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Today's
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March 5, 2004
Bill Christison
Faltering Neo-Cons Still Dangerous
March 4, 2004
Diane Christian
Sex
and Ideals
Sen. Robert Byrd
Stop the Stonewalling, Mr. President: Fairy Tales, Bush and the
9/11 Commission
Norman Solomon
Assuming the Right to Intervene: The US Press and Haiti
Jack Brown
A Fragrant Saga of Mexico's Greens
Hal Cranmer
The
John Kerry Experience
David Lindorff
Greenspan's Pension
Sam Smith
The Election is Over, We Lost
Christopher Brauchli
Goin'
to the Chapel: The Gay and the Dead
Brian D. Barry
The "Perfect" World of E-Voting: A Computer Scientist
Reports from the Polling Booth
Richard Oxman
Arsonists for Haiti?
Peter Phillips
Haitian
Fantasies: Mainstream Media Fails Itself, Again
Tariq Ali
Notes on Anti-Semitism, Zionism and
Palestine
Website of the Day
What If Boeing Ads Told the Truth?
March 3, 2004
Heather Williams / Karl
Laraque
Marines
Retake Haiti
Jack McCarthy
Guy's
Our Guy: "I am the Chief. My Hero is Pinochet."
Robert Sandels
The
Purloined Label: The Struggle Over the Havana Club Trademark
Juliana Fredman / James Davis
Israeli Organized Crime
JG
The Yuppie Silence on Haiti
Emilio Sardi
The
Colombia/US Free Trade Deal: It's About More Than Trade
Alan Farago
Swimming in Sewage
Mike Whitney
"Blood
Will Have Blood": 143 Murdered in Liberated Iraq
CounterPunch Wire
Nader's Legislative Record in the 1960s
Steve Perry
Kerry
Advisory: Remember Lena Guerrero
Nelson George/ Marcus Miller
Miles Davis & Hip Hop: a Conversation
Website of the Day
$10,000 Is Yours for the Taking: The USS Liberty Challenge
March 2, 2004
William Blum
If Kerry's
the Answer, What's the Question?
Conn Hallinan
Haiti:
the Dangerous Muddle
JoAnn Wypijewski
The Bravo
H-Bomb Test: One WMD They Couldn't Hide
Mike Whitney
Regime Change in Haiti: the Bush Dominos Keep Falling
Ra Ravishankar
Afghanistan, the Liberation That Isn't: an Interview with Mariam
from RAWA
Dan Bacher
Merle Haggard & the Politics of Salmon: "Clearcutting
is Rape"
Greg Moses
Oscar White
Brandy Baker
Mel Gibson's Minstrelsy Show
Little Tucker Carlson
What I Did on My Vacation
Robert Fisk
All This
Talk of Civil War, Now This
Merle Haggard
Kern River
Website of the Day
Rebel Edit
March 1, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Morris
Thanks War Criminal in Front of Billions
Richard Oxman
Oscar's
Obit: Thanking Bob McNamara
Elaine Cassel
Writing and Reading as "Terrorism"
Mickey Z
Thomas Friedman's Education
Mike Whitney
George Will and Anti-Semitism: a Cul-de-Sac of Prejudice
Heather Williams
Haiti
as Target Practice: How the US Press Missed the Story
Cathy Crosson
Chanson d'amour haïtienne
Website of the Day
God Hates Shrimp
February 28 / 29, 2004
Stephen Green
Serving
Two Flags: Neo-Cons, Israel and the Bush Team
Gary Leupp
Another Senseless Bush Battle: Defining and Protecting Marriage
William A. Cook
Israel:
America's Albatross
Ron Jacobs
Kucinich: Good Fight; Wrong Battlefield
Ben Tripp
A Nosegay of Posies: Queer Weddings at Last!
Leilla Matsui
Dances with Crucifixes
Mike Whitney
Dismantle
the Military Goliath
Yoel Marcus
Down and Out in the Hague
Uri Avnery
The Dancing Bear
Linda S. Heard
Britons and Americans Condemned to a Hobson's Choice
Al Krebs
Unmasking a Secret American Empire: Land, Water & Cotton
Stan Cox
Life (Pat. Pend.): Genetic Commandeering
JG
The Haiti Boomerang: "After The Looting & Pillaging,
Your Hunger Will Remain"
Rick Giombetti
Censorship at the Seattle P-I on Forced Psychiatry
Keith Hoeller
The Bankruptcy of Mental Health Insurance Parity
Dave Zirin
Colorado Football: Buffalo Swill
NADERAMA
Alan Maass
Nader and the Politics of Lesser
Evils
Michael Donnelly
Regime
Rotation: Anybody But Bush...Again?
