Watch From Labor Strikes to Logo Strikes

From Labor Strikes to Logo Strikes

Article by WorldNews.com Correspondent Dallas Darling.
"The strike is the weapon of the oppressed, of men capable of appreciating justice and having the courage to resist wrong and contend for principle." -Eugene Debs speaking to striking engineers and firemen during the Pullman Railroad Strike of 1887

"Ugh! Hideous and cheap looking. I will never shop there again." -Just one of tens of thousands of online comments when Gap revealed their new logo

When thousands of people went online protesting GAP's new logo claiming they would go on strike and boycott the clothing chain, it parodied an earlier era regarding America's Labor Movement. In 1911, a fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company in New York City killed 146 garment workers, many of whom were young Jewish women. They were unable to escape due to the factory doors that had been locked, either to hold workers at their machines or to prevent government inspectors from entering. As the fire raged, the young women leaped to their deaths from the eighth- and ninth-story windows. What followed was the Uprising of the Twenty Thousand, a massive general strike in New York City by shirtwaist workers.(1)

Clara Lemlich, a "wisp of a girl, still in her teens," offered the resolution that turned the walkouts from several shirtwaist factories into a general strike. She remarked, "I am a working girl, one of those who are on strike against intolerable conditions. I am tired of listening to speakers who talk in general terms."(2) Most of the young strikers, between the ages of 16 and 25, battled physical and sexual harassment while marching, along with beatings and mass arrests. Yet, after three months the Uprising of the Twenty Thousand led to the basis for better working conditions, new building codes like fire escapes, and a greater interest in unionization and labor activism.

Another labor strike at a shipping port led by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) centered around the right of workers to assemble and to practice free-speech. When authorities in Everett, Washington arrested 400 striking and picketing dock workers, a national call for assistance did not go unheard. James Rowan from Seattle was sent to organize a solidarity campaign. When he stood up to speak in public, Rowan was arrested. A free-speech fight ensued.(3) As more workers arrived by ferryboat to build-up the free-speech forces, they were immediately surrounded, arrested and imprisoned. In one battle, private security forces shot striking workers killing 5 and wounding 27.(4)

Even though the labor leaders of the IWW were put on trial for murder-which was typical for those who supported the American Labor Movement, and which the victims of State and corporate security forces were treated as the instigators-the attempt to suppress and extinguish the freedom of assembly and speech backfired. In a highly publicized trial, the IWW's achieved acquittals or dismissals of charges. This in turn, fueled the determination for other workers to seek long-sought basic reforms and rights. In the years that followed, the Everett Massacre, as it was called, produced numerous gains for the freedoms to strike and picket and for the right to publicly speak about workplace abuses and injustices.(5)
Coppied by http://article.wn.com/view/2010/10/12/From_Labor_Strikes_to_Logo_Strikes/?section=TopStoriesWorldwide&template=worldnews/index.txt

All the day's breaking news from the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa

Watches All the day's breaking news from the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa
breaking news from the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa
Paul, the octopus who became a sensation by correctly predicting the outcome of all seven of Germany's games plus the Spain-Netherlands final - is going to retire.

He will "go into retirement and do what he likes to do best: play with his handlers and delight children who come visit to him," according to Tanja Munzig, a spokeswoman for the Sea Life aquarium in Oberhausen.

Paul took one last curtain call when aquarium employees presented the octopus with a golden cup - similar to the official World Cup trophy.

2215: Spain goalkeeper wins Golden Glove award

The Spain keeper and captain Iker Casillas conceded just two goals in the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Under pressure after La Roja opened their campaign with a shock 1-0 defeat to Switzerland, Casillas answered his critics with a string of superb displays that proved crucial to Spain’s progress to the Final.

In the final it was Casillas ability with the high ball and quick reactions with his feet that denied a number of Dutch chances that could have lost Spain the World Cup.

2040: Dutch return to canal celebration

The Dutch football team, who were beaten 1-0 by Spain in the World Cup final, will return to a heroes welcome and a parade along the canals of Amsterdam, city officials confirmed.

"The players will parade in a boat which will navigate the canals of Amsterdam. The tour will last between two and two and a half hours," Guus Schoker, spokesman for the city of Amsterdam, told AFP on Monday.

"The fans will gather along the banks of the canals and can see the players."

