IWW Appeal.

An appeal from IWW:

SUPPORT YOUR BUS DRIVERS!

END METROLINE RACE TO THE BOTTOM:

REINSTATE OSCAR ALVAREZ

      Oscar Alvarez has been a London bus driver for 8 1/2 years. He reached the 10th position nationwide in Blackpool Best Bus Driver of the Year 2007 competition which to date is still unbeaten by any Metroline driver.

      Now he has been unfairly sacked following a disagreement with a car driver who cut up his bus endangering herself and others. Oscar was simply defending the safety of his passengers and other road users.

      Oscar is also a union activist defending his colleagues from a race-to-the-bottom attack on their terms and conditions - coincidence? Gerry Downing, another union activist, was recently sacked for similar reasons but has now won his job back. Other drivers in similar incidents have not been sacked.

TAKE ACTION: SEE OUR 3 EASY WAYS TO HELP

PLEASE HELP OSCAR

1. JOIN OUR EMAIL CAMPAIGN

Copy the model letter below and email it to Metroline:

• Sean O’Shea (Chief Operating Officer) soshea@metroline.co.uk
• Jaspal Singh (Chief Executive) jsingh@metroline.co.uk
• Nina Johnson (Senior HR Advisor) njohnson@metroline.co.uk
• Metroline Head Office info@metroline.co.uk

MODEL LETTER:

Dear Mr. Sean O’Shea,

Re: Compassionate appeal – Mr Oscar Alvarez

      I am writing to you as a member of the public and Metroline bus passenger to express my deep concern about the dismissal of Mr Oscar Alvarez, ex Metroline driver from the West Perivale Garage. Rather than gross misconduct it seems to me that Mr Alvarez actions should be construed as an attempt to correct the driving behaviour of another driver who had not only endangered her own safety, but also that of her baby and other road users. My understanding is that Mr Alvarez is an excellent driver; indeed has won a national award for good driving on behalf of Metroline. It is my firm belief that his action does not amount to gross misconduct and so I am requesting that you accept his appeal for reinstatement.

Yours sincerely

[Your name]

[ PLEASE SEND US A COPY OF YOUR E-MAIL TO london@iww.org.uk ]

2. PHONE METROLINE

Urge them to reinstate Oscar. Please focus on Oscar’s great record as an outstanding driver and on the very weak merits of his case.

• Directors Office: 020 8218 8844 Comments: 0845 300 7000
  
  
  3.   SPREAD THE WORD & BUILD THE CAMPAIGN

• You can do this by
• Leafleting Metroline: Session dates and times will be posted at http://tiny.cc/REINSTATEOSCARNOW
• Keeping up to date via our website https://www.iww.org.uk/ and FB page http://www.facebook.com/london.iww
• Sharing this by e-mail with your contacts

• Thanks…

  An injury to one is an injury to all!  

  
  

  
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Sheffield Anarchist Book Fair.

Worth a visit if you are in the area. Educate, communicate, organise.

Sheffield anarchist book fair.

9 05 2013

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Austerity And Environmental Devastation.

      Spain, like Greece, is at the sharp end of the financial Mafia's rape and plunder campaign. Stratospheric unemployment, slashing of social services and a fast-track to a sweatshop economy. With the "austerity" comes the devastation as the IMF (International Mankind Fuckers) complicit corrupt politicians surrender the environment to the corporate world all in the name of that magical "growth",  but, like the people of Greece, the people of Spain are also fighting back. Protests, strikes and all forms of direct action are an ever increasing part of life.

This from Loam:

      Circumventing security systems, today a Greenpeace activist has jumped on the roof of the super-protected Spanish Parliament and deployed a banner in defense of the battered Spanish coast.

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Fascist Army Unleashed.

       Is this film proof that the police in Greece are among the most brutal, racist and out of control police force in Europe. Police violence is a widespread daily occurrence, and during this financial plunder and rape of Greek society, their brutality goes unchecked. When the Greek Junta was ousted in 1974, the one part of their filth that was not cleaned up was the Greek police force. It is the same vicious, fascists element that it was from 1967 to 1974. It is a fascist army and it has been let of the leash to instill fear among the local population.

