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Reconciliation is Dead: A Strategic Proposal

Zig Zag | Warrior Publications | February 18th 2020 by tawinikay (aka Southern Wind Woman) Reconciliation is dead. It’s been dead for some time. If only one thing has brought me joy in the last few weeks, it began when the matriarchs at Unist’ot’en burned the Canadian flag and declared reconciliation dead. Like wildfire, it swept through the hearts of youth across the territories. […]

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#freeblr #socialism #news #Defending Territory #Oil & Gas #shutdowncanada #anti-pipeline resistance #Coastal GasLink #direct action #Unis’tot’en #Wet'suwet'en #Reconciliation is Dead: A Strategic Proposal #Warrior Publications #February 18th 2020

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Jasper Bernes | July 24th 2019 | Commune

Willem Van Spronsen couldn’t stand by any longer. What will the rest of us do?

An imprecise description can be as misleading as a false one. It is, for example, imprecise to say that Willem Van Spronsen was killed by police while attacking an immigration detention center in Tacoma, Washington. This was the standard account of the 69-year-old antifascist’s death offered by the news media. But don’t let that mislead you. Van Spronsen, at least, was more precise. His final act should be understood as such.

As far as we know: on July 13th, at around 4 a.m., the musician and carpenter neared the Northwest Detention Center, one of the largest Immigrations and Customs Enforcement concentration camps in the nation. In the parking lot, across the street from where over fifteen hundred migrants are jailed, he began his attempt to incinerate a fleet of ICE vehicles. With homemade incendiary devices, he tried to burn the empty buses, used to transport immigrants to and from cages and to the nearby airport for deportation. He reportedly aimed for a propane tank, too. His efforts were cut short; Tacoma police officers arrived and shot him dead. The aging anarchist expected as much. In a plainly worded final statement-cum-manifesto he wrote, “I regret that I will miss the rest of the revolution.”

He also wrote, “I have an unshakable abhorrence for injustice. That is what brings me here.”

ICE representative Shawn Fallah stated, misleadingly, “This could have resulted in the mass murder of staff and detainees housed at the facility.” Van Spronsen did not target any buildings holding immigrants or ICE staff. It’s true that he was armed, with a home-assembled AR-15, and we do not know whether he exchanged gunfire with the four Tacoma police officers who arrived on the scene; none of them were injured. (White supremacist mass murderer Dylann Roof was armed, too, when detained, unharmed by Charleston police after shooting up a black church. The cops bought him Burger King in custody.)

“Van Spronsen’s small yet absolute rebellion should be placed in this history, one that understands how the techniques of fascist terror presuppose modernity’s quotidian infrastructure and everyday bureaucracy.”

Beyond this, emphasizing Van Spronsen’s vehicular targets matters if we are to appropriately situate his dying act in the history of high-risk sabotage against fascist infrastructures and the implements of state terror.

In an obvious sense, the US deportation machine subjugates migrants through blockages both spatial and temporal—cages, razor wire, interminable waits in perilous borderlands and torturous camps. ICE jackboots wait in courthouses, they linger outside immigration offices. Necropower—the organization of life in constant proximity to death, to bare life—allows the state to hold migrants in brutal suspension. Yet ICE’s cruel operations are equally dependent on speed and movement—stealth raids, rushed deportation flights, the unimpeded circulation of the dispossessed and desperate through for-profit prisons. Cribbing from the late urbanist Paul Virilio, we might frame the battle against the fascistic deportation regime as dromological: that is, a struggle over territory, determined by movement and speed.

Immigration enforcement uses the same streets, the same highways, the same airports as the rest of us. The fact that they do so without impediment reminds us that, no, these are not our streets. “Possession of territory is not primarily about laws and contracts,” wrote Virilio, “but first and foremost a matter of movement and circulation.” Van Spronsen, it seems, understood this. He went for the buses.

