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Inside the New Print Edition of CounterPunch: a Special Double Issue on the US at War Encounters Outside Fort Sill: the Case of Camilo Mejia by David Smith-Ferri; A Marine's Time in Iraq: Jim Talib's Story: by Derek Seidman; The Marines or Jail: Take Your Pick Young Man by Ron Jacobs; Pie in the Sky: the Pentagon's Latest Star Wars Scam: by Jeffrey St. Clair; The Strategy of Tension in Bolivia by Forrest Hylton; How the Other Half Talks: HRC's War on Immigrants & Libertarians Debate Lincoln as War Criminal: by Alexander Cockburn. Remember these stories are available exclusively in the print edition of CounterPunch. CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! CounterPunch Books a Holiday Gift They Won't Put Down! Call Toll Free 1-800-840-3683 or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558

How the Press & the CIA Killed Gary Webb's Career   Today's Stories December 20, 2004 Gary Leupp Japan in Iraq Robert Fisk An Army Without Compassion Uri Avnery The Mountain and the Mouse Francisco Letelier My Case Against Pinochet Patrick Cockburn The Polls of Fear Chad Nagle Did Yushchenko Poison Himself?     December 18 / 19, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Why They Hated Gary Webb Saul Landau Gen. Pinochet Should Also Face Charges in DC Patrick Cockburn Losing Mosul: Once They Called It a Model for the Occupation Douglas Valentine Wolves and Revolution in Venezuela: a Caracas Romance Ray McGovern Laughing Dragon, Dancing Bear: the New China / Russia Alliance Fred Gardner DEA Upholds Grower's Marijuana Monopoly Jean-Guy Allard Locked Up Naked in a Hole Within a Hole: Have the Cuban 5 Been Tortured in US Prisons? Ron Jacobs Drifters Escape, Again: Encounters with Berkeley's Police Raymond G. Helmick, S.J. The Law and Peace in the Middle East Sean Sellers Values Voters, Desperate Housewives and Sweatshop Tacos Lee Sustar Christmas on the Picket Line at CNH: "They Want to Break Our Unions" Richard Thieme Webb's Wife: "Gary Was Never the Same After They Attacked Him" Sam Bahour WANTED: Middle East Negotiator Joshua Frank The Spin Doctor: an Interview with Mickey Z. Dave Lindorff A Man Who Confers with God Should Have Good Hearing Stan Cox What Kids Cost: Dallas v. Delhi Chris Frasier Farming By Numbers: More Poets, Fewer MBAs Poets' Basement Katz, Melek, Harley, Albert and Ford   December 17, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair CounterAttack: How the Press and the CIA Killed Gary Webb's Career Dave Lindorff Racism: Philly Style Dan Bacher Bush Abandons Salmon Restoration Marisa Jacott NAFTA and the Environment: Trade Still Runs Roughshod Francis Thicke How Now, Industrial Cow? Rupert Cornwell The Inuit Strike Back Website of the Day Franz Boas Unrolls Over in His Grave   December 16, 2004 Michael Neumann How We Became Barbarians Merlin Chowkwanyun An Interview with Ralph Nader Gabriel Espinoza Gonzales The Dubious Career of John Bolton Christopher Brauchli Louis Freeh's New Gig: Usurer Patrick Cockburn Allawi's Pre-Election Ploy: Putting "Chemical Ali" on Trial Mike Whitney Gearing Up for a Draft? Walter Brasch Hillbilly Humvees and Rumsfeld's New Physics Bill Conroy How Gary Webb Saved My Ass from the FBI Website of the Day Saturday Memorial for Gary Webb   December 15, 2004 Robert Fisk Who Killed Baha Mousa? Jennifer Van Bergen The Monster Under the Bed Heather Gray Will the Real Christians Please Stand?: a Personal Testimony Dave Lindorff The DNC, Albright and the Iraq Elections Luis Hernandez Navarro To Die a Little: Migration and Coffee in Mexico and Central America Joshua Frank The Ohio Recount: an Exercise in "Dumbocracy" Greg Moses Eighty-Sixing Civil Rights in Ohio? George Caffentzis The Petroleum Commons   December 14, 2004 Dave Lindorff DNC Meddling in the Ukraine Elections Larry Birns / Seth DeLong Haiti is Unraveling and No One is Saying Anything Richard Thieme My Last Talk with Gary Webb: "I Knew It Was the Truth and That's What