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Exeunt Serenaders; Enter Nader
Doug Giebel
So Nader's Running? Get Over It
Bruce Jackson
An Open Letter to Naderites
CounterPunch Wire
Stalinists for Kerry! and Other Roars from the Crowd
Poets' Basement
Davies, Scarr, Kearney & Albert
February 27, 2004
Thomas C. Mountain
A
White Jesus During Black History Month?
Laura Carlsen
Americans
Abroad: Bush is Persona Non Grata
John B. Anderson
Nader's Campaign Brings Back Memories: Creating an Open Electoral
Process
Jason Leopold
Spying
on Kofi Annan
John Chuckman
Nader,
Risk and Hope
Standard Schaefer
An
Interview with Michael Hudson on Putin's Russia
Ray McGovern
Punished
for Honest Intelligence
Saul Landau
The
Haiti Redux
Website of the Day
Bush: Why I'm Running for Re-election
February 26, 2004
Brandy Baker
Is Nader
on to Something?
Jacques Kinau
AEI
to Colombia: "Can't Give You Anything But Guns, Baby"
Norman Solomon
Bugging Kofi Annan: UN Spying
and the Evasions of US Journalism
Greg Weiher
A Purloined Letter: the Zarqawi Gambit
Walt Brasch
Janet Jackson, Bush & No. 542: There are No Halftime Shows
in War
Shadi Hamid
The Music World Explodes in Anger
Norman Madarasz
As Canadian as Corruption
Chris Floyd
Bullets and Ballots
Virginia Tilly
The
Deeper Meaning of the Wall
Amy Goodman / Jeremy
Scahill
Haiti's
Lawyer Says US is Arming Haiti's Anti-Aristide Paramilitaries
Website of the Day
Clear Channel Sucks
February 25, 2004
Dr. Susan Block
Saddam's
Sex Therapist and the Rape of Free Speech
Bruce Anderson
Treacherous Bastards: The Greens and the Dems and Nader
Ron Jacobs
Our Power is on the Streets and
in Our Hearts
Mike Whitney
Bush
and Gay America: the Politics of Duplicity
Sam Husseini
Jesus in 100 Words
John L. Hess
Kick Off or Flub?
Sam Hamod
Bush's Newest Red Herring
Cockburn / St. Clair
Winning
with Nader
Website of the Day
VotePact
February 24, 2004
Ralph Nader
Why
I'm Running for President
Greg Moses
Rally
the Mob! Bush, Gay Marriage and the Constitution
Douglas O'Hara
The
Merchants of Fear: Smearing Nader
Phillip Cryan
Frozen in Time: The WSJ's Paranoid
Lens on Latin America
David Lindorff
John Kerry's China Connection
Jason Leopold
Cheney's Shame: Halliburton Faces New Charges
Gary Younge
Haiti: Throttled by History
Kromm, Masri & Purohit
Why No Democracy in Iraq?
Steve Perry
Tangled Up in Red and Blue: Beware the Electoral College
February 23, 2004
Neve Gordon
Israel's Apartheid Wall on Trial
at The Hague
Kurt Nimmo
Richard Perle, Executioner: "Heads Should Roll"
Jonathan Franklin
US Soldier Seeks Refugee Status in Canada
Al Krebs
The Liberal "Intelligentsia" v. Nader
Josh Frank
Nader's Nadir? Not a Chance
Bruce Jackson
Nader, Another View: "He's as Evil as Bush"
Gary Leupp
A Misguided
Attack, The Passion, Rabbi Lerner and the Gospels
February 20 / 22, 2004
Cockburn / St. Clair
Kerry:
He's Peaking Already!
Derek Seidman
Chasing
Judith Miller from the Stage: Watch Her Run!
