Elizabeth Warren is fronting for Hillary.

Have you noticed how the Democrats are trotting out Elizabeth Warren to front for Hillary Clinton at many of their functions.

Minnesota Democrats, who are gearing up to support Hillary (which is pretty much the entire Democratic Party apparatus) are bringing in Elizabeth Warren to speak at their big fund-raising bash/prep the troops for 2014/2016 "Humphrey-Mondale Dinner."

Now, really; is there anyone who believes Elizabeth Warren offers any kind of progressive alternative?

In fact, the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party's hacks are even giving out the orders for the faithful to begin distancing themselves from Obama to make way for the re-imaging of Hillary since it would be impossible for Democrats to get elected to any office running on Obama's record of subservience to Wall Street... hence the need to bring in Elizabeth Warren with her phony populist rhetoric pretending to be anti-Wall Street.

It really is quite difficult to argue with "lesser evil logic."

A Minimum Wage of $7.75 is better that a Minimum Wage of $7.25.

Obamacare is better than no care.

Obama makes a better president than Romney.

It's better to use drones because "boots on the ground gets Americans killed."

Hillary will be a better president than Scott Walker, Rick Snyder or Pat McCrory.

It's better to eat shit than starve.

It's better to be alive than dead... except when its better to be dead than "red."

Just read what head Democratic Party hack, linguist George Lakoff, writes about why Democrats are better than Republicans and you will understand all of this.

I figured since I couldn't get anyone to provide me the full text of her recent writings and speeches, I would go directly to Hillary's own website: HillaryClintonOffice.com.

I made this very simple request:

"I would like to know where I can locate copies of Hillary Clinton's writings and speeches in their entirety. Can you provide me links to these speeches?"

Instead of being provided the information I requested, I was asked to make a financial contribution.

I am going to place in writing what many people are thinking.

I responded to an "interview" of a Socialist alternative member in Philadelphia concerning this "15 or Fight" movement:


http://blogs.philadelphiaweekly.com/phillynow/2014/03/07/qa-socialist-alternative-member-on-fight-for-15-minimum-wage/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=qa-socialist-alternative-member-on-fight-for-15-minimum-wage


I'm not all that concerned with what members of this Trotskyite Socialist Alternative sect has to say since they didn't show up to support the struggle to save the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant nor have they ever taken a position in support of casino workers struggling for their rights.


After years of badmouthing anyone working with grassroots activists inside the Democratic Party all of a sudden this outfit joins with the Democrats and their foundation-funded front groups and hacks to bring forward the same old classless crap as the Democrats only upping their poverty wage.


I expected Minnesota Greens to support this "15 or Fight" initiative since they too refuse to enter the struggle for casino workers' rights and they joined with the Ford Motor Company to kill 2,000 jobs, demolish the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant and give the Ford Hydro Dam to a multi-national conglomerate to profit from.


Quite frankly, I support any improvement in the Minimum Wage. For working people, any Minimum Wage higher than $7.25 is a "better" wage.


Are we building a movement for a "Better Minimum Wage" or are we building a movement for the Minimum Wage to become a real "Living Wage?"


If we are for a "better" Minimum Wage I would suggest we just accept what the Democrats are willing to give us as part of their scam to get votes. $7.75 would be a good place to settle since it is most likely what we are going to get. Perhaps the Democrats will agree to legislation creeping up gradually $9.50 after a few years. That will get people off their backs through 2016.


I have noticed neither Socialist Alternative nor the Democrats have taken note of the $10.25 Minimum Wage that the Leech Lake Tribal Council has legislated for all tribal employees--- including casino workers. As far as I know, this is the highest Minimum Wage in the country that universally enforced. $10.25 is better than what the Democrats offer and it is more than what this tiny sectarian Trotskyite sect or the Greens will ever win.


If "better" is what we are after, I would suggest joining with most of the Democrats and their partners among the millionaire labor leaders, their front groups like Take Action Minnesota and Working America, and all these muddle-headed, upper-middle class pundits and hacks for whom politics is a form of sport because touch football is to tough and grueling in advancing a $9.50 Minimum Wage--- after all, $9.50 is better than $6.15 or $7.25 or $7.75 and we don't have to fight.


This was my response in PhillyNow:



Leave it to a small Trotskyite sect to join the Democrats to advocate a Minimum Wage that is less than a real living wage in relation to the actual “cost-of-living.”


For sure $15.00 an hour is better than $7.25; but, $15.00 an hour is still a poverty wage.



Are we seeking a Minimum Wage that is a real living wage or are we seeking a Minimum Wage that is a “better wage?”


$7.75 better than $7.25.


$9.50 is better than $7.75.


$10.10 is better than $9.50.


$15.00 IS BETTER THAN $10.10.


But, being a “better” Minimum Wage does not make the Minimum Wage a “living wage.”


Are we seeking to boost the Minimum Wage incrementally or are we seeking to establish a just Minimum Wage based on actual “cost-of-living” factors?


The one and only way to judge wages are in comparison to “cost-of-living;” right?


Everything else supports some kind of improved Minimum Wage or amounts to very superficial comparisons.
The person being interviewed for this article just casually tosses in mention of “cost-of-living” as if it is just one more factor to consider in relation to establishing the Minimum Wage.


“Cost-of-living” is not just another factor; it is the primary factor in determining what is a living and just wage.
For a working class family, the one and only relationship is that between wages and what it costs to live— cost-of-living; what can be purchased with wages paid.


$15.00 an hour and a few credit cards maxed out gets a working class family a decent “standard-of-living”… until bankruptcy hits.


This is the old Walter Reuther ploy— get workers by on wages and credit cards and workers will think they are doing good. It wasn't coincidental Walter Reuther surrounded himself with Trotskyites; his self-serving leadership "qualities" and working class betrayals required this kind of left-sectarian support.


If people are satisfied with replacing one poverty wage with another poverty wage that is up to them.
People willing to get by on $15.00 an hour and a few maxed out credit cards does not amount to a real living wage.


The only way to arrive at a real living wage is to legislatively tie the Minimum Wage directly to the actual “cost-of-living” based on the factors tracked by United States Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics findings compiled for the Consumer Price Index consisting of 8 categories each with 200 sub-categories.


This would then have to be tied to the real inflation rate for the basic necessities of life working class families purchase:


Food.


Clothing.


Rents/Mortgages.


Health care costs.


Transportation costs.


Child care costs.


Home/Auto Insurance.


Electricity.


Home heating costs.


Cost of higher education.


The government has failed to control any of these costs choosing, instead, to leave working class families at the mercy of the Wall Street monopolies fixing prices from which they derive super-profits in the same way these monopolies derive super-profits from any wages that are poverty wages.


On top of this base living Minimum Wage indexed to inflation there would be periodic increases allocated for an improved “standard of living.”


This all needs to be included as part of a reform package intended to upgrade the “New Deal” to meet today’s problems.


