Walmart Retaliates Against Black Friday Activists By Adele M. Stan, AlterNet 23 November 12
[Excerpted] Two weeks ago, Walmart filed its own NLRB complaint
against the United Food & Commercial Workers, seeking an injunction
against the planned Black Friday actions. The complaint failed. A week
later, UFCW-affiliated OUR Walmart group filed a complaint with the
labor board against Walmart, alleging retaliation against workers
involved in the OUR Walmart campaign.
Even if you've never set foot near a Walmart store in
your life, today's actions offer a host of ways to get involved in the
fight for fair pay and benefits. The AFL-CIO blog, among other Web
sites, offers a list of ways to get involved.
The video below, Confessions of a Wal-Mart Hit Man,
features a former general manager for the company speaking of the ways
managers cheated workers out of wages they had earned, rigged a vote
against a union in the company's Annapolis, Md., store, and how hard it
was to eat in the staff lunchroom, where workers took their breaks with
no food, because they couldn't afford to buy lunch. The video is a bonus
scene from Robert Greenwald's documentary: Wal-Mart: The High Cost of
Low Price....
Pipeline Protest Draws Pepper Spray From Deputies By SAUL ELBEIN Published: November 23, 2012 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/24/us/texas-transcanada-protesters-are-pepper-sprayed.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20121124
[Excerpted] Since September, when construction began on the Keystone, the Tar Sands Blockade, a grass-roots coalition of East Texas landowners and environmental advocates from across the country, has been waging a nonviolent guerrilla campaign against the pipeline. About every week since construction began, blockade volunteers have locked themselves to construction equipment in protest. So far, 43 have been arrested. But on Monday, protesters who were not locked to equipment were pepper-sprayed as well, the first such incident, according to Ron Seifert, a spokesman for the Tar Sands Blockade.
The protesters have come from across the country. Some are young
activists from the coasts, veterans of the Occupy movement and other
environmental campaigns who believe that developing the Alberta tar
sands will seriously aggravate climate change. Many are locals angered
by what they see as TransCanada’s highhanded treatment of landowners.
“I don’t like how they’ve treated people,” said 75-year-old Jeanette
Singleton of nearby Nacogdoches, who was worried about the Keystone’s
effect on the Angelina River. “If you don’t want to sign, they just take
your land from you. It doesn’t seem right.”
TransCanada has attracted particular ire for its use of eminent domain
to take easements from landowners who did not want to sign. Many
landowners who eventually did sign say they did so out of fear of having
their land seized otherwise....
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.