Kept Me Going" Patrick Cockburn A Year After Saddam's Capture, Iraq is Getting Worse Chris Floyd Client State: Moral Values and Voluntary Servitude in Bush's America Akiva Eldar A One-time Hanukkah Miracle Burbach / Cantor The Legacy of Pinochet: Kissinger and the Teflon Tyrant   December 13, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair Gary Webb: a Great Reporter, Trashed by the CIA's Claque David Phinney "Contract Meal Disaster" for Iraqi Prisoners: Rancid Food Sparked Abu Ghraib Riots Paul Craig Roberts A Dose of Non-Delusional Reality for Douglas Feith M. Junaid Alam The War is the War Crime Robert Jensen The US Has Lost the Iraq War...and That's a Good Thing Richard Oxman Kafkaesque Lessons for the Left Greg Moses Send No Messengers of Defeat Douglas Lummis The Pentagon's Neurosis: Fallujah Gulag   December 11 / 12, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Running an Empire on the Cheap Ron Jacobs The Drugs of War: Getting High in the Green Zone? Saul Landau Listening and Talking to God About Invading Other Countries Gary Leupp Bush's Capital Sharon Smith The Horrible Toll on US Troops Dave Lindorff Deja Vu All Over Again: 5,000 Desertions and Counting Uri Avnery The Boss Has Gone Crazy Jude Wanniski The Neo-Con Smear on Kofi Annan: What Food-for-Oil Scandal? Heather Gray How the South Became Republican: an Interview with John Egerton Patrick Cockburn / Ken Sengupta Fallujah: the Homecoming and the Homeless John Pilger Return to Kosovo: Calling the Humanitarian Bombers to Account Joshua Frank All the Rage: Mr. Solomon, Say You're Sorry Ben Tripp O Canada!: the Truth About the Election of 2004 John Stanton God Speaks! Laura Nathan Porn Stars are People, Too: a Talk with Christi Lake Poets' Basement Capaccio, Davies, Louise, Ford and Albert Website of the Day Fallujah Photos: Killed in Their Beds   December 10, 2004 Ralph Nader President Bush, Stop Destroying the Mosques of Iraq Greg Moses Whitewashing Voter Fraud Nicole Colson Rebellion in the Ranks: Grunts Are Resisting Stop-Loss Orders Frederick B. Hudson "They Still Got Those Dogs": A New Book Probes Old Civil Rights Lessons Patrick Cockburn Iraq's Insurgents Oppose the Occupation, Not the Elections Kathy Kelly From Haiti to Iraq: Burying Water   December 9, 2004 Greg Moses Ask Not Who Bankrolled Fallujah Joshua Frank Cobb and the Ohio Recount: Vote Fraud as Fundraiser! Ralph Nader An Open Letter to Bush: It's Time to Disclose the Real Casualty Figures Lee Sustar Bhopal: the Making of a Disaster Tom Barry Restrictionist Resurgence Mickey Z. Sander Hicks and the 9/11 Truth Movement Christopher Brauchli Bush in the Bubble Mark Donham Why are House Democrats Trying to Deny Cynthia McKinney Seniority? Gary Corseri On the Anniversary of John Lennon's Death, 2012 Paul de Rooij The Voices of Sharon's Little Helpers     December 8, 2004 Ralph Nader Will the Real Michael Moore Ever Re-Emerge? Ann Harrison The Ohio Recount: Reluctant Officials and Few Rules Paul Craig Roberts War Crime Dave Lindorff They've Got a Secret: Inside the $40 Billion Black Budget for Spying Patrick Cockburn / Andrew Buncombe CIA Warning on Iraq: Fallujah Did Not Break the Back of the Insurgency Col. Dan Smith Rules of Engagement in Iraq Emily Alves / Michael Johnson Paradise Lost: Corruption and Clientelism in Costa Rica Richard Oxman The Dylan Bob Wouldn't Mention: Up With Dylan Thomas Ron Jacobs In Fallujah, Freedom Isn't Free   December 7, 2004 Patrick Cockburn Running Battles in Baghdad Behrooz Ghamari Lost Muslim Voices of Dissent Dave Lindorff American Fantasies: Psst! Hey Buddy, Did You Hear How Well the War's Going? Joshua Frank Dean at the DNC? Richard Oxman Down with Dylan: the Insufferable Interview Ray McGovern All Mosquitoes, No Swamp John Chuckman The Invasion of Hallifax: The Imperial Wizard Visits Canada James Petras Latin America: the Empire Changes Gears Website of the Day ToxMap: Who's Poisoning You   December 6, 2004 Paul Craig Roberts Paranoia and Pre-emption: Is the Bush