Included in such a reform package would be the need for a Basic Income Guarantee because any Minimum Wage that does not include a job with 40 hours of work still won’t provide a real living wage.


Also required would be a Full Employment Act mandating the president and Congress to attain and maintain full employment since workers without jobs are going to be poor.



We need a 21st Century Full Employment Act for Peace and Prosperity which would include these three basic reforms as an upgrade to the New Deal reforms.


Peace would have to be part of the package since it will be impossible to implement full employment without a huge “Peace Dividend.”


The government will have to create socially useful and necessary jobs to put everyone to work through programs like the WPA, CCC and C.E.T.A.because private enterprise and the free market have failed to overcome massive unemployment.


There are two things the American people desperately need:


Real health care reform and child care. Both provide massive job-creating opportunities. Both put people to work providing people what they need for improved lives and livelihoods.


A National Public Health Care System would create over 12-million new jobs putting people to work providing the American people with free health care through a network of community and neighborhood based health care centers.


A National Public Child Care System would put another three to five million people to work providing the American people with free child care.


Both of these programs would cost less than what we pump into the Military-Industrial Complex, squander on these never-ending dirty imperialist wars and what it is costing us to maintain over 800 U.S. military bases dotting the globe on foreign soil protecting Wall Street’s interests, assets and profits these greedy Wall Street “investors” seek to maximize their profits exploiting cheaper labor in the process of raping Mother Nature.



Both health care and child care should be based on the model provided by public education:


Public funding.


Public Administration.


Public delivery.


When all is said and done we need an anti-monopoly coalition and a broad-based working class based progressive people’s party capable of winning reforms AND challenging Wall Street for political and economic power.


We shouldn’t waste our time with these tiny, sectarian Trotskyite sects which opportunistically latch on to an issue in a less than honest manner because we have credible examples of actual anti-monopoly coalitions and parties that have worked— including the old socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party and its Farmer-Labor Association… both of which were smashed, after tremendous success, by government repression ordered by Wall Street.

More than Communists got purged from the labor movement.

"Cost-of-living" has been purged from our working-class vocabulary right along with the purging of Communists from the labor movement; coincidental?

To make way for concession bargaining and to prevent any meaningful discussion of wages.

We see this in the discussion taking place around the Minimum Wage and contract negotiations.

There is only one thing that wages can legitimately be compared to: "cost-of-living."

What can you purchase with your wages?

Your "standard-of-living" is determined by what you can purchase with your wages combined with access to universal social programs.

Something to think about:

When Communists were purged from the labor unions the millionaire labor leaders stopped talking about the relationship between wages and cost-of-living and concession bargaining began.

In addition, very simple yet truthful ideas are being left out of the national conversation spreading to the public square concerning poverty, income inequality and the Minimum Wage:

Workers paid poverty wages are going to be poor.

Workers without jobs are going to be poor.

We had better come up with real, specific solutions to both of these problems:

Paying workers real living wages in relation to cost-of-living.

Providing workers with real living wage jobs.

Question:

What is preventing every job from being a decent, living wage job?

Isn't this a legitimate question?

What about Polymet?

I generally agree with Tom Rukavina... 99.999% of the time. On this issue of sulfide-mining I, too, am in complete disagreement.

These so-called "hearings" are a fiasco--- window dressing for allowing the mining companies to do as they please in the name of "jobs, jobs, jobs" when the real issue is "profits, profits, profits."

I don't understand why anyone with labor's interest in mind would support permitting any other mining projects--- especially when nothing has been done to halt the decades of these mining companies swindling Iron Rangers out of their pensions while leaving behind polluted pits and massive poverty after they abscond with the profits.

United States Steel's huge MinnTac operation, the largest of its kind in the world has provided us with the "jewel" they call the "Clearwater Reservoir"--- what they call their gigantic tailing pond stretching for three miles and two miles wide--- leeching billions of gallons of the most dangerous contaminants and pollution into the Dark River and St. Louis River watersheds reaching into the depths of Lake Superior and even as far north as Hudson's Bay!

"Jobs, jobs, jobs"--- from 80,000 jobs in mining on the Iron Range to 12,000 jobs today.

Machines and technology have been allowed to replace workers.

While workers in the mining industry have been laid off; many of the remaining workers are forced to work ten and twelve hour days--- five, six and even seven days a week.

Want job creation in the mining industry?

Try a shorter work week with forty hours pay. Longer vacations. Earlier retirements with pension funds protected. Polymet will maybe create a few hundred jobs--- in the existing taconite industry, these kinds of reforms combined would create thousands of new union jobs.

Will Polymet be a union operation? Since the USW maintains a sweatheart agreement with Cleveland Cliffs to enable a gigantic non-union taconite operation at Silver Bay, judging from its current relationship of the way they are supporting this hideous Polymet project, it is doubtful the USW will ever try to organize Polymet. Jobs where workers unprotected without union contract have no rights; just what we need more of in Minnesota; like 44,000 casino workers employed in loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages and without any protections under state or federal labor laws isn't bad enough. 

I was glad to see and hear where rank-and-file union members of the United Steelworkers Union have organized a rank-and-file caucus, the Hard Rock Miners--- demanding that their pension funds be honored.

I would expect the entire Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party's Iron Range contingent to stand up in opposing any further mining permits--- at least until all of the pension funds of present and former miners have been honored. This is the very least these DFL politicians and party hacks can do.

These "public hearings" are meant to foment anger and sow confusion and discord  among the very people who should be united in making sure more mining companies are not allowed to shit on working people, the communities workers have to live in and the healthy ecosystems required for survival.

If not for the out of control Military-Industrial Complex requiring these non-ferrous minerals and metals, this mining would not even be under consideration. Why else would Congressman Rick Nolan have co-sponsored this legislation with Republicans protecting this mining Polymet as a "national security" project?

There are hundreds of projects that the government could undertake to provide Iron Rangers with jobs--- good jobs paying decent wages. Anyone can come up with a list of what needs to be done to improve the lives and livelihoods of people living in Appalachia North.

There are tens of thousands of existing jobs on the Iron Range that could be turned into good, decent, living wage jobs if only the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party with its super-majority would wield its power and pass Minimum Wage legislation making the Minimum Wage a real living wage based on cost-of-living, indexed to real inflation with regularly scheduled raises to improve the standard-of-living of working people--- of course, one has to ask why the unions affiliated with Change To Win and the Minnesota AFL-CIO have made nothing but half-hearted attempts to organize all of these workers? Isn't a good union contract better than any government anti-poverty program?

We should be telling the Minnesota DNR to take these hearings and shove them straight up their ass; what we need is a series of roundtable discussions bringing workers together to talk about all of this in a civil way; do we have a democracy that will tolerate this?

Many years ago, both socialist Farmer-Labor governors, Floyd Olson and Elmer Benson proposed that if mining was going to continue with our communities and jobs protected and the profits from mining going to make life better for people, mining was going to have to be brought under public ownership.

Were their concerns legitimate?

