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Up real early to get things going for the last day of prep for the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X rally and just saw this:
FairPoint, unions reach deal to end strike
No details yet, but hopefully it's some kinda win.
Partly for selfish reasons: One of Comrade Longears's American co-thinkers (and an SEIU organizer) made a comment a whiles back that my local commie branch is kinda like a good luck charm for strikes; thus far, with a record of three for three (Insomnia Cookies, Lifelinks, Weir Valve), any picket line that we visit wins.
It'd be nice if that kept being a thing.
One day longer/One day stronger!
For workers revolution!
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RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 32
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BostonFixed your headline.usingallowing trusted prisonerslike slave laborersto earn time off their sentence by shovel snow inback-breaking conditionsin time of emergency.
How generous of their benevolent overlords.
Slave for us, and as reward we'll not disrespect you. As much. And you will be _allowed_ to serve the community! Woo hoo!
F$$# that.
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Very interesting article about the influence of Murray Bookchin on free Kurdistan, whose militias, of course, are doing the bulk of the fighting against Daesh/IS at present.
Same, babe. *3*
He won't. Employing internet douchebaggery to point out hipster internet douchebaggery is kind of a point of pride for Alex.
Brief googling:
Low on Resources, Boston Turns to Prison Labor to Shovel Snow
Which led to Suffolk County Sheriff's Department Community Works Program
Which puts it somewhere in between the liberal hipsters at the Daily Kos (serves me right for branching out from my regular communist propaganda websites) and Citizen K(e)rensky's Democratic Party hackdom. For example, I don't see anything about earning time off of sentences, but maybe I have to dig deeper.
Anyway, I was thrilled to death to meet Steve Gillis and Andre Francois (two of the School Bus 5) this morning in the freezing cold outside of the Somerville District Court for the I-93 protestors court appearance. "You're doing a rally up in Lowell?" smiled Brother Gillis. When I offered to distribute leaflets to pack the court on March 3 for Red Steve Kirschbaum's next court appearance he smiled even wider and said "That's great! Now's the time to be meeting people and making contacts!" I almost died of joy!
Mayor Marty Walsh, pro-capitalist ex-labor bureaucrat that he is distanced himself from them during his campaign run because he would rather serve the interests of State Street than stand up for working people. I wouldn't be surprised if he and Citizen K(e)rensky run in the same circles.
Missed you today man! TotalCon wasn't the same without your Doodlebuglian presence.
:(
Did you have a good time?
Comrade Anklebiter in New Jersey this Saturday! Tremble, ye Garden Staters!
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Well, In These Times seems to think it was a victory. Good enough, I guess. Four for four, baby!
New England Workers Win Largest Telecom Strike in History
[Reads first section]
Man, what a shiznitty contract.... :(
[Breaks democratic centalism]
Seattle Socialist Alternative and the Black Lives Matter Movement
Comrade Anklebiter's Commie Vacation Thus Far:
Got in Thursday afternoon. Had to deal with La Principessa's depression for a while, then went to her Guatemalan from East Boston Anarcho-Syndicalist Playwright friend's girlfriend's Soup and Art Night (which he renamed Stupid Art Night). She worked on making banya caps; I just drank and ate butternut squash soup until the GfEBA-SPF'sG gave me an "Existentialist Coloring Book" and worked on the page devoted to Jean-Paul Sartre, Intrnet Troll's catchphrase ("Hell is other posters!).
