[Educationforall] spam con huevos, labor news, views and concerns, 11.19.11‏‏-I

Sun Nov 20 06:18:31 UTC 2011

Occupy LA makes a move & I got arrested‏

OCCUPY THE ART WORLD - Art For A Change Newsletter - Nov. 2011‏
Near Poor" Struggling Just Above Poverty Startle the Census
Nation of Shame: The Number of Children in the United States Considered Poor Rose by 1 Million in 2010, With More Than One in Five of the Youngest Americans Now Living in Poverty
Lessons We Can Learn From Egypt

Housekeepers sue, teachers strike and casino workers protest firings‏

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On Sat, Nov 19, 2011 at 11:03 AM, Clay Claiborne <cjc at cosmoseng.com> wrote:

Occupy Los Angeles today set up new encampment at Bank of American Plaza 4th & Flower. We are now surrounded by cops in riot gear, tear gas ready arrests planned for 4:00pm. Come help! 
Sent from my Razzberry® on the Anonymous DarkNet

That's the message I tried to send from the Los Angeles County Jail last night before they took my phone away.

This is what I just wrote and posted:

2011-11-18 Arrests & Renewal #OccupyLA Day 48Submitted by clayclai on Fri, 11/18/2011 - 16:02 

I just got out of jail a few hours ago. I was one of 300 people arrested Thursday in Occupy Wall St. protests across the United States. In Los Angeles, a total of 67 people were arrested from Occupy Los Angeles, SEIU and Good Jobs LA which combined forces for two back-to-back protests, both of which had as there centerpieces acts of civil disobedience that brought important sections of downtown to a complete standstill as the biggest occupation in the nation took to the streets. 
The first was a march that started at 7:00am to the 4th St. bridge, that brought Figueroa Ave, which at 30 miles, is the longest street in LA, to a complete standstill in the middle of the morning rush hour. This also pretty much shutdown freeway access to downtown, Figueroa is that important. 23 protesters, mostly SEIU members, were arrested in a very orderly, non-violent fashion after the protesters set up tents in the street.

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Read moreSame thing here, but the comments will be more & different:

Arrests & Renewal #OccupyLA Day 48

Clay Claiborne, Producer
Vietnam: American Holocaust
Linux Beach
Venice Beach, CA 90291
(310)581-1536

_______________________________________________
VAH-AO mailing list
VAH-AO at linuxbeach.net
http://LinuxBeach.net/mailman/listinfo/vah-

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Mark Vallen's ART FOR A CHANGE Newsletter -Nov. 2011 www.art-for-a-change.com/blog

Occupy the Art World
Essay by Mark Vallen
November 18, 2011
Pictured left: "Make Wall Street Pay" - Anonymous artist. 2011. Street poster based on a photo of a work by Damien Hirst. 

"The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement describes contemporary U.S. society as being under the domination of the 'one percent', those super-wealthy individuals and corporations that control everything from the media to the halls of Congress. 
While the primary focus of OWS has been aimed at the home foreclosures, unemployment, and social inequality fostered by the greed of rapacious banks and corporations, some critical assessment of the impact corporate titans have exercised over culture is also in order. 
For those inured to the art world having been commandeered by high finance, now is the time of reckoning. In view of the Occupy movement’s fight against plutocracy, the arts community should scrutinize the role financial institutions have played, and continue to play, in the collapse of the economy. Those same corporations maintain a benevolent public image through funding the arts; I will mention a handful of these oligarchic 'arts supporters' in this article."
Read the full illustrated article at: 
www.art-for-a-change.com/blog/2011/11/occupy-the-art-world.html

________________________________________ 
Subscribe to the "Art For A Change" web log by way of RSS Feed: 
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www.art-for-a-change.com/blog

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Near Poor" Struggling Just Above Poverty Startle the Census
Jason DeParle, Robert Gebeloff and Sabrina Tavernise, The New York Times News Service: "When the Census Bureau this month released a new measure of poverty, meant to better count disposable income, it began altering the portrait of national need. Perhaps the most startling differences between the old measure and the new involves data the government has not yet published, showing 51 million people with incomes less than 50 percent above the poverty line. That number of Americans is 76 percent higher than the official account, published in September. All told, that places 100 million people - one in three Americans - either in poverty or in the fretful zone just above it." 
Read the Article 

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Nation of Shame: The Number of Children in the United States Considered Poor Rose by 1 Million in 2010, With More Than One in Five of the Youngest Americans Now Living in Poverty
Read the Article at Reuters

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Lessons We Can Learn From Egypt
Mehrdad Azemun, Truthout: "The most valuable organizing nugget I carried back with me is the continual necessity for acting and thinking boldly. As an organizer here in the US, I was taught to be pragmatic and practical - go for what you can win in a specific time horizon…. Before Egypt, I was taught that politics is the art of the possible. After Egypt, I question whether we should all be reaching for the impossible and ludicrous. Who knows who else might agree? A common call for the laughable and ridiculous widens the possibility for what can and should happen." 
Read the Article 

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HOUSEKEEPERS SUE, TEACHERS STRIKE AND CASINO WORKERS PROTEST FIRINGS - Bay Area Workers Up In Arms
Photos by David Bacon

Hyatt Housekeepers Sue the Hotel in San Jose

In San Jose, two housekeepers at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission after they were fired for protesting against sexual harassment.  Martha and Lorena Reyes came to work and saw photos of themselves grafted onto images of women in bikinis, posted on the company bulletin board.  They tore them down.  Then they were fired.

