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CLEVELAND -- Protesting another attempt to cut government services, 60 postal workers and their supporters picketed the Cleveland Airport Mail Center July 31 responding to a threatened shutdown by the U.S. Postal Service.

The AFL-CIO has set a political goal, second only to helping presumed Democratic nominee Barack Obama win the White House, of achieving a filibuster-proof 60-vote pro-worker majority in this year’s elections.

More than 300 members of Local 1109 of the CWA/IBEW rallied outside of a Verizon facility in Brooklyn today to send a strong message to Verizon. This is a fight for working families throughout the country against an anti- union company that has created over 13,000 non-union jobs at non-union facilities since 2003

Those who say there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the Republicans and the Democrats should take a look at a piece of legislation that passed the House, but fell victim to another GOP filibuster. It involves a little-known federal agency, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC).

Facing the fact that many unionists may be reluctant to vote for Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) for the presidency because he is African-American, union leaders meeting in Chicago decided to confront that issue head-on by repeatedly emphasizing to members to “vote your jobs” and that economics trumps race.

Union leaders and a labor economist whose university has spent eight years studying the airline industry are warning of turbulence ahead I Atlanta-based Delta Airlines swallows Minnesota-based Northwest. In the third hearing on the proposed deal before various congressional committees, Machinists Vice President Robert Roach warned the deal could lead to $15 billion in combined pension liabilities being dumped on the federal government.

The Iowa town of Postville took center stage – again - in the debate over the nation’s failed immigration system, as 1,500 people, including unionists, rallied July 27 in support of packinghouse workers there. The march came one day after four members of Congress met with workers to discuss worker and safety violations at the Agriprocessors, Inc., plant in Postville, site of a now-infamous Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency raid that arrested 390.

HAVANA — July 14 — A group of 41 tired Americans walked across the International Peace Bridge connecting Canada and Buffalo, NY. These were not your everyday Niagara Falls tourists — when they arrived in Buffalo, banners, people and cheers awaited them. These Americans had just traveled to Cuba with the Venceremos Brigade, against US travel restrictions.

Turning back objections from big business and yet another veto threat from the anti-worker GOP Bush regime, the House July 31 passed the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill designed to put some teeth into federal equal employment laws. The 247-178 vote saw 14 Republicans join all 233 Democrats in voting yes. All the no votes came from the GOP.

Military alliances are always sold as things that produce security. In practice they tend to do the opposite. Thus, Germany formed the Triple Alliance with Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire to counter the enmity of France following the Franco-Prussian War. In response, France, England and Russia formed the Triple Entente. The outcome was World War I.