Apparently so given what the situation is today on the Iron Range--- yet, why isn't this idea of public ownership of the mining industry being brought forward and discussed here and now?

Wouldn't it make more sense to put all proposed mining projects on hold until public ownership has been discussed rather than allowing these mining companies to come in--- exploit workers, swindle them out of their pensions as they rape the land leaving nothing behind but massive poverty and a dirty mess for tax-payers to clean up?

The Minimum Wage... more thoughts.

Many articles are being written about the Minimum Wage. Most of these articles are nothing but nonsense as far as working people are concerned--- or should be concerned.

Most of the articles in the mainstream media only have one purpose: to confuse and disorient working people.

But even articles in the alternative media often fail to get it right.

I think some of the articles makes a lot of good points but have some very faulty conclusions in my opinion.

The number one problem is these articles mainly compare the Minimum Wage to everything except the actual "cost-of-living" and this is the one and only thing that really counts.

Also, I don't agree that 60% of the industrial wages is what we should be aiming for.

First of all because industrial wages are falling mainly because of concession contracts--- even in Canada, but worse here in the U.S. where labor is much weaker.

Second; because everyone has the right to real living wage jobs no matter what those jobs are.

Third; most industrial workers can't get by without using at least several credit cards usually always nearly maxed out.

Working class debt is not even part of the discussion at this point--- because you can purchase what you need to live on credit does this mean you are receiving a real living wage? Of course not.

Studies show most working class families are only a paycheck or two or three away from poverty and often bankruptcy and losing their homes and cars.

At least Canadians don't experience medical bankruptcies but even excluding this, most working class families in the United States and Canada are living at, or very near, poverty--- when actual cost-of-living factors are considered.

The U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics is the most thorough and credible government agency in the world when it comes to tracking actual "cost-of-living" factors which the U.S. Congress has required them to call the "Consumer Price Index" which includes eight categories with each of those eight categories having 200 or so sub-categories.

You won't find most U.S. or Canadian politicians, nor even labor leaders, talking about "cost-of-living;" and, in my opinion, this is why we haven't been able to win a Minimum Wage that is a real living wage.

I think this concept is very important:

We shouldn't be talking about a living wage as if it is not connected to the Minimum Wage.

We need to be very clear: We want the Minimum Wage to be a real living wage. If anyone disagrees with this let them have the moral, political and intellectual courage to argue otherwise.

The whole idea is to win, through struggle, a Minimum Wage that is a real living wage and the ONLY way to accomplish this is to legislatively tie the Minimum Wage to all "cost-of-living" factors, then determine the LEGITIMATE inflation rate and recalculate for inflation quarterly with periodic increases in the Minimum Wage just for the sole purpose of improving the Standard of Living of working people.

The fact of the matter is, the working class has one inflation rate and the wealthy quite another. Inflation doesn't matter to anyone if you have the money to purchase whatever you want. Have you ever heard a wealthy person complain about the price of hamburger or a gallon of milk or a loaf of bread or the price of gas or electricity or the cost of heating their home?

I challenge anyone to tell me there is any other way to arrive at a just Minimum Wage other than tying it to "cost-of-living."

In fact, the greatest advances in union organizing have been achieved when the unions focused on wages in relation to "cost-of-living."

Employers cringe when they hear wages compared to "cost-of-living." And they should because when workers fight for wages in line with "cost-of-living" business profits are going to be diminished--- should we care about their profits? Hell no! Because workers create the wealth.

Don't like what I write? Don't read it. Simple as that.

People have written me suggesting I stop using words like "imperialism," "Dumb Donkey," "Democratic Party hack," "foundation funded outfit," "company mole," "greedy bastards," "warmonger," "millionaire labor leader," "racist white mobsters," "goddamn," "the Israeli killing machine," and so on and so forth.

I never really know how to respond to these "concerns."

My position, quite frankly, and what I tell those complaining, is that they aren't being forced to read anything I write and if they disagree with what I write to simply respond instead of taking these cheap shots.

Usually, I think, although I can't explain the motives of others, is that this is being used as a way to try to try silence and censor me because there is disagreement with my ideas--- and instead of expressing their disagreement with me, it is just simpler for them to try to pressure me not to state my views.

I bring this up because Ken Martin, the Chair of the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party, recently told a group of people they should "monitor" my FaceBook posts and my blog posts and file complaints with my Internet Service Provider, Blogger.com and FaceBook anytime they found anything that might be considered "offensive" and in violation of their established standards.

What a morally, ethically and intellectually bankrupt way to participate in the political process.

Why doesn't this piece of donkey dung just come out and post his own responses to me? Goddamn chicken shit... Bakkk, Bak, Bak, Bak, Bak, Baaakkkk.

Wouldn't you know it; these Dumb Donkeys conducted an experiment using the wrong wage.

This Democratic Party front group set up by the AFL-CIO, Working America, sent out this letter (see below).

Please read it very closely.

In my opinion there is something very demented and perverse about this letter.

These Dumb Donkeys are living for a week on the current Federal Minimum wage of $7.25 instead of trying to live on the $9.50 an hour they are proposing.

This is very typical of the way these Democrats operate.

Why wouldn't they try living on their pathetic miserly proposed poverty wage of $9.50 an hour? Wouldn't this be the real test since EVERYONE already knows no one can live on $7.25?

Quite frankly, no one can even live on $15.00 an hour without maxing out a few credit cards until they have to declare bankruptcy.

We have gone from hearing these politicians and their front groups talking about "Elect us if you want the Minimum Wage to be a living wage" to "American needs a raise" to "$9.50 will help" to what the Democrats in the Minnesota State Senate propose instead of $9.50--- "$7.75 is better than $7.25."

These dishonest morons know full well their Democratic counterparts in the Minnesota State Senate are proposing to reach a "compromise" at $7.75--- and furthermore, they are well aware that Mark Dayton has met with the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce (more commonly referred to as the "Minnesota DFL Business Caucus because Democrats don't like people to know they work behind closed doors with the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce to give working people the shaft). Dayton and this "DFL Business Caucus" have agreed the Minimum Wage should not be raised over $8.00 an hour.

Of course this "liberal" billionaire Governor Dayton whose inherited wealth was, and is, being derived almost exclusively from the super-exploitation of Minimum Wage workers who are more often then not subjected to the double-whammy of not just poverty wages but wage theft.

Come on, really; did these Minnesota State legislators have "to spread the word about how hard it really is to live on $7.25 an hour?"

Don't they really have to "prove" that a human being can live on their proposed $9.50 an hour?

Slick as shit the way they pulled off this bait (a living wage) and switch (another poverty wage). Saying one thing to get votes; doing another thing to keep the corporate bribes coming.

Bait and switch is illegal in the retail world; not in the world of politics.

Anyways, read this letter for yourself...



Alan,

We've learned a lot this past week.

Because of our participants across the state, we've helped to spread the word about how hard it really is to live on $7.25 an hour.