As journalist and comrade Kim Kelly noted on Twitter (much to the ire of the paranoid right-wing commentariat), “History echoes. During WWII, Jewish partisans targeted Nazi infrastructure, blowing up trains, power plants, and factories. Italian partisans targeted communications links, bridges and rail tracks. In 1943, the Soviets launched Operation Rail War, derailing 1,000 Nazi trains.” The latter sabotage efforts are thought to have reduced German transportation and traffic on the Eastern Front by 40 percent. Van Spronsen’s small yet absolute rebellion should be placed in this history, one that understands how the techniques of fascist terror presuppose modernity’s quotidian infrastructure and everyday bureaucracy.

“You don’t have to burn the motherfucker down, but are you going to just stand by?” he wrote. According to the lore of defanged histories, there are bystanders and there are upstanders. But that’s not quite right; since when, in common parlance, has standing up been the opposite of standing by? The antithesis of standing by, letting something pass, is obstruction. ¡No Pasaran!, I, for one, have been too upstanding; there’s little resistance in that. You don’t, we don’t, individually, have to burn the motherfucker down; obstruction can take many forms. Only committed, collective direct action on a large scale, against the gears of the necropolitical deportation machine, could render individual extreme action unnecessary.

The opposite of standing by: activists from Never Again Action and the Cosecha Movement, who shut down the ICE headquarters in Washington, DC the same week Van Spronsen died. The protesters who swarmed JFK airport in 2017 against the Muslim ban, the cab drivers who refused to drop passengers there. The immigrant rebels of the Gilets Noirs who occupied a terminal in Paris’ Charles De Gaulle airport, in direct resistance to Air France’s role as “the official deporter of the French state.” Those who lock their doors to ICE and hide their immigrant neighbors. Those who makes the identities of agents of terror public, and their once comfortable lives intolerable. As Joshua Clover writes, of our new era of “circulation struggles”: “thoroughfare, public square, pipeline, railway, dockside, airport, border, these will be our places.”

“Terror is the realization of the law of movement,” wrote Hannah Arendt. She meant that terror makes it possible for ideologies of totalitarianism “to race freely through mankind, unhindered by any spontaneous human action.” I can’t speak to Van Spronsen’s life—that is, for his close comrades and friends. He left behind a small number of simple, hopeful, and melancholic guitar songs, his voice twanging like an E-string. In one, he prophesied: “I’d gladly pay the price that’s asked, I guess I always have. I guess I always will… I have no regrets, I’d do it all again, if this is how I land in the end.” I can’t speak to his life or his character, that’s for those who knew him to do. But as to where he landed in the end, it can at least be said: he stood in the way.

One week prior to Van Spronsen’s final act, Donald Trump basked in militaristic pomp during his Fourth of July parade. Army tanks occupied the National Mall as props, fighter jets dominated the sky. Such bellicose displays disturb because they appear like military occupations. It would be a mistake, however, to forget that these streets are already occupied; those individuals who are ushered through them against their wills—to prisons, jails and airport terminals—know this well. So too do those, hunted by ICE, who hide in homes and churches. To move in public is too dangerous. In his writing on the politics of speed, Virilio recalls the words of none other than Joseph Goebbels: “whoever can conquer the street can also conquer the State!” While Trump’s tanks stand out, the dromological battle is waged by more banal war machines: the ICE bus, unburned and ready to roll.

The post An Unshakeable Abhorrence for Injustice appeared first on Commune.

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admin | July 24th 2019 | 325

IT: SOLIDARIETA’ A DINOS GIAGTZOGLOU

SOLIDARITY WITH DINOS GIAGTZOGLOU αλληλεγγύη

Anarchist Dinos Giagtzoglou was arrested in central Athens on 28 October 2017, one of Greece’s national days, in an ambush by anti-terrorist police forces as he left a safe house-hideout rented by him under a false name, carrying weaponry.

Initially he got imprisoned in the prison of Larissa, a city 355 km from Athens, with the aim of isolating him from his comrades, family and friends, making the talks with the lawyer extremely difficult and preparing for his trial almost impossible since the case files contain thousands of pages in digital format.

On 21 February 2018, he was transferred back to Athens for a pending trial about an old arrest in clashes with the riot police in the context of a general strike against the Greek government’s austerity economic measures in May 2011. After the postponement of this trial he began a hunger strike demanding to be typically transferred to Korydallos prison, close to his place of residence.