The Oranje will then make their way to a specially-erected podium at the Museumplein in the city centre where 180,000 fans gathered on Sunday night to watch the final on a giant screen.
Coppied by http://www.foxsports.com.au/football/world-cup-2010/all-the-days-breaking-news-from-the-2010-fifa-world-cup-in-south-africa/story-fn50jked-1225921323471?from=public_rss

Watches Vahid Salemi From Ramadan to Lebanon

Vahid Salemi From Ramadan to Lebanon

"It was like shooting sparrows with a cannon" were the words of a U.N. peace-keeping officer, that was swept aside when Israeli attacked and invaded Lebanon in 1982.(1) And while refugees roamed the wreckage of Beirut in clouds of flies, mothers-eyes filled with terror and distraught-howled..orphans sobbed, and the stench of artillery smoke mixed with rotting corpses filled the air. Asked why Palestinian refugee camps were blasted to ruins, including houses containing women and children, an Israeli army officer explained "...they are all terrorists."(2)

Meanwhile, the U.S. (with its weapons and military advisors) gave its blessings to the armed invasion. Again, a Security Council resolution-with the exception of the U.S.-condemned Israel. While the New York Times trumpeted Israel's "purity of arms" and saluted the "liberation" of Lebanon by Israeli troops, one hundred thousand people were without shelter and food, scavenging through piles of wreckage, surrounded by tanks, gunshots, and hysteria.(3) Blindfolded men were tortured, humiliated, and murdered. Phalangist patrols and Haddad forces torched homes and beat people indiscriminately.(4)

Therefore, and almost thirty-years later, it was significant when Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that he would visit Lebanon after Ramadan. Ramadan is the ninth month of the Arab Islamic calendar when Muslims fast. Before the establishment of Islam, it was a holy Arab tradition, a month of truce and tribal peace.(5) For most Muslims, the holy month of Ramadan is a blessed time in the year when God's grace seems more closer and more easily accessible.(6) It reveals the principle of mans limitation and dependence on God, along with discerning his will and purposes.

The month of Ramadan and spiritual fasting is also a period when Muslims recognize the unity of the whole Muslim world, emphasized by an inward struggle for spiritual victory. It constitutes purification and a kind of sacrifice leading to renewal and fresh strength.(7) In the realms of politics and economics, Ramadan brings about a direct understanding of, and an empathetic feeling for, those who suffer and hunger and have been wronged.(8) Since it is occasioned by an intensive reading and appreciation of the Qur'an, public justice and mercy is sought after, including civil rights and the opportunities to secure essential food, clothing, shelter, health care, education and employment for others.

As the world awaits for President Ahmadinejad's visit to Lebanon, it is obvious he has taken on a triple mantle. The first one being empowering the poor of his own nation. The second mantle is drawing attention to the plight of Palestinians and correcting past (and current) injustices. Even now as Israel and the U.S. pressure the Lebanese government to try and prevent his visit on October 13, President Ahmadinejad remains undeterred. In the face of punitive sanctions and threats of either an armed invasion or aerial bombardment, President Ahmadinejad remains true to his calling by inquiring into the origin of Israel's existence (not its right to exist) and its Zionist regime.
Coppied by http://article.wn.com/view/2010/10/10/From_Ramadan_to_Lebanon/?section=TopStoriesWorldwide&template=worldnews/index.txt

Watches this New threat from Hungary reservoir

New threat from Hungary reservoir


Rescue workers have evacuated a Hungarian village due to a heightened threat of a second flood of toxic red sludge from a broken reservoir at an alumina plant.

A weakened wall in the reservoir from which one million cubic metres of sludge flooded several nearby villages, fields and waterways skirting the Danube river earlier this week is in danger to collapse.

Authorities evacuated 800 inhabitants from the village of Kolontar to the town of Ajka, Hungarian disaster agency spokesman Tibor Dobson confirmed and Kolontar has been sealed off.

Hungary declared a state of emergency in three counties after sludge from the alumina plant flooded three villages on Monday about 160 km (100 miles) west of Budapest, killing seven people and injuring around 150.

"Last night the interior minister informed us that cracks have appeared in the northern wall of the reservoir, whose corner collapsed, which make it likely that the entire wall will collapse," Prime Minister Viktor Orban told a news conference.

"Thank God, we have managed to rescue the large majority of people after the dam burst on Monday, but the region has been practically destroyed," Mr Orban said.

Speaking in Ajka, he said another 500,000 cubic metres of sludge could escape the reservoir but this substance would be thicker than the initial tide of the corrosive, caustic waste material.

The spill from the Ajkai Timfoldgyar plant could have been avoided and there will be "the toughest possible consequences" to ensure such a disaster does not recur, Mr Orban said.