Administration Certifiable? December 4 / 6, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Politicize the CIA? You've Got to be Kidding Joe Bageant Dining with the Rhinos Alan Maass Reporting from the Ground in Iraq: an Interview with Patrick Cockburn Brian Cloughley Democracy, Bush-style, in the Gulf Laura Carlsen Latin America Shifts Left Lenni Brenner Jefferson, Madison, Bush and Religion Anna Ioakimedes Brazil's Haitian Mission: Doing God's Work or Washington's? Uri Avnery Widow of Opportunity? Fred Gardner Supreme Court Hears Medical Pot Case Dave Zirin Steroids to Heaven Jackie Corr Mining Camp Blues: the Red State Variation Don Fitz Will Greens Abandon IRV? Lucy Herschel "Art can be a Weapon of the Oppressed": an Interview with Artist Anthony Papa Richard Oxman No Angels in America: Bashing the Gay Play Ron Jacobs Holiday Greeting Card Poets' Basement Collins, Albert, LaMorticella   December 3, 2004 Dave Lindorff Lie Then Escalate Ben Tripp Fun With Boycotts: How to Shop in a Time of Crisis Joe Allen Murder in El Salvador: the Assassination of Teamster Organizer Gilberto Soto Matthew B. Riley Human Rights Court Fails Lori Berenson Meir Shalev In the End, It is the Violin that Wins Bob Wing The White Elephant in the Room: Race and Election 2004 Christopher Brauchli When McCain Bit His Tongue Sasan Fayazmanesh The EU, the US, Israel and Iran   December 2, 2004 Tito Tricot No Justice in Chile: I'm a Torture Survivor in a Country Where Torturers Still Run Free Behzad Yaghmaian The Murder of Theo Van Gogh and Muslim Migration Dr. Susan Block Lana and Me: Meetings with Remarkable Apes Frank / Chowkwanyun Liberalism and Its Bounds Lee Sustar Standoff in Ukraine: the Bad v. the Corrupt Patrick Cockburn Another Grim Record in Iraq Mark Engler Seattle at Five Michael Donnelly Something Stinks in South Bend: the Firing of Tyrone Willingham Nate Collins The Bay Area Mall on an Ohlone Burial Grounds Saul Landau The Assassination of Danilo Anderson   December 1, 2004 Phillip Cryan Associated with Whom? Rightist Bias in Wire Coverage of Colombia Dave Zirin What's the Matter with "Leon"?: Budweiser's Racist Commercial Ghali Hassan Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation: 200 Children Die Every Day Donna J. Volatile Beware Western Nations Threatening "Democracy" Patrick Cockburn How Saddam Tried to Arm the Insurgency Nick Meo Chemical War Over Afghanistan Mike Ferner The Battle of Toledo Mokhiber / Weissman Shame and Determination on Global AIDS Day: 40 Million and Rising Kathy Kelly Looking the Other Way: the Real Crimes of the UN in Iraq   November 30, 2004 Jennifer Van Bergen The Veil of Secrecy Toni Nelson Herrera Meeting Kurtz: When Art is a Crime Paul Craig Roberts The Bush Delusions: Successful at Incompetence Patrick Cockburn The Insurgency Strikes Back: There Are No Safe Havens in Iraq Chuck Munson WTO Protests Five Years Later: Seattle Weekly Trashes Anti-Globalization Movement Adam Williams Citizenship Sold: Back to Business in Indiana Gregory Elich A Dangerous Turn in the US Plans for North Korea Website of the Day Read Lynne Cheney's Lesbian Novel Online!   November 29, 2004 Dave Lindorff Blowback in Ukraine: The Hand of the CIA? Omar Barghouti "The Pianist" of Palestine: Roadblock Concerto at Gunpoint Mike Whitney The US Media and Fallujah: How to Market a Siege Uri Avnery The Abu Mazen Style: "Give Me Some Credit!" Matt Vidal Globalization and Economic Inequality: a Look at the Numbers Patrick Cockburn An Interview with Iraq's Foreign Minister Alan Farago Sex Change and Salvation: God, Girly Men and Endocrine Disrupters Justin Huggler Bhopal 20 Years Later Antony Loewenstein How Australia Reported Arafat's Death and Legacy Gary Leupp Ukraine: Poll Results Aren't the Real Issue Website of the Day Mosul: Images from a Kill Zone     November 27 / 28, 2004 Peter Linebaugh Torture & Neo-Liberalism with Sycorax in Iraq Alexander Cockburn What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa? Fred