SPIRITED

 Last night's AK-47 practice seemed just a little more spirited than usual . We're all sad about Logan's closing for good , and maybe a little frustrated with the whole pandemic thing and everything that goes along with that . Despite that, we're still working on new songs and practicing every week , even with no sign of live music happening any time soon. It seems fitting that the last show we played at Logan's was with the world renowned punk rock heavyweights DOA , and our friends in Class Of 1984 . It was a great night , and I'll never forget it .

Here's a fantastic tribute to Logan's by a very talented and dedicated photographer named John Carlow . Read it here .

SAD NEWS FOR ALL WHO ENJOY LIVE MUSIC

 I know it's a phrase that's been used too much for too many different reasons , but for us in this small scene in this small town , this is truly the end of an era . 

Different genres , different scenes , different people, they all made Logan's their home. So many memories made , causes played for , new friends being met .......it's all done .

I was sad that I wouldn't get to see The Angry Snowmans this year along with all of the people I don't get to see regularly, but that's the least of it now. Will it ever get back to normal again ? Who knows ? I am one of many sad people in this city right now.

Goodbye, Logan's.

SWEET SWEET FREEDOM

 Is this the "freedom" that reagan, bush, clinton , obama , and now fuckface trump are always braying about , the one that the "shithole countries" are jealous of ? Stupid stupid  arrogant amerikkkan motherfuckers....

Three-year-old boy in Texas shoots and kills himself at his own birthday party

Harriet Alexander

Sun., October 25, 2020, 10:53 a.m. PDT

A pistol fell out of a family member’s pocket in Texas and was found by a toddler celebrating his birthday (Getty)

A three-year-old boy in Texas has died at his own birthday party after finding a family member’s gun and accidentally shooting himself in the chest.

The accident happened on Saturday afternoon in Porter, 30 miles from downtown Houston.

“Family and friends had gathered earlier to celebrate the birthday of the three-year-old, and while playing cards, heard a gunshot,” the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office said.

“The child was located with a gunshot wound to the chest.”

A pistol had fallen out of the pocket of one of someone in the family, they said. The toddler was taken to a nearby fire station, and pronounced dead.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family and friends of this tragic accident.”

Children finding guns and killing themselves and others is depressingly common in the United States.

It is at least the fifth fatal accidental shooting by a child this year in Texas, according to a tally kept by activist group Everytown For Gun Safety – meaning that Texas is tied with Tennessee for the highest number of such shootings in 2020.

There have been at least 229 unintentional shootings by children in 2020, it calculates, with 97 deaths and 139 injuries.

An estimated 4.6 million American children live in homes with at least one gun that is loaded and unlocked, the organisation says.

Every year, hundreds of American children gain access to firearms and unintentionally shoot themselves or someone else.

The campaign group Be Smart recommends guns be stored unloaded, locked in a case, and placed in a secure locked box with the ammunition stored separately.

AMERIKKKAN FASCISM

 The majority of people think that fascism could never happen in a country like the u.s.a. , but I'm sure if you went to places that have felt the ravages of u.s. imperialism for decades, they would disagree .

Read this piece by political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal to truly understand what amerikkkan fascism looks like .

Ignoring history to our detriment

By Mumia Abu-Jamal posted on October 21, 2020

These lightly edited remarks were made by Mumia Abu-Jamal in a prerecorded message that aired on October 14 during “Conversations with Trudy,” an online interview program hosted by Trudy Knockless. The full episode is available at tinyurl.com/y3pscmjr and includes commentary by Workers World Party member Ted Kelly.

Why did I even suggest the radical notion that the government is totally fascist? Most historians would disagree with the idea that there could ever be fascism in the U.S. As a student of history, I probably would have disagreed myself a few years ago. 

I know that in my youth as a member of the Black Panther Party we spoke about “the fascist government” of Richard Nixon, the former Attorney General John Mitchell and Spiro Agnew, and their war against Black America and Black freedom movements. We used words like fascism and I think we were trying to speak about the threat of things coming but not the threat of things that existed.

Until a friend of mine — my doctor, actually — talked to me about the period of American history after Reconstruction. Again, students of history know we’re talking about a period of history after 1865, after the Civil War, and after the so-called Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution, the 13th, the 14th, and the 15th amendments which granted the rights to vote and the right to be a citizen to African American freedmen. So for ten, perhaps fifteen years, Reconstruction obtained that in many parts of the South.

And then it was crushed by terrorist wars waged by the Ku Klux Klan, the White Citizens Council, and other similar white supremacist organizations allied with the state to crush the freedom movement of African American people. This was a fascist war that the government ignored because it was on one side. 

People wrote to Washington but they got no answers. Black people were driven out of Congress and then driven away from the vote at the risk of being robbed, beaten, terrorized, murdered, or burned — or all those things. So we had fascism in the United States at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th.