       On 2nd February 2013 Cheick Ndiaye's body was found on the rail tracks of Thissio metro station in central Athens. A friend, who was a witness states he saw Cheick being pushed to his death by two municipality police officers who were chasing him. Cheick was a migrant from Senegal.

This film is part of an ongoing research project in Athens.

crisis-scape.net/

"It was racism that killed him" from Ross Domoney on Vimeo.

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Waiting For The Barbarians.

      No it's not another poem-a-day month, it's just that I like poetry. I find this poem by Constantine Cavafy 1864-1933 fascinating, so relevant of today with the various states, "enemy without", its manufactured fear of the other, who are never as refined as us!! This translation is by Edmund Keeley.

Waiting For The Barbarians.

What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?

The barbarians are due here today.

Why isn't anything happening in the senate?
Why do the senators sit there without legislating?

Because the barbarians are coming today.
What laws can the senators make now?
Once the barbarians are here, they'll do the legislating.

Why did our emperor get up so early,
and why is he sitting at the city's main gate
on his throne, in state, wearing the crown?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and the emperor is waiting to receive their leader.
He has even prepared a scroll to give him,
replete with titles, with imposing names.

Why have our two consuls and praetors come out today
wearing their embroidered, their scarlet togas?
Why have they put on bracelets with so many amethysts,
and rings sparkling with magnificent emeralds?
Why are they carrying elegant canes
beautifully worked in silver and gold?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and things like that dazzle the barbarians.

Why don't our distinguished orators come forward as usual
to make their speeches, say what they have to say?

Because the barbarians are coming today
and they're bored by rhetoric and public speaking.

Why this sudden restlessness, this confusion?
(How serious people's faces have become.)
Why are the streets and squares emptying so rapidly,
everyone going home so lost in thought?

Because night has fallen and the barbarians have not come.
And some who have just returned from the border say
there are no barbarians any longer.

And now, what's going to happen to us without barbarians?
They were, those people, a kind of solution.

ann arky's home.

Open Media, Or Censorship.

This Speaks for itself.

Having trouble viewing this email? Click here.

We now know the controversial international agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), threatens to criminalize your online activity including use of your favorite websites. A new chief negotiator named Michael Froman has just been announced. Will you send him a message at this pivotal moment before Big Media lobbyists get to him?

“The Biggest Global Threat to the Internet”: That’s how legal experts describe the controversial international agreement known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).¹

The TPP agreement threatens to criminalize use of your favorite websites—including YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and your favourite blog—and even your online comments.² But you can stop it if you act now >>>

A man named Michael Froman has just been appointed as the new TPP chief negotiator. Froman now has a unique ability either to put this secretive, global Internet criminalization plan to an end – or to cement it into place for generations.

The question is: Who will Michael Froman hear from in his first week on the job? You, or the Big Media conglomerates that see the Internet as a threat?

Legal experts are now warning that under the TPP, normal online activities “could lead you to be cut off from the Internet, have your computer seized, be fined up to $150,000, or even land you in prison.”³

Will you *click here* to send a message to Michael Froman at this pivotal moment? We must speak up before Big Media lobbyists convince him to criminalize use of the Internet.

We can do this,

Steve and Josh, on behalf of your OpenMedia team

P.S. After you participate in this time-sensitive action, please help us continue to push this campaign by chipping in whatever you can now—every bit really does help our small team succeed. Thank you for supporting this community in its time of need.

Footnotes

[1] Recent analysis by lawyers at the Electronic Frontier Foundation called the TPP the biggest global threat to the Internet. Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation.

[2] Provisions in leaked drafts of the TPP could prohibit use of “temporary copies”, which according to policy experts at InternetNZ, are crucial: “The Internet—and computing—fundamentally depends on making temporary copies.”

The EFF writes that if this proceeds, “anyone who ever views content on their device could potentially be found liable of infringement”.

[3] The quote comes from the EFF’s Maira Sutton writing in the Daily Dot.

About OpenMedia

OpenMedia fights for the open Internet, through OpenMedia.ca and OpenMedia International. We empower people to participate in Internet governance with fresh and engaging citzens' campaigns. Together with the pro-Internet community, we've successfully defended the Internet from threats to neutrality, affordability, privacy, and media choice. ann arky's home.