Gardner Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court Kathy Kelly What We Can Control Diane Christian The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts" Gary Leupp One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea Lenni Brenner Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York Times Ron Jacobs Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of the AMS Clerics Joshua Frank An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd Toni Solo The Murder of Danilo Anderson Saul Landau Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica JoAnn Wypijewski Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are No Cure for Homophobia Justin Taylor Empire's Lawless Opportunities Amos Harel The Case of Captain R. Walter A. Davis Tabloid Justice Stephen Hendricks God's Kind of Men Poets' Basement Albert, LaMorticella and Ford     November 26, 2004 Peter Feng Gavin Newsom: Man or Machine? Greg Moses It's the White Vote, Stupid Liaquat Ali Khan The Devil's Work: Bush's Minority Appointments Michael Mandel / Gail Davidson Why Bush Should Be Banned from Canada: a Memo to the Ministry of Immigration Dave Lindorff Nation of Sheep, Turkey of an Election: Urkrainians Show the Way Gary Corseri When Black Friday Comes... Paul Craig Roberts Whatever Happened to Conservatives? Website of the Day Iraq Pipeline Watch     November 25, 2004 Willliam Loren Katz Giving Thanks to Whom?: "Thanks to God We Sent 600 Heathen Souls to Hell Today" Mitchel Cohen Why I Hate Thanksgiving Mike Ferner An Uncommon Mom     November 24, 2004 Gila Svirsky License to Kill: the Example of Violence is Set by the State Winslow T. Wheeler The Other Mess in Congress Christopher Brauchli The Company He Keeps: the Syndicate of Tom Delay Dave Lindorff Double Standards on Exit Polls: Hypocrisy Sans Irony Ron Jacobs The Occupation of Iraq is the Root of t he Problem Ken Sengupta Witnesses: War Crimes in Fallujah Diana Barahona The Final Holocaust or Why I Voted for Ralph Nader John L. Hess Safire the Shameless Jason Leopold Did Harvard Hire (Another) War Criminal? Jeffrey St. Clair The Mark of McCain: the Senator Most Likely to Start a Nuclear War Map of the Day Now and Then: 2004 v. 1860   November 23, 2004 Forrest Hylton Bush and Uribe at the Beach         November 22, 2004 Dave Zirin Fight Night in the NBA: Selective Outrage in Detroit Paul Craig Roberts On to Iran: We Won't Get Fooled Again? Michael Mandel / Gail Davidson Why Bush Should be Banned from Canada Kathie Helmkamp Our Son: a Marine Who Won't Kill Ken Sengupta The Triangle of Death: "This is Now the Most Dangerous Place in Iraq" Mike Whitney Greenspan's Hammer Roger Burbach Why They Hate Bush in Chile Website of the Day Fed Up with Government Lies and Corporate Spin?     November 20 / 21, 2004 Alexander Cockburn The Poisoned Chalice Todd May Religion, the Election and the Politics of Fear Abbas Ahmed Ibrahim The Horrors of Fallujah: a First-Hand Account Kevin Zeese Mishandling Nader Landau / Hassen After Arafat Tom Barry The Vulcans Consolidate Power: The Rise of Stephen Hadley Fred Gardner Pot Shots: Ask Dr. Todd Justin E.H. Smith Triumph of the Will: the Sequel Carl Estabrook Where We Are Now Gary Leupp Imperial History-Making vs. Reality-Based Thought: a Dialogue Dave Lindorff Apocalypse Soon Jenna Michelle Liut Plans Colombia and Patriota: Wanton Wastes of Money, Manpower and Lives Mickey Z. The Granma Moses of Radical Writing: an Interview with William Blum Greg Moses The Same Old Struggle Against Imperial America Sharon Smith Abortion Rights and the Election: What Now? Ron Jacobs Sandwiches and Car Bombs Ben Tripp Raising d'Etre: Finding Money in Hollywood These Days Richard Oxman Basketbrawl Two Pointer: Iraq Rules! Gilad Atzmon Politics and Jazz Poets' Basement LaMorticella, Albert, Ford, & Anon. Website of the Day Voice of the Forest                                                     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. 