Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Please note I have a new phone number...

512-517-2708

Alan Maki

Alan Maki
Doing research at the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

A program for real change...

http://peaceandsocialjustice.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-progressive-program-for-real-change.html


What we need is a "21st Century Full Employment Act for Peace and Prosperity" which would make it a mandatory requirement that the president and Congress attain and maintain full employment.


"Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens"

- Ben Franklin

Let's talk...

Let's talk...

Friday, January 23, 2015

When sleaze raises its ugly name-calling head under the guise of being "liberal" and "progressive" and then turn to thwarting and blocking discussion, dialog and debate

  • Alan L. Maki
    22 hrs
    After listening to Obama's "State of the Union Address," I am so glad I didn't get hooked into voting for this creep Obama--- this imperialist Wall Street warmonger; I didn't vote for him either time either time--- nor did I support him as a delegate to the the State Convention of the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party.


    Obama is neither liberal nor progressive; he is definitely not left.


    Like the fascist Mussolini, Obama is nothing but a demagog who knows how to talk in a populist properly "framed" language making all kinds of implications he intends to do what is right by the people without providing or presenting any specific solutions--- and when he does present highly popular specifics like his touting a free community college education he knows damn well it has no chance of passing; just like Obama and all these Democrats with their hypocritical campaign rhetoric saying they don't think anyone working should have to live in poverty knowing that when they get elected they are going to legislate one more Minimum Wage that is nothing but a poverty wage when compared to soaring prices of goods and services which constitute the actual "cost-of-living" which when we combine wages and "cost-of-living" we are able to determine the actual "standard-of-living."


    Wages plus government programs plus the real "cost-of-living" determines one's "standard-of-living."


    When we use this equation we discover that wages have not only been "flat" for many years but that most working class families are caught in a "cost-of-living trap" with more working class families than ever being pushed further and further into poverty making Obama's talk about "I work for you" when addressing his hand-picked audiences of working people a complete and total farce and fiasco--- worse than this, he is arrogantly mocking us and playing us for chumps and fools; and, then, his supporters have the unmitigated gall to blame the voters because fewer and fewer people are turning out to vote for these Dumb Donkeys with millionaire labor leaders still holding up the tails of these Dumb Donkeys and peddling what the sparrows leave behind as some kind of "prize" we should be thankful for.


    When is enough really enough?


    It is time for a working class based progressive people's party which will stand firm and fight for peace, social and economic justice; all of which requires putting an end to these goddamn dirty imperialist wars Wall Street merchants of death and destruction profit from murdering people all over the world financed with austerity measures (poverty) shoved down the throats of working people and their families.


    Some so-called liberals, progressives and most disgustingly shameful leftists shoved Obama down our throats using lies and deceit while intentionally failing to disclose Obama's Wall Street agenda... don't get suckered again by these worthless charlatans many of whom have enormous incomes based on how well they can snooker people into voting for their Wall Street enemies under the guise of being our "friends."


    The time has come--- long overdue, actually--- to tell these Dumb Donkeys to "go to hell."


    Republicans and Democrats working in cahoots with pundits from "think-tanks" financed by the Wall Street "philanthropists," together, combined, form the components of Wall Street's "two-party trap" intentionally set in a way to trap workers leaving the working class powerless.


    Democrats have the nerve to suggest that we should accept another poverty wage as the Minimum Wage because someplace down the road they claim they will get the Minimum Wage to a real living wage as they piously and hypocritically pretend to emphasize with us as their very actions of using the levers of government enables Wall Street to get bigger and fatter as a direct result of its control and manipulation of these politicians--- it is a vicious circle and even a dog wouldn't chase its tail for so long of a time.


    These Wall Street bribed politicians then proceed to try to pass off their reactionary and regressive legislation as "reforms" when the very definition of the word "reform" is to make something better. For doing so much in the way of "reforms" it is amazing how bad things are for the working class and how life just keeps getting worse.


    We need to launch grassroots and rank-and-file struggles for real reforms but our struggles must all lead towards the same end--- removing Wall Street from political and economic power which requires not just the important movements for specif reforms intended to alleviate and solve our many problems but these struggles must be part of forming a massive anti-monopoly coalition with its own political party.


    Our struggles need to be fought united and militant in the workplace, in the streets and at the ballot box--- education, organization and united action.


    Do you have a rank-and-file organization in your place of employment?


    Do you have a grassroots organization in your neighborhood?


    If not, Organize!


    Quite frankly, unless we organize by educating people about the link between wages and "cost-of-living" which determine our "standard-of-living" I doubt our struggles will be winning struggles... the politicians, pundits and their "think tanks" along with the millionaire labor leaders will say and do just about anything to obscure this link between wages and "cost-of-living"... because as far as they are concerned they got theirs'--- at our expense--- and the rest of us can go to hell.


    And the wealthier the Wall Street crowd becomes the more all powerful they become in determining how we will live and work and the kind of world we will be forced to live in--- not just their wars, racism and poverty but polluted air and water along with contaminated land not to mention how, for profits, they are killing us with the food they are feeding us.



  • Merle Dudley-Nelson After listening to the President.....I wonder.....I heard the middle-class over and over....and 7 paid sick days for millions of Americans....and 2 years free college just like high school....I heard that over 13,000 troops bought back to America....st...See More
    22 hrs · Like · 3
  • Sheila Puryear The President is considerably to the left of Kennedy, who doubted the legality of Social Security expansions and was a resolute Cold Warrior.