W.E.B. DuBois writes about the Red Summers of the teens of the 20th century, 1918, 1919. And there were white riots against Black communities in Cincinnati, in Philadelphia, in Louisville, and all across the country. That was fascism. And we’re used to thinking about fascism in the context of Mussolini in Italy or Hitler in Germany. But we’re not used to seeing this read as an American face or in an American accent. And that’s our fault. That’s our problem. We have ignored history to our detriment.

Think about this. If the American Constitution granted the rights of Black people to vote after the Civil War ended in 1865, why did it take the Civil Rights Movement of 100 years later to make those rights real and to call for the recall of laws that diminished Black freedom?

So we’re thinking about fascism. And I think we need to look at it and then look at this era that we’re living in now.

Ona MOVE. From a Prison Nation, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal. 

WHO CAN YOU TRUST ?

 Are either u.s. presidential candidates worth shit ? Will either of them stop the pig murder of black and brown youth across the country ? I'm sure most agree that maybe under biden the people would be given a bit of a break , although he's totally against defunding his precious pigs , whatever good that would fucking do  , and he also completely supported the war on Iraq, like all of the bloodthirsty motherfuckers in both parties .

As mentioned in previous posts , I don't necessarily support all of the views of the Progressive Labor Party , but they write some in depth articles that should be read . So please do .

REJECT BIG & SMALL FASCISTS, REBEL AGAINST DICTATORSHIP IN DISARRAY

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2020 AT 4:35PM

The U.S. ruling class is in chaos. As the presidential election campaign kicks into final gear, the splits among the capitalists are getting sharper by the day.  The debate between Klan hero Donald Trump and mass incarcerator Joe Biden degenerated into an incoherent shouting match between two lifelong racist liars. After Trump and more than a dozen of his closest advisors tested positive for Covid-19, the Superspreader in Chief was left to shamble around a mostly deserted White House, jacked up on steroids and contradicting himself from one minute to the next. In the face of full-blown fascist China’s disciplined, sword-rattling challenge to U.S. dominance, the rupture between the Big Fascists (led by multinational finance capital like JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs) and the Small Fascists (organized around domestic energy firms and short-term profits) has reached a breaking point.
Elections are a critical tool for resolving the capitalists’ internal conflicts. The Big Fascists need masses of workers to vote for their side to legitimize their plans for inter-imperialist war and fascism. Equally important, they need the myth of electoral democracy and the “peaceful transition of power” to mask their brutal capitalist dictatorship (see page 5). This time around, however, it’s unclear whether either gang of bosses will accept the results of the November ballot. The stakes are high. The future of the U.S. profit system and its teetering liberal world order hangs in the balance.
Progressive Labor Party (PLP) calls on all workers to see that their power lies not in the voting booth but in class struggle in the streets and workplaces. Among capitalists there is no “lesser evil,” only a choice between blood-sucking mass murderers. Democrats and Republicans alike stand for racism, sexism, exploitation, state terror, and the death of millions from  lack of food, shelter, medical care, and public health infrastructure.  Only by organizing anti-racist fightback and building for communist revolution will we turn the tide against rising fascism and impending global war.
Rise of Small Fascists throws U.S. bosses into disarray
The Small Fascists’ agenda is to cut taxes for the wealthy, remove the U.S. military from costly overseas commitments, withdraw from international alliances, eliminate social services for the working class, and scrap environmental regulations. After years of organizing on the margins, with fringe third parties like the Libertarians, they found their chance to move inside the tent with the rise of the gutter racist Tea Party. But they were unable to challenge the Big Fascists’ stranglehold on state power until Trump. The failed developer and reality TV con man hijacked the Republican Party with a base of alienated white workers, hard-right vigilante racists, and hypocritical evangelicals. Finance capital placed its bet on the despicable Hillary (“Super-Predator”) Clinton and is still paying for its arrogance.
We know through dialectics that the internal is primary. The Big Fascists’ lack of discipline—their corruption, individualism, and short-term outlook—enabled the Small Fascists to grab power. The loss of decent-paying industrial jobs and two failed Middle East wars cracked open the door. The Great Recession of 2008 and Barack Obama’s bank bailout opened it wider. Small Fascists like the Kochs didn’t much like Trump and his anti-immigrant rants, since much of their profits come from immigrant labor. But in an act of mutual opportunism, they came together to seize the executive branch.
Trump’s wildly disruptive presidency reflects a qualitative change in the capitalist bosses’ internal struggle. To many CHALLENGE readers, Trump and his openly racist and sexist backers are repellent, the very essence of capitalist callousness, selfishness, and greed. They aren’t wrong. But for our class, the alternative can’t be Joe Biden and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. Because it’s the Big Fascists who have an even more dangerous long-term outlook for the international working class.
Big Fascists in jeopardy
For over a century, and especially since World War II, U.S. finance capital has controlled the military, the intelligence agencies, all three branches of government, and virtually all of the big media. Along with rulers in Western Europe, they established alliances to maintain U.S. supremacy and contain their enemies, like the old Soviet Union and current-day China and Russia. Not so long ago, the bosses could work out their differences before the knives came out. In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court stopped the Florida recount and named George W. Bush president. A united ruling class rallied behind the fascist Patriot Act and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. It formulated the Hart-Rudman plan, a blueprint to sustain its domination through the 21st century. The contradiction between the bosses’ two wings, so glaring today, was still young.
But external pressures have sharpened the contradiction. China’s rise—its Belt and Road Initiative, its global leadership in the pandemic—gives the U.S. bosses less room to patiently work out their disagreements. This reality is driving finance capital to fascism that much faster—first to destroy the Small Fascists, then to build a multicultural, patriotic movement to control the working class and prepare for World War III.
U.S. allies are plainly worried. After the first (and maybe last) Trump-Biden debate, labeled “a shit show” by CNN, a French political analyst said, “European leaders must have woken up this morning thinking, ‘The American leadership is over, and for a while, even if Biden is elected and tries to rebuild what Trump has destroyed.’” The U.S. bosses’ rivals also took notice. According to a state-controlled newspaper in China, “Such a chaos at the top of U.S. politics reflects division, anxiety of U.S. society and the accelerating loss of advantages of the U.S. political system” (NYT, 9/30).  
Although Trump proclaims himself the “law and order” president, the Big Fascists have a much longer and uglier history of promoting state terror against the working class. Biden, who built a career on serving the profit-hungry banks and credit card companies, is the embodiment of finance capital’s decay. From his 1994 mass incarceration crime bill, to the bloody Middle East wars executed by the Bushes and Obama, to his latest refusal to “defund” his beloved police, Biden has been the most loyal of stooges for the Big Fascists’ lethal program. His running mate and former prosecutor Kamala Harris, proudly known as California’s “top cop,” played a significant role in unleashing the Klan in blue to kill Black workers like Oscar Grant (NYT, 8/9).
Don’t vote, revolt!
Fighting for communism means building a mass revolutionary party and a world run by and for the international working class. We can’t get there with the bosses’ sham of democracy, with elections that force us to pick one racist exploiter over another. And we can’t get there without smashing the racist, sexist, and nationalist divisions that keep our class in shackles.
Over the seven months of the worldwide capitalist pandemic, in their fightback on the streets and their courageous labor in hospitals and grocery stores, workers have shown that our class can take the lead in caring for one another and overcoming the most challenging obstacles. These communist impulses within the working class are what keep the bosses up at night. The next step is to sharpen our struggle with comrades and friends to create that better world. Fight for communism! Join Progressive Labor Party