In the dawn of 24 February, as he was temporarily in Korydallos prison for this trial and conducting a hunger strike, a group of prison guards along with police special forces clenched the bedridden comrade for the strike to transfer him again to the Larissa prison. As an immediate response, an upheaval broke out among the other prisoners with the occupation of almost all the sections of the prison, the representative of the Ministry of Justice asked for a meeting, for the immediate return of Dinos to the Korydallos prison. The protests are spread in the prisons of Malandrino and Chania and a representative of the Ministry of Justice meets the representatives of the prisoners of the Korydallos prison.

From Larissa on February 25th Dinos declares the beginning of the thirst strike as a reaction to this unprecedented “abduction” and an escalation of his struggle. He obtained the transfer on 2 March thanks also to the support of a broad and varied solidarity context: demonstrations, solidarity banners, interventions, occupations, barricades and incendiary attacks lit hearts and nights.

Dinos is accused of terrorist organization, with the well-known counter-insurgency article 187A, of having sent several letter bombs to EU officials, economic organizations and Credit Rating Agencies throughout Europe in Spring 2017, including a booby-trapped folder to Lucas Papademos, former Greek Prime Minister, former governor of the Bank of Greece and former vice president of the European Central Bank, who had been seriously injured by the explosion of the package and for this reason Dinos is also accused of attempted murder.

The first trial for the possession and transport of weapons and explosives will begin on 20 September 2019. For the second process the investigations are still open while the French authorities have already visited Athens investigating the explosion in the office of IMF in Paris.

Dinos rejects the accusations of being the author of attacks or a member of “terrorist” organization and declares that both the rent of the apartment and the transfer of material were part of his revolutionary solidarity with a persecuted comrade.

May solidarity once again become the concrete action of all those who fight to disrupt the mega-machine that annihilates all bodies.

A solidarity that is alive and made of hearts that beat in unison with the same spirit and tension for a different world.

“I want you to be sure, my dear comrades, that the values of struggle and solidarity are infinitely more timeless than any rotten social dictate, than snitching, boot-licking or submission. So if a fighter asks for your help you shall not deny, you shall offer it generously by following your wild instincts; even if the unknown danger of being betrayed in the future lurks it will be worth the risk for the realization of our ideas. It is worth for the concrete proof that solidarity is not just a nice word empty of content without ethical grounds and physical substance, neither a non-threatening occasional occupation without perils and revolutionary peaks, but that it is a real “arsenal” that abolishes in practice the artificial dipoles of legality-illegality or innocence-guilt and is equipped with “weapons” for all those who indeed want to attack the Existent. It is worth the risk because you will know that you acted according to your anarchic ”beliefs” and against the sacred social standards of selfishness, moderation and compromise, legalism and voluntary servitude… “

Dinos Giagtzoglou

Resistenze al nanomondo Collective www.resistenzealnanomondo.org Spazio di documentazione La Piralide www.lapiralide.noblogs.org pdf text: Solidarity with Dinos MANIFESTO PDF: ENG

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Duncan Thomas | July 24th 2019 | rs21

Boris Johnson’s election signals a desperate new stage in the long death of British conservatism, writes Duncan Thomas.

Photo: Andrew Parsons. Via flickr (cc)

Do or die, dude. Daunted? Not Boris. He has confidence. He has a ‘can-do attitude’. He wants to insert fibreoptic broadband into ‘every orifice’ in the country. He has, apparently, something called ‘charisma’, which must be what you get if you routinely fuck up and embarrass yourself with displays of wanton public stupidity, but are posh enough to become Prime Minister anyway.

Apparently, landing the top job has always been a ‘burning ambition’ for Boris Johnson, although it’s not really clear why or what for. Now, he has his wish, and the backing of a whopping 0.19% of the electorate to carry it out. That negotiators for the European Union are apparently unimpressed by this mandate shows, once again, how little respect they have for British democracy.

Unfortunately for Bojo, this is probably as good as it gets. He has, it is true, a certain ‘skill set’, and is hardly the only weird-haired racist to make recent political hay on the back of a xenophobic, entitled, petit-bourgeois support base. But, unlike Trump, Johnson has a very specific set of immediate and intractable crises to deal with; and unlike Farage, he is embedded within an establishment party riven by seemingly unresolvable divisions, and laden with the inconvenient burden of actually governing. He has little room to manoeuvre, and the walls of reality are closing in.

