|
November 9, 2001 | Issue 383
FRONT AND BACK PAGES
Stop the bombing!
This war only brings more horror
The village of Chowkar-Karez no longer exists. Neither do most of the people who lived there. But that's what the Pentagon wanted. "The people there are dead because we wanted them dead," an unidentified military official told CNN.
Defend our union rights
Justice for the Charleston Five!
Prosecutors in Charleston, S.C., are taking aim at five union dockworkers. And organized labor and civil rights activists will protest this attack across the U.S. and around the world on November 14.
A day of action for the Charleston Five
A torchlight rally outside the courthouse in Charleston, S.C., will mark the opening day of the trial of the Charleston Five, followed by an International Day of Action on Wednesday, November 14. Events are planned in cities and campuses across the U.S.
SW SPECIAL FEATURE
Washington declares open season on civil liberties
Big Brother is watching
The USA PATRIOT Act gives law enforcement at every level extraordinary new powers for domestic spying, searches, detainment and deportation. It should have been called the Big Brother Bill.
Back to the top
WHAT WE THINK
Washington's message to allies and enemies alike:
What we say goes
George W. Bush promised that his "war against terrorism" would be based on a coalition of nations. But now that coalition "partners" are beginning to complain, the U.S. has a new message for all of them: We'll escalate the killing when and how we want--whether you like it or not.
Shut down the School of Assassins
"If any government sponsors the outlaws and killers of innocents, they have become outlaws and murderers themselves." That was George W. Bush's warning to foreign governments that "harbor terrorists" as the bombs began to fall on Afghanistan. For the last half-century, the U.S. military has run its very own terrorist training camp--at Fort Benning, Ga.
Argentina at the brink
Once a showcase of neoliberal economic "magic," Argentina has become a basket case of neoliberal reality.
Back to the top
ANTIWAR NEWS AND ANALYSIS
Giuliani lashes out at the firefighters he praised as "heroes"
Attacked at Ground Zero
On November 2, hundreds of firefighters--furious with new restrictions on how many could be at the World Trade Center site to help with recovering the remains of their comrades--marched on "ground zero," clashing with police who tried to bar their way.
FBI looks for U.S. source of anthrax
Are Nazis to blame?
A month after the deadly anthrax attacks hit the headlines, four people are dead, more than a dozen others are infected--and only now have authorities begun to admit that the attacks might well have come from "homegrown" terrorists.
We know what the CIA was doing last summer
It's a strange way to treat "Public Enemy No. 1." But a leading French newspaper is reporting that the CIA met with Osama bin Laden when the U.S.-ally-turned-enemy was hospitalized last summer in the Persian Gulf state of Dubai.
News from our movement
Students build for conferences
With the Bush administration preparing for a long war, student activists are showing that they're prepared to build an antiwar movement from the ground up. November 10-11 is slated as a weekend of student antiwar conferences in cities across the U.S.
Back to the top
COLUMNS AND FEATURES
Moratorium now! Abolition next!
For years, Democrats and Republicans tried to outdo each other to show their support for capital punishment. But since 1999, the number of executions has fallen two years in a row--for the first time in 25 years. This is the latest sign of growing doubts about the U.S. killing machine.
WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON?
U.S. government's war of terrorism
The looming prospect of mass civilian casualties from slaughter and starvation makes it more difficult for the Bush administration to sustain its claim that "this war is not against the Afghan people." This is not a "war against terrorism"--it is terrorism.
THE MEANING OF MARXISM
The two arms of U.S. imperialism
The argument, popular in the global justice movement, that corporate globalization undermines the "sovereignty" of states could, if unqualified, lead to the idea that you must rally around your "own" state. The result of such politics is now apparent in the wake of September 11 in a recent Nation article by William Greider, a critic of the ravages of corporate globalization.
Shadowy world of the secret inner government of the U.S.
Lies, spies and dirty tricks
The top U.S. military brass wanted a war. Their solution? Stage an attack on an American military base, followed by a series of bombings and shootings that could be blamed on terrorist opponents of the U.S. If this was submitted as a Hollywood movie script, it would be rejected as too far-fetched. But it's the truth.
Back to the top
SW READERS SPEAK OUT
"They don't give a damn about the rest of us"
Workers' lives at risk
Every day, the news is filled with more terrifying rumors about anthrax. But for the past month, the same media that have been whipping up anthrax hysteria have been lying to all of us who work near "Ground Zero" in New York City about the air that we've been breathing.
Berkeley teachers oppose the war
I am a teacher in Berkeley, Calif., and a member of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT). On October 18, those of us on the executive board of the BFT approved a resolution opposing the U.S. response to the tragic events of September 11.
We can't be scared into keeping quiet
I think I may have been the victim of a terrorist attack. A few weeks back, I came home from an antiwar protest to find that my truck had been burned to the ground.
I'm for making sure racists can't attack people
A few days after the September 11 attacks, a cartoon ran in the Daily Californian, the student newspaper at the University of California-Berkeley, that showed two turbaned Arab men carrying flight manuals in hell. Antiwar and antiracist students demanded an apology from the editors of the newspaper, but the editor-in-chief refused, calling it "freedom of speech."
Back to the top
ON THE PICKET LINE
Locked-out UAW members reject latest contract offer
Accuride workers still defiant
Locked out workers once again said "no" to a union-busting contract proposal from Accuride that was pushed to a sudden vote by the UAW's International staff. With more than two-thirds of the workers voting, the contract was rejected by 97 percent--again.
Reformers challenge the Hoffa regime's rotten record
Leedham battles for Teamster vote
"We have a rank-and-file network. We don't have a lot of money, but we have a grassroots campaign." That's how Seattle UPS feeder driver Dianne Bolton summed up the campaign for Tom Leedham for Teamsters president.
Labor in Brief
Back to the top
OTHER NEWS
The Microsoft mob got away scot-free
The beast from Redmond, Wash., is back. Software giant Microsoft and the U.S. government ended their three-year legal battle with an agreement announced last week.
Obituary: William Jenkins
William Jenkins, a videographer, union reformer and socialist well-known in the Chicago area, died September 30 of a heart attack while at work. Despite a full-time, third-shift hospital job, he tirelessly worked to arm people with information and to involve them in the fight for a better world.
Back to the top
REVIEWS
Boondocks won't be silenced
While Boondocks has always been controversial, some of the 250 newspapers that carry the strip began censoring it after September 11. Boondocks creator Aaron McGruder has responded defiantly.
The lives of war-weary Afghans
Jung (War): In the Land of the Mujaheddin--a documentary film that looks at the war-weary people of Afghanistan--is a powerful weapon in the antiwar movement's arsenal.
Home page | Back to the top
| 
