Congressman Alcee Hastings wants 55 percent increase in Florida's Minimum Wage.

U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings wants a referendum on the ballot next year to increase Florida's minimum wage to $12.50 an hour.

Hastings, a Democrat who represents parts of Broward and Palm Beach counties, said the 55 percent increase from the current $8.05 an hour, is a "starting point." He said he'd prefer $15 an hour, but wouldn't ask for that much because opponents would "go bonkers."

Read more:

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-minimum-wage-increase-hastings-20150215-story.html#page=1


Being lost in all of the increase the Minimum Wage proposals is the fact that whether it is $8.50, $10.10, $12.50 or $15.00 an hour, the only way the Minimum Wage will ever be anything other than a poverty wages providing employers with cheap labor is if the Minimum Wage is legislatively tied to the actual and real "cost-of-living" factors as monitored by the United States Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics and then linked to inflation.

Here in Minnesota, the Democratic Governor, Mark Dayton, who promised to make the Minimum Wage a living non-poverty wage in order to get elected, ended up giving his cabinet heads raises that were more than what most workers make in a year while legislating one more poverty Minimum Wage for workers.

Here is the kicker: Dayton and Minnesota Democrats claim they are looking out for tax-payers but giving his cabinet members these huge raises is a burden on tax-payers while raising the Minimum Wage to a real living non-poverty wage wouldn't have cost tax-payers one single penny.

While no one is dumb enough to turn down a raise of any amount, this struggle for a just Minimum Wage needs to get centered on wages and cost-of-living not just "raising the Minimum Wage" which lets these politicians, most of whom are multi-millionaires, off the hook.

I read an interesting article in Consortium News about the naming of a highway in Virginia the Jefferson Davis Highway.

Link: https://consortiumnews.com/2015/02/12/lynching-and-jeff-davis-highway/

See full article below.

I posted this comment:

I lived in Virginia for several years and was always amazed how, when visiting historical sites and battlefields of the Civil War era, how things were stated by tour guides.

Things like, "Our boys put up a good fight." When I asked, "Which boys put up a good fight?," I would receive dirty looks and told, "Confederate soldiers."

When I would ask, "Who won the war?" no one wanted to comment.

Even worse than the monuments erected to the Confederacy and its leaders, were the deplorable present day working conditions and poverty wages I experienced.

In one sweatshop in Virginia Beach, working conditions were so deplorable and harsh, one elderly Black woman told the plant manager, "Why don't you just bring back the chains?"

Just recently I visited the Lyndon B. Johnson exhibits in Texas and one exhibit about Civil Rights noted that Texas has more KKK chapters than any other state and Texas is often held up as an example of "the new South."

I also learned that it is in Texas where what is published in school text books becomes the standard for the entire country and a bunch of right-wing racist bigots dominate the Texas text book commission. So, it is no wonder people have become so ignorant about the Civil War and who the real heroes of this period were.

More people visit the Alamo where, when the truth is told, these "heroes" died for the defense of slavery, than who visit the Lyndon B. Johnson ranch--- the Texas White House where one learns the evils of racism and how Johnson ended up supporting George McGovern, another little fact the textbooks omit.

While those like slavery defender Jefferson Davis are given prominence and honored, others like W.E.B. DuBois and Paul Robeson are being written out of history and text books and it is workers paying the ultimate price as Wall Street corporations use racism to try to squeeze more and more production (profits) out of workers using many of the same methods as the slave owners along with the same sick racist ideas modified to better fit "the new South" and its corporations which have replaced the slave plantations for generating tremendous wealth.

It isn't just the naming of streets and highways in honor of these defenders of human barbarity that is repugnant and indecent--- it is the way our society is being built on their very ideas with the origin of profits owned and controlled by the wealthy still not being explained in order to put an end to human misery, the product of a sick system of exploitation held in place largely by racism in all of its ugly forms--- social, institutional and historic.

But doesn't a sick society and economic system need to elevate to prominence those like Jefferson Davis and all the evils he stood for in order to continue its own evil existence?