In remarks carried by private broadcaster HirTV, he said a decision on whether to allow the plant to resume bauxite refining would not be made before Monday.

Mr Orban said the government was ready to foot the entire bill of the rescue and recovery effort, but it was too early at this stage to make precise estimates about the size of the damage.

Earlier today, Gyorgy Bakondi, head of the National Disaster Unit, told the daily Magyar Nemzet in an interview the final bill could top 10 billion forints (€36.25 million).

He said checks were made of all similar reservoirs in Hungary. Mr Orban said Hungary had launched a disaster relief fund, which accepted contributions from Hungarians across the world.

Mr Orban, who called the spill Hungary's worst ecological disaster to date, said there was now a high risk of up to 500,000 cubic metres of even thicker sludge escaping the reservoir due to a deterioration of a wall in the stricken part.
coppied by http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2010/1009/breaking2.html

Floods Force Thousands From Homes in Pakistan

Watch Floods Force Thousands From Homes in Pakistan


A Pakistani woman displaced by flooding, living on a roadside in Sukkur in southern Pakistan.
SUKKUR, Pakistan — Floodwaters surged deeper into areas of southern Pakistan on Sunday, forcing thousands more people to abandon their homes in haste and flee to higher ground. Attention has now focused on the province of Sindh as the floods that have torn through the length of the country for three weeks finally move toward the Arabian Sea.

Water reached within half a mile of Shadad Kot, a town of 150,000 people, on Sunday afternoon, and several nearby villages were already cut off when a protective embankment began to give way, Yasin Shar, the district coordination officer of Shadad Kot, said by telephone. Most of the population had been evacuated and more were still leaving, he said. “We are trying to save the embankment and keep on repairing wherever it is damaged, but the water is flowing with a lot of pressure,” Mr. Shar said. “We hope the embankment won’t break. We are praying.”

Nearly five million people have been displaced from the worst flooding ever recorded in Pakistan. Hundreds of thousands are being housed in orderly tented camps set up in army compounds, schools and other public buildings, but thousands more are living on roadsides and canal embankments, spreading out mats under the trees or making shade over the simple rope beds they brought with them.

The town of Sukkur is overflowing with an influx of displaced people. On the edge of the town, a group of 15 families with scores of children are camped along the Dadu Canal. Their mood is edgy, and they race in a horde after any vehicle that slows in the hope that it bears food or assistance. One woman showed her fractured arm, the result of a tussle for food.

“People are looting, people run after trucks snatching things,” said Shad Mohammad, 28, a shopkeeper and father of five, who came here after his town, Ghospur, was flooded 15 days ago. “People come, sometimes the government comes, or charities with food. Sometimes you get something, sometimes not.”

The children are often hungry and crying, Mr. Mohammad said. “We don’t know what will happen to us; we have lost everything,” he said. “We have nothing here, just the clothes we are wearing.”

He and others spoke of their anxiety that because Sindh is so low-lying, it will take months for the waters to subside, and for them to return home. And they know they will return to nothing. The water was up to their necks, so their mud-brick houses will have collapsed and their animals drowned, they said. Surviving would be difficult without assistance, and few expressed confidence they would receive much.

The older people were more resigned. “We will sit under the sky, and God will provide what he wills,” said Qaim Din, 50, a father of eight, who had to abandon his donkey and a buffalo as the family fled the rising waters.

The younger men expressed anger and impatience. “We are not living here happily,” said another man, also named Qaim Din but not related. A fertilizer dealer, he came here after his village 125 miles away was flooded. “We are angry, and they are treating us like animals,” he said.

“You are talking of anger, we are sometimes thinking of killing this government,” he said. “If you go further along this road, you will see people, you will see their faces, they are hurting.”

Jamshaid Khan Dasti, a member of Parliament from a neighboring constituency in Punjab Province, said, “Food is creating a law-and-order situation because there is no proper system to look after these people.” There were already episodes of looting and burglary, and Mr. Dasti said he had asked the government to deploy paramilitary rangers to prevent the situation from further deteriorating.

The majority of the displaced were falling outside the humanitarian net, he said. In his district, 800,000 people were displaced, but only 100,000 were being provided for in camps. “The rest are scattered, stuck in different places and they don’t have food or water,” Mr. Dasti said.

A former prime minister, Zafarullah Khan Jamali, a member of Parliament whose constituency in neighboring Baluchistan was 90 percent underwater, warned that the mood would only worsen. “These people will be out in the streets, this is what I see,” he said. “I have been through many floods, in ’56, ’73, ’76 and 2007, but I have never seen a government less bothered.” He added, “The state is a failure, and the people will come out, and naturally nothing can stop the wave of people.”