    Your reaction speaks more to a disgust with the President and displays no understanding of either recent political history or the American public. But rail on: we do need a more progressive nation. I'm just not certain that hatred will get us there.
    21 hrs · Like · 5
  • Laurie Jackson Someone needs to take a chill pill.
    16 hrs · Like · 5
  • Crystal Powell Alan L. Maki why are you here. I would suggest that there are better pages for you that can offer you the political panacea that you believe exists. I was wholly offended by your rant for 3 separate reasons. 1. You clearly didnt listen to the Presidents speech because your assessment isn't rooted in reality. 2. Your suggesting a change in parties that you have no earthly clue how to get and in fact is impossible based on your immature rant. 3 Finally This is a Progressive page for actual REAL Progressive People who are EDUCATED about not just politics but the US political system.. ... Most of us have run for office or ran campaigns for a good number of years, clearly you have not. Progressives are people that want to see the needs of the nation advanced and the Tax dollars collected used for that advancement. To paint the President .. the most Liberal and Progressive since Kennedy with policy as Progressive as FDR clearly means that you do not know the meaning of ism's that you have called him. Im gonna leave this post for 8 hours so that you have time to see what I have said to you before I delete it and you. I encourage you to seek out the libertarian cesspool that Koch industries would be happy to provide for you. Good riddance.6 hrs · Like · 5
  • Gretchen E. Peterson Alan, you are not a progressive and do not belong here. And you know it. You need to be kicked out and blocked.
    6 hrs · Like · 3
  • Crystal Powell Alan L. Maki I want to make sure you see this so im pushing it up
    5 hrs · Like · 2
  • Mary Aleba Alan L Maki, I think you were looking for Fox News page....please re-google that address...and take your rant into the echo chamber that keeps you happy
    1 hr · Like · 4
  • Ben Donahue Buzz off!!!!!!
    1 hr · Like · 2
  • Marylou Eliot if it writes like a troll, looks like a troll then it is a troll...someone please block this asshat from this page...I look here to get news that I want to see and here not gibberish from this troll
    1 hr · Like · 2
  • Charlie Diggs Alan L. Maki. Did you vote for Willard? Or McCain/PALIN? Who is the hypocrite?
    1 hr · Like · 1
  • Charlie Diggs Alan L. Maki. You FB page only criticizes Democrats! TROLL
    1 hr · Like · 5
  • Carrie Charles Stone I just joined and this is the first post I read? Based on the comments I'm giving the group a little more time but whoever this Alan L. Maki is, he wasn't watching the SOTU speech I saw or witnessing the same Obama I've been observing these last 6 years.
    1 hr · Like · 3
  • Charlie Diggs He is a TROLL that comes in, throws out some crap, and then splits without any discussion. His FB page is critical only of Democrats. Any reasonable person could find very much to criticize the haters about if they wanted to. He calls President Obama a war monger without even mentioning members of the previous administration,
    58 mins · Like · 3
  • Jeanean Williams Delete him now.
    53 mins · Like · 2
    • Carol Thompson Bork I agree. No waiting 8 hours, please! Delete!!
    42 mins · Like · 1


    • Sheila Puryear Repeating your charges does not make them true. Come back to reality please, or head to Fox. (You make them look sane.). And while they will agree with your demonization of the President, your critique will be rejected.
      50 mins · Like · 1
      • Gretchen E. Peterson Alan L. Maki is well known in Minnesota political circles. He does NOT belong here!

      Admins, DELETE AND BLOCK, PLEASE!


      Alan L. Maki

      Thanks for your kind words,       Gretchen E. Peterson. I am glad to know that your circle of dirty birds and Dumb Donkeys takes note of what I say and do.
      Just now · Like
Posted by at

Richard Trumka heaps praise on Wall Street's President

http://www.aflcio.org/Blog/Political-Action-Legislation/Trumka-Obama-Forcefully-Advocated-for-Working-Families-in-State-of-Union

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka heaps praise on Wall Street's president, Barack Obama...

"President Obama eloquently and forcefully advocated for working families throughout his State of the Union Address," last night.


Trumka also said:
The  president’s focus on raising wages through collective bargaining, better paying jobs, a fairer tax code, fair overtime rules, and expanded access to education and earned leave sent the right message at the right time..."


Is there anyone who actually believes this crap?

While Richard Trumka continues to hold up this Dumb Donkey's tail, the only thing left for workers to fight over is what the sparrows leave behind.

For the hundreds of millions of dollars and energy labor is wasting supporting the Democratic Party and its worthless politicians, the working class could have its own political party--- a party similar to Canada's socialist New Democratic Party which is organized labor's party.

Posted by at

Larry Cohen, President of the Communications Workers of America announces he will be leaving the position

http://www.cwa-union.org/news/entry/a_message_from_cwa_president_larry_cohen#.VMJPvC7rV01



Posted by at

IT IS 3 MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT


Please consider sharing this blog post.

IT IS 3 MINUTES TO MIDNIGHT

CLIMATE CHANGE AND NUCLEAR TENSIONS PUSH DOOMSDAY CLOCK HANDS FORWARD
“Extraordinary and Undeniable” Climate, Weapons Threats Cited for Movement;
Doomsday Clock Adjustment is 1st in 3 Years and is Accompanied by Urgent Call for Action.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – January 22, 2015 – Warning that “the probability of global catastrophe is very high” unless quick action is taken, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists Science and Security Board today cited unchecked climate change and global nuclear weapons modernization as the basis for their decision to move the minute hand of the historic Doomsday Clock forward two minutes. The shift of the Doomsday Clock hands to three minutes to midnight is the first such adjustment to be made in three years. The Board also outlined action steps that will need to be taken “very soon” in order to avert catastrophe.

The full statement from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists Science and Security Board -- in consultation with its Board of Sponsors that includes 17 Nobel Prize laureates -- is available online at http://thebulletin.org.

The opening paragraph of the statement from the Board reads as follows: “In 2015, unchecked climate change, global nuclear weapons modernizations, and outsized nuclear weapons arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity, and world leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of political leadership endanger every person on Earth.”

The final paragraph of the statement from the Board warns: “In 2015, with the Clock hand moved forward to three minutes to midnight, the board feels compelled to add, with a sense of great urgency: ‘The probability of global catastrophe is very high, and the actions needed to reduce the risks of disaster must be taken very soon.’”