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December 20, 2004 The Chokepoints of the Giant Attacking Wal-Mart's Supply Chain By YOSHIE FURUHASHI Wal-Mart's dedication to "low, low wages" is a satirist's dream. The Onion zeroes in on it in "Wal-Mart Announces Massive Rollback on Employee Wages": Above: A sign announces a Louisville, KY Wal-Mart's low, low wage for cashiers. The Onion can take on "the $259 billion retail behemoth" satirically, but can American trade unions organize it, whose managers are directed by Bentonville to make "a full-time commitment" to "staying union-free"? Wal-Mart has been reined in by the labor movement abroad: "in Germany, . . . many Wal-Mart workers are unionized and the company abides by a sectorwide agreement with a large retail union, and has been the target of pickets and warning strikes. . . . In Brazil Wal-Mart has had to reach agreement with unions on some workers' rights issues, while in Japan all of the company's workers are unionized, and Wal-Mart abides by an agreement reached with the stores' previous owner." To the surprise of many, even Chinese workers (whose "right to strike was removed from China's constitution in 1982" ) recently saw Wal-Mart reluctantly agree to allow the All China Federation of Trade Unions to unionize Wal-Mart workers. The Chinese Communist Party and its unions, fearful of the political fallouts of naked capitalism, are at least willing to make a show of standing up for workers' rights. Will organized labor in the United States? So far, the United Food and Commercial Workers has spent little: "the UFCW devotes only 2 percent of its national budget to the Wal-Mart campaign"; and the UFCW has won nothing: "In the United States, only one group of Wal-Mart employees has successfully organized. In February 2000 ten meatcutters in Jacksonville, Texas, voted 7 to 3 to unionize their tiny bargaining unit. Two weeks later, Wal-Mart abruptly eliminated their jobs by switching to prepackaged meat and assigning the butchers to other departments, effectively abolishing the only union shop on its North American premises." Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union, wants to change that. Stern recently gave the AFL-CIO an ultimatum: adopt the changes he proposes, or the SEIU will pull out of the federation. Among the changes he demanded in his ten-point program, "he called for the AFL-CIO to return half of all dues to unions to fund aggressive organizing drives. And he said the federation should set aside about $25 million -- out of its $118-million annual budget -- for an effort to organize Wal-Mart Stores Inc." Whatever you think of the rest of Stern's program, you would have to agree that spending more on organizing is the way to go. The question is how the money will be spent, however. Peter Olney argued that union organizing should focus on "the most strategic sectors of the economy that are crucial to labor's overall power and place in society," one of which is the "logistics (transport and storage)" sector. Why logistics? First of all, it is impossible for capital to offshore the jobs of transport and warehouse workers. Furthermore, corporations' obsession with "just-in-time" inventory control makes them vulnerable to supply disruptions. Efficient supply chain management is the key to the profitability of Wal-Mart, which pioneered "just-in-time" inventory in the retail industry: "The 'Wal-Mart model' is the leading retail strategy (perhaps the leading business strategy in any sector) to emerge since the 1970s. This model features a super-efficient production process in which each operation -- buying products from manufacturers, distributing them to the retail stores, and selling them to customers -- is linked to the next in a continuous 'just-in-time' chain." Wal-Mart's zeal to "hold the lowest feasible [inventory] level while avoiding the risks of 'stock outs,'" its competitive advantage, is also the weak link in its anti-union empire. According to the Teamsters, Wal-Mart had 78 distribution centers that employed