The Ministry Of Love Needs You.

     This appealed to me as it seems very relevant to today's corporate capitalism. They have all the money they could ever desire, but still they want to grow. Control, domination, is what it is all about. Lifted direct from Teacher Dude's Grill and BBQ:

Ministry of Love Needs You, a photo by Teacher Dude's BBQ on Flickr. 

      The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing.
     All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal.
     We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?’

1984 George Orwell

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European Sweatshops!!

       That babbling brook of bullshit, the media, has give a lot of coverage to the recent deaths of garment workers slaving away in the sweatshops housed in the  building that collapsed in Bangladesh. Of course there is rightful outcry and anger, though any tears shed by the corporate world, will be of the crocodile type, cheap labour equals bigger profits. However that same babbling brook of bullshit doesn't report on the sweatshops here in Europe, they exist here, as else where in the world, and they are on the increase in European countries being raped and plundered by the financial Mafia's austerity plans. This report is from Greece, but where else in this so called group of European developed nations are the same conditions being experienced day and daily?

This from Contra Info:

We will either raise our voices, or be forced to work ourselves to death
     Radka Nikolova, 38, was a kitchen worker in the pizza fan store in Patras. On Monday, January 14th, 2013 she was found dead at work, locked inside the store. Early estimates said the woman died due to heart failure. The story was covered up.
     It is relatively known that a heart condition alone is not enough to cause someone’s death. But yes… with a job at pizza fan, our heart does not seem to last long enough.------

Read the full article HERE:

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Glasgow May Day 2013 And Photos.

 

      Glasgow's May Day parade set off from George Square today Sunday 5th. May, and marched through the centre of the city and across the river. It was a well attended affair with a myriad of groups displaying their colourful banners. 

     Though well attended, not well enough, this is our day, traditionally a workers celebration day, as well as celebrating our victories, it is an opportunity to show our strength and solidarity. Now more than ever that solidarity is going to be a necessary weapon in the coming struggle. We need to come together as one body of all the people, we are not fighting a multitude of individual struggles, it is one big battle, corporate capitalism against the people. At the moment their attack is relentless, while our response seems, at times, somewhat haphazard. That is a recipe for our defeat and a continual worsening of our living conditions. 

       The marchers got a reasonably dry day, if a bit windy. Some had difficulty in managing the banners as they marched into a strong wind. One group had to do some repairs at the side of the road as their banner suffered some minor damage from the strong wind.

      All in all, a reasonable show, if not noisy enough, not boisterous enough, and certainly not large enough.

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Anarchism, Marxism,

       In spite of my pocking a little fun, a night worth marking in your diary, I'm sure it will be both informative and interesting, as well as lively. 

       Friday 10^th May, with Ben Franks: 'Between Anarchism and Marxism: The beginnings and ends of the schism?'Discussion 6.30-8.30pm. Social 8.30pm onwards at Kinning Park Complex, 40 Cornwall St, Glasgow G41 1AQ

https://www.facebook.com/events/558999170798205/?ref=ts&fref=ts

      Benjamin Franks will introduce his recent work, 'Between Anarchism and Marxism: The beginnings and ends of the schism? (2012), which will be followed by group discussion of the questions posed. 
     "The standard approach, endorsed by orthodox Marxists and many anarchists, is to see an irreconcilable difference between anarchism and Marxism. However, the historical record shows that whilst Marx opposed – and was opposed by - leading anarchists prior to 1917 there was considerable positive interaction between diverse Marxist and anarchist groups. The division between the two, viewed as fundamental, I argue, is in fact the product of a particular form of political structure that dominated the revolutionary-left in the last century. Now that these hierarchical forms of organisation have been discredited, rediscovered and revised forms of Marxism have arisen that, once again, actively engage with anarchism."

     Hosted by The Strickland Distribution, with the support of Glasgow Anarchist Federation, Radical Independent Bookfair, Clydeside IWW.
All welcome!
(Refreshments available. BYOB.)
Kinning Park Complex, 40 Cornwall St., Glasgow G41 1AQ
http://www.kinningparkcomplex.org

ann arky's home. 