The last time the Doomsday Clock minute hand moved was in January 2012, when the Clock’s minute hand was pushed ahead one minute from six to five minutes before midnight. Since its creation in 1947, the Doomsday Clock has been adjusted only 18 times, ranging from two minutes before midnight in 1953 to 17 minutes before midnight in 1991. The last time the Doomsday Clock was at three minutes to midnight was 1983, when “U.S.-Soviet relations were at their iciest,” according to the Bulletin.

In unveiling the change to the Doomsday Clock, Kennette Benedict, executive director of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, said: “Today, unchecked climate change and a nuclear arms race resulting from modernization of huge arsenals pose extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity. And world leaders have failed to act with the speed or on the scale required to protect citizens from potential catastrophe. These failures of leadership endanger every person on Earth. Based on their observations, the members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Science and Security Board find conditions in the world to be so threatening that they are moving the hands of the Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight. It is now 3 minutes to midnight.”

Sivan Kartha, a member of the Science and Security Board, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and senior scientist, Stockholm Environment Institute, said: “Steps seen as bold in light of today’s extremely daunting political opposition to climate action do not even match the expectations of five years ago, to say nothing of the scientific necessity. The results are unsurprising. Global greenhouse gas emission rates are now 50% higher than they were in 1990. Emission rates have risen since 2000 by more than in the previous three decades combined. Investments have continued to pour into fossil fuel infrastructure at a rate that exceeds $1 trillion per year, with additional hundreds of billions of dollars in continued fossil fuel subsidies. We can and must turn this around.”

Sharon Squassoni, a member of the Science and Security Board, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, and director and senior fellow at the Proliferation Prevention Program, Center for Strategic and International Studies, said: “Since the end of the Cold War, there has been cautious optimism about the ability of nuclear weapon states to keep the nuclear arms race in check and to walk back slowly from the precipice of nuclear destruction. That optimism has essentially evaporated in the face of two trends: sweeping nuclear weapons modernization programs and a disarmament machinery that has ground to a halt. Although the United States and Russia no longer have the tens of thousands of nuclear weapons they had during the Cold War, the pace of reduction has slowed dramatically in recent years, well before the crisis in Crimea. From 2009 to 2013, the Obama administration cut only 309 warheads from the stockpile.”

Richard Somerville, a member of the Science and Security Board, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and a distinguished professor emeritus and research professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego, said: “Efforts at reducing global emissions of heat-trapping gases have so far been entirely insufficient to prevent unacceptable climate disruption. Unless much greater emissions reductions occur very soon, the countries of the world will have emitted enough carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by the end of this century to profoundly transform the Earth's climate. The resulting climate change will harm millions of people and will threaten many key ecological systems on which civilization relies … We call upon world leaders to take coordinated and rapid action to drastically reduce global emissions of heat-trapping gases, especially carbon dioxide. We also urge the citizens of the world to demand action from their leaders. This threat looms over all of humanity. We all need to respond now, while there is still time.”

Progress on climate and nuclear weapons issues has been too limited in recent years, according to the Board statement. And there is concern about the impact that even a “limited” nuclear weapons exchange would have both in terms of large-scale deaths and a further worsening of the climate:

“Despite some modestly positive developments in the climate change arena in the past year, reflecting continued advancement of renewable energy technologies, current efforts are entirely insufficient to prevent a catastrophic warming of Earth. Absent a dramatic course correction, the countries of the world will have emitted enough carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by the end of this century to profoundly transform Earth's climate, harming millions upon millions of people and threatening many key ecological systems on which civilization relies.”

“At the same time, efforts to reduce world nuclear arsenals have stalled. The disarmament process has ground to a halt, with the United States and Russia embarking on massive programs to modernize their nuclear triads—thereby undermining existing nuclear weapons treaties—and other nuclear weapons holders joining in this expensive and extremely dangerous modernization craze.”

“The science is clear: Insufficient action to slash worldwide emissions of greenhouse gases can produce global climatic catastrophe. Even a so-called “limited” nuclear weapons exchange will produce massive casualties and severe effects on the global environment ... We implore the political leaders of the world to take coordinated, quick action to drastically reduce global emissions of heat-trapping gases, especially carbon dioxide, and shrink nuclear weapons arsenals.”

The statement from the Board includes the following recommended steps:

  • Take actions that would cap greenhouse gas emissions at levels sufficient to keep average global temperature from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels.

  • Dramatically reduce proposed spending on nuclear weapons modernization programs.

  • Re-energize the disarmament process, with a focus on results.

  • Deal now with the nuclear waste problem.

ABOUT THE BULLETIN OF THE ATOMIC SCIENTISTS

Founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had helped develop the first atomic weapons in the Manhattan Project, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists subsequently created the Doomsday Clock in 1947 using the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero), to convey threats to humanity and the planet. The decision to move the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock is made by the Bulletin's Board of Directors in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 17 Nobel Laureates. The Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world's vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change, and emerging technologies in the life sciences.

MEDIA CONTACTS: Patrick Mitchell, (703) 276-3266 or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com; and Alex Frank, (703) 276-3264 or afrank@hastingsgroup.com.

EDITOR’S NOTE: A streaming audio replay of the Doomsday Clock news event will be available as of 3 p.m. EST/2000 GMT at http://thebulletin.org. High-resolution art of the newly reset Doomsday Clock and headshots of news event speakers are available upon request by contacting Patrick Mitchell, (703) 276-3266 or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com and Alex Frank, (703) 276-3264 or afrank@hastingsgroup.com.


Note: I got this off the U.S. Labor Against the War website:

http://uslaboragainstwar.org/

U.S. Labor Against the War has taken up the struggle to "beat swords into plowshares" by initiating a discussion about how to transition the U.S. economy away from production for militarism and wars to a green peace economy in a way that protects and creates jobs while improving the standard-of-living for working class families... all workers and trade unionists are invited to participate in this discussion along with presenting ideas for activities and action. There are many excellent articles like the one above on the USLAW website that you can share for discussion with family, friends and fellow workers. Use this information in leaflets, to prepare for forums, debates and media interviews or as sources of information for writing letters to the editor or for union news letters and web sites as well as posting to your own blogs or to share with FaceBook and other social media friends.