Friday was more depression, some really hawt sex, then a very frustrating evening waiting in Barnes and Noble while she met with another comrade to go over her presentation on the labor movement centered on the UE strike at Weir Valve. Followed by more frustration as we went over her single mother friend's house and they got to talk politics while I had to babysit a hyperactive, ADD-diagnosed seven-year-old who kept farting on me and wouldn't let me play on his keyboard. :(
Saturday we went to the Newark rally organized by our 16-year-old New Jersey high school student comrade. Afterwards, we went to some bbq restaurant where I kept trying convince the hyperactive seven-year-old of the existence of trolls, ogres, and that the upcoming blood moon was a harbinger of the opening of the gates to the fairy realms. Later, on the ride home, I tried to convince him that the delta blues singers on the radio were centaurs. La Principessa kept telling me to cut it out in deference to the communist atheism of the boy's mother, but I protested "If you can't lie to children, then who can you lie to?" and denounced her bourgeois modernity. The boy's mother seemed to think it was funny. Anyway, then we got home and smoked the last of my [bubble bubble bubble] and had even hawtter sex. Twice.
Sunday, we went to the Day School. I was pretty excited because the latest Member's Bulletin had a long document about Black Liberation and Socialist Revolution that discussed Richard S. Fraser (a fave my old comrades) and I was looking forward to some real commie talk, but La Principessa got ill after the first two hours, so we skeddadled, had some Thai food on the offchance that she just needed to eat something, no such luck, so then I got to do my first NYC driving as we listened to a Patsy Cline hour on some college radio station. Then we watched a lot of bad SNL and Snowpiercer which she thought was terrible, but I thought was watchable enough for a Chris Evans movie.
Meanwhile, back in New England, I'm getting updates on our Black Lives Matter coalition work in Lowell. Expect more posts on the future, but in the meantime, I've still got a whole week to spend in this city with little to do. I think there's a branch meeting in Brooklyn tomorrow, a visit to a car wash strike on Wednesday, maybe meet up with a former IBEW steward turned CWA organizer who's Facebook friends with some of my NH labor contacts, meet up with Comrades Freehold and Healer hopefully, but other than that, got little planned. Maybe some more hawt sex. We'll see.
Don't think I've ever linked an article about Swaziland before:
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Elected Officials Arrested at Brooklyn Car Wash Rally
Struck shop was right around the corner from La Principessa's school. Had a nice time familiarizing myself with New York's labor activists, then marched through Brooklyn, called La Principessa and she ran outside to hold hands and take pictures. God, I love that woman.
Hung out with a young machinist comrade from Pittsburgh who was disgusted. "This is what they call a labor action?!? They pretend to picket and then the cops pretend to break the strike?!? Where are the mass pickets lines that no one dare cross?!?" God, I love that man.
Afterwards we all chatted and then La Principessa went back to work and we went to a Dunkin Donuts. While there, I receive the following text:
"Hey. Thanks for getting me today. Can we talk later? I'm kind of uncomfortable with you calling me 'baby' in front of other people."
I text back, "Can we skip the talk and just get to the part where I apologize for infantilizing you?" and make a mental note to complain about it on Paizo.com.
[Shakes head in exasperation]
Women.
DSAer in Jacobin on my fave Founding Father. Haven't read it yet, but figured I'd link it anyways.
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Happy International Woman's Day!
:(
Did you have a good time?
I did. It wasn't the same without you and Gruumash. Maybe next year :)
I hope so.
In commie news, lessee...while I was in Brooklyn our NH branch, in coalition with the Black Lives Matter activists and the local 350 activists, have apparently launched a group called Community Activists for Justice and Equality whose acronym, of course, is CAJE. "The system is a caje" etc., etc. [Shudders] Don't blame me comrades, I was in New York. Anyway, cynical hispter negativity aside, while I was gone they held a public meeting (30 or so attendees), a film showing on International Women's Day (again, 30 or so attendees), on Monday, while I was dilly-dallying about, kissing La Principessa good bye before the long trek back, and held a rally outside a courthouse against the New Jim Crow and in solidarity with some black kid who was being unfairly railroaded for something or other (I've been out of the loop, alas).
This weekend we've got a rally against visiting Gov. Scott Walker in Concord that should bring out all the leftie-labor types and then back to Lowell for another CAJE meeting, although I might have to help The Black Goblin move his Pregnant Dreadlocked Libertarian Ex-Welder Girlfriend into the Free NH Goblin Resistance Hideout. 'Tis truly the end of an era, comrades. (Links to come later, maybe.)