SAME SHIT

I know I've gone on and on about how kkkanada's role in the world is not much different than the u.s.'s , except on a smaller scale. The fact remains that imperialism is imperialism, and the same things that drive u.s. actions drive kkkanada's as well. Here's more of that , and there will be more in the future also.

 

Canadian military training in Africa is extension of US imperialism

Which is more believable as motivation to send soldiers to other countries, altruism or self-interest?

Canadian forces don’t train their African counterparts out of a commitment to professionalism or democracy but to extend this country’s influence.

Recently the Ottawa Citizen reported that Canadian special forces will continue to participate in “U.S.-led training exercises despite links to instructing troops who have been involved in two separate military uprisings in Mali. Malian soldiers forced the resignation of the country’s President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita after they launched a coup on Aug. 18. Coup leader Col. Assimi Goita, as well as many of the soldiers who took part in the uprising, had received training at the U.S.-led annual Flintlock military exercises which involves western special forces providing counter-terrorism training to African units. A former army officer has now taken over as president in Mali and Goita has declared himself vice president.”

The Canadian Special Operations Regiment (CSOR) has participated in Exercise Flintlock since 2011. Sponsored by the US Africa Command (AFRICOM) and directed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Flintlock takes place in a different nation of the Sahel region of northern Africa each year. “Although Flintlock is considered an exercise, it is really an extension of ongoing training, engagement, and operations that help prepare our close Africa partners in the fight against extremism and the enemies that threaten peace, stability, and regional security,” said the commander of the US Joint Special Operations Task Force-Trans Sahel, Colonel Kenneth Sipperly, during Flintlock 2014.

In addition to Flintlock, Canadian forces have trained thousands of African military personnel in recent years in a variety of forums and countries across the continent. Hundreds of African soldiers have also come to train in Canada through the Military Training Assistance Program (MTAP).

