By CAL WINSLOW - January 7, 2009

"We will have to destroy UHW to save it” This, it seems, is the objective of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) in its campaign against its California affiliate, United Healthcare Workers-West (UHW)...In the past year, SEIU national leaders have orchestrated a multi-fronted assault on the 150,000 member California health care workers union – all designed to break the union. The intention, it is clear, is to seize control of UHW, remove the elected leaders and relegate its members to other jurisdictions, or to altogether new organizations.

By WAJAHAT ALI - January 5, 2009

I tell my friends that any time I’m depressed or lonely, I decide to go to the airport where instantly I’m lavished with meticulous attention and treated like a Hollywood celebrity. Rarely, have I and other ethnic undesirables been afforded such a loving reception. What’s not to love about the multiple (TSA) agents who “randomly” select you for special inspection? Or their curious, unbridled interest in asking you which mosques you frequent? Their desire to express their hospitality and love is so uncontainable that you’re treated to several physical pat-downs covering every inch of your body.

By Sean Maher - Oakland Tribune

A [Bay Area Rapid Transit] police officer struggling to handcuff a 22-year-old man stood up over the facedown Hayward resident and fired a single shot into his back while a handful of officers watched, a video taken by a train passenger apparently shows...The attorney for the family of Oscar Grant III, fatally shot by an unidentified BART officer early New Year's Day, said Sunday he plans to file a $25 million lawsuit against the department and asked prosecutors to consider filing murder charges against the officer.

By Stephen Zunes - January 05, 2009

No one in the mainstream media or government is willing to acknowledge America's sordid role interfering in Palestinian politics...The United States bears much of the blame for the ongoing bloodshed in the Gaza Strip and nearby parts of Israel. Indeed, were it not for misguided Israeli and American policies, Hamas would not be in control of the territory in the first place.

A free four-part video series has been created by the non-profit Turtle Island Project (TIP) in Munising, Michigan on the third annual "Cowboys and Angels" concert that benefited the White Buffalo Calf Woman Society (WBCWS) in Mission, South Dakota – the world's oldest Native American domestic violence shelter...WBCWS battles domestic violence, sexual assault and an alarming increase in teen suicides on the Lakota Rosebud Sioux Reservation...A wide variety of social problems are among the causes for the Rosebud suicides and family violence including poverty, depression, no jobs, and substance abuse Rev. Dr. Lynn Hubbard performed original songs and seasonal music during the free concert on Saturday, Dec. 13, 2008 at the Falling Rock Cafe and Bookstore in Munising, Michigan.

by Evelyn Pringle - Dissident Voice

For years, the research that showed SSRI antidepressants (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) were dangerous and practically useless was kept hidden, while the studies published and presented to potential prescribers painted a glowing picture of success. These days, a person would be hard pressed to find someone who does not have a family member or friend labeled mentally ill and taking drugs like Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Lexapro and Celexa, or their chemical cousins Effexor, Cymbalta and Wellbutrin.

"...[M]uch of labor officialdom in [the United States] — often without the knowledge or consent of union members — has a longstanding complicity with Israeli Apartheid that dates to before 1948...In April 2002, while Israel butchered Palestinian refugees at Jenin in the West Bank, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney was a featured speaker at a belligerent 'National Solidarity Rally for Israel.'"

By BRIAN CLOUGHLEY - January 5, 2009

There is little doubt that the bias towards Israel will continue in the legislature and administration of the United States of America, no matter what Obama might really think, and no matter how many Palestinian children the Zionists have slaughtered. The Israelis are behaving like genocidal filth, but those who stay silent about their atrocities are not far behind in the gutter stakes.

by James Petras - Dissident Voice

Israel’s sustained and comprehensive bombing campaign of every aspect of governance, civic institutions and society is directed toward destroying civilized life in Gaza. Israel’s totalitarian vision is driven by the practice of a permanent purge of Arab Palestine informed by Zionism, an ethno-racist ideology, promulgated by the Jewish state and justified, enforced and pursued by its organized backers in the United States.

By Jim Miles - December 24, 2008

My immediate response to those in our government who fear socialism is to ask them to renounce their inclusion in their very generous pension plans (voted on by themselves of course, no conflict of interest there), their participation in the universal health care that Canada provides, the safety net of Canada pension, old age security and social assistance that assist other members of their families who are not intelligent enough to get in on the government dole.

By MIKE WHITNEY - December 31, 2008

Perhaps Obama's inaction will finally put to rest the idea that he's a man who is seriously committed to justice or change. He's not. He's nothing more than an ambitious and well-spoken young man who's being used to conceal the genocidal operation of the imperial machine...The truth is Obama is a "cool guy" who doesn't really feel that strongly about anything. That's why Obama's moral authority has been gravely eroded before he's even been sworn in.

While the current APOC movement is relatively new, it's roots can be traced from Mexican anarchist Ricardo Flores Magon and the Baja Magonista Revolt of 1911, the revolutionary Chicana/Native/Black American Lucy Parsons Gonzalez (1853-1942) and later to Afro Rican anarchist/activist Martin Sostre (framed on drug possession charges and unjustly imprisoned for nearly a decade in the early sixties), the late anarchist and former member of the Black Liberation Army Kuwasi Balagoon, and former Black Panthers Ashanti Alston and Lorenzo Komboa Ervin.

By WAJAHAT ALI - January 1, 2009

...[E]arlier this summer [President-elect Obama said] "If someone were sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I would do anything to stop it.” One wonders, however, if President elect Obama’s principles of safety, dignity and self defense apply to Palestinians as well? If Obama and President Bush’s daughters were forced to suspend their emergency hospital operations due to fuel shortages, beg for 300 essential medicines, drink contaminated water that causes malnutrition and anemia in children, eat bread made of animal feed, and renounce electricity because their main power plant was forced to shut down, what would they do?

Monday, December 29 2008 - Infoshop News

As we've learned from the excellent interview over at the CrimethInc. Ex-Workers' Collective blog, what happened in Greece was not accidental. In fact, the rioting, firebombing, street-fighting, occupying, looting, and marching was largely initiated and coordinated by autonomous affinity groups of anarchists, some more defined than others, with roots in the occupations and social centers around Greece.

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS - January 2-4, 2009

The Palestinians are no more of a threat to Israel than Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto were a threat to the Nazi state. Yet, everywhere in America--Congress, the executive branch, the print and TV media, the universities, evangelical Christian institutions--there is the belief that Israel is on the verge of annihilation by Palestinian terrorists. This ignorance, so carefully cultivated by the Israel Lobby, turns genocidal aggression into self-defense.