What I find interesting is that these scientists continue to overlook the fact that militarization, including expansion and updating of the nuclear arsenals, is a major contributor to global warming in that all the industrial process and production leaves a huge carbon footprint.


The fact is, putting Wall Street's Military-Industrial Complex out of business could reduce global warming more than any other steps.


See the article I wrote below:

https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/climate-change-and-the-military-industrial-complex1


Climate change and the military-industrial complex

Alan Maki   Environment   January 26, 2014

This letter was written in reply to our recently published interview with Noam Chomsky about climate change. You can read the original Chomsky interview HERE.

The one important aspect of climate change the Left keeps missing is the fact that Wall Street’s very lucrative military-industrial complex leaves the largest carbon footprint of any industry.


So, why have the peace and environmental movements, along with most of the Left, failed to make this important connection?


I’m surprised neither Chomsky nor Canadian Dimension brought this important connection forward in this interview.


How much of what is produced from the Tar Sands will be consumed by the Military-Industrial Complex?


One aircraft carrier of the Nimitz class carries three million gallons of aircraft fuel. Fuel for just 80 aircraft. The U.S. typically deploys six of these aircraft carriers during manoeuvres, conflicts and wars. This alone is one heck of a carbon footprint and we still have to figure out what kind of carbon footprint is created manufacturing these aircraft carriers and planes.


And this example is just the tip of the melting iceberg.


Consider all the mining and manufacturing which goes into producing for militarism and wars – what kind of carbon footprint is created in preparation for wars, by wars and rebuilding in the aftermath of wars?


There is a point to be made about global warming and militarism and wars which leads me to conclude that the most effective way to fight global warming and climate change is to fight for peace by “beating swords into plowshares.”


For some reason all these foundation-funded peace organizations and environmental organizations don’t want to acknowledge that the Military-Industrial Complex bears primary responsibility for global warming and climate change. Perhaps because the “great philanthropists” funding the foundations profit so handsomely from militarism and wars?


If changing out light bulbs contributes to ending global warming and climate change, can you imagine the contribution peace would make towards this effort?


It seems our environmental and peace movements could use what the great labour leader and working class revolutionary, William Z. Foster, advised “a good strong dose of anti-imperialist education,” connecting all the dots.


Alan Maki is the Director of Organizing for the Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council; also one of the founders of Minnesotans for Peace and Social Justice.


Posted by at

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Are you still in search of the "lesser evil?"

After listening to Obama's "State of the Union Address," I am so glad I didn't get hooked into voting for this creep Obama--- this imperialist Wall Street warmonger; I didn't vote for him either time either time--- nor did I support him as a delegate to the the State Convention of the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party.



Obama is neither liberal nor progressive; he is definitely not left.



Like the fascist Mussolini, Obama is nothing but a demagog who knows how to talk in a populist properly "framed" language making all kinds of implications he intends to do what is right by the people without providing or presenting any specific solutions--- and when he does present highly popular specifics like his touting a free community college education he knows damn well it has no chance of passing; just like Obama and all these Democrats with their hypocritical campaign rhetoric saying they don't think anyone working should have to live in poverty knowing that when they get elected they are going to legislate one more Minimum Wage that is nothing but a poverty wage when compared to soaring prices of goods and services which constitute the actual "cost-of-living" which when we combine wages and "cost-of-living" we are able to determine the actual "standard-of-living."



Wages plus government programs plus the real "cost-of-living" determines one's "standard-of-living."



When we use this equation we discover that wages have not only been "flat" for many years but that most working class families are caught in a "cost-of-living trap" with more working class families than ever being pushed further and further into poverty making Obama's talk about "I work for you" when addressing his hand-picked audiences of working people a complete and total farce and fiasco--- worse than this, he is arrogantly mocking us and playing us for chumps and fools; and, then, his supporters have the unmitigated gall to blame the voters because fewer and fewer people are turning out to vote for these Dumb Donkeys with millionaire labor leaders still holding up the tails of these Dumb Donkeys and peddling what the sparrows leave behind as some kind of "prize" we should be thankful for.



When is enough really enough?



It is time for a working class based progressive people's party which will stand firm and fight for peace, social and economic justice; all of which requires putting an end to these goddamn dirty imperialist wars Wall Street merchants of death and destruction profit from murdering people all over the world financed with austerity measures (poverty) shoved down the throats of working people and their families.



Some so-called liberals, progressives and most disgustingly shameful leftists shoved Obama down our throats using lies and deceit while intentionally failing to disclose Obama's Wall Street agenda... don't get suckered again by these worthless charlatans many of whom have enormous incomes based on how well they can snooker people into voting for their Wall Street enemies under the guise of being our "friends."



The time has come--- long overdue, actually--- to tell these Dumb Donkeys to "go to hell."



Republicans and Democrats working in cahoots with pundits from "think-tanks" financed by the Wall Street "philanthropists," together, combined, form the components of Wall Street's "two-party trap" intentionally set in a way to trap workers leaving the working class powerless.



Democrats have the nerve to suggest that we should accept another poverty wage as the Minimum Wage because someplace down the road they claim they will get the Minimum Wage to a real living wage as they piously and hypocritically pretend to emphasize with us as their very actions of using the levers of government enables Wall Street to get bigger and fatter as a direct result of its control and manipulation of these politicians--- it is a vicious circle and even a dog wouldn't chase its tail for so long of a time.



These Wall Street bribed politicians then proceed to try to pass off their reactionary and regressive legislation as "reforms" when the very definition of the word "reform" is to make something better. For doing so much in the way of "reforms" it is amazing how bad things are for the working class and how life just keeps getting worse.



We need to launch grassroots and rank-and-file struggles for real reforms but our struggles must all lead towards the same end--- removing Wall Street from political and economic power which requires not just the important movements for specif reforms intended to alleviate and solve our many problems but these struggles must be part of forming a massive anti-monopoly coalition with its own political party.



Our struggles need to be fought united and militant in the workplace, in the streets and at the ballot box--- education, organization and united action.