Ghada Karmi
Sharon is not the Problem
Vanessa Jones
This Week in Redfern, a Boy Dies, Chased by Cops
Ben Granby
Anatomy of a Night Raid on Balad, Iraq
John Holt
An Air That Kills: Greed, Apathy, Dead People
Saul Landau
Entry from a White House Diary
Tom Jackson
Why They Couldn't Wait to Invade Iraq
Frederick B. Hudson
Slave Power and the Constitution: Jefferson, Slaves, Haiti and
Hypocrisy
Roger Burbach
Argentina Fights Back
Kate Doyle
Lessons on Justice from Guatemala
Mike Whitney
Operation Enduring Misery: the Afghanistan Debacle
Greg Moses
What Gives Texas A&M the Right to Trample the Civil Rights
Act?
David Krieger
US Elections: an Opportunity to Debate Nuclear Weapons
Sam Bahour
Palestinian Issue Riddles Bush's Budget
David Grenier
You Could Get 10 Years in Prison Just for Reading This
Charles Sullivan
Corporatism vs. Single Party Politics
Poet's Basement
Hilda White, Larry Kearney & Stew Albert
Website of the Weekend
The Rumsfeld Fighting Technique
February 19, 2004
Cecilie Surasky
Anti-Semitism
at the World Social Forum? That's Not What I Saw
Ray McGovern
Iraq
Hawks and Deceptive Intelligence: Did They Really Think They'd
Get Away With It?
Tariq Ali
How Far
Will Bush Go in Iraq?
Ralph Nader
Whither
the Nation?
Wayne Madsen
Would Kerry Purge the Neo-Cons?
Norman Solomon
The Collapse of Dean's Cyber-Bubble
Christopher Brauchli
Cheney, Halliburton and the NYT
Mike Whitney
Bush's Iraq Strategy: "I Hope They Kill Each Other"
Lewis Carroll
Bush the Mighty Helmsman from Yale
Website of the Day
Sex Toy Horoscope
February 18, 2004
William Wilgus
Bush:
AWOL and Dereliction of Duty
William Blum
Mush-Minded
Liberals
Dave Lindorff
Bush's China Syndrome
Greg Weiher
Why
is Kerry Getting a Pass?
Mike Griffin
Killing the Messenger: the AFL-CIO's Attack on Harry Kelber
Mark Hand
Kerry Tells Peace Movement to "Move On"
February 17, 2004
Mike Ferner
The
Countryside Murders in Iraq
Mokhiber / Weissman
Corporation
as Psychopath
Marjorie Cohn
DrakeGate:
a Victory for Free Speech
Kurt Nimmo
Bush's
Endgame: a Review of Chalmers Johnson's "Sorrows of Empire"
Greg Bates
Nader Ambush: a New Low for The
Nation
Ximena Ortiz
A Bush
Doctrine, of Sorts
Gary Leupp
Whatever Happened to Gen. Khazraji?
Sen. John Kerry
"The Cause of Israel is the Cause of America"
Steve Perry
Kerry
1, Drudge 0
February 16, 2004
James Johnston
Huddling
with the Cheeseheads in a NASCAR World
Sara Eltantawi
To
Wear the Hijab or Not
Bruce Anderson
Kevin
Cooper and the Midnight Needle
Elaine Cassel
Feds
on Campus: the Drake Subpoenas
Rahul Mahajan
Bush,
Is the Tide Finally Turning?
Kevin Cooper
The Ritual of Death
Stan Cox
Goodbye, Howard Dean
Larry David
My War
Steve Perry
Bush and the Guard: the Cover-Up's the Thing
Website of the Day
Prison Patriots: Help This Vital Film Get Made
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
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Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
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WMD: Who Said What When
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Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
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Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
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March
5, 2004
A Night of Inspiration
Oakland
Benefit for Grocery Strikers
By JAVIER ARMAS
I recently moved up from Los Angeles to Oakland
and since the inception of the LA grocery strike I'd been working
with a group of people to help strengthen the strike and organize
a solidarity campaign with a lot of the militant rank-file workers.
The group was called the Los Angeles Strikers Solidarity Organization.
When I moved up to Oakland some of the people in LASSO asked
me if I would organize a benefit and show a video the UFCW produced
on the strike. The strike was continuing, but with sharp blows
from economic hardship the workers faced from not being able
to pay for the regular expenses of life.
I was very interested in the project
but I wanted to make sure it would have a splash in the Bay Area.
Most importantly, the contracts are up on September 11 for Albertson's
and Safeway workers in this area, which could mean an attack
on healthcare and a cap on wages for new workers in effect
a two-tier system. As I proposed the idea to people who I thought
would be interested in such a project, most people were too cynical
to take it on and just grunted at the fact the union leadership
was fighting in such a defensive manner that it didn't give anyone
hope. But a couple people saw the importance and were willing
to dedicate time and work for such an event. We made a tight
team of three and created the newly formed Bay Area Strikers
Solidarity Organization.