Canadian officials generally tell the media the aim of training other militaries is to help fight terror or the illicit drug trade but a closer look at military doctrine suggests broader strategic and geopolitical motivations. An important objective is to strengthen foreign militaries’ capacity to operate in tandem with Canadian and/or NATO forces. According to Canada’s MTAP, its “language training improves communication between NATO and other armed forces” and its “professional development and staff training enhances other countries compatibility with the CF.” At a broader level MTAP states its training “serves to achieve influence in areas of strategic interest to Canada. … Canadian diplomatic and military representatives find it considerably easier to gain access and exert influence in countries with a core group of Canadian-trained professional military leaders.”

When Canada initiated post-independence military training missions in Africa a memo to cabinet ministers described the political value of training foreign military officers. It stated: “Military leaders in many developing countries, if they do not actually form the government, frequently wield much more power and influence domestically than is the case in the majority of western democratic nations … [It] would seem in Canada’s general interest on broad foreign policy grounds to keep open the possibility of exercising a constructive influence on the men who often will form the political elite in developing countries, by continuing to provide training places for officers in our military institutions where they receive not only technical military training but are also exposed to Canadian values and attitudes.”

As part of Canada’s post British rule aid efforts, Canadian troops trained armed forces in various African countries in the 1960s. In Ghana, Nigeria, Zambia and Tanzania, Canada endeavoured “to fill in the vacuum left by the withdrawal of British officers and training facilities,” notes Professor Robert Matthews. Military historian Sean Maloney further explains: “These teams consisted of regular army officers who, at the ‘operational level,’ trained military personnel of these new Commonwealth countries to increase their professionalism. The strategic function, particularly of the 83-man team in Tanzania, was to maintain a Western presence to counter Soviet and Chinese bloc political and military influence.”

In 1966 Ghana’s Canadian-trained army overthrew Kwame Nkrumah, a leading pan-Africanist president. After Nkrumah’s removal the Canadian High Commissioner boasted about the effectiveness of Canada’s Junior Staff Officers training program. Writing to the undersecretary of external affairs, C.E. McGaughey noted, “all the chief participants of the coup were graduates of this course.” (Canadian major Bob Edwards, who was a training advisor to the commander of a Ghanaian infantry brigade, discovered preparations for the coup the day before its execution, but said nothing.)

After Ghana won its independence the CF organized and oversaw a Junior Staff Officers course and took up a number of top positions in the Ghanaian Ministry of Defence. In the words of Canada’s military attaché to Ghana, Colonel Desmond Deane-Freeman, the Canadians in these positions imparted “our way of thinking”. Celebrating the influence of “our way of thinking”, High Commissioner McGaughey wrote the undersecretary of external affairs in 1965 that “since independence, it [Ghana’s military] has changed in outlook, perhaps less than any other institution. It is still equipped with Western arms and although essentially non-political, is Western oriented.”

When today’s internal documents are made available, they will likely show that Canadian military training initiatives continue to influence the continent’s politics in ways that run counter to most Africans’ interests.

DEATH SENTENCE FOR RIDING YOUR BIKE

 I've said before, that just when you think you've heard it all, more shit comes to the surface, especially in racist amerikkka. Imagine getting shot for riding your bike without lights or on the sidewalk . What the fuck is this ?

Riding Your Bike While Black or Latino Can Get You Shot by the Pigs

October 19, 2020 | revcom.us

 

On August 31, 29-year-old Dijon Kizzee was murdered in cold blood by members of the LA Sheriff’s Department (LASD). They had stopped Kizzee for riding his bike on the wrong side of the street. Kizzee ran away on foot, yelling, “They’re going to kill me.” The pigs fired 15 shots into Kizzee’s back—continuing to shoot even after Kizzee had fallen still. People took to the streets for weeks protesting this vicious murder. (See here for previous revcom.us coverage.)

The killing of Dijon Kizzee was outrageous enough. But as it turns out, the pigs murdering someone riding a bike after stopping them for a very minor violation is a pretty routine thing, according to an October 16 article in the Los Angeles Times. There have been 16 cases in Los Angeles County just since 2005 where the cops stopped someone for a bike violation—like no lights, riding on the wrong side of the street or on the sidewalk—and ended up shooting the person. Most of these shootings happened in Black and Latino communities. In 11 of these cases, including Kizzee’s, the bicyclist was Black or Latino and was KILLED. Some people have just stopped riding their bike after constantly being stopped and harassed by pigs—which at any point could turn into something deadly.