Asked if he was talking about a revolution, he said: “Yes. We are heading toward that, very fast.”

Waqar Gillani contributed reporting from Sukkur, and Salman Masood from Islamabad, Pakistan.
Coppied by http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/23/world/asia/23pstan.html?_r=1

4 decapitated bodies hung from bridge in Mexico

Watch and enjoy 4 decapitated bodies hung from bridge in Mexico

Associated Press Writer= CUERNAVACA, Mexico (AP) — The decapitated bodies of four men were hung from a bridge Sunday in this central Mexican city besieged by fighting between two drug lords.

A gang led by kingpin Hector Beltran Leyva took responsibility for the killings in a message left with the bodies, the attorney general's office of Morelos state said in a statement.

The beheaded and mutilated bodies were hung by their feet early Sunday from the bridge in Cuernavaca, a popular weekend getaway for Mexico City residents.

Cuernavaca has become a battleground for control of the Beltran Leyva cartel since its leader, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed there in a December shootout with marines.

Mexican authorities say the cartel split between a faction led by Hector Beltran Leyva, brother of Arturo, and another led by Edgar Valdez Villarreal, a U.S.-born kingpin known as "the Barbie."

The message left with the bodies threatened: "This is what will happen to all those who support the traitor Edgar Valdez Villarreal."

Authorities said the four men had been kidnapped days earlier. The family of one of the men reported the abduction to police.

In western Mexico, police found the body of a U.S. citizen inside a car along the highway between the Pacific resorts of Acapulco and Zihuatanejo.

A report from Guerrero state police said the man was shot to death and had identification indicating he was from Georgia.

The U.S. Embassy could not be reached to confirm the man's identity.

Police said they had no suspects and had not determined a motive.

Guerrero state has been wracked by drug-gang violence, including the strife within the Beltran Leyva cartel. There have also been a series of deadly carjackings this year along highways in the state.

Mexico has seen unprecedented gang violence since President Felipe Calderon stepped up the fight against drug trafficking when he took office in December 2006, deploying thousands of troops and federal police to cartel strongholds.

Since then, more than 28,000 people have been killed in violence tied to Mexico's drug war.

(This version CORRECTS tate where Cuernavaca is located to Morelos instead of state of Mexico, corrects the second family name of 'Barbie' to Villarreal instead of Villareal.)
Coppied by http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9231438

Pakistan accepts $5m flood aid from India

We are enjoy Pakistan accepts $5m flood aid from India

Tens of thousands have been made homeless by the floods in Sindh province
Pakistan has accepted $5m (£3.2m) in aid from its rival and neighbour India, as donors pledged more money for the flood-hit country.
Abdullah Haroon, Pakistan's UN Ambassador, welcomed the offer saying the disaster transcended any differences the two countries had.

Meanwhile, officials say the province of Sindh is now the worst hit, with more than two million people affected.

Continue reading the main story
Pakistan's Monsoon Floods

Battle for survival
Feuds and sickness in camps
Who cares about Pakistan?
In pictures: Pakistanis await aid
New warnings are being issued and villages evacuated, they said.

Mr Haroon welcomed the latest offers of help, which followed a two-day special meeting of the UN Security Council in New York to discuss the crisis.

UN figures showed on Friday that $490.7m had been raised for the relief effort, with another $325m pledged. The total tops the $460m sought in the UN emergency appeal.

Mr Haroon described the new donations as "indeed heartening" and "a good beginning", but added that Pakistan will need support for years to come.

India's UN Ambassador, Hardeep Singh Puri, said the donation of $5m in relief supplies was an initial offer and his country was ready to do more if needed.

"We are willing to do all that is in our power to assist Pakistan in facing the consequences of floods," he said.

"We extend our wholehearted support to the government of Pakistan in its efforts for relief and rehabilitation of the... population."

The offer came after Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke to his Pakistani counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani on Thursday.

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We had no way to save our goats and buffaloes, stranded in the water and crying”

Qasim Bhayyo
Refugee from Sindh province
Pakistan and India have slowly been improving ties since the Mumbai militant attacks of 2008 put relations between the two nuclear-armed rivals at a new low.

Homes lost
The floods began last month in Pakistan's north-west after heavy monsoon rains and have since swept south, swamping thousands of towns and villages in Punjab and Sindh provinces.