We walked through some of the biggest hurdles minimum wage earners have to face, and had real conversations with workers across Minnesota about why a raise is important to them.

We've gotten close, and we need you to act now. Will you contact your state lawmakers now?

Alan, no one should have to skip a meal just to afford bus fare to work. Raising the wage to $9.50 is a start that will help thousands of Minnesota workers.

Can you do one final thing and make sure HR 92 passes the Senate?

It's been a great week, so thank you for participating. For taking action, following along online and engaging with the Challenge in all the ways that you did.

We can do this.

Thanks for all that you do,

Bree Halverson
State Director, Working Minnesota

P.S. Check out all of the photos and blog posts from the week.

AFSCME members in Minnesota are not happy campers.

Rank-and-file AFSCME workers in Minnesota say: We don't want Eliot Seide and his toothless, management-loving paper union

Minnesota's billionaire "liberal" "pro-labor" governor, Mark Dayton, has ordered working hours for thousands of state employees reduced by up to 20% while bringing in lower-paid new hires to do the jobs of the members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees with no objections from the District Director, Eliot Seide, or his side-kick, Eric Lehto. Why no opposition from Shar Knutson, President of the Minnesota AFL-CIO or her side-kick Mark Froemke.

What is going on here? State employees are losing 20% of their pay--- their standard of living slashed--- and these union "leaders" sit in silence doing nothing?

No wonder this leaflet is being distributed by a rank-and-file organization made up of AFSCME members who are pissed off:

We don't want Eliot Seide and his toothless, management-loving paper union

Our Dues - Our Union.

OUR AFSCME

Our rights.

Our Livelihoods.

Building a rank and file caucus for a democratic, fighting, militant, united union.

Brothers and Sisters,

With every new contract we have had our rights and our livelihoods decimated. Only a paper union with leaders taking our dues while doing nothing to represent us would have allowed this to happen.

This isn't Eliot Seide's union. This is our union. Let Eliot Seide go into the business world to build his fortune instead of building his fortune on our backs, off our unresolved grievances and problems.

Eliot Seide negotiated a concession contract with a Democratic governor.

The wage increases are far off-set with the rising prices we pay for groceries, home mortgages and rents, home and car insurance, gas, electricity, home heating fuels, child care and college tuition for our children. Our co-pays for healthcare have increased. This is going backwards, not forwards.

Our pensions are at risk.

We get no support or help from union leaders as unfair and unpaid disciplinary suspensions mount. Grievances have become a hassle. Arbitration has become too costly. What do our dues pay for?

One by one we are being picked off and fired as we gain seniority with increased pay levels.

Our union has shamefully endorsed a Minimum Wage for other workers based on what the Chamber of Commerce wants instead of the living wage morality, human decency, justice and solidarity requires.

We have a union leadership covering its betrayals with glowing hypocritical statements of admiration to real leaders like Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela as a cover for refusing to stand and fight the injustices of the present.

We ask you to build a caucus of OUR AFSCME in your AFSCME local and in your workplace. Together we can get our AFSCME back on course. This is OUR union. OUR dues.

We need an active and involved membership. We need to understand self-serving power in our union and the power of management concede nothing without struggle. Our union was built in struggle. Our union will survive in struggle fighting for our rights, for safe workplaces and for our livelihoods.

Forward together. Together In Struggle. Together in Solidarity. OUR AFSCME the voice of the rank-and-file

All out for Earth Day and May Day!

From Earth Day to May Day--- everyone an activist doing something to advance a real progressive agenda.

There are plenty of jobs in this country--- these jobs just have to be turned into good jobs with real living wages and decent benefits; the work week reduced with 40 hour pay; longer paid vacations; earlier retirements with real living pensions. We need a Minimum Wage that is a real living wage. We need huge government jobs programs putting people to work doing socially useful things solving the problems of the people and our country. We need a Basic Income Guarantee based on cost-of-living. We need a full employment act requiring the president and Congress to work together to attain and maintain full employment instead of waging these dirty imperialist wars--- the money saved could easily fund everything here.

In short, we need to create a government that puts the standard of living and quality of life for everyone before Wall Street's profits.

Unless we can come together and successfully challenge Wall Street for political and economic power we are doomed.

Every worker needs a job paying real living wages.

These wars are making us all poor with the exception of the few people from the Wall Street crowd who profit as this Military-Industrial Complex leaves behind horrendous death and destruction with the largest carbon footprint contributing to global warming and climate change... and if these foundation-funded environmental organization's over-paid "leaders" who have the same backwards views as these millionaire labor "leaders" with their over-staffed organizations playing footsies with politicians and their corporate donors (the "philanthropists) instead of mobilizing people for real reforms as we struggle for power, we are doomed.

We should bring together everyone for peace, those concerned about climate change and everyone who believes America's workers are entitled to a raise in united actions commencing on Earth Day without let-up through May Day.

Can we survive under capitalism?

I was glad to see an instructor from Naugatuck Valley Community College, Waterbury, Connecticut, Leonard Yannielli, publish this on the internet as part of what he wrote on the environment:

The single greatest global problem and threat to the environment is war and war preparations. Agent Orange use in the U.S. War in Vietnam killed an area the size of Massachusetts. Genetic damage among ensuing generations has occurred among the Vietnamese.

The burning of the oil fields during Iraq War I is a more recent example. Both Iraqi and U.S. forces suffered the respiratory consequences. No one entity uses more nonrenewal resources than the U.S. Military. All these examples may pale in face of the dangers of spent radioactive material that spew radiation for 1,000s of years.

The explanation of war and its extreme environmental consequences are to be found in the bowels of capitalism. The tendency of rates of profits to fall send competing capitalist elements around the globe seeking to stop this trend. Going to places whose people are not in a position to defend nature is their "solution."

An unfortunate example now is the so-called "pivot to Asia." The U.S. Administration is deploying up to 60% of its military force there. Why? It is looking to exploit natural resources such as oil and gas.

War and war preparations along with peace and peace making construct one dialectical whole. The resolution of this contradiction in favor of peace is of major importance to the many who place nature before profits. Here lies the material basis for cooperation between the labor, peace and environmental movements. The blue-green alliance is one result that needs much more attention in our work both on state and local levels.

Socialism has the best chance to do it right vis a vis the environment. Its thrust for social solidarity and raising the cultural/educational level of all the people can only bode well for the environment. Of course, there are no guarantees. Immersion in environmental struggles would be the best determiner of a Left and peoples movement with a deep environmental consciousness.

"Lesser evil" politics creates some very troubling thought patterns.

I'm wondering what kind of country we have become where politics has reached the point where we are willing to trade a Supreme Court appointment of dubious value and worth for the lives of children killed in drone attacks whose young lives are written off as "collateral damage?"

Is "social media" a movement or a tool for change?

My experience with this "social media" has been that far too many people aren't going beyond this "social media" to actually get out among people to talk, meet face-to-face and engage in action of one kind or another.