Austerity, A Beast With Blood On Its Teeth.

     Austerity is an ugly beast, it tears at the fabric of society, bloodying the present and devouring the future. It is not just a matter of cutting down on the cappuccinos, skipping a night at the movies, it's the spread of fear, the creation of bitterness, the struggle for survival. With austerity comes anger and to contain that anger, and preserve their own privileged position, the establishment unleashes its fascist dogs, intimidation and repression are necessary for the survival of their ideological beast austerity. Austerity never arrives by accident, it is called in to do its masters bidding. What is happening in Greece is neither an accident nor necessary, it is an ideological plan. What we should not forget is that the austerity beast is already prowling the streets of other countries about to start its ravenous feast and devour the lives of those ordinary people.

    This film is not the Greece I visited for many years, it has been changed, brutalised and its people impoverished, austerity has ravished them. All this because a bunch of corrupt rich politicians follow the grand plan laid down by another bunch of even more rich financial parasites who never live in the world they create, by their enforced austerity. 

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Iain Duncan Smith, Rat-bag!!

  

     It is always pleasant when some ordinary person gets a chance to speak their mind to one of those charlatans from the parasitic political class. It is even more pleasant when you hear the audience applaud that opinion.

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Asset Stripping On a Grand Scale.

       The fascist Troika, that governs Europe has dealt another blow to the income of the Greek people. Opap, the Greek government owned gambling giant, which last year made €505 million for the Greek public purse, I presume, welcome money to a state groveling for money, has been sold, on the instructions of that fascist Troika. A 33% slice of it was sold for something over €622 million, the exact figure is still “secret”, a price not much more than one year's profits. The fascist Troika has instructed the Greek government to sell of €9.5 billion of Greek assets, the Greek people's assets, by 2016. Anything that could make money for the Greek people has to be sold to the corporate world so that they can make that money. A country being punished for its debt, and the remedy is to cut of its sources of income. It is obvious that the fascist Troika's grand plan has nothing to do with debt reduction and more to do with asset stripping. Country after country is being forced to sell of the people's assets and hand the money to the banksters. All this brings the people's standard of living crashing down. What do we the people get in return for all this “austerity”, plundering? Why we get lots of pie-in-the-sky, after ten or more years of wage cuts/freeze. There will be a promised land waiting for you, if you will only accept a decade or two of groveling in the gutter you'll be just fine. Of course the parasites will not be joining you there in the gutter, no they will be laughing at you will the stuff their faces at some fancy banquet. Ah well, that's capitalism for you.

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Debt Reduction Leads To Debt Increase!!

     It's amazing how the fascist Troika stepped in, in 2011 with a cure to sort out Italy's debt and economic woes. It swept aside the elected government, installed a technocrat, “economic expert” Mario Monti, to rule according to their dictates. Severe debt reduction “austerity measures“, large lay-offs, wage freeze/cuts, the usual savage attack on the living conditions of the ordinary people, pushing Italy towards that corporate dream of a sweatshop economy. Now here we are in 2013 and according that other bunch of “economic experts”, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Italy is now in a worse state than when the fascist Troika stepped in, in 2011. When Magic Monti stepped in Italy's debt was 120.8% of GDP, with the expertise of the Troika at the helm, it is expected to reach 131.5 for 2013 and up again to 134.2 for 2014. So many “experts” getting it so wrong, all that has happened is that the public purse has been plundered, slashing living conditions, and the coffers of the financial mafia have been enhanced. This rising debt is another excuse to introduce even more severe “austerity measures”, slash public spending and raise taxes. Of course to you and I, that looks like a failure, but to the corporate world, everything is going fine. Another country in Europe is going the road of Greece, heading for deprivation, fertile ground for a sweatshop economy, to rival those similar conditions else where in the world. To corporate Europe, the only way to compete with Eastern sweatshops is to slash wages and conditions here in Europe, and they are well on the way, with Greece, Spain, Portugal. Ireland, Cyprus and Italy all on the rapid conveyor belt to deprivation, with other countries gaining momentum in the same direction.