This doesn’t mean that he isn’t dangerous and unpredictable. In particular, having a Prime Minister with ‘pickaninnies’ in his vocabulary is likely to further encourage racism. But it would still be a mistake to overestimate him. Unlike most ‘populists’, he doesn’t have any real political principles (by his own admission), and tends to get flustered under the slightest pressure. He is an opportunist who responds to shifts in public opinion, rather than an ideologue who shapes it. This makes him ultimately unsuited to the role of demagogue: he’s really just a posh boy in over his head with a penchant for dinner-table bigotry, and little else. His bullshit and bluster are unlikely to carry him as far as the figures to whom he is regularly compared.

For, as has been repeatedly stated elsewhere, there really is no way out of the Brexit mess for Johnson, or indeed any Conservative Prime Minister. The gap between the desires of large capital, which the Tories have more or less successfully represented for centuries, and the parochial and delusionally nostalgic party membership is simply too large. The smart money is probably on Johnson doing what he has always done: obfuscate, backtrack, and lie. His recklessness means that we can’t rule out a No Deal exit that he is manifestly unprepared for. But, generally speaking, when the going gets tough, Boris turns and runs. Some minor cosmetic alterations aside, he is unlikely to get any real concessions from the EU; what he is likely to do in these circumstances is sell his supporters down the river and fumble his way through by polishing Theresa May’s turd. We’ll see how well that goes for him.

There was a time, not so long ago, that the Conservative Party prided itself on prudence, statecraft, and long-term strategic governance. This is a party of the rural, monarchist aristocracy that not only survived the vast social and economic transformations heralded by industrial capitalism, free trade liberalism, universal suffrage, and social democracy, but actually flourished under circumstances to which it seemed hugely ill-suited. It can claim, with some justification, to be the most successful political party of all time, having governed the United Kingdom for the majority of the 19th and 20th centuries. Over that time, it has welded together electorally viable coalitions of big capital, the petit-bourgeoisie, and considerable sections of the working class. At its post-war peak, it was a mass party of nearly 3 million members – nearly three times the number claimed by the Labour Party at the time.

This record, presumably, is what Johnson was trying to gesture towards in his acceptance speech when he waffled incoherently about the Conservatives understanding the ‘jostling sets of instincts in the human heart’ (truly, which of us does not wake up every day worrying about whether we would prefer to buy a house or share our wealth?).

Yet, his election to office represents a defining moment in the long story of Conservative decline. In his vacillation, his ineptitude, his fundamental lack of seriousness, Johnson is the perfect embodiment of a political tradition struggling to remain relevant in a changing world. His wildly contradictory statements and posture – ‘fuck business’ one moment, boasting about doing more to ‘stick up for bankers’ than anyone else the next; dropping vague hints about ‘One Nation Conservatism’, before promising massive tax cuts for the rich – encapsulate the contradictions running through the heart of a party that has boxed itself into a corner. It simply cannot effectively represent all the various fractions of its traditional support.

His coronation is less a way out of the Tories’ impasse than an admission that the best they can do is bluff their way from one crisis to the next. Johnson’s approach to Brexit, and governance in general, is akin to a Victorian artic explorer who thinks he can open the northwest passage simply by reciting the Iliad with a plucky attitude. That might wash with an aging, jingoistic, overwhelmingly white membership who seem to think they all personally fought on D-Day. How well it will go down with the public at large in the event of a snap general election remains to be seen.

There is a bigger story here of the declining competence of the ruling class, the long death of British conservatism, and the unintended consequences of the political alienation caused by the neoliberal restructuring of state and society. Boris Johnson has ascended to an office that his party would never dream of letting him near in normal times: we are witnessing a desperate role of the dice from a political tradition that has run out of ideas, and an expression of the current state of chaos among the ruling class and its political representatives. Do they really think Boris Johnson has the vision, the political skill, or simply the concentration span to offer any solutions here?

‘Do you feel daunted?’ he asked his party yesterday morning. The silence said it all.

***

Join the Fck Govt Fck Boris demonstration at Russell Square in London, starting from 5.30 pm today (Thursday 24 July).