"When I arrived at my job one day in September, I heard my co-workers laughing at a photo collage posted on the wall," Martha recalled. "I saw a photo of my face edited onto the "sexy" body of a bikini-clad woman holding a surfboard. A similar faked image of my sister Lorena had also been posted.  I was humiliated, and I took down the photos of my sister and me. I wouldn't give them back, and I said that if anyone wanted the photos back they would have to get them from me in court.  Days later the hotel fired us."

Lorena worked at the hotel property for 24 years, and Martha worked there for seven. "I have five children and legal custody of three grandchildren, and I'm now in danger of losing my home," Martha added.

Both women have supported the effort of UNITE HERE Local 19 to win a fair contract at the hotel.  One reason workers want a union there is the high rate of job injuries.  According to the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, Hyatt housekeepers have the highest injury rate of all housekeepers it studied.  State and Federal health and safety authorities have issued 16 citations against the Hyatt at 11 hotels.  "We did not deserve to be fired. We just want to be treated with respect," Martha said.

Teachers Go On Strike at Cal State East Bay

On November 17 members of the California Faculty Association shut down two campuses in the state university system, in Hayward and Dominguez Hills.  At Cal State East Bay, almost all of the normal 600 classes were cancelled.  Traffic backed up so far that police shut down the roads in and out of the campus.

Faculty members of the California Faculty Association have been trying to negotiate a new contract, and are incensed by the raises and perks given by Chancellor Reed to top executives, while claiming the system is broke, that fees for students must rise, and salaries for faculty must decline.

As chanting and dancing students joined teachers on the picket lines, Kim Geron, CFA Vice President of the California Faculty Association voiced solidarity with the Occupy movement that has led young people to erect encampments across the country.  "The American people feel an urgency to save the American middle class," he said.  "We see that with the Occupy movement all over the country.  Here in California on the CSU campuses, we feel the same way.  The Chancellor is taking care of his management team behind closed doors, just like the 1% of Americans have been taken care of in this country.  The CSU community has had enough."

Lillian Taiz, CFA President, added, "Chancellor Reed is completely out of touch with what is happening on the 23 CSU campuses. He is very in touch with his Presidents and management team - and the salaries and perks that they all enjoy."  The same points were made by Cornel West, the noted African American historian, who visited the picket lines at CSU East Bay.  "Human life is not subject to cold market calculations," he declared. 

Casino San Pablo Workers Protest Anti-Union Firing

At Casino San Pablo just north of Richmond, workers and community supporters joined in a candlelight vigil to focus public attention on the termination of one worker, the threatened firing of another, and efforts by the wealthy casino to roll back benefits for its employees. 

Nirmani Kalakheti came to the vigil with his wife and daughter.  Kalakheti was fired after he took time off to mourn the death of his father, according to Hindu ritual.  While the casino gave him permission to take the time, he was fired after he returned to his job.   "I feel that I have been targeted as a union leader and that the Casino management
is not respecting my religious and cultural traditions," he said.

Another worker, Ruth Springs, is due to have a baby any day, but was told that she would have to return to work three days after giving birth or lose her job.   "During these difficult economic times, my family has already had to move into a smaller apartment," she said.  "Now I am worried that we could lose our health care and end up on the streets.  No one, especially not an expecting mother, should have to go through what I am going through".

Despite making fabulous profits, Casino San Pablo is replacing full time workers, who have benefits, with part timers who do not.  The company is demanding extensive givebacks in contract negotiations, after getting help from the workers' union, UNITE HERE Local 2850, in getting permits to set up the casino years ago.

"These are the some of the most significant moments in any of our lives -- the death of a parent and the birth of a child." said Local 2850 President Wei Ling Huber.  "These are times when we should be showing sympathy and compassion for workers, rather than creating even greater hardship and insecurity."

For more articles and images, see  http://dbacon.igc.org 

See also Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants  (Beacon Press, 2008)
Recipient: C.L.R. James Award, best book of 2007-2008
http://www.beacon.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=2002 

See also the photodocumentary on indigenous migration to the US
Communities Without Borders (Cornell University/ILR Press, 2006)
http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/cup_detail.taf?ti_id=4575 

See also The Children of NAFTA, Labor Wars on the U.S./Mexico Border (University of California, 2004)
http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/9989.html -- 

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David Bacon, Photographs and Stories
http://dbacon.igc.org 

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