There is a reason Black History and Black Studies are being taken away under the guise of "reforms" and the struggles of the Civil Rights Movement are being perverted in school history books.

As for labor history, which embodies so much of the Civil Rights Movement and the struggle against slavery and racism, labor history has never been told in our schools and universities. When labor history is told, it is usually so perverted and nothing but lies not even basic truths can be found by reading between the lines.


Here is the story I commented on:

Lynching and Jeff Davis Highway

February 12, 2015

Exclusive: Many parts of the South, including Arlington, Virginia, just outside the U.S. capital, still honor Confederate President Jefferson Davis by attaching his name to important roadways. But a recent study on lynching puts the motive for honoring that white supremacist in a sickening new light, writes Robert Parry.


By Robert Parry


A new study of Southern lynching of blacks, sharply raising the total to nearly 4,000 victims, adds some context to the decision in 1920 to attach the name of Confederate President Jefferson Davis to parts of Route One, including stretches near and through African-American neighborhoods. That period was a time when the number of lynchings surged across the South and whites were reasserting their impunity.


According to the study by the Equal Justice Initiative, the use of lynching – mob killings and mutilations of blacks by hanging, burning alive, castration, torture and other means – was nearly as high around 1920 as it was in the latter part of the Nineteenth Century. There was a gradual decline in lynchings in the early Twentieth Century, but the pattern reversed and the use of lynching surged to about 500 during a five-year period heading into 1920.

A Civil War-era African-American soldier and his family. (Photo credit: Encyclopedia Virginia)

That period also marked a determination by many Southern whites to reaffirm the rightness of the Confederate cause and to reassert white supremacy. Thus, in 1920, to drive home the point of who was in charge, the Daughters of the Confederacy had Southern states name portions of Route One after Jefferson Davis, who was hailed as the “champion of a slave society” when he was chosen to lead the Confederacy in 1861.


Besides honoring a dyed-in-the-wool white supremacist who favored keeping African-Americans in chains forever, the Daughters of the Confederacy saw these designations of Route One as a counterpoint to plans in the North for a Lincoln Highway in honor of assassinated President Abraham Lincoln.


But bestowing this honor on Jefferson Davis was also a political message of pro-Confederate defiance that was not limited to the brutal era of 1920. The Jefferson Davis designation was extended to parts of Route 110 near the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, in 1964 as Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement were pressing for landmark civil rights legislation to end segregation and as white Virginian politicians were vowing to resist integration at all costs.


A year or so ago, I wrote to the five members of the Arlington County Board and urged them to seek an end to this grotesque honor bestowed on a notorious white racist. When my letter went public, it was treated with some amusement by the local paper, the Sun-Gazette, which described me as “rankled,” and prompted some hate mail.


One letter from an Arlington resident declared that it was now her turn to be “RANKLED by outsiders like Mr. Parry who want to change history because it is not to his liking. … I am very proud of my Commonwealth’s history, but not of the current times, as I’m sure many others are.”


I was also confronted by a senior Democratic county official at a meeting about a different topic and urged to desist in my proposal to give the highway a new name because the idea would alienate state politicians in Richmond who would think that Arlington County was crazy.


But the new study on the terrorism of lynching reminds us that attaching Jefferson Davis’s name to roadways wasn’t just some romantic gesture to honor an historical figure beloved by Southern whites who in 1920 still pined for the ante-bellum days when they could own black people and do to them whatever they wished.


The years around 1920 marked a violent revival of the carnival-like scenes in which whites treated the lynching of blacks as a moment for community hilarity and celebration, often posing with their children for photographs next to the mutilated corpses. Stamping Jefferson Davis’s name on a highway that passed near and through black neighborhoods was another way to send a chilling message to African-Americans.


In my 37 years living in Virginia, I have always been struck by the curious victimhood of many Southern whites. Because of the Civil War, which some still call “the War of Northern Aggression,” and the Civil Rights Movement, which finally ended segregation, they have been nursing grievances, seeing themselves as the real victims here.


Not the African-Americans who were held in the unspeakable conditions of bondage until slavery was finally ended in the 1860s and who then suffered the cruelties of white terrorism and the humiliation of segregation for another century. No, the whites who lorded over them were the real “victims” because the federal government finally intervened to stop these practices.