We need to bring people out into the streets; we need to organize a new political movement and party that is anti-capitalist, anti-monopoly, anti-imperialist which has as its objective challenging Wall Street for political and economic power where people are brought together to create the kind of country at peace most people want to live in... where people come before profit.

In my opinion, we need to view "social media" as one of many tools we need to use, but not exclusively use, for social change.

Get out and share what you learn via social media with friends, neighbors, people you work with.

Organize little meetings with a few people around your kitchen table or in your living room. Organize bigger meetings, forums, debates and roundtables in church basements, community centers and union halls.

How many young Americans have come back from these dirty wars wounded, mangled, insane and in body bags as hundreds of thousands of people have had to suffer and die in these dirty imperialist wars from which Wall Street profits?

"Shared prosperity" is a false hope under capitalism. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

We are all very lucky the rich don't like to work or they would have killed us all off a long time ago.

Big blowhard Richard Trumka holds another press conference.

Big blowhard millionaire labor "leader" Richard Trumka holds another press conference. Every time Trumka talks, workers lose:

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Union-leaders-view-Texas-as-fertile-ground-5243221.php

The TPP

Get ready for the same contingent of phony "liberals," "progressives" and "leftists" who sold Obama as something other than the neo-liberal Wall Street imperialist warmonger that he is to get him elected--- all of whom went on to betray us on health care and the Minimum Wage becoming a real living wage--- now going against us on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

I would suggest that you take the time to read this article from The Hill:

http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/trade/198665-froman-makes-the-case-for-white-house-trade-agenda

and then Froman's speech itself:

http://www.ustr.gov/about-us/press-office/press-releases/2014/February/A-Values-Driven-Trade-Policy_Remarks-by-USTR-Froman-at-Center-for-American-P

If you only read the news reports about this speech and not the speech itself you will be sorry.

Obama continues to wage Wall Street's war on the working class, not only in our our country, but across the globe, by advancing the TPP.

Those who fear discussing "imperialism" and the socialist alternative to capitalism in its most decadent and barbaric stage of imperialism because doing so is some kind of "infantile leftism" are doing working people a great disservice.

Now, more than ever, we need to be providing the American people with and anti-imperialist education in building an anti-imperialist movement to fight against the TPP.

Those who "liberals," "progressives" and "leftists" who promote this idea are dividing our movements which would be capable of winning peace, real reforms, real change and most importantly challenging Wall Street for political and economic power:

"The emergence of an extreme far-right accelerated sharply in reaction to the overturning of the eight-year rule of the right wing with the 2008 election of Barack Obama, an African American and a liberal with a grassroots base and generally progressive agenda."

Obama has a right-wing agenda because he is carrying out Wall Street's agenda of wars abroad paid for through austerity measures here at home.

To suggest that Obama, the drone President carrying out Wall Street's thoroughly reactionary right-wing neo-liberal agenda, is a "liberal" with a "progressive agenda" is adding to the confusion that already exists in this country.

Such "analysis" is inconsistent with anti-imperialist education and building an anti-imperialist movement.

No matter what "spin" Ambassador Froman attaches to the TPP it is part and parcel of Obama's reactionary Wall Street imperialist agenda and this can never be "liberal," "progressive" or "left" by any stretch of anyone's imagination nor using linguistics to creatively twists and bastardize language to make Obama appear as something that he is not.

The logical conclusion one would have to draw from calling Obama a "liberal" with a "progressive agenda" is that imperialism is liberal and progressive.

Is there anyone prepared to make this assumption?

Would anyone believe this?

What "values" drive U.S. trade policy?

Isn't U.S. trade policy driven by Wall Street's insatiable greed?

Isn't this what the TPP is all about? Wall Street greed?

Megan Rice, an octogenarian nun and seasoned peace activist, was sentenced to 35 months in prison after breaking into the grounds of a nuclear weapons complex once considered the "Fort Knox" of weapons-grade uranium.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/USA-Update/2014/0218/Nun-sentenced-to-35-months-in-prison-for-antinuclear-peace-protest-video

Minneapolis Uniting People for Progressive Power Forum

Really great videos of the Minneapolis Uniting People for Progressive Power Forum held on Saturday, February 15, 2014:

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/86897833

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/86897834

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/87011603

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/87011606

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/87011605

http://vimeo.com/album/2739033/video/87026372

President Scott Walker?

Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama...

Now President Scott Walker?

Could it be?

How much worse could it possibly get?

There is no light at the end of the tunnel. We are on the road straight to hell.

Wall Street will keep on dishing out this crap as long as we are willing to take it.

Hillary Clinton versus Scott Walker.

Do you suppose we will be hearing: "You have to vote the lesser evil."

Oh, ya; I know... now is not the time to be talking about a working class based progressive people's party--- the consequences of a Walker presidency are just too much to bear... or is it bare.

We are told we can't get along without the Democrats.

The phony "liberals," "progressives" and "leftists" will be telling us Hillary Clinton is a liberal with a progressive agenda as they tell us how much they would like single-payer, real living wages, jobs for everyone and what a great idea Tom Paine had with his Basic Income Guarantee and how drone warfare is better than dying U.S. soldiers and how we should just overlook how all these Democrats back the Israeli killing machine.

If only we have patience real reforms and peace are sure to come.

Even real liberals, progressives and leftists appear ready to accept legalization of marijuana as the only achievable victory possible as it is easier and less controversial to advance the legalization of pot than a National Public Health Care System, National Public Child Care, real living wages based on cost-of-living, Basic Income Guarantee and a full employment act. Don't talk about and advance these social programs through a new party and then sit around smoking joints complaining we don't get any of this.

Hippies without politics, hippies without struggle is what passes for liberalism, progressivism and leftism.

I think it is pathetic more "activists" will turn out for a demonstration to legalize marijuana then will turn out to demonstrate for peace.

Minnesota's Democratic Governor with a Democratic super-majority says the main controversial issue in the upcoming legislative session will be the legalization of pot.

Needless to say, Governor Dayton doesn't want his campaign promise for a real living--- non-poverty--- Minimum Wage to become the point of controversy in this legislative session when the Minimum Wage comes up--- he wants another poverty wage passed and wants to see us jumping for joy that whatever passes is better than the present $6.15 an hour.

Like suckers, activists will take Dayton's bait on marijuana.

And the claim is: Marijuana doesn't affect the thought process.

Then again, we have a Democratic Governor who admits he is an alcoholic who can't shake the bottle and who acknowledges he suffers from severe depression while using heavy-duty psychiatric drugs but says he is opposed to the legalization of marijuana.

What a circus.

Wall Street just loves the show.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/20/us/wisconin-political-investigation.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20140220&_r=1

Stupid labor "leaders."

Talking about stupid labor leaders... the AFL-CIO has been pumping cash into defeating this Republican Governor by supporting her Democratic Party opponent...