In completely other news, my Independent Red Maoist-Inclined Historian Rival for La Principessa's Affections (Since Vanquished) had a review published in a commie journal and he Tagged me in his Facebook post, so etiquette demanded that I say I'd read it soon, so I'm posting it here so that I'll remember to do so:
It may interest the comrades to know that "Enaa" is the name of one of his Dungeons and Dragons characters.
Nerds of the world, unite!
Oh yeah, I forgot, La Principessa's parents retired out in Madison, Wisconsin. She called her father--who did some work in Texas during the later year of the Civil Rights Movement (apparently he's got stories about being chased by the Klan) and later did pro bono police brutality cases in NYC (for which he was awarded some honor by the Bar Association)--for his birthday and asked him if he had been going to any of the demonstrations in the wake of the killing of Tony Robinson. He said he had and La Principessa, excited to have something to bond with her father about, asked him how it was.
"It was depressing, Check" (they call her "Check") "It was really depressing. Here it is forty, fifty years later, and I'm still going to these f#*#ing things."
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It's just dawned on me that 'zero tolerance' onle seems to mean putting extra police in poor, run-down areas, and not in the Stock Exchange.
Anatole France quote about sleeping under bridges comes to mind.
Lessee, any commie articles worth posting?
Protests erupt after police killing in Madison
Pasco, Washington: Mexican Worker Shot Dead by Cops
200 schools hold rallies to oppose Cuomo’s education reforms
Well, that's not a commie article, but, thanks to La Principessa, I've recently met quite a few UFT lefties
Black Lives Matter Activists and Union Members Band Together Against Scott Walker
USW Reaches Tentative Agreement with Oil Industry; Agreement with Shell Sets Pattern for Industry
30,000 Chinese Factory Workers Strike Against Maker of Nike Sneakers
Woops, grabbed wrong article about China:
Oh, this one is worth bookmarking:
That's nice, Alex. I tend to buy whatever I can get for $30 at Marshall's.
[Shrugs]
I've got to save a couple thousand bucks or so to get my car (made by UAW workers if it's any consolation) to pass inspection (three months late and counting) before I can start saving for boots.
It's possible. Hopefully, though, I will be moving to New York soon(ish) and will never need a car again. Also, my father gave it to me. Also also, it has a cassette player and it allows me to tape my records and listen to them while driving around. Otherwise, I'd never get to listen to my albums.
Thank you for the advice on personal finance, though.
Hmmm. Lack of intonation in internet communication strikes again!
[Shrugs]
I've got to save a couple thousand bucks or so to get my car (made by UAW workers if it's any consolation) to pass inspection (three months late and counting) before I can start saving for boots.
Only three months? That's not so bad!
You know how when people are talking about fighting or whatever on the message boards someone will always pop up who is a level 9 black belt or certified sharpshooter? Well that was me with dodging inspection. I once had a 96 Volvo 850 wagon that went for something like 4 years without inspection! {Note: sold it to a guy in the Bronx who seemed unconcerned about inspections...) Anyway, in NY you don't have to pass emissions if your car is ~1995 or older! Most other problems can be worked around/patched if you find a sympathetic shop to work with.
Also, good clothing deals can be found at your nearest Sal's Boutique (Salvation Army) or consignment shop. I also find that many wealthy people have tonnes of crap that they want to get rid of, but don't know how. Giving stuff to a hard worken' Gobbo would make them and you feel good. Asking in the right way can be tough, but that is how I got said Volvo for FREE!
Only three months? That's not so bad!
Four years is quite impressive, Comrade Fergie, and I bow to your inspection avoidance-fu.
I was less concerned about it in years past when I was going to work at two in the morning and only had to worry about the ride home. Now, with Daylights Savings, I have to worry about it both ways. Also, it's affecting my ability to do political work. For example, I don't want to drive to Concord to protest Scott Walker and leave my car on the side of the street for a couple of hours.