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claudia | July 24th 2019 | Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)

For the last 12 days the People of Puerto Rico have been bravely fighting  on the streets to demand the resignation of the current Governor, Ricardo Roselló. Puerto Rico is giving us all a lesson in struggle and solidarity. 

We have watched in awe, how the Puerto Rican people have risen in protest against the abuse of power, the humiliations, the corruption and the hate that has come from the Governor and his close allies and other government officials. 

We recognize the incredible hardships that the Puerto Rican people have faced in the last three years, in large part because of the oppressive colonial relationship between the archipelago and the US that is now more than 120 years old. We have also been amazed at the power of solidarity and the strength Puerto Ricans have shown in order to take care of each other and defend and rebuild their communities and their country. 

The Democratic Socialists of America understand that the challenges Puerto Rico faces are not just the result of a corrupt governor. That said, we stand in solidarity with the Puerto Rican people in their fight to oust Governor Rosselló and their right to a fair, autonomous and democratic process to establish a new government. 

In the case that the governor resigns, we are against any efforts of the US government, including the Financial Control Board to try to impose any form of government on the People of Puerto Rico. Who gets to govern them is for them to decide.  

We also stand in solidarity with the efforts to decolonize Puerto Rico, and we are committed to fighting alongside our Puerto Rican comrades for the rights that we all deserve.

Durante los últimos 12 días, el pueblo de Puerto Rico ha estado luchando valientemente en las calles para exigir la renuncia del actual gobernador, Ricardo Roselló. Puerto Rico nos está dando una lección de lucha y solidaridad. Hemos observado con asombro cómo el pueblo puertorriqueño se ha levantado en protesta contra el abuso de poder, las humillaciones, la corrupción y el odio del Gobernador y sus aliados cercanos y otros funcionarios gubernamentales.

Reconocemos las increíbles dificultades que el pueblo puertorriqueño ha enfrentado en los últimos tres años, en gran parte debido a la opresiva relación colonial entre el archipiélago y los Estados Unidos, que ya tiene más de 120 años. También nos ha sorprendido el poder de la solidaridad y la fuerza que los puertorriqueños han demostrado para cuidarse mutuamente y defender y reconstruir sus comunidades y su país.

Los socialistas demócratas de América entienden que los desafíos que enfrenta Puerto Rico no son solo el resultado de un gobernador corrupto. Dicho esto, nos solidarizamos con el pueblo de Puerto Rico en su lucha por expulsar al Gobernador Rosselló y su derecho a un proceso justo, autónomo y democrático para establecer un nuevo gobierno.

En caso de que el gobernador renuncie, estamos en contra de cualquier esfuerzo del gobierno de los EE. UU., Incluida la Junta de Control Fiscal para tratar de imponer cualquier forma de gobierno a la gente de Puerto Rico. La decisión de quien les gobierne es de la gente. También nos solidarizamos con los esfuerzos para descolonizar a Puerto Rico, y estamos comprometidos a luchar junto a nuestres camaradas boricuas por los derechos que todes merecemos.

The post Solidarity with Puerto Rico appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

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Bernie Sanders | July 24th 2019 | Socialist Project

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) led a group of 13 members of Congress urging the US Department of Labor to immediately investigate chronic violations of workplace safety at all Amazon warehouses, “owing to the breadth and severity of past violations as well as mounting public revelations of brutal and hazardous working conditions.”

Their letter to the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) comes in the wake of a Monday work stoppage by Amazon warehouse workers in Minnesota to protest unfair and unsafe conditions in the midst of Prime Day, Amazon’s biggest sales event of the year.

Dear Deputy Assistant Secretary Loren Sweatt:

We are writing to request that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) launch a comprehensive investigation into the workplace conditions at the warehouses from which Amazon.com, Inc. and its subsidiaries and contractors operate.