We flyered at numerous events, had interviews
on Pacifica KPFA, sent out emails to all the groups we thought
would be interested and walked into Safeways and told the workers
about our project. One time one of the workers was so enthusiastic
about the benefit, he walked us to the back of the store where
the workers punch in their time clocks and we had a little shop-floor
meeting about the strike, the UFCW, and the importance of relying
on ourselves so the continuing offensive against healthcare doesn't
take root here in the Bay Area. Only two workers took part in
the discussion but about 6 or 7 were listening with intensity,
carrying a serious silence in their facial expression.
We continued to organize for February
20 and when the day of the event came a nervousness took hold
of me from the fear of no one showing up. But there were early
signs of success. A BART worker (Bay Area Rapid Transit) came
in the hall of the event 45 minutes early to tell me she found
the flyer in a BART train; she completely supported us and gave
me $30 dollars, but couldn't stay because she had to work. As
we started the event, a group of workers from UFCW Local 770
were in the front row, with the panel itself comprised of 3 workers
from Orange County Local 324: Debbie Brown, Sheldon Curtis and
Gary, along with Gerald Sanders, who is with numerous organizations
like the electricians union, Cop Watch, and the Committee to
Save Mumia Abu Jamal. Also featured on the panel was John Reiley,
a member of Labor's Militant Voice.
I introduced the event without knowing
what to expect as I saw about 45 people the audience. I announced
that the group just formed was called the Bay Area Strikers Solidarity
Organization, which was really formed by a couple of people.
I told the audience that the amount of people that were consistent
and dedicated to building the event were less than the amount
of fingers I have on my hand. I remarked that we are taught to
believe that one person cannot impact or change major societal
problems, but if a few people can organize a successful event
like this, it can have an impact on the workers on strike up
here, who in turn can have an impact on the workers on strike
down south; individuals can make change but the system teaches
otherwise not the case to eliminate hope.
I introduced the video and more and more
people wandered through the door. All the chairs were taken and
the late arrivals had to start standing. As the video ended,
a strong applause rippled as we began to introduce the panelists.
The first panelist, Gerald Sanders, expressed militant remarks
about the futility of relying on the courts, binding arbitration,
Democrats, Republicans or the union leadership for that matter,
and the urgency of relying on ourselves based on the power of
the working class, a message greeted with much applause took.
Each time Gerald proposed such militant actions and methods,
the audience immediately gave him a sincere applause.
Sheldon Curtis, an African-American worker
locked out of his Albertsons job from the Orange county area,
spoke about the hardships of the strike on his family and the
difficulties of paying for his house, nevertheless stressing
that his main obligation is too continue fighting no matter what.
The microphone was then passed to Gary, who moved the audience
to tears when he spoke about a conversation he had with his son,
who asked if he should drop out of college because of the financial
problems that arose from the strike. Gary then started crying
and said the impact of the strike has challenged his importance
and social role as a father. As Gary spoke about the deep psychological
effect the strike has had, he still exemplified the notion of
being firm and militant about continuing the strike. As the mic
passed a warm sensitive applause was giving to Gary.
Debbie Brown then spoke about one of
her co-workers and friends, who was one of the most militant
picketers on the line and would walk the picket and demonstrate
an example to the rest of the workers on the line. Towards the
beginning of the strike there were valley fires in Southern California,
which sent a disturbing smoke across the city. This lady that
Debbie spoke about was sensitive to the smoke and developed a
complication with her lungs and got ammonia. She was hospitalized
and died from the severity of the complication. Debbie looks
at her co-worker as an example of true human being who died for
principles and honor.
John Reiley concluded the panel by advocating
the need to extend the strike nationwide through out all Safeways.
He said that to have a strike at the other Safeways is formally
illegal because of the no strike clause in between contracts,
but he asked how the company and police could deal with hundreds
of thousands of workers on strike. He took the audience back
in history and spoke about in the 1930's when workers would take
over the workplace and bring out the community to build a support
system to win strikes. The laws the strikers followed were based
on principles of fighting for the working class and not the establishment.