Do you have a rank-and-file organization in your place of employment?



Do you have a grassroots organization in your neighborhood?



If not--- organize!



Quite frankly, unless we organize by educating people about the link between wages and "cost-of-living" which determine our "standard-of-living" I doubt our struggles will be winning struggles... the politicians, pundits and their "think tanks" along with the millionaire labor leaders will say and do just about anything to obscure this link between wages and "cost-of-living"... because as far as they are concerned they got theirs'--- at our expense--- and the rest of us can go to hell.



And the wealthier the Wall Street crowd becomes the more all powerful they become in determining how we will live and work and the kind of world we will be forced to live in--- not just their wars, racism and poverty but polluted air and water along with contaminated land not to mention how, for profits, they are killing us with the food they are feeding us.



We won't get any of the good things Obama alluded to like free Community College... what we will get from Obama, the Democrats and their Republican colleagues is the democracy killing, job-killing, poverty-causing TPP--- Trans Pacific Partnership which is NAFTA on steroids which will lead us into more wars people refuse to have their country's wealth stolen out from under them.



And now comes Hillary...



Quite frankly, after saddling us with Obama, I'm surprised Wall Street hasn't thought of running a Hillary Clinton-Jeb Bush ticket--- after all, what we end up with is "bi-partisan unity" to give us a royal shafting anyways.
Posted by at

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Martin Luther King on capitalism and socialism.

I imagine you already know that I am much more socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic... [Capitalism] started out with a noble and high motive... but like most human systems it fell victim to the very thing it was revolting against. So today capitalism has out-lived its usefulness.
(Letter to Coretta Scott, July 18, 1952)

One day we must ask the question, "Why are there forty million poor people in America?" ... When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy.
(Final speech to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 1967)
Posted by at

Monday, January 19, 2015

Defeat Stephen Harper

Our neighbors to the north are gearing up to defeat Stephen Harper:

There's a Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) election strategy meeting this weekend in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

The CLC is making a point of inviting community organizations to work together.

Register! Attend!! Participate!!!

* * * * *
Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2015

From: "Cindy Murdoch"

To:

Subject: Register Now - Election Planing Conference!

Greetings,

As you’re aware a Federal election will be held in 2015. The exact dates for the election is another question with some suggesting late spring while others are suggesting Prime Minister Harper will wait until the last possible moment which would put an election in October of 2015.

The Canadian Labour Congress, with support from affiliates, Federations of Labour and Labour Councils, and community partners is holding Election Preparation Conferences in many communities across the country during the first few months of 2015.

In Manitoba this important Conference is being held on Friday January 23rd and Saturday January 24th at the Fairmont Hotel located at 2 Lombard Place in Winnipeg. So please mark your calendars and attend and encourage other members in your local to attend.

It is anticipated that over 100 union will join us to participate in the Winnipeg Conference. Friday evening will see keynote speakers while Saturday will be an opportunity to attend the many workshops scheduled.

As have the desire, passion and strength of our movement and others to come together and make change in the next federal election. The information below will help get you registered.

Election Preparation Conference Winnipeg
January 23 & 24, 2015 at the Fairmont Hotel, 2 Lombard Place

Sign up now. Registration is free! To Register Go to www.canadianlabour.ca

In the upper right hand corner click ‘Member Login’

If you have ever registered for an event with the CLC before you can use your initial info.

If not create a new user log on and REGISTER!

Problems? Call the CLC Prairie Regional Office at: (306) 525-6137

Cindy Murdoch
Regional Representative, Manitoba
Canadian Labour Congress
207-275 Broadway, Winnipeg, R3C 4M6
Office: 204-947-9494
Cell: 204-930-4829
E-mail: cmurdoch@clc-ctc.ca
Posted by at

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Human Rights and MLK

"Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world ... Such are the places where every man, woman and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere."
— Eleanor Roosevelt (on the 10th Anniversary of the UDHR)
"Commit yourself to the noble struggle for human rights. You will make a greater person of yourself, a greater nation of your country and a finer world to live in."
— Martin Luther King, Jr., April 18, 1959,Youth March for Integrated Schools, Washington, D.C.



http://unudhr.blogspot.com/

I would encourage the wide dissemination of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights at all functions commemorating the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We to organize to insist these words become a living reality for people everywhere. This Declaration should become the basis for unity in struggle.


Martin Luther King, Paul Robeson and W. E. B. Du Bois worked relentlessly their entire lives to make this document a living reality for every human being; we should, too. The foundation-funded outfits financed by the great Wall Street "philanthropists" will not be bringing this idea forward nor will their efforts be extended to organizing movements demanding the enforcement of these very basic human rights. Therefore, unless you take the initiative to educate, organize and mobilize in support of enforcing these rights through legislation creating the kinds of universal social programs and an economy based on human needs instead of maximum Wall Street profits these human rights will never become a living reality.


Quite frankly, I doubt capitalism--- no matter how "compassionate," can ever provide all people everywhere with these human rights; quite to the contrary, capitalism deprives the majority of the people of these very basic and fundamental human rights.


Only a cooperative socialist system can insure these very basic human rights become a living reality.


Participate in MLK Day activities and distribute copies of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights with a link to Dr. Martin Luther King's speech honoring W. E. B. DuBois:


http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/2015/01/honoring-dr-du-bois-by-mlk.html

Don't allow the foundation-funded outfits and corporate CEO's to distort and define what MLK stood for.


These foundation-funded outfits would like us to forget that W. E. B. DuBois, Paul Robeson and MLK were participants and activists in the global movements to advance human rights.
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Saturday, January 17, 2015

Will Canada's New Democratic Party take political power away from Wall Street and Bay Street?

Canada's New Democratic Party's progressive social democrat, Thomas Mulcair, talks about the upcoming most important Federal Election; what do you think?


http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/Politics/ID/2648143090/


For the very first time, Canada's socialist New Democratic Party has a real chance to deprive Wall Street's junior partner, Bay Street, and Wall Street itself, of political power.


The New Democratic Party is labor's, and the people's, party in Canada.


