ST. JOHN'S, Nfld. (CP) - It was 100 years ago, and women in Canada couldn't vote or hold public office, yet Mina Hubbard set off into the unforgiving, uncharted wilderness of Labrador and into history.

This year, Labrador is celebrating this forgotten hero of feminism, whose ankle-length skirts and petticoats were in stark contrast to the rugged landscape around her.

On July 26, residents of North West River will re-enact Hubbard's departure as part of the celebrations of her historic, if little known, expedition.

"We're the Canadian Forces, and our job is to be able to kill people," said Rick Hillier, Canada's top military officer, announcing last week the deployment of more than 2,000 soldiers to Afghanistan, including commandos mandated to "take down" (Afghan resistance).

In a press conference in Washington last February, Hillier outlined Canada's new defence policy . Canada's first priority is to conduct operations on its own territory. Second, Canadian Forces are committed to the defence of North America. Finally, providing troops to serve in hot spots around the world, what used to be our top priority, is now third. Action abroad appears to have been redefined; it is no longer to stop the killing.

"Abu-Rhame was arrested in a nonviolent protest on July 15, 2005. A Judge at Ofer military base on Tuesday, July 26, ruled that Abu-Rhame was "too dangerous" to be released on bail and that he will be held until the end of the proceeding against him."

The following report is by Sarita Ahooja, who is a member of the
International Solidarity Movement - Montreal, currently in Palestine)

July 25, 2005.

Nablus, West Bank.

Over 500 demonstrators, including Palestinian groups, mothers of prisoners and internationals, marched towards Huwara checkpoint and military base
to demand freedom of movement and freedom for the prisoners.

In response to the July 6th Cite Soleil massacre at the hands of U.N. troops in Haiti, the largest trade union in Brazil hosted an action in Brazil's capital, demonstrators took to the streets in Paris, and actions were held in six Canadian cities and seven American cities. The actions aimed to bring an end to the state violence and to restore democracy to Haiti. Canadians are becoming increasingly worried about their government's direct involvement in the toppling of Haiti's democratic government last year.

Read on for more details and background, as well as brief reports of the actions held in all fifteen cities.

Telus blocks access to union-run photo website

http://www.canada.com/vancouver/theprovince/news/story.html?id=b26ceb13-6695-48cb-9128-c06e9d8bb01d

If you are on Telus Internet and can't get to the TWU Voices for Change site here's how to do it.

http://anon.free.anonymizer.com

It provides a free url for FREE Private Surfing that bypasses Telus blocks!

put in the url: http://www.voices-for-change.com

Or you can use this proxy site link:

http://vfc.proxy.pfak.org/index.asp

The Toronto Star,
July 25th, 2005

Aaron Maté

Recently the Council of Sages, the Western-backed body that has overseen Haiti's political affairs since the February 2004 ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, made a startling recommendation. Blaming the exiled Aristide and his Lavalas party for continuing "to promote and tolerate violence," the council urged the interim regime that it appointed to "disqualify the Lavalas Family Party from the electoral process."

OCAP | OCAP List | July 24, 2005

Less than two weeks ago, top Toronto welfare bureaucrats informed us that they were implementing immediately, two devastating changes to the City's Special Diet Policy.  All those who had obtained the Supplement would be required to get it approved all over again on a new municipal form. Moreover, only doctors would now be able to fill this in.  Nurse Practitioners, dieticians and midwifes would be banned from doing this.

On Friday, July 22, OCAP received a letter from Social Services Division General Manager, Heather MacVicar, announcing the City's decision to retreat and call off the attack.

by Kim Fellner | Monthly Review Zine

The battle over labor's future is heading toward a showdown at the AFL-CIO Convention, beginning Monday July 25th in Chicago. But the confrontation pitting a team of insurgent unions led by the Service Employees International Union against the AFL-CIO establishment is shaping up to be organizationally bloody, but spiritually bloodless. We're fighting for the heart and soul of the labor movement as though we had neither.

One hundred years ago in Zurich; Lenin, Tristan Tzara and James Joyce were in exile, drinking coffee in cafes, and writing.

Einstein published his General Theory of Relativity, workers in Russia called a General Strike and organized workers councils for the first time.

It was the birth of Modernism.

And I celebrate this movement with a cut and paste of the avante-garde manifestos that have influenced the 20th century.

http://plawiuk.blogspot.com/.../100-years-of-avante-garde...

by Shirley Pate | ZNet | July 20, 2005

"Two helicopters flew overhead. At 4:30 AM, UN forces launched the offensive, shooting into houses, shacks, a church, and a school with machine guns, tank fire, and tear gas. Eyewitnesses reported that when people fled to escape the tear gas, UN troops gunned them down from the back."

Haiti is Gaza and Gaza is Haiti because occupation always yields the same things: relentless provocations of the population, murder on a massive scale, oppression, persecution, incarceration, disenfranchisement, joblessness, homelessness, starvation and resistance.

eugene plawiuk | Le Revue Gauche | July 18, 2005

Ethanol burns more than it saves: study

Researchers at Cornell University and the University of California-Berkeley say it takes 29 per cent more fossil energy to turn corn into ethanol than the amount of fuel the process produces.

By Uri Davis, Ilan Pappe, and Tamar Yaron | Counter Punch | July 15, 2005

Confirming our worst fears, General (Res.) Eival Giladi went on record in print and on television to the effect that "Israel will act in a very resolute manner in order to prevent terror attacks and [militant] fire while the disengagement is being implemented" and that "If pinpoint response proves insufficient, we may have
to use weaponry that causes major collateral damage, including helicopters and planes, with mounting danger to surrounding people."

We believe that one primary, unstated motive for the determination of the government of the State of Israel to get the Jewish settlers of the Qatif (Katif) settlement block out of the Gaza Strip may be to keep them out of harm's way when the Israeli government and military possibly trigger an intensified mass attack on the approximately one and a half million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, of whom about half are 1948 Palestine refugees.

Since Thursday, June 23, Joseph McNeil has been sitting outside a McDonalds restaruant in uptown Barrie, Ontario, on a hunger strike against McDonalds Corporation. This former security guard, now 50-something and sleeping under a tarp in a nearby forest, has three seemingly simple demands:

(1) Corporations must abide by all laws; the same laws applied to individuals should be applied to corporations as well.

(2) All workers holding management and supervisor positions should be trained bi-annually on the laws; labour and beyond; that apply to their business.

(3) All workers, especially the most vulnerable of the workforce - young workers and new Canadian citizens - should be treated to bi-annual courses reviewing their rights as employees, how these rights are most often violated, and how to properly assert these rights.

eugene plawiuk | Le Revue Gauche | July 23, 2005

The creation of the clock is a defining moment in the history of capitalism. It allowed for the regimintation of work, and for the development of industrialization as clock works were applied to steam power.