May 21, 2005

CHICAGO — “You might see me coming down the aisle 20 years from now with my walker,” said flight attendant Melissa Madden. Faced with the slashing of their pensions to the tune of $6.6 billion, she and other United Airlines flight attendants here warn that if United gets away with using bankruptcy to dump its pension obligations, the nation’s entire defined-benefit pension system — and the futures of the 44 million workers it covers — could come tumbling down. Retirement for American workers could become a thing of the past.
click here for related story

Not since the dismal Cold War days of the 1950s has labor been under such attack from capital in our country. Capitalist globalization is pressing hard on labor from all sides. The far right, with control of both the Congress and the White House, sees its best opportunity in decades to greatly weaken labor. The Department of Labor and the National Labor Relations Board have been turned into total tools of big business, abandoning even the appearance of neutrality and impartiality.
click here for Spanish text

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — “The people can win” was the theme of this year’s May Day celebration here, held a week early on April 24 to allow for the participation of New Haven activists in the huge May 1 march in New York City against nuclear weapons and the war in Iraq.

AUSTIN, Texas — Workers, students and their families assembled on May 1 here to celebrate working-class solidarity and rejuvenate themselves for the ongoing struggle for social justice. The event was sponsored by the Industrial Workers of the World and the Monkeywrench Books collective, and featured talks on the history of May Day, songs, children and workers’ theater.

In a significant victory for Iraq war resisters, a Navy judge decided not to send sailor Pablo Paredes to jail for refusing to board a ship bound for Iraq.
click here for related article
click here for Spanish text

UNITED NATIONS — The Bush administration has provoked the nuclear crisis on the Korean peninsula and caused untold suffering for Koreans on both sides of the 38th parallel, representatives of Solidarity for Peace and Reunification in Korea (SPARK) said at a forum held here May 6.
click here for related article

“The Bush administration doesn’t know how to get out of this tangled and embarrassing situation,” Fidel Castro said May 1. “While they have been playing with terrorism, fomenting it, supporting it and nurturing it, it comes as no surprise that they now have a time bomb on their hands.”
click here for Spanish text

Over 200 MOVE supporters and members gathered May 14 near the site where Philadelphia police dropped a bomb on the group’s row house 20 years ago. Police Commissioner Gregore Sambor ordered the fire department “to let the fire burn.” Eleven MOVE members, including five children, died in the blaze.

BOSTON — The Bush administration is receiving a barrage of criticism from public officials, environmentalists and outdoors groups for opening up federal wilderness lands to timber, mining, oil and gas drilling corporations, as well as to tourism development companies.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Advocates for the homeless and members of the clergy held an interfaith service at a tent city here May 9 to bring attention to the growing plight of homeless men, women and children in Rhode Island. They also appealed for increased state support for affordable housing and services.