approximately 25,000 workers by the end of 2001 -- about 3% of the total Wal-Mart employees in the United States at that time. By now, it has more than 100 distribution centers, but the ratio of Wal-Mart distribution center workers to Wal-Mart store and office clerks is likely to have remained roughly the same (and it will decline further soon, upon the introduction of radio-frequency identification). It makes sense to concentrate on organizing distribution center workers, who represent a small proportion of the total Wal-Mart workforce and yet control the strategic points of the Wal-Mart supply chain, as several labor writers suggested. What if the unions spent $25 million salting the distribution centers? "Training and hiring new professional organizers, Olney argues, is not as important as encouraging potential organizers to take jobs themselves, in target workplaces. This 'salting' -- taking a job with the intent to organize -- was one factor in the massive drives of the 1930s," says Jane Slaughter. Distribution centers are good targets from the point of view of using public subsidies already lavished upon them for an argument for working-class community control. Philip Mattera and Anna Purinton found that "90 percent of the company's distribution centers have been subsidized" and that Wal-Mart has received an average of about $6.9 million per subsidized distribution center, far more than $2.8 million that it captured per its subsidized store. A Wal-Mart distribution center generally employs "660 to 800 employees." That's $8,600-10,000 per job in direct subsidies alone, not counting the costs of "food stamps, Medicaid, the earned income tax credit and other social safety-net programs that Wal-Mart retail workers (and their families) may be eligible for because of the low wages and limited health insurance coverage they receive": "A state survey [in Georgia] found that 10,261 of the 166,000 participants in the PeachCare program, which provides health care coverage for youngsters in low-income uninsured families, were children of Wal-Mart employees. This was more than 10 times the number for any other employer." The main obstacle is locations, locations, locations. Take a look at the map of Wal-Mart distribution centers: Source: Teamsters, "Wal-Mart Organizing Update," Warehouse Newsletter (August 2000). Many of them are in the South, especially outside metropolitan areas, where unions have had little success organizing. Wal-Mart's aggressive expansion, however, has brought it into the traditional strongholds of organized labor in the East, the West, and the Midwest, laying the ground for a coordinated national campaign. Then, there are choke points at ports. Chris Kutalik's article on the "[w]ildcat strikes, rallies, and highway blockades by port truck drivers [that] rocked West and East Coast ports in late April and early May" demonstrates their potential power to impact the bottom lines of many bosses, "from ship owners to port authorities to retailers like Wal-Mart": Wildcat strikes, rallies, and highway blockades by port truck drivers rocked West and East Coast ports in late April and early May. Angered by rising diesel fuel prices and other factors that keep them at or under the poverty line, hundreds of mostly African-American and Latino owner-operators (sometimes called troqueros) parked their trucks and blocked terminals. . . . The troqueros' unique position in the transportation system enabled them to shut down freight traffic and force powerful interests, from ship owners to port authorities to retailers like Wal-Mart, to listen to their demands. Troqueros move freight between ports and inter-modal terminals, the sites where truck cargoes are loaded onto rail cars or unloaded from them. All freight that enters the country must pass through a troquero's hands before being loaded onto other trucks or onto trains for its journey to warehouses, stores, and factories around the country. In West Coast ports truck drivers are paid $50-$200 