Canada also has very vibrant and active Communist and Green parties, neither of which has the potential at this point to take power nationally, but whose participation in the upcoming Federal Election can help shape the direction of discussion, dialog and debate in a way which prevents Mulcair from being wishy-washy or opportunistically moving to the right.


Will Mulcair take into consideration what is going on in Manitoba's NDP in order to avoid costly dissension mainly because the Leader, and Premier, reneged on his promise not to raise the regressive and reactionary sales tax? It is good that Mulcair is focusing on raising taxes on corporations but he is kind of quiet about how Canada will go about taxing the multi-national corporations who have been stealing Canada's wealth.


Many left wing working class activists don't appreciate Mulcair's Obama-style politics, and for good reason... but, the NDP is not a corporate party like the Democratic Party; the NDP is labor's party and reflects the various thinking within the working class movement; which, unfortunately, still contains a strong dose of class collaboration which "progressive social democrats" like Tom Mulcair adhere to and this kind of thinking is hard to defeat if rank-and-file leftists don't strenuously bring forward their opinions and ideas--- especially about forming an anti-monopoly electoral coalition that makes it a point to single out the need to take political and economic power away from Wall Street and its junior partner, Bay Street. Make no mistake, both the Liberal Party of Justin Trudeau and the Conservative Party of Stephen Harper represent Wall Street's interests in Canada--- even more than they represent the interests of Bay Street.


Mulcair and the NDP have the opportunity to deprive Wall Street and Bay Street of political power which will severely weaken big capital's dictatorial power over the working class--- and this alone is a good enough reason to support and vote for Mulcair while building support towards depriving Wall Street and Bay Street of BOTH political AND economic power while putting the working class in a stronger position for bringing and end to capitalism in Canada which requires weakening the influence and power of big-business, especially the power of multi-national corporations.


U.S. workers have an anti-imperialist obligation to study what is taking place in Canada in a way that brings us into active solidarity with Canadian workers and we can't do this unless we understand the importance of the upcoming Canadian elections and our own stake in these elections from which cross-border solidarity will strengthen our own struggles--- especially if Wall Street ends up battered and crippled and on life support in Canada.


Wall Street is our common enemy and anything we can do to help weaken Wall Street's influence and power any place in the world is in our interests as workers.


I believe this is a revolutionary working class view that Tim Buck or William Z. Foster would have taken towards the upcoming elections in Canada.


No matter what your point of view, it is detrimental to the working class movement for workers here in the United States not to take an interest in what our sisters and brothers north of the border are thinking and doing.


I will be sharing a number of viewpoints on my FaceBook page and on my blog and I welcome the viewpoints of others, including those who disagree.

Tom Mulcair interview
NDP leader talks about the price of oil, controversial new security legislation and why he cleaned house today ahead of the federal election
cbc.ca
 
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Friday, January 16, 2015

Honoring Dr. Du Bois by MLK


I would suggest that this speech by Martin Luther King be distributed at every Martin Luther King event:



"We cannot talk of Dr. Du Bois without recognizing that he was a radical all of his life. Some people would like to ignore the fact that he was a Communist in his later years. It is worth noting that Abraham Lincoln warmly welcomed the support of Karl Marx during the Civil War and corresponded with him freely. In contemporary life the Englishspeaking world has no difficulty with the fact that Sean O’Casey was a literary giant of the twentieth century and a Communist or that Pablo Neruda is generally considered the greatest living poet though he also served in the Chilean Senate as a Communist. It is time to cease muting the fact that Dr. Du Bois was a genius and chose to be a Communist. Our irrational, obsessive anti-communism has led us into too many quagmires to be retained as if it were a mode of scientific thinking."




Honoring Dr. Du Bois



Martin Luther King, Jr.



Tonight we assemble here to pay tribute to one of the most remarkable men of our time. Dr. Du Bois was not only an intellectual giant exploring the frontiers of knowledge, he was in the first place a teacher. He would have wanted his life to teach us something about our tasks of emancipation. One idea he insistently taught was that black people have been kept in oppression and deprivation by a poisonous fog of lies that depicted them as inferior, born deficient and deservedly doomed to servitude to the grave. So assiduously has this poison been injected into the mind of America that its disease has infected not only whites but many Negroes. So long as the lie was believed the brutality and criminality of conduct toward the Negro was easy for the conscience to bear. The twisted logic ran if the black man was inferior he was not oppressed-his place in society was appropriate to his meager talent and intellect. Dr. Du Bois recognized that the keystone in the arch of oppression was the myth of inferiority and he dedicated his brilliant talents to demolish it. There could scarcely be a more suitable person for such a monumental task. First of all he was himself unsurpassed as an intellect and he was a Negro. But beyond this he was passionately proud to be black and finally he had not only genius and pride but he had the indomitable fighting spirit of the valiant.



To pursue his mission, Dr. Du Bois gave up the substantial privileges a highly educated Negro enjoyed living in the North. Though he held degrees from Harvard and the University of Berlin, though he had more academic credentials than most Americans, black or white, he moved South where a majority of Negroes then lived. He deliberately chose to share their daily abuse and humiliation. He could have offered himself to the white rulers and exacted substantial tribute for selling his genius. There were few like him, Negro or white. He could have amassed riches and honors and lived in material splendor and applause from the powerful and important men of his time. Instead, he lived part of his creative life in the South-most of it in modest means and some of it in poverty, and he died in exile, praised sparingly and in many circles ignored.



But he was an exile only to the land of his birth. He died at home in Africa among his cherished ancestors, and he was ignored by a pathetically ignorant America but not by history.



History cannot ignore W. E. B. Du Bois. Because history has to reflect truth and Dr. Du Bois was a tireless explorer and a gifted discoverer of social truths. His singular greatness lay in his quest for truth about his own people. There were very few scholars who concerned themselves with honest study of the black man and he sought to fill this immense void. The degree to which he succeeded discloses the great dimensions of the man.