Yet, while some white Virginians remain “very proud” of that history, there has been a studied neglect of other more honorable aspects of Arlington’s history, including the role played by Columbia Pike as an African-American Freedom Trail where thousands of former slaves, freed by Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, traveled north to escape slavery.


Many were given refuge in Freedman’s Village, a semi-permanent refugee camp along Columbia Pike on land that now includes the Pentagon and the Air Force Memorial. Some of the men joined the U.S. Colored Troops training at nearby Camp Casey before returning to the South to fight for freedom, to end the scourge of slavery once and for all.


As blacks joined the Union Army, Confederate President Jefferson Davis ratified a policy that refused to treat black men as soldiers but rather as slaves in a state of insurrection, so they could be executed upon capture or sold into slavery.


In accordance with this Confederate policy, U.S. Colored Troops faced summary executions when captured in battle. For instance, when a Union garrison at Fort Pillow, Tennessee, was overrun by Confederate forces on April 12, 1864, black soldiers were shot down as they surrendered. Similar atrocities occurred at the Battle of Poison Springs, Arkansas, in April 1864, and the Battle of the Crater in Virginia. Scores of black prisoners were executed in Saltville, Virginia, on Oct. 2, 1864.


Yet, while Jefferson Davis’s name remains on roadways through Arlington — and as the Confederate president is effectively honored whenever people have to use his name — there is still no commemoration of Freedman’s Village (though something is supposedly being planned) and no one apparently even knows the precise location of Camp Casey, arguably one of Arlington’s most significant and noble historical sites. (Camp Casey is believed to have been located close to where today’s Pentagon now is, an area that in the 1860s was called Alexandria County before being renamed Arlington County in the Twentieth Century.)


Apparently, recognizing the place where free African-Americans were trained and armed to defeat the Confederacy and end slavery might “rankle” some white Arlington residents.


Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com). You also can order Robert Parry’s trilogy on the Bush Family and its connections to various right-wing operatives for only $34. The trilogy includes America’s Stolen Narrative. For details on this offer, click here.

Who are the "phony leftists" I refer to?

Sam Webb, is one of these phony leftists.

Below you will find an article he wrote.

Obama and the Wall Street Democrats can always count on Sam Webb to defend them and make up excuses for them from a "left" point of view.

Note some things when reading Webb's article attacking grassroots and rank-and-file activists who have become impatient with corrupt and incompetent union leaders--- most of whom have never been democratically elected to their offices by the rank-and-file:

First; Gus Hall, the former head of the Communist Party U.S.A., called Sam Webb and his band "a bunch of traitors."

Second; Webb spent over one-million dollars remodeling the CPUSA's offices while refusing to spend one single penny to develop an alternative to Obama's Wall Street agenda. In fact, in this article below, Webb fails to even mention that Obama is Wall Street's president.

Third; Webb declares the corrupt, incompetent millionaire union leaders and their foundation-funded associates backing Obama to be the leaders of the democratic movements. These "leaders" Webb refers to from the labor unions spend more time making up excuses for Obama and the Democrats then they spend time or allotting resources to solving the problems of workers in their places of employment.

In fact, Webb identifies with these corrupt labor leaders because, like them, he is corrupt. Webb has become a millionaire himself through pilfering the funds of the Communist Party. For over 40 years, Webb has been on the CPUSA payroll and what is there to show for this? A Communist Party USA that has dwindled from thousands to less than 200 members nation-wide with many of these "members" still members only because Webb has them on the payroll for being his loyal kiss-asses.

Webb refuses to recognize that Obama is Wall Street's president but then goes on--- with his silence--- to defend Obama's criminal acts and dirty deeds in service to imperialism with his bloated increased military budgets simultaneously cutting social programs as he increases spending for nuclear weapons and continues to expand the dirty imperialist wars begun by Bush. Obama has started new wars of his own.

No mention of drones. Hit lists. Killing, murder and mayhem. Barbarity defying everything humanity and civilization is supposed to be supposed to.

