peoples to representatives from communities impacted by climate change both in the U.S. and around the world. Each had their own set of demands, but the overarching theme was the need to build power from the grassroots and stop relying on governments and the UN to do this for us. Hundreds to possibly a few thousand of these folks will be taking part in the Flood Wall Street direct action to bring attention to the real culprits of climate change, and to expose the corporate capture of the UN." Petermann recently wrote the piece: "Confronting Climate Catastrophe: Direct Action is the Antidote for Despair: Or, Why the UN is Worse than Useless and we need to Flood Wall Street!" 

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On the Count, Using, Not Doing Time: 
A Truly Amazing, Authentic African American History Lesson 
with 
Marshal "Eddie" Conway   

Marshal "Eddie" Conway  a veteran of The Black Panther Party 
was held as a political prisoner for four decades in a government 
frame-up.  But whether behind the walls or now back in the 
community after his recent release, Convey exemplifies the 
power of love.  He is a theoretician, who melds his knowledge 
with activism, to prove that the educational key to self-growth 
and realization lies within  the collective process of striving for 
human rights and fundamental change wherever you are.

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Facing Thousands of Layoffs , Olive Garden, and other Darden 
Workers Prepare to Take Direct Action 
with 
Saru Jayaraman, Co-Founder and Co-Director, ROC United

Starboard Value, a hedge fund continuing to increase its control over the Darden restaurant chain, just released a 300 page presentation on the future of  Olive Garden, franchising out the company, increasing part-time scheduling, and thousands of lay-offs.Starboard Value and Darden Restaurants have continued to ignore the requests of a  petition, singed by thousands of Darden employees to meet with leadership from both the hedge-fund and restaurant company. The petition also calls attention to problematic labor practices, including the company’s elimination of auto-gratuities on large parties, unpredictable scheduling, and wages that
are unable to sustain a family. Darden Restaurants’ Inc employs more than 130,000 people across the U.S. The company’s annual shareholders’ meeting is confirmed to take place on October 10th in Orlando, Florida. Employees are planning direct action in New York City before the shareholders’ meeting .
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Eliminating NY’s Tipped Sub-Minimum Wage  
with 
Paul Sonn, General Counsel, Ntl. Employment Law Project (NELP) 

Marking a new front in the fight for fair pay for low-wage workers in NY a new coalition of women’s leaders, food delivery workers, and low-wage tipped workers are calling for an end to the sub-minimum wage for tipped workers by the Cuomo administration’s Wage Board charged with recommending an increase in the state’s tipped sub-minimum wage. A new report by NELP finds that a  Wage Order eliminating the tipped sub-minimum wage would benefit an estimated 229,000 low-wage tipped workers. The minimum wage for thousands of tipped food service workers remains stuck at just $5.00/hr. (tipped hotel workers earn slightly 
higher at $5.65 per hour). In many states the tipped minimum is far lower

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Exciting Labor Highlights From Sunday's Peoples Climate March

With our future on the line and the whole world watching, labor and community groups joined forces to take a stand to bend the course of history. And as the people took to the streets to demand that the world we know is within our reach: a world with an economy that works for people and the planet; a world safe from the ravages of climate change; a world with good jobs, clean air and water, and healthy communities, we were there.  Building Bridges was there to now bring you labor voices from the Peoples Climate March .

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