In the year 2019, working conditions in the United States of America should be the best and the safest in the world. Unfortunately, according to numerous media reports, and reflected in previous fines levied by your agency, that is not the case at Amazon. In fact, the working conditions at this highly profitable company have been described as “unsafe,” “bruising,” “grueling,” “a recipe for disaster,” putting “workers and communities at risk,” and “intrusive.”1

Work Stoppage on Prime Day

Just this week, Amazon workers in Minnesota organized a work stoppage in order to protest their employer’s unfair, unsafe practices. Workers at the Minneapolis facility, and all of Amazon’s warehouses across the country (referred to by the company as “fulfillment centers” and “sortation centers”) undertake work that is physically demanding, often requiring walking more than 10 miles in a single shift and repeatedly lifting heavy objects, all while being afforded minimal rest breaks, not being allowed to sit, and being forced to work “mandatory overtime” shifts.2

This work environment creates a high risk of physical injuries, a risk increased by Amazon’s intentional disregard for the health and safety of their employees. Last year the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (NCOSH) put Amazon on its “dirty dozen” list of most dangerous places to work in the United States, referencing Amazon’s “disturbing pattern of preventable deaths,” which includes “seven workers killed at Amazon warehouses since 2013 – including three workers within five weeks in 2017.”

Earlier this year, Mother Jones published an investigation showing that “hazards on the warehouse floor can launch months and years of medical injury that ultimately result in worker disability.” When workplace injuries occur, Amazon has repeatedly ignored their severity. Last year The Guardian published an investigation that revealed “numerous cases of Amazon workers suffering from workplace accidents or injuries in its gigantic warehouse system and being treated in ways that leave them homeless, unable to work or bereft of income.”

Desperate Working Conditions

Hundreds of stories shared with our offices paint a picture of desperation and a corporate employer with little regard for the health of its employees. We heard from an Amazon worker who described the warehouse as a “21st century sweatshop.” Workers shared stories of high temperatures in some warehouses and an inability to take water or bathroom breaks for fear of retaliation: “I myself take medication so I will not have to use the restroom and drink little fluids also to help. Sometimes I think is this torture really worth it??;” “afraid to drink water for fear of not hitting [his] rate;” “no air conditioning when it’s hot in the facility;” “the air conditioning was not working and you could easily pass out from the heat in Arizona going on 115 that week;” “please help stop the mandatory overtime and ten hours shift in a humid atmosphere.” One worker issued this plea: “please send OSHA to investigate these conditions that are affecting workers physically and mentally.”

In addition to the intense physical stress, Amazon pushes workers to the emotional brink. Over the last five years, emergency workers were called to Amazon warehouses at least 189 times at 46 different locations for workers experiencing a mental health breakdown or at imminent risk of suicide. A navy veteran and former Amazon employee told our offices that “there was a point where I would find myself crying on my shift… I really felt like I just didn’t wanna be alive anymore.”

In another story shared with our offices, a former Amazon employee said, “working at Amazon was one of the most depressing periods of my life. For nearly four years I worked in isolation barely speaking to anyone. At work you never heard much from anyone other than how much they hated it there and wanted to leave. I imagine prison is very similar… My mental state began to decline until I began to feel unstable. My nights were spent walking around in circles in the warehouse pulling things from shelves for hours until it made me want to snap. One day I just broke. I found myself unable to get out of bed where I stayed for five straight days. I ate nothing. I thought about suicide.”

Workers also commented directly on injuries and safety concerns: “someone would get injured in the building every day. They would talk about working safely yet keep demanding high rates. That’s why there were so many injuries. They also filled WAY too many items in the warehouse. This caused items to fall off shelves onto workers. It was common to hear someone received a concussion or back injury.” Another worker noted that safety was disregarded during busier periods: “while generally my supervisors are concerned about safety that seems to fly out the window when we are under pressure to fill orders on time.” Another worker said, “I frequently see the ambulance come to the warehouse. Three laborers fainted in front of me – they keep a wheelchair in the middle of the warehouse.”

Amazon operates more than 100 warehouses across the country that employ more than 125,000 people,3 and yet in the last five years OSHA has reported conducting only 150 inspections of Amazon spaces and issued just 41 violations.4 OSHA has previously found that Amazon fails to report worker injuries and when OSHA does investigate, your agency has found instances of egregious injuries, including fractures and amputations.5

In one year at one facility, OSHA found 26 separate cases of “work-related fatality, injury or illness” that Amazon failed to report. Those incidents included falls resulting in head injuries, face wounds that were “glued closed,” as well as a number of severe back, shoulder, and wrist strains. After finding these unreported injuries, OSHA issued one “other-than-serious” violation with a penalty of $7,000.