In addition to Dijon Kizzee, the Los Angeles Times cited these examples:

• May 2014—23-year-old Noel Aguilar was riding his bicycle on a sidewalk when he saw a couple of LA County sheriffs and quickly rode away. Minutes later, Aguilar was dead with three bullets in his back.
• February 2012—When 26-year-old Christian Cobian was stopped because his bike didn’t have any lights, he ran. Deputies said they thought Cobian had a gun and fired 13 rounds, killing him. No gun was found.
• May 2007—Two Inglewood cops in an unmarked car tried to stop 20-year-old Richard Tyson from riding his bike on the sidewalk. They said he was a “gang member.” Tyson kept riding and said, “Why are you always messing with me? I’m just coming from the store.” The pigs, who said they saw a bulge in Tyson’s shirt, chased him to the backyard of an apartment complex and then fired six rounds, killing Tyson. Paramedics found a packaged T-shirt in Tyson’s sweatshirt pocket and there was no gun.
• October 2012—44-year-old Alfonso Cerda was run over and killed after deputies pulled into a driveway to block Cerda’s path. The deputies said they were trying to detain Cerda because his bike didn’t have proper lights and that Cerda had a gun. No gun was found.

In this white supremacist country (now with a genocidal racist at its head), it’s a common saying that a person can be killed by the pigs for driving while Black—DWB. It’s clear that RWB/L—riding your bike while Black or Latino—can also make you a target of police brutality and murder.

For more, see “Deputies killed Dijon Kizzee after a bike stop. We found 15 similar law enforcement shootings, many fatal,” by Nicole Santa Cruz and Alene Tchekmedyian, Los Angeles Times, October 15, 2020.

PANDEMIC PROFITS

 Of course while millions suffer due to job loss and cutting back of hours because of the pandemic ,some others are reaping the rewards of this global plague .

This is the their system works,it always has and always will.

Viral capitalism: Racist, sexist bosses kill jobs

By Kathy Durkin posted on October 13, 2020

Another 1.3 million people filed for unemployment benefits during the week of Sept. 28, adding to the ranks of the 12 million workers still jobless due to the pandemic. They and their families have lost health insurance, not provided by this ruthless capitalist government. Evictions and homelessness are on the rise. Food lines are everywhere.

Yet no pandemic rescue plan is in sight. Despite the suffering of millions of workers and their families, the Democrats and Republicans cannot come to an agreement. Especially hard hit are Black, Latinx, Indigenous, immigrant and low-income workers. Undocumented workers deserve assistance, but this racist government denies them any aid, even medical care or food stamps.

A coalition of Philadelphia organizations at a in-person action, People’s Unemployment Line: Demand a Safe & Just Return to Work! June 2020. (Photo: Joe Piette)

October 5 marked the tenth week since laid-off workers receiving unemployment benefits failed to get the extra $600 weekly federal benefits that expired at the end of July. Right-wing politicians refused to agree to it. Even more workers have lost jobs since the White House halted stimulus talks on Oct. 6. That trend will continue if the pandemic spikes again and businesses close. (Economic Policy Institute, Oct. 8)

What recovery?

Job growth slowed in September, with many furloughs becoming permanent and the “recovery” losing steam. While some companies are hiring, others are laying off. EPI says there are 6.6 million more unemployed people than job openings and warns that without further aid to state and local economies, millions more jobs will be lost.

This denial of funding comes at a time when half of those laid off during the pandemic are still jobless, while 60% of those still working who took a pay cut have not regained their former salaries. The labor market “recovery” has bypassed Black, Latinx, low-income and young workers, who were disproportionately laid off or paid reduced wages. Some 56% of laid-off low-wage workers are still unemployed. (Pew Research Center, Sept. 24)

The jobless rate declined to 7% in September for white workers, but 12.1% of Black workers, 10.3% of Latinx workers and 15.9% of young workers are still unemployed. (Bureau of Labor Statistics, Oct. 2) White workers are being rehired twice as quickly as Black workers due to entrenched racism. Many laid-off Black workers have joined the ranks of the 3.8 million who permanently lost their jobs as of last month. 

Denying further rescue funds will severely harm Black, Latinx and Indigenous communities, who already suffer lower incomes and assets due to systemic racism. It means no more federal funds for housing, health care, protective equipment for health workers, COVID testing and treatment, or the Postal Service.

Jerome Powell, chairperson of the Federal Reserve Board, reacting to President Trump’s order to stop rescue plan talks, warned that if the virus spreads, more businesses will close and the economy will tank. His concern is not about workers suffering but about companies losing profits as the economy contracts. At the core, he and the capitalist class fear growing mass anger by the multinational working class and political instability.

$10.2 trillion bonanza – to the wealthy

One group has fared quite well during this pandemic — the 2,189 billionaires whose combined wealth soared 27.5% between April and July to a record $10.2 trillion. UBS bank reported Oct. 7 that the rate of growth soared during the coronavirus crisis in the technology, health and industrial sectors. (UBS.com, “Riding the Storm”) Health industry tycoons raked in the most, spurred on by various innovations and COVID-19 treatments and equipment.

