Wal-Mart’s War on Workers
Last week’s job actions at Wal-Mart facilities around the U.S. are largely a response to cuts imposed on employee hours. “Wal-Mart has been experiencing a squeeze at the sales level and, therefore, putting a squeeze on their employees,” said journalist Liza Featherstone, who has covered the world’s biggest corporation for more than a decade. “In recent years, they’ve made it much more difficult for workers to work full time.”
“Fiscal Cliff” is Phony
“It’s a purely manufactured crisis,” said Arun Gupta, co-founder of The Indypendent and The Occupied Wall Street Journal, referring to the so-called “fiscal cliff” of spending cuts and tax increases looming over the U.S. economy. “Both parties are committed to austerity policies,” he said. “The danger with Obama is that he will be able to force through cuts to Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare because there is no opposition on his left flank.”
Mobilization in Defense of Affirmative Action
Activists plan to mobilize “hundreds of thousands” of young people in support of a recent federal court decision that struck down a ban on affirmative action programs at Michigan public universities. “Black and Latino high school and middle school students will be leading the line of march,” said Monica Smith, a lawyer for Detroit-based BAMN, By Any Means Necessary. “This shows that when you fight, you can win.”
U.S. Wages War on Congo
The United States has protected, armed and financed countries complicit in the genocide that has killed at least six million people in the Democratic Republic of Congo since 1996, said Kambale Musavuli, of Friends of Congo. U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice “has blocked UN reports” of Rwanda and Uganda’s crimes in Congo, including support for the so-called rebels that captured the provincial capital of Goma, earlier this month. “She has to be doing so with the blessing of the White House,” said Musavuli.
Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network is hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey. A new edition of the program airs every Monday at 11:00am ET on PRN. Length: One hour.
“The chickens have come home to roost,” one resident said. “Our exact fears have come true.”
In this week’s segment, we discuss the impact on the voting rights of Black people if the SAVE Act is signed into law. But we begin with a discussion of an historic vote at the United Nations which…
Kwesi Pratt Jr. is General Secretary of the Socialist Movement of Ghana.
The SAVE Act would require proof of U.S. citizenship to be presented in person in order to register to vote in this country and would disenfranchise millions of people who are currently able to vote…
Russia finally makes good on promises to help Cuba, but its level of commitment is unclear. The left are clearly immobilized, even as Iran demonstrates how to fight back.