per cargo container hauled (often a truckload), depending on length of the trip. After expenses for fuel, insurance, registration, and maintenance, earnings average $8-$9 an hour, according to Teamsters Port Division estimates. With diesel prices hitting record highs -- $2.39 per gallon in California on April 30 -- drivers' income has been eroded even further, pushing drivers to desperation. The issues that drove the port truckers to their direct actions -- "a 30 percent rise in freight rates paid by trucking companies," "fuel surcharge increases of 5 percent, plus 5 percent for each $.25 a gallon when diesel fuel tops $1.95 a gallon," "[r]ecognition of the drivers as workers" rather than "independent contractors" were their demands -- remain unresolved, providing opportunities for joint actions between them and Wal-Mart distribution workers, attacking Wal-Mart's supply chain simultaneously. Yoshie Furuhashi is an activist in Columbus, Ohio and writes the blog Critical Montages.   Notes 1. December 8, 2004, www.theonion.com. 2. Liza Featherstone, "Will Labor Take the Wal-Mart Challenge?" The Nation, June 28, 2004, www.thenation.com/e. 3. "Labor Relations and You at the Wal-Mart Distribution Center #6022," September 1991, p. 7. 4. Featherstone, June 28, 2004, www.ufcw.org/. 5. John Pomfret, "Labor Unrest in China Reflects Increasing Disenchantment," The Guardian Weekly, May 4, 2000, p.37, www.laborrights.org/. 6. Dexter Roberts, "China: A Workers' State Helping The Workers?" BusinessWeek, December 13, 2004, yahoo.businessweek.com/: [S]ome action by Beijing is crucial. Workers are increasingly taking to the streets. The number of protests reached 300,000 in 2003, estimates (Robin) Munro (research director at China Labor Bulletin). This year more than 500 workers in Dongguan damaged facilities and injured a manager at a big Taiwanese shoemaker. 7. Featherstone, June 28, 2004. 8. Nancy Cleeland, "The Service Employees International President Threatens to Leave the Umbrella Federation," Los Angeles Times, November 11, 2004, www.labornotes.org/archives/2004/12/articles/h.html. 9. "The Arithmetic of Decline and Some Proposals for Renewal," New Labor Forum, Spring/Summer 2002, qcpages.qc.cuny.edu/. 10. Annete Bernhardt, "The Wal-Mart Trap," Dollars & Sense 231, September-October 2000 . 11. Bahar Barami, "Productivity Gains from Pull Logistics: Tradeoffs of Internal and External Costs," Paper presented at the Transportation Research Board Conference on Transportation and Economic Development, September 23-25, 2001, www.marshall.edu/ati/tech/PortlandConference/. 12. "Wal-Mart: Driving Down Standards in the Food Industry," July 11, 2000, www.teamster.org/00news/nr_WW_1.htm. For instance, Marc Brazeau, "What Would a Successful Recognition Campaign for Wal-Mart Workers Look Like?" The Joe Hill Dispatch, April 30, 2004, www.joehilldispatch.org/walmartbeat/archives/002886.php; and David Moberg, "The Wal-Mart Effect: The Hows and Whys of Beating the Bentonville Behemoth," In These Times, June 10, 2004, www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/the_wal_mart_effect/. 13. "Organizing for Numbers -- Or for Power?" Labor Notes, October 2002, www.labornotes.org/archives/2002/10/g.html. 14. "Shopping for Subsidies: How Wal-Mart Uses Taxpayer Money to Finance Its Never-Ending Growth," May 2004, www.goodjobsfirst.org/pdf/wmtstudy.pdf. 15. Mary Hopkin, "Grandview Official Wants Grant Put on Hold," Tri-City Herald, December 20, 2002, www.tri-cityherald.com/news/2002/0220/story5.html. 16. Mattera and Purinton, May 2004. 17. Chris Kutalik, "Dockside Wildcats Halt Freight Traffic: Gas Prices Fuel Port Drivers' Revolt," Labor Notes, June 2004, www.labornotes.org/. 18. Kutalik, June 2004. Weekend Edition Features for November 27 / 28, 2004 Peter Linebaugh Torture & Neo-Liberalism with Sycorax in Iraq Alexander Cockburn What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa? Fred Gardner Ashcroft v. 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