While much of this wealth was obtained through betting on the global stock market recovery after the virus peaked, it helped that the U.S. ruling class has one of their own in the White House, who cut their taxes and connived to undermine workers’ rights and labor unions. President Trump not only didn’t “drain the swamp” of corporate lobbyists and magnates, he “reinvented it.” (New York Times, Oct. 11)

Health care workers and others rally Oct. 7 in solidarity with California nurses’ strike and to build a Workers Assembly Against Racism. New York City. Go to www.shutdownracism.org

This obscene wealth is an insult to the millions worldwide infected by the coronavirus. Over 8 million have been sickened in the U.S., and 220,000 have died — mainly Black, Latinx and Indigenous people, plus disabled individuals and seniors. It’s a slam at “essential workers” and courageous medical workers who jeopardize their lives to save others. Over 1,700 health workers have died from COVID-19. (National Nurses United, Sept. 28)

In richest country, widespread poverty

There’s a crying need for another rescue plan. Some 78 million adults are having difficulty paying for basic necessities due to long-standing inequities, “often stemming from structural racism,” in employment, housing and health care. This has intensified with the pandemic. Nearly half of Black and Latinx families are having trouble paying basic bills, compared to one-fourth of white households. (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Oct. 7) They are twice as likely to fall behind on housing payments and lack emergency funds.

The COVID crisis created a hunger crisis as parents lost incomes. Food lines extend for blocks. An estimated 54 million people, including 18 million children, many no longer receiving healthy school meals, aren’t getting enough to eat. One in eight households lacks adequate food, with Black and Latinx families twice as likely as white households to go without. (New York Times, Sept. 2)

More pain is projected for the multinational working class, which has recouped only half of the 24 million jobs lost in the spring. Corporations say that due to the pandemic crisis and the lack of more federal stimulus money, they must implement massive job cuts. Omitted from the financial news is that businesses are also shrinking their workforce in reaction to the global capitalist economic crisis.

Business Insider’s list of implemented or projected corporate layoffs adds up to a  stunning tens of thousands of jobs lost. Disney is cutting 28,000 jobs. United and American airlines furloughed 32,000 workers on Oct. 1 Numerous other companies are eliminating workers. (tinyurl.com/y54at7yg)

Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, represents 50,000 workers, 75% of them women. She told MSNBC on Oct. 10 that furloughed workers are desperate; some are homeless. They are waiting for a government rescue plan, as the union had an agreement with the airlines that jobs and employee health insurance would be retained if a deal came through.

Pandemic’s impact on women workers

Women, many Black, Latinx and immigrants, make up the majority of “essential” workers on the front lines at medical facilities, providing childcare, staffing big box stores and volunteering at food pantries.

The viral disaster has exposed gender inequities and widespread racism in the system, acutely impacting women workers of color. The pandemic eliminated many of women’s jobs in health care, education and transportation. By April, 16.2% of women were out of work, compared to 13.5% of men. (NBC News, June 8)

Due to “occupational segregation,” many Black and Latinx women toil in the hospitality, food service and retail industries with low pay and little to no job security. Many struggled to make ends meet even pre-pandemic. These sectors were the first hit by COVID-19. Shutdowns, layoffs, even collapses followed. By May, 20% of Latinx and 16% of Black women workers were unemployed.

With many schools and daycare centers now closed, women have more parenting responsibilities. Some are reducing work hours to help their children with remote learning. Single mothers must do it all. The economic and parental burden is staggering, but no government help is on the horizon. 

From August through September, of the 1.1 million individuals who dropped out of the labor force, 865,000 were women, including 324,000 Latinx and 58,000 Black women. (National Women’s Law Center) Their reasons: unavailability or insecurity of jobs, the gender wage gap — especially severe for women of color — and childcare. The unemployment rate for Black and Latinx women workers is now 11% and rising.

Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, co-founder of Moms Rising, stressed: “The big numbers we’re seeing in the news are not showing the actual tragedy below that: intense wage discrimination, compounded by structural racism that moms of color are experiencing right now.” (Boston Globe, Oct. 2)

THE ONLY THING THAT WILL STOP THEM

 The amount of racism and exploitation against Native People and their land is beyond injustice . It is nothing short of genocide . Just the fact that some fucking asshole politician thinks it's still okay to dump hazardous waste on Reserve land is reason enough to tear all of this shit down for good.