For Webb, Obama's Wall Street agenda, a big part of which is militarism and wars, amounts to victory after victory for working people and he urges us to be patient in inching our way forward when, in fact, Obama is responsible for massive attacks on our rights and our standard of living.

Where are the progressive victories Webb alludes to? He doesn't provide a single detail out of fear his words might be subject to debate. This is sheer intellectual cowardice on Webb's part; it is nothing short of working class betrayal.

Webb is to the Communist movement what Richard Trumka is to the trade unions--- he splits and divides the working class with his words of praise for Wall Street's President, Barack Obama.

It must be noted that Webb joined with these crooked and corrupt millionaire labor leaders to shove Obama down our throats as some kind of "progressive" and a "leader of the people's movements" of which none is true.

Obama promised single-payer universal health care to get the nomination and once elected silenced the voices of the proponents of single-payer--- going so far as to have some of these proponents of single-payer arrested; many of whom were stupid enough to support Obama in the first place--- and some are even still so stupid they still do support Obama and now voice their support for Hillary Clinton.

Isn't it interesting Sam Webb has made no observations concerning Hillary Clinton's drive to become president? Come on Sam, tell us what you think about Hillary Clinton--- should she be supported for president, too, because the Republicans will be so much worse?

Isn't it interesting that Sam Webb has never joined us in voicing OUTRAGE when it comes to Obama's dirty Wall Street imperialist wars that are making us all poor?

If Sam Webb didn't steal the Communist Party's funds, where did the millions of dollars go?

Notice, also, Webb has never written in defense of what working people require in the way of reforms in order to live more decent lives free from poverty.

Notice, also, Webb has never supported one single resolution articulating any needed reform to be brought before the Democratic Party which he supports.

The American people are outraged and angered with Obama's dirty wars and the austerity measures being shoved down our throats to pay for these dirty imperialist wars.

The American people are outraged and angered about this "cost-of-living crisis" we are being forced to endure.

Perhaps Webb, the recently new millionaire, doesn't understand why the American people, rank-and-file workers in the first place, are outraged and angered because he has no need nor inclination towards urgency in solving the many pressing problems working class families are being forced to endure?

Webb is one more millionaire urging us to be patient in "inching" our way to reforms as they laugh all the way to their banks.

Isn't it just a bit strange this moron, Sam Webb, who claims to be the leader of the Communist Party U.S.A.--- a position he wasn't even elected to by the membership--- writes more about the need to defend Obama from attacks by the left than explaining the problems of working people and becoming involved in searching for solutions?

If Sam Webb would like to answer the questions and comments I have posed I will post his response.

By the way, just like the Dumb Donkeys, including Obama, who Webb supports--- not once has Sam Webb ever mentioned the fact that working class families are caught up in a crisis of everyday living at which the "cost-of-living crisis" is smack dab in the center of--- spun by increased spending on militarism and these dirty imperialist wars defending Wall Street's investments, holdings and profits and Wall Street's monopoly price-fixing.

And Webb never so much as mentions state-monopoly capitalism because he might have to explain Obama's role in all of this.

Is Obama the people's President looking after "We The People;" or, is Obama Wall Street's President looking out for Wall Street's interests which stand in complete contradiction to the people's interests.

No doubt Webb finds such a question to be insulting.

In fact, Obama is not inching us towards reforms. What Obama is doing is pushing us relentlessly into World War III with his support for a bunch of Nazi lovers in the Ukraine.

Not one single Communist leader from anyplace in the world can be found who will publicly defend and support Sam Webb's very dishonest and confusing views.

Sam Webb is a deceitful, dishonest coward who refuses to debate his views side-by-side with a leftist who will refute his views. in fact, Webb will not even allow those who oppose his views to state their views along with his; what kind of leftists engages in this kind of anti-democratic activity.

Instead of pushing an agenda which would include rank-and-file trade unionists fighting for action and democracy in the unions which would get rid of these corrupt, class collaborationist, millionaire labor leaders supporting war mongers like Obama who are attacking working class families, Webb is defending the status quo.