Check out the stupidity of where this "lesser of two evils" has brought us:

And how is the Right-to-Work Democrat opposing her any better?

http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20140220/PC16/140229984

The "lesser of two evils" politics makes strange bedfellows... I wonder how much the AFL-CIO will contribute to these rotten Democrats in South Carolina?

In case you don't want to read the entire article:

"Haley's likely opponent in this year's election, Camden Sen. Vincent Sheheen, says South Carolina should remain a right-to-work state where employees decide whether to join a union."

And to look at this a little more in-depth placing all of this in perspective---

AFL-CIO unions, including the IAM, have pumped more money into Sheheen's campaign than what they have spent trying to organize Boeing in South Carolina.

Hypocrisy

Have you ever seen anything more hypocritical than this? Leech Lake tribal politicians erect these signs than continue to allow smoking in their three casinos--- The Palace, Northern Lights and White Oak--- employing hundreds of workers?

One has to wonder what kind of "sacred circle" the corrupt Leech Lake Tribal Chair, Carri Jones, believes in.

The Minimum Wage.

My position is the Minimum Wage needs to be legislatively tied to all cost of living factors, then indexed to inflation with periodic increases to provide workers with improved living standards. If tied to the U.S. Dept. of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index the Minimum Wage would be between $22.00 to $26.00 an hour.

We need a non-sectarian left movement to become a catalyst for change.

Several people have been discussing the need for a Great Lakes Regional Roundtable to discuss building a movement that would:

1. Work towards making the Minimum Wage a real living wage;

2. Bring forward legislation for a Basic Income Guarantee;

3. Place real Full Employment legislation on the table.

We want to meet in time to have an impact during the 2016 Elections and would hope that organizing this kind of roundtable would have an impact on the 2014 Elections, too. We need unity around bringing forward specific solutions... this doesn't require ideological unity.

We would like to hear from those interested where and when this roundtable discussion should take place.

Place your thoughts here or send me a private message or call me: 218-386-2432

Are we really supposed to believe Obama is the cat's meow when all of Hillary Clinton's suporters are trying to distance her from Obama? I would think if Obama was as great as they claimed Hillary would want to run on his shirt tail.

Hillary Clinton's supporters are on a massive campaign to distance themselves from Obama; they have to in order to win... although it is my personal opinion that we are probably looking at the next president being a Republican like Scott Walker, Rick Snyder or Pat McCrory--- all of whom have policies almost identical to Barack Obama; after all, the Democrats and Republicans are different teams but they both have the same owner: Wall Street.

It's like watching Don King promoting a boxing match where he is also the bookie who owns both fighters

If an Elmer Gantry like Barack Obama could be packaged and sold by Madison Avenue anyone else can be packaged and sold to the American people, too.

We who are fed up with this debacle and fiasco after fiasco and war upon war with expanding, instead of shrinking, poverty need to make ourselves understood that:

1. We aren't buying into this "lesser evil" crap any longer;

2. That running a candidate who has the ability to deprive the Democrats of votes they need to win is power, too.

We need to run candidates supporting real solutions to our problems no matter if they take votes away from the Democrats.

What gives these Democrats the right to expect our votes when we get absolutely nothing in return for our votes?

We should each and everyone of us be personally insulted when anyone tells us we need to join them in voting for the "lesser evil." This is an insult to our intelligence not to mention it makes a mockery of democracy.

Do you notice that not one of these people trying to convince us that everything will change if we just give the Democrats a super-majority at the national level that not one of these people will explain what is taking place here in Minnesota where Democrats are "known" to be the most "progressive" in the United States?

The only comfort they can give us about having a Democratic super-majority here in Minnesota is "that at least we don't have Republicans."

If this makes up for poverty wages, not having a job, having mining companies polluting the air, water and land along with having 44,000 Minnesotans forced to work in loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages and without any rights under state or federal labor laws all brought to us courtesy of the Democrats without any help from the Republicans; if this is acceptable to those still trying to shove these Democrats down our throats then they should stick with their dirty, corrupt Democratic Party--- but, they should at least have the political courage to defend what these Democrats are doing.

But; it is just like the way they have glamorized Hubert H. Humphrey--- they like to quote his illustrious words from speeches but they don't want to own his authorship of the most reactionary piece of legislation in U.S. history: the anti-democratic, fascist Communist Control Act.

Why don't these "progressives" and "liberals" want to own Hubert H. Humphrey's Communist Control Act?

Because they needed the Communist Control Act to eradicate and destroy the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party and its Farmer-Labor Association which had become, under the leadership of Socialists and Communists, the most powerful anti-monopoly coalition in this country.

By the way--- during the time when the socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party was the most powerful political party in Minnesota, both the Republicans and Democrats were relegated to minor party status.

And what did these Democrats who don't want us to consider building a new political party do during this period? Why, they joined with the Republicans to try to thwart the reforms brought forward by the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party.

Yes; these Democrats who tell us how bad and rotten the Republicans are actually joined these Republicans in their dirty, filthy racist and anti-Semitic campaign to elect that two-bit half-assed fascist--- Republican--- Harold Stassen in order to defeat our socialist Governor Elmer Benson who was--- unarguably--- the most honest politician ever in Minnesota history.

These Democrats now lecturing us about how we need to vote for the "lesser evil" joined with the most evil of evil to defeat the best of the best.

And when they couldn't put an end to the left-wing voices of labor, for peace and against racism and anti-Semitism, these dirty bastards cheered on Hubert H. Humphrey bringing forward his fascist Communist Control Act.

It is almost funny, if not so sad; that in spite of over six decades of anti-Communism these shit asses couldn't prevent the most outspoken Communist in Minnesota from being elected to its State Central Committee--- they had to revert to engaging in the most dirty deeds to remove me from the State Central Committee. Dirty deeds that included announcing the time and place of the Roseau County Convention and then changing the time and location without telling anyone except for a small group of their friends about the change leaving less than 20 people to choose a new member of the State Central Committee while leaving over 90 of us shivering in a cold rain waiting for the doors to open at the designated place.

This is how these purveyors of the "lesser evil" work and operate; completely outside of the parameters any thinking person would conceive democracy to be.

But, we are just supposed to forget history--- past and most recent present--- and vote for the Dumb Donkeys these people bring forward.

Did I mention that our billionaire governor who was married to a Rockefeller who campaigned on the promise of enacting a living Minimum Wage and then once elected has pushed another poverty Minimum Wage of $9.50 an hour and has now met in secret with the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce and the Business Caucus of the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party promising the Minimum Wage will be no more than $8.00 an hour?

Never mind "Goddamn Mississippi;" Goddamn Democrats. Just substitute Democrats for Mississippi:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVQjGGJVSXc

Oh!

Wait!

Goddamn!

It was Democrats Nina Simone was singing about!

Liars from MoveOn.org supporting Obama got us into this mess; let them figure out how to get out of it on their own.

Our friends at MoveOn.org are very worried the Republicans are poised to capture control of the U.S. Senate this fall--- they want your time, your money and your vote.