Yet he had more than a void to fill. He had to deal with the army of white propagandists – the myth-makers of Negro history. Dr. Du Bois took them all on in battle. It would be impossible to sketch the whole range of his intellectual contributions. Back in the nineteenth century he laid out a program of 100 years of study of problems affecting American Negroes and worked tirelessly to implement it.



Long before sociology was a science he was pioneering in the field of social study of Negro life and completed works on health, education, employment, urban conditions, and religion. This was at a time when scientific inquiry of Negro life was so unbelievably neglected that only a single university in the entire nation had such a program, and it was funded with $5,000 for a year’s work.



Against such odds Dr. Du Bois produced two enduring classics before the twentieth century. His Suppression of the African Slave-Trade, written in 1896, is Volume I in the Harvard Historical Studies. His study The Philadelphia Negro, completed in 1899, is still used today. Illustrating the painstaking quality of his scientific method, to do this work Dr. Du Bois personally visited and interviewed 5,000 people.



He soon realized that studies would never adequately be pursued nor changes realized without the mass involvement of Negroes. The scholar then became an organizer and with others founded the NAACP. At the same time he became aware that the expansion of imperialism was a threat to the emergence of Africa. He recognized the importance of the bonds between American Negroes and the land of their ancestors, and he extended his activities to African affairs. After World War I he called Pan-African Congresses in 1919, 1921, and 1923, alarming imperialists in all countries and disconcerting Negro moderates in America who were afraid of this restless, militant, black genius.



Returning to the United States from abroad, he found his pioneering agitation for Negro studies was bearing fruit and a beginning was made to broaden Negro higher education. He threw himself into the task of raising the intellectual level of this work. Much later, in 1940, he participated in the establishment of the first Negro scholarly publication,Phylon. At the same time he stimulated Negro colleges to collaborate through annual conferences to increase their effectiveness and elevate the quality of their academic studies. But these activities, enough to be the life work for ten men, were far from the sum of his achievements. In the six years between 1935 and 1941 he produced the monumental seven-hundred-page volume on Black Reconstruction in America, at the same time writing many articles and essays. Black Reconstruction was six years in writing but was thirty- three years in preparation. On its publication, one critic said: “It crowns the long, unselfish and brilliant career of Dr. Du Bois. It is comparable in clarity, originality and importance to the Beards’ Rise of American Civilization.” The New York Times said, “It is beyond question the most painstaking and thorough study ever made of the Negroes’ part in Reconstruction,” and the New York Herald Tribune proclaimed it “a solid history of the period, an economic treatise, a philosophical discussion, a poem, a work of art all rolled into one.”



To understand why his study of the Reconstruction was a monumental achievement it is necessary to see it in context. White historians had for a century crudely distorted the Negro’s role in the Reconstruction years. It was a conscious and deliberate manipulation of history, and the stakes were high. The Reconstruction was a period in which black men had a small measure of freedom of action. If, as white historians tell it, Negroes wallowed in corruption, opportunism, displayed spectacular stupidity, were wanton, evil, and ignorant, their case was made. They would have proved that freedom was dangerous in the hands of inferior beings. One generation after another of Americans were assiduously taught these falsehoods, and the collective mind of America became poisoned with racism and stunted with myths.



Dr. Du Bois confronted this powerful structure of historical distortion and dismantled it. He virtually, before anyone else and more than anyone else, demolished the lies about Negroes in their most important and creative period of history. The truths he revealed are not yet the property of all Americans but they have been recorded and arm us for our contemporary battles.



In Black Reconstruction Dr. Du Bois dealt with the almost universally accepted concept that civilization virtually collapsed in the South during Reconstruction because Negroes had a measure of political power. Dr. Du Bois marshalled irrefutable evidence that, far from collapsing, the Southern economy was recovering in these years. Within five years the cotton crop had been restored, and in the succeeding five years had exceeded pre-war levels. At the same time other economic activity had ascended so rapidly the rebirth of the South was almost completed.



Beyond this he restored to light the most luminous achievement of the Reconstruction-it brought free public education into existence not only for the benefit of the Negro, but it opened school doors to the poor whites. He documented the substantial body of legislation that was socially so useful it was retained into the twentieth century even though the Negroes who helped to write it were brutally disenfranchised and driven from political life. He revealed that, far from being the tragic era white historians described, it was the only period in which democracy existed in the South. This stunning fact was the reason the history books had to lie because to tell the truth would have acknowledged the Negroes’ capacity to govern and fitness to build a finer nation in a creative relationship with poor whites.



With the completion of his book Black Reconstruction, despite its towering contributions, despite his advanced age, Dr. Du Bois was still not ready to accept a deserved rest in peaceful retirement. His dedication to freedom drove him on as relentlessly in his seventies as it did in his twenties. He had already encompassed three careers. Beginning as a pioneer sociologist, he had become an activist to further mass organization. The activist had then transformed himself into an historian. By the middle of the twentieth century, when imperialism and war arose once more to imperil humanity, he became a peace leader. He served as chairman of the Peace Information Bureau and, like the Rev. William Sloane Coffin and Dr. Benjamin Spock of today, he found himself indicted by the government and harried by reactionaries. Undaunted by obstacles and repression, with his characteristic fortitude he fought on. Finally in 1961 with Ghana’s independence established, an opportunity opened to begin the writing of an African Encyclopedia, and in his ninety third year he emigrated to Ghana to begin new intellectual labors. In 1963 death finally came to this most remarkable man.



It is axiomatic that he will be remembered for his scholarly contributions and organizational attainments. These monuments are imperishable. But there were human qualities less immediately visible that are no less imperishable.



Dr. Du Bois was a man possessed of priceless dedication to his people. The vast accumulation of achievement and public recognition were not for him pathways to personal affluence and a diffusion of identity. Whatever else he was, with his multitude of careers and professional titles, he was first and always a black man. He used his richness of talent as a trust for his people. He saw that Negroes were robbed of so many things decisive to their existence that the theft of their history seemed only a small part of their losses. But Dr. Du Bois knew that to lose one’s history is to lose one’s self-understanding and with it the roots for pride. This drove him to become a historian of Negro life, and the combination of his unique zeal and intellect rescued for all of us a heritage whose loss would have profoundly impoverished us.