One can conclude from Webb's previous statements proclaiming Obama to be the leader of the democratic people's movements and now his pronouncement that a bunch of crooked and corrupt millionaire union leaders and wealthy foundation-funded outfit directors to be leaders of the democratic people's movement that Webb doesn't even know what constitutes a democratic people's movement.

Webb's criticism of outraged leftists reminds me of the dogs barking as the caravan passes... of course, it is writings like this from Webb which places him on the sidelines like a toothless barking dog.


Read what this phony leftist Sam Webb has to say in his defense of Obama:

Obama and the politics of outrage

by: Sam Webb

February 9 2015

Some of the commentary from the left on President's Obama's recent State of the Union address struck me as too negative, even cynical in a few instances. It's said that the speech was at once too little, too late, and too celebratory. Some left critics went further, claiming that it was nothing but idle, and even deceptive, chatter since the president knew that any progressive initiatives in his speech are dead on arrival in the Republican-controlled 93rd Congress.

This contrasts with the reaction of the larger movement. Labor's take on the speech was very positive.


Much the same can be said about the African American community and other communities of color (for example, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and NAACP). The movements for women's and gay rights found stuff in the speech that they liked, as did many fighting for policing and sentencing reforms. Ditto the immigrant rights movement and the organizations and people fighting for livable wages and union rights. And progressives in Congress said they were buoyed by the president's speech. Photos showed them leading the cheers to the speech, while congressional Republicans, looking dour and sitting silent, inwardly burned with rage at Obama's every word and his mere presence at the podium.

In other words, the major democratic forces and movements got a lift from the speech, while understanding full well that the terrain of struggle is still uphill. They saw openings and opportunities in Obama's words, though not agreeing with his every word.

They liked how he framed many questions and the spirit and oratorical power that he exhibited to spotlight the deeply reactionary role of the Republican Party, even if they thought his counter-proposals should have gone further.

And they were encouraged by the fact that the speech signaled a refusal on the president's part to cede initiative and ground to the Republicans and their reactionary agenda over the next two years, despite enormous pressure on him to do so coming from many directions.

How do we explain this contrast, this differing take on this State of the Union address?

Speaking generally, the leaders of the democratic movements don't pigeonhole the president as simply an unreconstructed neoliberal. They don't peg him as nothing more than a centrist in the mold of Bill Clinton. Nor do they believe that he cynically "plays" the American people with his "fancy" rhetoric and oratory, while paying obeisance to his first and abiding focus group - Wall Street (and its deep pockets.) They also don't subscribe to the notion that Obama's presidency is summed up as "the triumph of identity as content" (Adolph Reed writing in Harper's). Finally, they are particularly aware of the toxic, crude, and unremitting racist invective directed at the president.

In other words, these mass movement leaders don't hollow Obama out to the point where he is nothing but an abstract and frozen political category with absolutely no progressive instincts, potential, or record of achievement. In fact, they note that the president has a genuine democratic sensibility and a list of political and legislative successes that have made a difference, large and small, in the lives of millions of working class people.

Moreover, in sharp contrast to some on the left, leaders of the main mass organizations want him on their side. Victories, they know from experience, are much more difficult to secure with a president opposing them or assuming a position of neutrality. They have no truck with a one-sided Howard Zinn view of historical progress and radical social change, in which political compromises, unreliable allies, tactical and strategic retreats, stages of struggle, participation in electoral politics, and so on are to be studiously avoided. Based on their real movement experience, they conclude that such a hopelessly uncomplicated reading of the past and what it will take to make a more livable future for the vast majority is politically wrong-headed and counterproductive.

Finally - and maybe above all - the leaders of the broader democratic movement are aware that the president governs in a concrete political context in which the singular mission of the opposition party, dominated by right-wing extremists, isn't simply to wreck the Obama presidency. It extends far beyond the occupant of the White House to every political, economic, and social right and gain secured over the past century - not to mention the institutional bases of the broad democratic movements, labor in the first place. The wholesale decimation of democratic rights, organizations, and institutions may seem an unlikely possibility to some, but leaders as well as activists of the broader movement are keenly aware that right-wing extremists, who are in the driver's seat in half the states and show no hesitation to use power in ruthless ways when given the opportunity, are only one election away from gaining control of the one remaining branch of the federal government not now in their reckless, authoritarian hands.