When Amazon employee Phillip Terry was “fatally crushed when a forklift’s lift fell on him while he was doing maintenance work on it,” the corporation was fined just $28,000 for “failure to ‘provide adequate training’ and to develop and document certain safety procedures.”

That is unacceptable. Owing to the breadth and severity of past violations as well as mounting public revelations of brutal and hazardous working conditions, we request that OSHA launch a thorough and comprehensive investigation into the workplace conditions at all of Amazon’s warehouses, and that any violations uncovered in the course of such an investigation be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. OSHA’s mission is to “ensure safe and healthful working conditions for working men and women.” We ask that you intensify your efforts to ensure that goal is met for all Amazon workers. No employee, especially those who work for the wealthiest person in the world, should be forced to work in unsafe conditions.

We look forward to your response. Sincerely,

Bernard Sanders United States Senator

Ilhan Omar Member of Congress •

A PDF of this letter is available here.

Further information: “Amid Amazon Prime Day Protests, Sanders and Omar Lead Call for Probe of ‘Brutal and Hazardous Working Conditions’,” by Jessica Corbett.

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dcdirectactionnews | July 24th 2019 | DC Direct Action News

On the 23ed of July, with the the Sanders/Cortez climate emergency resolution going nowhere, Extinction Rebellion returned to Capitol Hill. Multiple teams converged on the tunnels connection House office buildings to the US Capitol. They arrived all at once and as the commotion started it quickly became clear that protesters had superglued themselves across the access doors to at least one tunnel. There were 16 reported arrests, but the blockades held for over two hours.

About 20 minutes into the blockades, cops advanced on the support team, reading out warnings rapid-fire as though intending to arrest not only blockaders but all of the supporters. This raised the specter of possible police plans to remove blockaders requiring privacy as in to conceal abuse. An Indymedia reporter who slipped out of that potential kettle spotted a firetruck parked outside the Rayburn building. It is possible that firetruck brought a crew more familiar with superglue “emergencies” than police, who acted at first like the had no idea whatsover what to do about protesters with their hands glued to the building.

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| July 24th 2019 | Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)

We have a lot going on and I wanted to be sure we are in touch with you even if you are not attending the convention!

Reminder to Chapters and Members of the Critical Need for Confidentiality in the Grievance Process

Jane McAlevey Tools from No Shortcuts to Organizing for Power Series

Democratic Socialist Labor Commission (DSLC) Update

Electoral Endorsements in California and Ohio

DSA In Office Gathering in Atlanta

Convention is Coming Up!

Pre-Convention Budget Webinar for Members

Delegate Convention Emails

Reminder to Chapters and Members of the Critical Need for Confidentiality in the Grievance Process

On the July 8 call of the National Political Committee Steering Committee, the SC voted to send this letter to members.

The entire process for Resolution 33 grievances and non-Resolution 33 cases may be seen here, as well as resources for chapter Harassment and Grievance Officers.

Jane McAlevey Tools from No Shortcuts to Organizing for Power Series

In the last two months, hundreds of members attended three mass organizing calls with Jane McAlevey, ending on July 10 with a call on how to use these techniques to strengthen your DSA chapter. In moments like now, when the boss class is doubling down on their campaign to divide, conquer, and spread fear, it is more important than ever that we build effective chapters who can both mobilize, but also organize.

Stay tuned for an August follow up call to see how folks have applied Jane’s lessons, and in the meantime, here are some tools she developed for chapter members in DSA. We hope you can try them out and then get on our next call!

DSA chapter charting conversation rap

DSA chapter charting worksheet

DSA 1 to 1 organizing conversation roleplay debrief checklist

If you missed any or all of these mass calls, click here to watch the three videos. At the link you will find a discussion guide for No Shortcuts, brought to you by the DSA Fund, dedicated to education and outreach about Democratic Socialism. Learn more or support the DSA Fund here.