Fascists in D.C. and Oklahoma Move to Poison and Pollute Native American Lands

In July, a Supreme Court ruling called McGirt v. Oklahoma determined that territories of five Native American tribes in Oklahoma remain as established by earlier treaties, and that Native American people accused of crimes within the boundaries of those reservations can’t be prosecuted by state or local authorities. The ruling was widely mischaracterized. For example, a USA Today article had the headline “Supreme Court Says Eastern Oklahoma Remains Native American Territory.” In fact, the Native peoples in Oklahoma (and the rest of the U.S.) do not have sovereignty (full political and economic control) over their territories.

A couple of weeks after the ruling, J. Kevin Stitt, Oklahoma’s Christian fascist governor, sent a letter to the head of the “Environmental Protection Agency” (more accurately, the Ecocidal Pollution Agency, or EPA), Andrew Wheeler. Stitt requested that Oklahoma have explicit authority to administer virtually all EPA programs within the state’s extensive Indian reservations.

Among the specific programs for which Stitt requested state oversight and regulation:

• “Underground Injection Control,” which is the EPA’s fracking permission system. Fracking is a highly destructive form of removing oil and gas from shale rock; it is a major contributor to climate change and often leaves behind contaminated water and land.

• Hazardous waste dumping on tribal lands—this includes chemicals like mercury, formaldehyde, lead, asbestos, pesticide chemicals, PCBs, and hundreds of others.

• Mega-farms and industrial-size livestock operations that produce enormous amounts of waste.

On October 1, Wheeler responded in a letter that gave a green light to Oklahoma’s full-bore ravaging of the Indian territories. Its opening paragraph ends, “EPA hereby approves Oklahoma’s request.” As an article on the Young Turks website said, “The EPA has now granted the State of Oklahoma the same authority it had before McGirt on environmental issues....”

Casey Camp-Horinek, Environmental Ambassador and Elder and Hereditary Drumkeeper of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma, made the following bitterly poignant statement about this development: “After over 500 years of oppression, lies, genocide, ecocide, and broken treaties, we should have expected the EPA ruling in favor of racist Governor Stitt of Oklahoma, yet it still stings. Under the Trump administration, destroying all environmental protection has been ramped up to give the fossil fuel industry life support as it takes its last dying breath. Who suffers the results? Everyone and everything! Who benefits? Trump and his cronies, climate change deniers like Governor Stitt, Senators Inhofe and Lankford, who are financially supported by big oil and gas. I am convinced that we must fight back against this underhanded ruling. In the courts, on the frontlines and in the international courts, LIFE itself is at stake.”

Centuries of oppression of Native Americans and wanton destruction of the environment have intensified horribly during the years of Trump/Pence rule, and they will bring these nightmares to entirely new depths if they succeed in fully consolidating their fascist regime.

---

Sources:

EPA grants Stitt request for state oversight on tribal lands, Washington Post, October 5, 2020.

EPA Grants Oklahoma Control Over Tribal Lands, TYT.com, October 5, 2020.

Approval of Oklahoma Request, U.S. EPA, October 1, 2020.

Indigenous Leaders Furious After EPA Grants Oklahoma Control Over Sovereign Tribal Lands, Eco Watch, October 6, 2020.

Supreme Court Rules That About Half Of Oklahoma Is Native American Land, NPR, July 9, 2020.

Native Americans won an unusual legal victory at the Supreme Court. Congress could undo it, Washington Post, July 29, 2020.

The Trump Administration Is Reversing 100 Environmental Rules. Here’s the Full List, New York Times, July 15, 2020.

STILL HAPPENING

 There were immigrant children being separated from their parents under the obama regime, and of course it's still happening under fuckface trump and probably will be with idiot biden in control . By the same token, there will be people of conscience fighting back against all of that no matter which asshole is in power . Read.

“I felt like I was a caged animal”

Dramatic Action in Downtown Los Angeles as Part of Daily Protests Demanding Trump/Pence Out Now!

October 12, 2020 | revcom.us

 

As immigrants are STILL being tortured in ICE jails and children are STILL separated from their parents, and traumatized for life...

As news comes out that these family separations were not some accidental byproduct of Trump’s immigration policy, but very DELIBERATELY ordered by Jeff Sessions and the Department of Justice...

As multiple allegations come out from a Georgia ICE jail about medical procedures being done to women without consent, even removing their uteruses...

And ICE begins mass raids targeting sanctuary cities across the country...

Refuse Fascism in Los Angeles launched a powerful, 48-hour dramatic action on Friday and Saturday, October 9-10, against the Trump/Pence regime’s attacks on immigrants. They called out the parallels between what’s happening to immigrants—demonization, criminalization, concentration camps—and what happened to Jews in Nazi Germany, and sounded the alarm about the beginning stages of a racist genocide. They issued a wake-up call to people in this country to stop “getting used to” kids in cages and babies being pulled from their parents’ arms, letting yesterday’s outrage become today’s new normal—because that is exactly how the German people became complicit collaborators with Nazi atrocities.