None of this makes the president above criticism in the view of progressive movement leaders, but when they offer criticism it is contextualized and carefully calibrated. Its purpose isn't to show up the president or bring him down. Or simply to be right without a thought as to how words and the way they are expressed educate or miseducate and mobilize or demobilize people. Its intent is to nudge, prod, and move President Obama, inch by inch if necessary, in a progressive direction. And we should never forget, as an astute trade union leader once reminded me, that a lot of people live on those inches.

Perhaps there is something that the left can learn from here.

Shouldn't our political categories and analysis - not only as it applies to the president, but to political phenomena generally - be more open-ended and elastic to allow for contradictions, inconsistencies, indeterminacy,new experience, and, not least, human agency?

Shouldn't we complicate our understanding of the process of social change and bid farewell to cut and dried schemes, pure forms, and pat answers?

Shouldn't we - much like the broader democratic movement does - make the actual balance of class and social forces, the depth of political understanding and unity of millions, and what people (not just the left) are "ready to do" an indispensable frame for our politics and practice?

Shouldn't we attach as much significance to the electoral and legislative arena as a major locus of power and necessary gateway to social change as the broader democratic movement (and perhaps even more so the right wing) does, even at this stage of struggle and level of political independence?

The point of this isn't to water down the critical-analytical, organizing, or visionary-programmatic role of the left, but to develop a politics - strategy, tactics, demands, message, language, etc. - that can break the current political impasse (now more than 30 years long), unite broad cross-sections of people, and lift the country to higher ground where freedom and justice penetrate every aspect of life - probably not all at once, but in the course of a protracted mass, nonviolent struggle that draws strength from the formerly passive and backward sections of the American people.

Without such a reset, I suspect that too many on the left will continue to spend too much time bellyaching, talking only to each other, living in their own cocoon of struggle, and missing opportunities to join with others in broader campaigns for justice, equality, and freedom.

The politics of "opposition and outrage," which too large a section of the left has turned into a refined art form over the past half century, is like a drug. It brings a momentary high, but later on leaves its practitioner feeling washed out and utterly frustrated. It may register some victories here and there, but it has no transforming potential.

What is to be done, someone, once asked long ago and then answered: Put an end to the past period. The left would do well to do the same, but that will only happen if we get rid of narrow, simplistic, schematic, and small-universe ideas - some of which have become nearly second nature to too many of us. And that can be easily done without sacrificing a morsel of our anti-capitalist perspective and goals - our freedom dreams.

Photo: President Obama delivers the State of the Union address in the House chamber at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Jan. 20, 2015. White House photo/Pete Souza

No authorization for more war. "AUMF"... No New "Authorization to Use Military Force"

I would encourage you to sign and pass this petition along to your friends and fellow workers.

This page may not be viewable on your browser. If such is the case, simply click on the link "Click here to oppose any new AUMF" and you will be able to view the entire page.

Sorry about the formatting problems but this is an important issue so I did the best I could.

Not subscribed to this newsletter? Subscribe now! Unsubscribe information at bottom.

  

The U.S. Congress is considering another "Authorization for the Use of Military Force" -- a broad approval for more war. Click here to oppose any new AUMF  This is the last thing we need. These wars are not making us safer but are generating enemies. They are not surgical operations, but mass killings, as well as assaults on the natural environment and the public budget -- not to mention excuses for curtailing civil liberties. Please click here to sign the following statement for delivery to the media and Congress: We oppose any new authorization for the use of military force and call for the immediate repeal of the authorizations passed by Congress in 2001 and 2002. P.S. This petition is jointly promoted by U.S. Labor Against the Warin partnership with Conference of Major Superiors of Men, Iraq Veterans Against the War, KnowDrones.com, Military Families Speak Out, Peace Action, Peace Action Montgomery, RootsAction.org, United National Antiwar Coalition, Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones,  and World Beyond War.

