A message from Confederação Nacional dos Trabalhadores Metalúrgicos, which represents workers at two GM plants in Brazil.
AFGE president J. David Cox Sr. has pledged the support of his union’s members for striking GM workers.
Issued September 17, 2019
WASHINGTON, D.C. – SEIU International President Mary Kay Henry released the following statement today in support of the striking GM workers and their right to the healthcare coverage they were promised:
“GM’s decision to yank healthcare coverage away from their dedicated employees, in the dead of night, with no warning, is heartless and unconscionable. GM’s actions could put people’s lives at risk, from the factory worker who needs treatment for their asthma to the child who relies on their parents’ insurance for chemotherapy. Thankfully these men and women have their union, which is making sure working people and their families can continue to get care.
“The UAW workers on the strike lines are showing immense bravery in the face of intimidation. They are an inspiration to SEIU’s two million members, and millions more working people united in the Fight for $15 and a Union. This is why we are demanding Unions for All: so that working people have the power to hold big corporations like GM accountable and to fight for our future, our families and our communities.”
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The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) unites 2 million diverse members in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. SEIU members working in the healthcare industry, in the public sector and in property services believe in the power of joining together on the job to win higher wages and benefits and to create better communities while fighting for a more just society and an economy that works for all of us, not just corporations and the wealthy.
www.seiu.org
Southeast Michigan Jobs With Justice
UAW Strike Solidarity Support Action
Community activists to join UAW/GM workers on their picket line
Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2019
6 pm to 7 pm
Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Plant
2500 East Grand Boulevard
Detroit, Michigan, 48211
“I’m not a GM worker. Why should I care about the UAW’s strike there?
A significant number of GM production workers are classified as Tier 2 and paid only $17 an hour while legacy, or higher seniority, workers are paid $28 to $33 an hour.
If the UAW is able to overcome this income inequality and win higher wages, millions more dollars will be put into the Metro Detroit community. This mass purchasing pow- er benefits all of us.
Yes, we all do better when we all do better.
This two tier system is the source of a great deal of division within the ranks of UAW membership. Overcoming this income inequality can lay the foundation for a stronger union and stronger unions are good for all of us.
Joining the UAW’s picket line on Wednesday shows striking workers exactly who’s on their side. Talking with them, getting to know them and they getting to know you and your cause can build trusting relationships that can carry on beyond the strike. Af- ter all, we are workers, too, and UAW members live our communities.
A worker’s victory at GM can inspire others, union and community, in their struggles with other greedy corporations and institutions.
As identified by the former Occupy Wall Street movement, the extreme inequality of wealth and power of the 1% hurts us all. With so much wealth and power in the hands of so Few, there never seems to be enough money — nor political will — to raise the minimum wage, fix our roads, fund our schools, rebuild our infrastructure, create green jobs, fight climate change, and eliminate racial and gender inequities.
Whatever is your issue of concern, we all have a stake in this strike.
Sponsored by Democratic Socialists of America-Detroit and Southeast Michigan Jobs with Justice
If you or your organization wishes to express solidarity with UAW/GM strikers and be publicly listed, please write: semjwj2@gmail.com
Please note: There could be a problem finding parking near the plant.
Southeast Michigan Jobs With Justice
Viewing musicians as exploited workers and as beleaguered contractors helps contribute to a better understanding of their art form and art more generally.
“Take ‘be-bop’ — officialdom in Manhattan was objecting to heterosexual dancing across racial lines and, thus, the music morphed from a ‘dancing’ music to a ‘listening’ music.”
Dodging violent attacks by racist and drunken “fans,” resisting pressure from drug-peddling bosses and inhaling smoke for hours in dank clubs comprised the “common plight” of jazz musicians in the early 20th century, says historian Gerald Horne, author of Jazz and Justice: Racism and the Political Economy of the Music. In this interview with Truthout, Horne describes the role of racism in the development of jazz, the gulf between its domestic and international reception; and why creativity, improvisation and technical mastery were a means of survival for its performers.
Anton Woronczuk: Can you imagine a more dangerous profession than being a jazz musician in the United States during the 20th century?
Gerald Horne: Certainly, being a “jazz” musician in the first decades of the 20th century was probably the most dangerous profession in the arts and, along with coal mining, one of the most dangerous jobs of all. Inhaling cigarette smoke in dank clubs, being plied with alcohol and other controlled substances by unscrupulous bosses of clubs and record labels alike, being attacked violently by racist “fans” — all this and worse was part of the common plight of these artists.
Jazz and Justice looks at the history of jazz by understanding musicians as workers. What does this approach reveal about the production of this art form and the experiences of those who made it?
Viewing musicians as exploited workers and as beleaguered contractors, helps — I think — contribute to a better understanding of their art form and art more generally, both of which often are removed from the muck of materialist analysis and, instead, analyzed all too subjectively as a “thing in itself,” disengaged from the mode of production and productive forces more generally. Perhaps this subjectivity is understandable given the angelic and melodious sounds produced by these artists, which can easily lure the unwary into thinking there is something “otherworldly” about the process: this is both true — and false.
Certain musical riffs…were drawn from the “rat-tat-tat” of gunshots, a not infrequent sound heard in the often mob-controlled clubs where artists were compelled to perform…
Tehran has dismissed the US’s claim of Iranian involvement in the recent Yemeni drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities, saying Washington seems to be shifting from a failed campaign of “maximum pressure” to one of “maximum lying” and “deceit” against the Islamic Republic.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif responded in a tweet on Sunday to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s claim that Tehran had “launched an unprecedented attack on the world’s energy supply” and “is behind nearly 100 attacks on Saudi Arabia.”
Pompeo’s rant came after Yemeni armed forces conducted a large-scale drone operation on Saudi Arabia’s Aramco oil facilities in response to Riyadh’s years-long military aggression, causing a partial halt in crude and gas production from the world’s top oil exporter.
The top US diplomat, however, failed short of offering any evidence to substantiate his claim.
Zarif said Pompeo is now resorting to a campaign of “max deceit” against Iran after the administration he serves failed to achieve the desired results from its anti-Iran “maximum pressure” policy — which has seen Washington impose the toughest of economic sanctions against the Iranian nation.
“US & its clients are stuck in Yemen because of illusion that weapon superiority will lead to military victory,” said Zarif.
The top Iranian diplomat further called attention to a four-point peace proposal that Tehran submitted to the United Nations in April 2015 in an effort to help end the conflict in Yemen.
“Blaming Iran won’t end disaster. Accepting our April ’15 proposal to end war & begin talks may,” Zarif added….
September 16, 2019 at St. Marcus Lutheran School in Milwaukee / Photo: MTEA
Betsy DeVos is not welcome in Milwaukee! Her privatization agenda continues to hurt Milwaukee children. The voucher school that we’re standing outside of teaches that women are inferior to men, homosexuality is a sin, and the Earth is 6000 years old. Public dollars should go to public schools not religious vouchers and charters!