     How far they will get with their profit crazed dream, will depend on you and I. Do we struggle to get them to slightly modify their desire for our deprivation, asking for a little bit better deal for us? Or do we realise that it is impossible to have “compassionate capitalism” and start to dismantle this exploitative greed driven system and create an economic system based on the needs of all our people? We have the resources, we have the numbers, we have the ability and imagination, I know we have the desire, all we are lacking is the will to start.

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Glasgow May Day.

 May Day, Glasgow Buchanan Street, 2013.

        Today, May 1st., May Day, has been celebrated across the planet, and rightly so. It is probably the most important day in the calendar of the ordinary people.  In some cities it was a massive display of workers solidarity, in others it was a more quiet affair, but there would be few cities that didn't have some sort of show. Though it should be held on May 1st. and is in lots of cities and towns, in others, Glasgow for example, it will be on the first weekend after May 1st.. That said, Glasgow had a small but colourful stall in Buchanan Street, put on by the Clydeside IWW and the Glasgow Anarchist Federation. The stalls attracted considerable interest from passers-by, and a lot of literature was handed out. There was of course, lots of old faces reappeared, just to be there and show solidarity, even if it was just for a few minutes and a few words with old comrades.

May Day, Glasgow Buchanan Street, 2013.

This report from Labour Start:

 

 

As I write these words, it's still morning in London -- and already LabourStart's front page is full of coverage of May Day 2013, the international workers' holiday.

• In Istanbul, police have used tear gas to try to block trade unionists from gathering in the city's central Taksim square, scene of an infamous massacre in 1977.

• In Jakarta, a massive workers' rally with more than 135,000 participants has shut down the Indonesian capital.

• In Greece, a general strike by workers protesting against the highest unemployment levels in Europe has shut down much of the country's transport system.

Your local newspaper or television station may be reporting all these stories -- but I doubt it. That's why we created LabourStart 15 years ago -- precisely for moments like this when we need to know what is happening in the labour movement all over the world.

Please make sure to visit LabourStart today and spread the word to your friends, family, co-workers and fellow union members.

Thank you -- and happy May Day!

Eric Lee

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Torture, A Brutal Tool Of Their Trade.

        We know every state does it, some more subtle, some more brutal, but they all have their methods. I'm talking about torture, it is a tool of the state and it will do everything in its power to hold onto it in one form or another. The more we expose it the more difficult it becomes for them, they have to work harder at justifying it, or concealing it, or devising new methods. Torture will continue until we rid ourselves of that shackle on our freedom, the state. That doesn't mean we should ignore torture until that day arrives, we have to expose it and campaign against it, when ever we get any information regarding torture. Never forget, it is a human being that is being tortured, no matter the name the state puts on that being, it may be an autocratic institution that sanctions the act, but it is also human beings that implement those actions.

This interesting article from Human Rights First:

       The argument about whether torture works is still raging. Four years after President Obama ended the torture program, torture proponents continue to claim that torture saved American lives and was necessary to find criminals like Osama bin Laden. Just last week, Condoleezza Rice said that because of torture, “we have not had a successful attack on our territory.”

       I served the CIA for 23 years, and I was directly involved in the “enhanced interrogation” program. I know from experience that torture not only undermined our values and Constitution, it made us less safe.

        The Senate Intelligence Committee has produced the most comprehensive report on the post-9/11 CIA torture program, based on a review of more than 6 million pages of official records. Those who have read the report say that it shows the CIA torture program was much more widespread and cruel than we thought, and much less effective at gathering actionable intelligence than torture proponents claim.

      However, the Obama Administration is sitting on this report and has delayed its release. On Friday, Vice President Biden supported the report's release. Ask President Obama to work with Congress to declassify the torture report.

      Senator Dianne Feinstein, Chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and national security experts (me included) have said publicly that torture did not lead to bin Laden or save American lives. But until this report is released, torture proponents will continue to argue that we should return to torture.

     Let’s be clear: torture is un-American, illegal, and immoral. Let’s end this debate once and for all. Urge President Obama to work with Congress to declassify the torture report.

Sincerely,

Glenn Carle
Former Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Transnational Threats, National Intelligence Council
Author, The Interrogator

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