In general, I don't waste my time with these on-line petitions any more but this is one I support. It certainly can't do any harm to sign it. Add your own comment, too; I did.

What is really needed, though, is organized, united and militant action action in the streets and at the ballot box.

Voting for the Democrats is useless as the election of Obama has proven. Never again will Wall Street allow or tolerate its Democratic Party to be used as a voice for peace as progressive George McGovern did.

We need a new working class based anti-monopoly progressive people's party for peace, social and economic justice which will make as its main priority challenging Wall Street for political and economic power... This is something that can't be put off any longer as the phony liberals, progressives and leftists tell us this must not be done now and we should put off doing this until later. They always tell us, "Wait for the next election" but when the next election comes they play the same tune. The time is now. The struggles for real reforms required to meet the needs of the people for jobs, real health care reform and peace must be merged with challenging Wall Street for political and economic power. Real system change is what is required.

Capitalism is Wall Street's system, a system breeding endless wars; socialism is the system of the working class, a system for peace--- socialism is what we need to be building towards as we fight for reforms while challenging Wall Street for political and economic power. What we need is a socialist cooperative commonwealth which finally puts the needs of people and our living environment before Wall Street's profits.

We must not be afraid to state all of this--- not at some distant point down the road as the apologists for the sleazy, warmongering Democrats say we need to do; but today, here and now.

These Democratic apologists are trying to set us up to support Hillary Clinton; one more worthless warmonger supporting the Israeli killing machine (and every single reactionary government in the world propped up with our tax dollars) who will try to hide her support for Wall Street and its dirty imperialist wars behind a phony "economic populism" from which she and her supporters would have us believe financing all this militarism and these dirty wars is of little consequence to the economy when just the opposite is true. Don't buy into this crap of "economic populism" being peddled and pushed by the Democrats and their over-payed party hacks and these millionaire labor leaders who have no sense of urgency in solving the problems of working people.

These millionaire labor leaders waste our resources electing these Dumb Donkeys to make wars but won't take the time to file a grievance or fight for justice and a voice at work.

Feel free to forward this e-mail on to your friends and post it anywhere. Add your own thoughts, too.

Just a note to inform you since many have been asking why I am no longer on FaceBook. FaceBook shut me down... So much for democracy; just more hypocrisy.

I invite you to share your thoughts and ideas.

One last thing. A very few Democrats have said they are not for giving authorization for this war against ISIS... Don't be surprised when most of these Democrats change their tunes and go with the flow of Wall Street bribes. Militarism and wars are among Wall Street's most profitable ventures--- hence there is this massive Military-Industrial Complex presided over by these Wall Street masters of war.

We have a capitalist system that is in the "advanced stage" of decay--- this advanced stage of capitalism is called imperialism.  Imperialism is when these huge monopolies have merged with the government and their one and only concern is for Wall Street's profits, the "bottom line," which never takes into consideration the lives, livelihoods and problems of working people.

We, the people, are paying for these dirty wars in many ways. We are living with a run-away "cost-living-crisis" eroding our standard of living and dragging us all into poverty--- all fueled by militarism and wars along with monopoly price fixing---- all maintained through a thoroughly corrupt political process as rotten to the core as is the capitalist economic system itself.

Another way we pay for this mess Wall Street has us entangled in is the loss of democracy and loss jobs in spite of endless talk by these hypocrites about how the United States is the world's greatest bastion of democracy and all the talk about "jobs, jobs, jobs" at election time but as these very same politicians go goose-stepping backwards in the footprints of Joe McCarthy and his accomplice Hubert H. Humphrey (who was the primary author of the Communist Control Act of 1954) in trampling our democratic rights they fail to assign themselves the task of attaining and maintaining full employment.

The jobs being created are a bunch of poverty wage jobs no one can raise a family on.

We need jobs paying real living wages.

We need Minimum Wage legislation legislating real living wages based on all "cost-of-living" factors not this Minimum Wage legislation which assures business of being able to hire workers at low wages.

Low wages mean higher profits for employers.

It isn't the job of government to assure employers have a huge pool of cheap labor.