The formal laws that were broken by the workers could not be
dealt with by the police because no one can arrest 45,000 workers
who have taken over their own workplace. He concluded his piece
by advocating a workers' party that can fight workplace struggles
and win elections as an alternative from the Democrats and Republicans,
eliciting strong applause.
As I looked across the room I now noticed
the place was significantly filled with about 80-90 people. I
gave one last call for the audience to donate money even if they'd
done so at the door, and money started coming out of nowhere.
An older man in his late 70's or early 80's insisted on speaking
first so I gave him the microphone. He spoke about how he was
first awakened in life by a steel strike in 1936 and how the
grocery strike embodies so much for him. He began crying as he
announces that he is donating 700 dollars to the strike, one
penny for each striker. Three striking workers from the front
row burst out in tears and emotion, walking up to the old man
to give him a passionate hug. The audience was struck with a
rare feeling, as if a special unification was taking place.
It took a couple of minutes for the audience to calm down from
their sympathetic applause as I began the discussion and started
handing the mic to people who wanted to speak and add their comments.
Rank-and-file workers from an array of unions come up and spoke
about personal experiences they have had in the workplace and
how they see the grocery strike as an exemplified form of their
own struggle. Workers from SEIU, ILWU, CUE, AFSME, the Oakland
teachers union, the Berkeley teachers union, the Amalgamated
Transit Union Local 1555, International Brother Hood of Teamsters
local 921 and our very own syndicalist Industrial Workers of
the World spoke about how the grocery workers struggle is their
struggle and their struggle is the grocery workers struggle.
Militant declaration after declaration took place about the need
to rebuild a workers movement that has once existed and now is
the time to start. Each declaration was met with a mighty applause.
The idea of an 'injury to one is an injury to all' penetrated
deep into the air of the hall to degree that there was nothing
else to breath.
As I had to call for the ending of the
event, I announce that we made $2,100 dollars night and I asked
the audience to offer one last applause to demonstrate the success
of the event. Soon a roaring sound of clapping hands emanated
from the audience and transformed into a spontaneous outburst
of singing the song, 'Solidarity Forever'. Everyone grabbed each
other's hands and held them high as the whole room spontaneously
made a human chain.
This was an inspirational benefit that
I will never forget. It taught me that with dedication and effort,
the outlook and consciousness of workers in America can change
very quickly. Even though capitalism aims to socialize people
into docility, it can never fully transform people into the robots
the system wants. All the socialization in the world will not
change the course of workers naturally fighting for their own
collective better mine through creative and productive struggle.
As they fight for control over their own lives, they naturally
begin to fight against their own exploitation proving that
there is always potential for fundamental change.
Javier Armas, 22, recently attended Santa Monica College
in Los Angeles and was a member of the SMC Progressive Alliance.
You can send him feedback at javsacs@yahoo.com.
First published in www.lefthook.org
Weekend
Edition Features for February 28 / 29, 2004
Stephen Green
Serving
Two Flags: Neo-Cons, Israel and the Bush Team
Gary Leupp
Another Senseless Bush Battle: Defining and Protecting Marriage
William A. Cook
Israel:
America's Albatross
Ron Jacobs
Kucinich: Good Fight; Wrong Battlefield
Ben Tripp
A Nosegay of Posies: Queer Weddings at Last!
Leilla Matsui
Dances with Crucifixes
Mike Whitney
Dismantle
the Military Goliath
Yoel Marcus
Down and Out in the Hague
Uri Avnery
The Dancing Bear
Linda S. Heard
Britons and Americans Condemned to a Hobson's Choice
Al Krebs
Unmasking a Secret American Empire: Land, Water & Cotton
Stan Cox
Life (Pat. Pend.): Genetic Commandeering
JG
The Haiti Boomerang: "After The Looting & Pillaging,
Your Hunger Will Remain"
Rick Giombetti
Censorship at the Seattle P-I on Forced Psychiatry
Keith Hoeller
The Bankruptcy of Mental Health Insurance Parity
Dave Zirin
Colorado Football: Buffalo Swill
NADERAMA
Alan Maass
Nader and the Politics of Lesser
Evils
Michael Donnelly
Regime
Rotation: Anybody But Bush...Again?
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Exeunt Serenaders; Enter Nader
Doug Giebel
So Nader's Running? Get Over It
Bruce Jackson
An Open Letter to Naderites
CounterPunch Wire
Stalinists for Kerry! and Other Roars from the Crowd
Poets' Basement
Davies, Scarr, Kearney & Albert
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