Dr. Du Bois the man needs to be remembered today when despair is all too prevalent. In the years he lived and fought, there was far more justification for frustration and hopelessness, and yet his faith in his people never wavered. His love and faith in Negroes permeate every sentence of his writings and every act of his life. Without these deeply rooted emotions his work would have been arid and abstract. With them his deeds were a passionate storm that swept the filth of falsehood from the pages of established history.



He symbolized in his being his pride in the black man. He did not apologize for being black and, because of it, handicapped. Instead he attacked the oppressor for the crime of stunting black men. He confronted the establishment as a model of militant manhood and integrity. He defied them and, though they heaped venom and scorn on him, his powerful voice was never stilled.



And yet, with all his pride and spirit he did not make a mystique out of blackness. He was proud of his people, not because their color endowed them with some vague greatness but because their concrete achievements in struggle had advanced humanity, and he saw and loved progressive humanity in all its hues, black, white, yellow, red, and brown.



Above all he did not content himself with hurling invectives for emotional release and then to retire into smug, passive satisfaction. History had taught him it is not enough for people to be angry-the supreme task is to organize and unite people so that their anger becomes a transforming force. It was never possible to know where the scholar Du Bois ended and the organizer Du Bois began. The two qualities in him were a single, unified force. This life style of Dr. Du Bois is the most important quality this generation of Negroes needs to emulate.



The educated Negro who is not really part of us and the angry militant who fails to organize us have nothing in common with Dr. Du Bois. He exemplified black power in achievement and he organized black power in action. It was no abstract slogan to him.



We cannot talk of Dr. Du Bois without recognizing that he was a radical all of his life. Some people would like to ignore the fact that he was a Communist in his later years. It is worth noting that Abraham Lincoln warmly welcomed the support of Karl Marx during the Civil War and corresponded with him freely. In contemporary life the Englishspeaking world has no difficulty with the fact that Sean O’Casey was a literary giant of the twentieth century and a Communist or that Pablo Neruda is generally considered the greatest living poet though he also served in the Chilean Senate as a Communist. It is time to cease muting the fact that Dr. Du Bois was a genius and chose to be a Communist. Our irrational, obsessive anti-communism has led us into too many quagmires to be retained as if it were a mode of scientific thinking.



In closing, it would be well to remind white America of its debt to Dr. Du Bois. When they corrupted Negro history they distorted American history, because Negroes are too big a part of the building of this nation to be written out of it without destroying scientific history. White America, drenched with lies about Negroes, has lived too long in a fog of ignorance. Dr. Du Bois gave them a gift of truth for which they should eternally be indebted to him.



Negroes have heavy tasks today. We were partially liberated and then re-enslaved. We have to fight again on old battlefields, but our confidence is greater, our vision is clearer, and our ultimate victory surer because of the contributions a militant, passionate black giant left behind him.



Dr. Du Bois has left us but he has not died. The spirit of freedom is not buried in the grave of the valiant. He will be with us when we go to Washington in April to demand our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.



We have to go to Washington because they have declared an armistice in the war on poverty while squandering billions to expand a senseless, cruel, unjust war in Vietnam. We will go there, we will demand to be heard, and we will stay until the administration responds. If this means forcible repression of our movement, we will confront it, for we have done this before. If this means scorn or ridicule, we will embrace it, for that is what America’s poor now receive. If it means jail, we accept it willingly, for the millions of poor already are imprisoned by exploitation and discrimination.



Dr. Du Bois would be in the front ranks of the peace movement today. He would readily see the parallel between American support of the corrupt and despised Thieu-Ky regime and Northern support to the Southern slave masters in 1876. The CIA scarcely exaggerates, indeed it is surprisingly honest, when it calculates for Congress that the war in Vietnam can persist for one hundred years. People deprived of their freedom do not give up—Negroes have been fighting more than a hundred years, and even if the date of full emancipation is uncertain, what is explicitly certain is that the struggle for it will endure.



In conclusion let me say that Dr. Du Bois’ greatest virtue was his committed empathy with all the oppressed and his divine dissatisfaction with all forms of injustice. Today we are still challenged to be dissatisfied. Let us be dissatisfied until every man can have food and material necessities for his body, culture and education for his mind, freedom and until rat-infested, vermin-filled slums will be a thing of a dark past and every family will have a decent, sanitary house in which to live. Let us be dissatisfied until the empty stomachs of Mississippi are filled and the idle industries of Appalachia are revitalized. Let us be dissatisfied until brotherhood is no longer a meaningless word at the end of a prayer but the first order of business on every legislative agenda. Let us be dissatisfied until our brother of the Third World- Asia, Africa, and Latin America-will no longer be the victim of imperialist exploitation, but will be lifted from the long night of poverty, illiteracy, and disease. Let us be dissatisfied until this pending cosmic elegy will be transformed into a creative psalm of peace and “justice will roll down like waters from a mighty stream.”



The Centennial Address delivered by Nobel Laureate Dr. Martin Luther King at Carnegie Hall in New York City, February 23, 1968. The occasion was the International Cultural Evening sponsored by FREEDOMWAYS Magazine on the 100th birthday of Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois and launching an “International Year” (1968) honoring his life and works.






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Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam... Martin Luther King

Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyE4eo_leX8


Full speech.


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Martin Luther King

"There is something wrong with capitalism. There are 40 million poor people here and one day we must ask the question, Why are there 40 million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising a question about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy" - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 1967

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Thursday, January 15, 2015

All you can eat buffet and good music...

Armadillo Jump
Hey all you friends in the Armadillo Army - we'll be at Wilebski's Blues Saloon this Friday January 16th from 6:00 to 10:00 pm - come on out for an early party!! Here's the address:


Location:
1638 Rice St Saint Paul, MN 55117

Phone: 651-207-0000


The buffet opens at 5 p.m.


There is a $5.00 cover charge
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