Rather, it is the job of government to provide legislation to improve the lives of the majority of the people who are working people.

Wall Street employers can fend for themselves; these greedy bastards don't need government intervention looking out for their bottom line.

Some suggestions for action you can take in addition to signing this petition:

* Start a peace committee in your neighborhood, where you work or go to school.

* Set up a table where there are lots of people and circulate this petition.

* Write a "letter to the editor" of your local newspaper, union newsletter, or student newspaper supporting this petition.

* Send your letter to the editor to public officials, circulate your letter among family, friends, neighbors.

* Consider running for public office or help support a real peace candidate breaking free from this two-party trap.

Again, I look forward to sharing ideas with you.

Please sign the petition not to authorize any more wars and check out and share my blog posts from time-to-time.

Yours in the struggle,

Alan L. Maki

No New Authorization for the Use of Military Force

The U.S. Congress is considering another "Authorization for the Use of Military Force" -- a broad approval for more war.

This is the last thing we need. These wars are not making us safer but generating enemies. They are not surgical operations, but mass killings, as well as assaults on the natural environment and the public budget -- not to mention excuses for curtailing civil liberties.

Please sign this statement for delivery to the media and Congress:

We oppose any new authorization for the use of military force and call for the immediate repeal of the authorizations passed by Congress in 2001 and 2002.

By taking action you agree that you may be contacted by one or more of the participating organizations. This petition is a joint project of:Conference of Major Superiors of Men, Iraq Veterans Against the War, KnowDrones.com, Military Families Speak Out, Peace Action, Peace Action Montgomery, RootsAction.org, United National Antiwar Coalition, Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones, U.S. Labor Against the War, World Beyond War.

First Name*

Last Name*

Email*

Country*    Select Country  United States Afghanistan Albania Algeria American Samoa Andorra  Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria  Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin  Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam  Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic  Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, The Democratic Republic of the  Cook Islands  Costa Rica Cote D'Ivoire Croatia Cuba Curacao Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica  Dominican Republic East Timor Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia  Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France France, Metropolitan French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories  Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada  Guadeloupe Guam Guatemala Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State)  Honduras Hong Kong Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland  Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Dem. People's Republic of  Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People's Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya  Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, Former Yugoslav Republic Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives  Mali Malta Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Micronesia, Federated States of  Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru  Nepal Netherlands New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue  Norfolk Island Northern Mariana Islands Norway Oman Pakistan Palau Palestinian Territory, Occupied Panama Papua New Guinea  Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Qatar Reunion  Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Helena Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa  San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Sint Maarten Slovakia  Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Sudan S. Georgia and S. Sandwich Islands Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname  Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand  Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu  Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela  Vietnam Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands, U.S. Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Yugoslavia Zaire Zambia Zimbabwe 

Zip/Postal Code*

Street

City

State/Province      Select a state   Alabama   Alaska  American Samoa  Arizona  Arkansas  California  Colorado  Connecticut  Delaware  D.C.  Florida  Georgia  Guam  Hawaii  Idaho  Illinois  Indiana  Iowa  Kansas  Kentucky  Louisiana  Maine  Maryland  Massachusetts  Michigan  Minnesota  Mississippi  Missouri  Montana  Nebraska  Nevada  New Hampshire  New Jersey  New Mexico  New York  North Carolina  North Dakota  Northern Mariana Islands  Ohio  Oklahoma  Oregon  Pennsylvania  Puerto Rico  Rhode Island  South Carolina  South Dakota  Tennessee  Texas  Utah  Vermont  Virgin Islands  Virginia  Washington  West Virginia  Wisconsin  Wyoming         Armed Forces (the) Americas         Armed Forces Europe         Armed Forces Pacific  Alberta  British Columbia  Manitoba  Newfoundland  New Brunswick  Nova Scotia  Northwest Territories  Nunavut  Ontario  Prince Edward Island  Quebec  Saskatchewan  Yukon Territory  Other 

Please add a comment if you are so inclined. We'll include them all and quote the great ones.

"Crack down" on Wall Street or challenge Wall Street for political and economic power?

We need to remove Wall Street from power.