Democratic Socialist Labor Commission (DSLC) Update

The DSLC is hosting a call featuring the leaders of Labor Working Groups, Committees, and Branches throughout the organization. They will be discussing the approach they take to the labor movement in their chapters, campaigns they’ve taken on, and issues they’ve faced. We are still finalizing a time and agenda, but you can pre-register for the call at this link.

And check out the DSLC’s Labor 101 curriculum! There will be an opportunity for delegates to participate in a Labor 101 session at the convention, which is a great opportunity to bring this training back to their home chapter.

Electoral Endorsements in California and Ohio

The National Electoral Committee is proud to endorse Dean Preston for San Francisco, CA Board of Supervisors and Liliana Rivera Baiman for Columbus, OH City Council!! Both are up for election Tuesday, November 5th. Vote for them if you live in town, donate to them if you can, and reach out to [email protected] to volunteer remotely for them or our other candidates like Shaun Scott in Seattle.

Dean Preston wrote the Right to Counsel ballot measure that San Francisco DSA endorsed and won, and is known as one of the lead organizers who helped save CA rent control in 2008. He has represented tenants in eviction cases and victims of police misconduct as a lawyer, and now he is running to represent working people on San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors. This is a chance to elect a DSA member who has already worked alongside the chapter to office and boost their fights for a green new deal, public transportation, and of course, tenants’ rights and affordable housing.

Liliana Rivera Baiman is a mother, labor organizer, and DREAMer activist who is running because Columbus workers shouldn’t need more than one job to survive. That means good union jobs with benefits, and a city that can support them. She’s a member of Columbus DSA and knows that without municipal ID cards and public internet, it’s hard for everyone to take advantage of everything the city has to offer. With public services that are funded by prioritizing the good of all over the good of developers, Liliana believes everyone can thrive.

DSA In Office Gathering in Atlanta

The past few weeks we have seen what happens when the Wall Street wing of the Democratic Party attacks their left flank. It opens the door for the likes of Trump to go on the offensive, galvanizing and growing his base from among those who would like to return this country to pre-Reconstruction economic and social relations.

Outside the formal political arena, DSA members across the country have attended and in many cases helped organize Close the Camps mobilizations. It is critical that our chapters be part of broad based majoritarian coalitions organizing both in direct actions and in civil society against the increasing neo-fascism of the Republican Party, the accomodationism of too many moderate Democrats, and the corporations who assist ICE and other institutions of oppression.

We are also working inside the formal political arena, supporting our members in office to use their resources to facilitate working class self defense in their communities, and helping new democratic socialists candidates run for office at all levels of government. Dozens of DSA members currently in office will gather concurrent with the national convention to build our national network and find new ways to leverage our independent, collective power.

Convention is Coming Up!

It’s been great seeing members on social media discussing some of the many resolutions before delegates at the convention, and knowing many of you are holding chapter meetings to discuss them as well. Delegates will make major decisions about the direction of the organization in just two weeks.

We will also hear from inspiring leaders both inside and outside DSA, including:

Sara Nelson, International President of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO. During the government shutdown, Nelson released a video calling on flight attendants to stop working and support air traffic controllers sickouts. Hours later, Trump cut a deal to end the shutdown. Now she’s standing up against climate change, supporting the Green New Deal, and calling on airlines to stop enabling deportations.

Linda Sarsour, DSA member, co-founder of MPower Change, Palestinian-American community organizer, former executive director of the Arab American Association of New York and Women’s March board member.

Together we will marshall our strength for the struggles ahead. We want nothing less than a planet for the many, not the few!

Pre-Convention Budget Webinar for Members

The Budget and Finance Committee is organizing a Preconvention Webinar Budget Presentation on Sunday, 7/28th 8pm ET/7pm CT/6pm MT/5pm PT. The call will be one hour long and will include an mid-year budget analysis. This call will be limited to DSA members as of 7/11/2019.

To verify memberships are up-to-date with their dues, we ask that you RSVP for access to the call. Every member who RSVPs will receive a recording of the call.

Delegate Convention Emails

Are you a national convention delegate but not receiving convention bulletin emails? You may not have filled out the full registration process! Email [email protected] to check.

Learn more about our national convention here.

The post Special Mid-Month Dispatch appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

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