I wouldn't waste my time, my money or my vote on a bunch of Dumb Donkeys whose priorities lie with wasting the wealth of our Nation on wars and bailing out Wall Street banks and industries instead of providing for the needs of the people.

They have good reason to be worried since Obama and the Democrats refused to deliver on any of their promises.

They tell us the Affordable Care Act is in jeopardy--- like anyone should care if it's repealed; good riddance I say. It's time to advance the demand for a National Public Health Care System which would put millions of people to working providing us all with free health care--- just like public education: public funding, public administration and public delivery. Tell the insurance companies and the rest of the profiteers to go to hell.

MoveOn.org should have thought of the consequences when they started creating the lies that Obama is some kind of liberal with a progressive agenda.

What would we get from Obama and the Democrats if voters purged each and every Republican from the House and Senate?

If there wasn't one single Republican in the House or Senate Obama and the Democrats wouldn't do any different then they are doing now.

Anyone who doesn't believe this needs only to look at what is going on in Minnesota where the Democrats have a super-majority with each and everyone of these Democrats claiming to be "progressive."

And what are we, as working people, getting out of the Democratic super-majority here in Minnesota?

Let me tell you what we are getting:

Shit.

Worse yet; we are getting shit on.

Initiating movements

Working people can initiate movements and have greater say in existing movements.

Here is what we often do:

1. Write a Letter to the Editor;

2. Send the Letter to the Editor to politicians;

3. Turn the Letter to the Editor into Precinct Caucus resolutions, resolutions for different organizations;

4. Turn the Letter to the Editor into a petition or statement for others to sign;

5. Turn the Letter to the Editor (often two or three letters on the same topic but from slightly different perspectives) into leaflets;

6. Use all the above for tabling with banners;

7. Use the Letters to the Editor as a call to meetings, pickets and demonstrations.

8. Use the Letter to the Editor as an outline for talks, speeches, forums and debates.

9. Use the Letter to the Editor as a platform to run for public office.

10. Always conscious of trying to build a movement.

The thing is to be persistent and never give up until you get what you are after or unless you lose... if you lose, then try to merge your work with another ongoing struggle so all is not lost.

"Kitchen table" issues require working people coming together around the kitchen table creating organizations which become part of larger movements. Try to fill all four chairs around the kitchen table.

Obviously there are fairly well organized movements for peace, a living wage, health care reform we can all plug into.

Other issues are out there that movements need to be built around from the ground up.

I guess we have to think in terms of every person a "citizen lobbyist" but it sure would help if we had a massive "People's Lobby" we could all plug into that was serving notice on politicians that we intend to build a political party that would be part of our movements challenging Wall Street for political and economic power so we could finally get the kind of country we can all be proud to live in.

In my opinion, and what I have found, is that when you are willing to write down your views and sign your name for the public to consider, you immediately gain credibility.

Try writing a Letter to the Editor and experiment with the above suggestions.


Example of a Letter to the Editor that has helped to influence a movement and served as a catalyst to spark a movement:

Where is the real minimum wage?

Published 9:00am Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Albert Lea Tribune

http://www.albertleatribune.com/2013/12/where-is-the-real-minimum-wage/

Holiday shoppers and voters should beware of the bait and switch.


Bait and switch is an illegal advertising gimmick in the retail world; but, in politics bait and switch has become the way of life, the new normal.

For example: Obama campaigned for the Democratic Party’s nomination telling everyone, everywhere he went, he was for a single-payer universal health care system like they have in Canada; this was the bait.

Once elected, Obama pulled a switch and delivered Obamacare/Romneycare or as it should be known, the Health Insurance and Pharmaceutical Industry Bailout and Profit Maximization Act of 2010.

Another example: Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party Gov. Mark Dayton campaigned for office saying he would raise the minimum wage to a real living wage — this was the bait. Once elected, Dayton, a multibillionaire, is now pushing a miserly increase in the minimum wage which would keep the minimum wage a poverty wage — the switch.

Buyer (voter) beware of bait and switch.

The Minnesota DFL Party has a super-majority. Republicans have no say about anything; all they can do is cry.

We should at least be able to get a real living minimum wage out of these Democrats corresponding to actual cost-of-living factors as tracked and monitored by the United States Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics — the minimum wage should also be indexed to inflation with periodic increases to improve the living standards of working people.

Working people are entitled to this in return for their votes, especially from a political party which makes the claim that it is for labor.

If there are any obstacles the Democrats are encountering that would prevent them from implementing a real living — non-poverty — minimum wage, I would like to hear what the impediment is.

Alan L. Maki

director of organizing

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council

Warroad

The above Letter to the Editor led to this Open Letter to the Governor of Minnesota being drafted with the participation and agreement by many people. It is now being circulated:

January 2014

An Open Letter . . .

TO:  Governor Mark Dayton and the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party Legislative Caucus.

FROM:  Your Constituents

Enough!  We are not waiting any longer!

As DFL candidates, you campaigned on a promise to enact legislation that provides low-wage workers a real, living wage — not just a “minimum” wage.

Your campaign language explicitly called for “workers being entitled to living wages!”  It promised a Living Wage Act, but no progress was made in your first super-majority session.

All it would take, you said, was for Minnesotans to give the DFL a super-majority. Well, we voters delivered it to you!  You have it! But now, instead of advancing Living Wage legislation, the DFL is floating another “minimum wage” bill that will just perpetuate poverty wages for many Minnesota workers!

For years, the DFL leadership has claimed Republicans were the lone obstacle to establishing a Living Wage in our state. That obstacle has been removed. You are now in the driver’s seat!

We, the workers of Minnesota, gave you the legislative votes to enact the Living Wage legislation you promised us.

We expect you now to do so.  You could call it “The Minnesota Living Wage Act of 2014.”

Most importantly, we need to begin with a realistic dollar amount. Living Wages need to be calculated based on realistic levels of cost-of-living. U.S. Census data suggests at least $15 per hour; while, based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), hourly wages of $22 and $26 at 40 hrs/week are needed to cover basic necessities. When making decisions on determining basic needs for a dignified life, the testimony from low-income Minnesotans should also be taken into consideration.

 A Living Wage must also be subject to regular cost-of-living adjustments. The Consumer Price Index is our best indicator, and it should be used to adjust a new Minnesota Living Wage level quarterly or at least semi-annually.

If you should fail to enact such legislation, we will assume that you were just baiting us with nice-sounding campaign rhetoric, and that you are pulling a switch on us by simply advancing more employer-friendly “minimum wage” legislation, that does nothing to alleviate the hardships of Minnesota’s working poor.

Perhaps you think any increase is better than nothing.  We don’t!

Minnesota has long been considered a progressive bellwether.  Do something significant now for her working men and women. It is what everybody morally deserves  —  the prospect of a dignified life.

Be courageous. Lead our state — and our nation — in securing the right of every worker to earn a decent living. 

It can begin with the Minnesota Living Wage Act of 2014.