Most importantly, they gave people a way to stop these atrocities, by joining the people’s movement, in the streets every day in LA and nationwide, to drive this this regime from power. They challenged people with the truth: Voting to defeat Trump is important. But voting is not enough. They are torturing immigrants NOW. They are appointing a fundamentalist Supreme Court judge NOW. They are recruiting an “army” of “poll watchers” to intimidate voters NOW. They are preparing NOW to hijack the election and unleash MAGA thugs, in and out of uniform, to enforce it. That’s why Refuse Fascism is mobilizing NOW, to overwhelm them with mass, nonviolent, sustained protest, demanding Trump/Pence OUT NOW.

At Pershing Square in downtown LA, volunteers stepped up to build cages to represent the ICE jails our immigrant brothers and sisters are held captive in. Others volunteered to spend an hour or two in the cages. At one point, two children got inside the cages. On the second day, new volunteers wore bloody pants inside the cages to represent the immigrant women in Georgia. This was a visually jarring and moving experience for the people who were part of it, and for people walking by.

Here are some sights and sounds from this dramatic protest, and some excerpts of statements from people who were part of it.

 

Below are excerpts from what some of the participants in this action said:

Rev. Frank Wulf, Pastor Echo Park United Methodist Church

The atrocities that are being committed against migrants and refugees are only some of the atrocities that are being committed by the Trump/Pence regime. We hear of many, many others, you know—the taking over of the courts, the failure to give adequate healthcare to American citizens, the attempts to take away what healthcare American citizens have. These are all atrocities that are being committed by this regime. So ultimately the goal is not just simply to draw attention, but ultimately the goal is to remove the Trump/Pence regime from power...

Well, everyone thinks that voting is going to be enough, and we have to vote. We have to get out there and we have to vote in order to get this regime out of power. But we know that voting is not enough, and so we really need to create a mass movement that is going to be saying Trump/Pence Out Now! Trump/Pence Out Now! Not on January 20th but now, because we don’t know what kind of new atrocities that can be committed between now and January 20th.

Charlie Castaneda, an activist who took part in the cage protest

What brought me out here is to bring attention and awareness to what’s going on with ICE and those detention centers, with ICE—all those immigrants that are locked up, including the little children that are in inhumane conditions and in cages liked locked animals. And unfortunately the media have lost touch with that, they stopped covering that story like it just never happened. People, now, today—they’re just walking around like nothing’s going on. And that’s not right! There’s madness, there’s evil, right here in front of our doorstep, and we want to make awareness of this. We want to the people to know that this is unacceptable.

...I felt like I was a caged animal, like I was an animal inside the zoo. And this is nothing, absolutely nothing compared to what the immigrants and the children are experiencing at this very moment in time. And just seeing people walk by, not even taking a look at what’s going on is just sad. Sad for what the world has come to, to the point where I had to literally stare at them, to look at what’s going on....

Don’t let fear take over you. Fear is the number one thing that’s keeping people from going out there and fighting. And what’s crazy is that the Trump/Pence regime is instilling that fear to you. Don’t let them get to you because once you’re no longer afraid they can never oppress you. So, the more people we come out here and unite, we can transfer our energy to these people so they can be as strong as us and come out and fight for the same reasons.

Aunt of Dijon Kizzee, Black man killed by LA Sheriff’s Department in August

I’m stepping into this today because systemic racism—it runs very deep. And it affects African American populations as well as Mexican Americans, Latino Americans, and branching out also to Pacific Islanders as well. This is something that we should pay attention to right now in this day and age. Trump and Pence being in office—it’s not a good thing for any of us for the simple fact he has been using tactics, unreasonable tactics to have individuals scared to come out and speak up for themselves, individuals who are immigrants scared to walk down streets because they’re going to be arrested and they’re going to get deported, if you don’t vote for Trump—all these type of things, your family, you won’t see them. So I’m really disgusted by things that I’m seeing, that I’m hearing, but I’m empowered and enlightened that people like me can come out and say: hey, this has to stop. The whole fascism regime has been going on for way to long.

Photo: RefuseFascism.org

What You Can Do NOW

• Link up with Refuse Fascism here.
• Join the daily protests in your area—or start one of your own.
• Learn more by checking out what Bob Avakian, leader of the revolution, says about fascism and the fight against it.

Andy Zee, DISPATCH FROM THE RNL SHOW —
48 Hours of Dramatic Visualization in Downtown LA — Trump/Pence OUT NOW!

Photos: October 9 & 10, Los Angeles, California. Refuse Fascism launched a powerful dramatic action against the Trump/Pence regime’s attacks on immigrants.