EDIT: Oh, also, I've had a copy of The Best of Abbie Hoffman since my teen years. Here in NH we've recently befriended an elderly Jewish man from Brooklyn who claims he was in the Yippies back in the day.
Anyway, fighting with La Principessa about Abraham Lincoln on Facebook. Where's that article about Marx and the Civil War? Hmmm...
Ahh, it was in the Books Thread.
Karl Marx and the American Civil War
A few others that failed to persuade La Principessa (man, she's stubborn):
Reading Karl Marx with Abraham Lincoln
The Civil War: The Second American Revolution--Honor Abraham Lincoln!
Lincoln and Marx
I had 'Steal This Book' when I was a teenager. Most of his advice made sense at the time, but none of his handy hints for bringing down THE MAN worked :(
I've had something through from my Union asking whether or not I want to continue to contribute to the Labour Party, which has prompted a bit of angsty soul searching.
* Most of the present Tory government's policies just continue what Labour was doing before - the privatisations, sneaky (and not so sneaky) assaults on our welfare system/the NHS, etc
* They take a lot of Union cash but never seem to give value for money, being more interested in futilely trying to make Rupert Murdoch love them as much as he loved T. Blair
* Tony Blair. Iraq war, Afghan war, being a cheesy friend of fourth rate dictators and other grubby oinks (Berlisconi, for example), etc
* I'm fed up of having to hold my nose when I go and vote
* Miliband is a massive nebbishy dork
* They're slightly more likely to do stuff I approve of, or slightly less likely to do stuff I really disapprove of, which is often as good as you're going to get...
* If they don't get money from the Unions, they'll get it from somewhere else (Lord Sainsbury, for example) and things will go downhill even faster
* They are still (technically) the mass party of labour in Britain. No one else - The Greens, TUSC, us, and so on, even comes close
* Any amount of nose-holding is worth it if we don't get another Tory government
* I'm a massive nebbishy dork too, and we nebbishy dorks have got to stick together!!!
That feels better.
Well is was more of a suburban/ predictable schedule thing. Also, it was a newish looking Volvo station wagon driven by a square looking white guy. I knew where the checkpoints might be most of the time (once got through a state trooper roadblock without them noticing!) and there were some serious limitations - no metered parking, no train station parking, and toll booths were a little tricky. (Sometimes the NYPD will hangout checking stickers at some of the entrances to NYC. I did get a ticket or two, and had to turn in the plates and re-register the car because the DMV won't let you renew without an inspection.
I have tried going without inspection more recently, however they are more hardass they they used to be years ago. I got popped for expired inspection, got it inspected the next day, and sent in the new proof of inspection to the court clerk. In the past this would have been it, but I got called into court something like 16 months later. I avoided the whooping surcharges but still had to pay a fine. That is the other thing - it used to be a small fine, but now they are generating some serious revenue for fines and surcharges and stuff. Ferguson isn't the only place where the cops are a money making scam.
EDIT: NYS Registration complaint: About 10 years ago I registered my motorcycle for something like $14. Just got a notice in the mail - it now costs $42.50! WTF NYS? Why does it now cost you 3X as much to do the exact same thing you did 10 years ago?
* They are still (technically) the mass party of labour in Britain. No one else - The Greens, TUSC, us, and so on, even comes close
Had another fight with La Principessa back in Brooklyn when I was stupid enough to point out that one of the TUSC candidates was wicked hawt. She refused to come to bed and when I confronted her about it, berated me about not taking her low self-esteem into consideration, even though I tell her all the time how hawt she is.
Meanwhile, she can drool all over over the hunky UE Local 279 president...
Women.
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Older one making the rounds due to the impending Scott Walker visit to my fair state:
You Hate "Right To Work" Laws More Than You Know. Here's Why