You can make it happen!

Sincerely,

Your fellow Minnesotans 

(as the undersigned, with our signatures attached herein)

Check out this blog talk radio program hosted by Stewart Alexander as we discussed Obama's State of the Union Address and what kind of program the left needs to bring forward:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/airamarteifio/2014/02/04/the-socialist-insight-dialectics

Minimum Wage

Questions surrounding the Minimum Wage continue to persist.

Should we just pick a poverty wage number out of the hat and allow the politicians to carry on with their own self-serving political interests?

Yes, $15.00 would definitely "help" many people; but, the fact remains that is still a poverty wage.

The Chair of the Minnesota Select Committee on Living Wage Jobs, Democratic State Representative Ryan Winkler, after calling me a liar for over a year, has finally acknowledged that here in Minnesota, which is one of the lower cost-of-living states, requires a Minimum Wage somewhere between $24.00 and $28.00 an hour for the wage to be considered a "living wage."

There is the argument that the Minimum Wage can't be raised so drastically from $6.15 to $24.00 in one fell swoop... well, why not?

Haven't these employers been pocketing the wages they have been cheating workers out of over these many years the Minimum Wage has been a poverty wage?

Just think of the hardship and suffering working class families have had to endure for all these years because of the pathetic miserly Minimum Wage. This has to count for something.

Quite frankly, employers and these politicians should be very happy workers would be satisfied with getting a real living wage and aren't going to initiate a class action lawsuit to get the back-pay they are entitled to.

If we can't get a real living wage out of this Democratic super-majority we have here in Minnesota with each and every one of these Democrats making the boast that they are "progressive;" then what can we ever expect to get out of the Democrats except for their dirty wars--- and Obamacare... the "Health Insurance and Pharmaceutical Industry Bailout and Profit Maximization Act of 2010?"

We have to step up the struggle for a real living wage based on cost-of-living; we must take this struggle into the proverbial "public square" in a way people will have the opportunity to mull all of this over.

Democracy and the standard of living of the American people requires no less than this kind of open and frank discussion with the involvement of working people.

Should Socialists and Communists engage in electoral struggles?

The election of a socialist to public office in this country is treated as some kind of novelty by both the mainstream media and most of the alternative and even left media; why?

This was my response to an article on a left wing web page and note I attached to it in an e-mail I sent out. A lot of people are being subjected to the lie that Socialists and Communists do not remain true once elected to public office in capitalist governments:

Socialists and Communists can, and more often than not, often do, "keep true" once elected to public office.

This has been proven time, and time, again. Examples are the socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party, the most successful third party ever here in the United States. Even as Socialists and Communists were fighting tooth and nail at the national level, here in Minnesota they had the good common sense to figure out that if they worked together they could accomplish a great deal.

In more recent years there was the tremendous success of the Howard Pawley led socialist New Democratic Party majority government in Manitoba, Canada.

Fortunately, former New Democratic Party Premier Howard Pawley has written an excellent, honest, thought-provoking and informative book about his life in politics, "Keep True," which should be required reading for anyone involved in electoral politics. We have a great deal to learn about politics and the class struggle from our northern neighbors. We also have a great deal to learn from our own history which includes the incredible history of the socialist Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party.

If for no other reason, both the Pawley led NDP and the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party should be studied for the honest government that was delivered to the people of Manitoba and Minnesota. In addition to delivering honest and ethical governance with maximum citizen participation in the decision-making, both of these governments delivered huge reforms improving the lives of working people--- not to mention striking major blows against racist discrimination.

Many, many working class and progressive/left activists who become engaged in electoral struggles do remain true.

That there are also some who betray our struggles is just life--- no reason for us not to engage in electoral struggles as we fight in the streets, in our schools, our communities and places of employment for peace, social and economic justice.

We have seen and experienced first hand the betrayal of those on the left supporting Wall Street's imperialist warmonger--- Barack Obama. This has sown deep divisions in the progressive, left and working class movements which is proving to be a real challenge to overcome; but, this is the problem of our times, not whether or not we should be engaged in electoral struggles.

*****************

Note: I could have cited an untold number of Socialists and Communists who have run for public office--- and many who have won--- in both the United States and Canada to prove that most Socialists and Communists "keep true" once elected. I find, more often than not, that those who raise these questions about "if" we should be engaged in electoral activity, at least in some way, are just a tad dishonest since they are not providing a true picture of the electoral struggles in Canada and the United States. I could have provided the examples of Joe Zuken and Jacob Penner in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada or the long history of Coleman Young's election to public office. I think Jacob Penner may still be the holder of the record for the longest serving elected public official of any political party in North America--- Penner was continually elected and re-elected as the Communist Party of Manitoba-Canada's candidate. It is no secret to anyone that Coleman Young rose, not from the ranks of working class struggle--- but with the ranks of working class activists to become a state legislator and then Mayor of Detroit all the while carrying a Communist Party membership card.

There is nothing strange, nor unique, about Socialists and Communists being elected to public office here in the United States or Canada.

In fact,  had it not been for the decades of never-ending severe governmental repression brought on by Republican Joe McCarthy and Democrat Hubert H. Humphrey (the primary author of the vicious, undemocratic and fascist-like Communist Control Act), it can very reasonably be assumed we would have Socialists and Communists occupying many seats of political power in this country today. It is not our electoral system, as corrupt as it is, which prevents Socialists and Communists from being elected in large numbers today--- it is the failure of the left to defy government repression and intimidation which includes lies, smears and slanders from the corporate mass media.

Just a few months ago I met with a group of people in the Frank P. Zeidler Municipal Building in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to discuss creating a campaign for a "21st Century Full Employment Act for Peace and Prosperity. Zeidler and his Socialist Party have played a dominant role in Milwaukee politics for the better part of the 20th Century. No one wants to talk about this; why not?

Why is it that one can go into almost any school on Minnesota's Mesabi Iron Range and no one, including the history teachers, knows who John Bernard was? A Communist Congressman from the small mining community of Eveleth elected by the workers from the Iron Range on the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party ticket.

It is one thing to disagree with Socialists and Communists--- this is everyone's right in a democracy; however, it is quite another thing for these cowards who don't even dare to debate Socialists and Communists in the public square, to use the apparatus of government and the media to restrict the participation of Socialists and Communists in the political process and then go on to boast to the rest of the world that the United States is the world's greatest bastion of democracy.

I would also point out one very simple, basic and fundamental fact:

Unless Socialists and Communists lead the way in challenging Wall Street for political and economic power--- no such challenge will ever be made... think about that. 

To think that issues like peace, full employment, a living wage Minimum Wage, anti-scab and anti-lockout or the repeal of "At-Will Employment" legislation will even be discussed without bringing forward Socialist and Communist candidates for public office is very naive thinking.

I asked the question:

Should Socialists and Communists engage in electoral struggles?

Perhaps a more appropriate question would be:

Why aren't more Socialists and Communists engaged in electoral struggles?