About one-fifth of Pakistan's territory is underwater and an estimated 20 million people are affected.

Officials estimate that about 1,600 people have been killed.

In the southern province of Sindh, hundreds of thousands of people have been left homeless as the Indus river overflowed, swamping homes and valuable farmland.

"Everything has been wasted. Nothing is left," said Qasim Bhayyo, 45, a refugee from Qayyas Bhayyo village in Sindh.

"I saw my house of wood and mud washed away. I saw grain and flour - we stockpiled food for months. It was all destroyed. We had no way to save our goats and buffaloes stranded in the water and crying."

As aid agencies stepped up the relief effort, the UN said on Friday that more helicopters were urgently needed to reach communities cut off by the water.

Experts warn of a second wave of deaths from water-borne diseases such as cholera unless flood victims have access to supplies of fresh drinking water.

If you would like to make a donation to help people affected by the floods in Pakistan, you can do so through the UK's Disasters Emergency Committee at www.dec.org.uk or by telephone on 0370 60 60 900

Coppied by http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11046139

A woman weeps over the coffin containing the body Obama's exit strategy from Iraq under threat once again of her nine-year-old son

A woman weeps over the coffin containing the body of her nine-year-old son at his funeral in Najaf, south of Baghdad, Iraq. As the US winds up combat operations in Iraq this month, terror has returned to the country. Photograph: Alaa Al-Marjani/AP
Watches this Obama's exit strategy from Iraq under threat once again
Christopher Hill's departure from Iraq after a stint as US ambassador has eerie parallels with that of Paul Bremer, with both leaving the country at a tipping point
For the second time since the fall of Baghdad, America's main man in Iraq has ended a year-long stay by talking up a country on the wrong side of a tipping point. US ambassador Christopher Hill's departure last weekend was a much lower-profile exit than the dash to the airport in 2004 of unpopular post-invasion viceroy Paul Bremer, but it did have eerie parallels.

Bremer left claiming he had helped make Iraq sovereign and to establish the foundations of a functional state. His prophecy was in tatters long before George W Bush gave him America's highest civilian honour, for his role in running post-Saddam Iraq in the shambolic early days of the occupation.

Hill arrived in Iraq 16 months ago on a mission to turn things around. Sectarian chaos had ravaged the country in the interim. Bush's democratic project here looked stillborn, far from being central to the birth pangs of a new Middle East. And, more important for a US diplomat, America's standing both in the region and around the world had taken a pounding.

Like Bremer, Hill also claims to have made gains. But in mid-2010, it is difficult to find any trend or tangible evidence to support his optimism. Indeed, the country looks in worse shape than when Hill arrived.

Over the past month, US officials have been trying hard to push the incumbent prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, and Iyad Allawi, the man who edged him out in a general election five months ago, into a power-sharing arrangement that would end a dangerous political deadlock.

Like a pair of bull walruses fighting, neither man has given ground as the fragile security gains of the past two years threaten to unravel. At the same time, the mood on the street has palpably soured.

Throughout this most brutal of summers (where the daytime temperature in Baghdad has rarely been below 48C), Iraqis have been getting by with around four hours per day of electricity (usually too weak to run more than one air conditioner). Even more concerning is the creeping return of terror; almost daily assassinations, a spike in bombings and rocket fire. This was not the way it was supposed to be when the conquerors left town.

The US-sponsored deal would mean Maliki could hang on to the prime minister's chair, but with diluted powers, while Allawi would take a newly formed position as head of a national security council, which would give him an executive overlord role across the security forces.

All stakeholders here were thought to have been satisfied. In Allawi, the restive Sunni centre of the country would get a strongman who had their interests at heart. His return to real power would also likely win over Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Iran, meanwhile, was believed to be appeased by the reinstallation of Maliki and his Shia Islamic backers.

Last week, however, the proposal somehow found itself back on the drawing board. Not for the first time had the machinations of power-sharing confounded those who come here to make sense of it all. All sides seem to have retreated to positions that are not far beyond the postures they struck shortly after the results of the 7 March poll, which gave Allawi a narrow 91 to 89 seat victory, but in need of a coalition to help him form a government in the 325-seat parliament.

After much post-poll jousting, the ballot was deemed to have been fair and transparent. Little since then has met the same standards. The intractable stalemate seems to point to far more than the stubborn wills of the two opponents. Neighbouring Iran is as much to blame; it wants to entrench Shia majority rule in the heartland of Arabia, and of Saudi Arabia, which remains horrified by such a prospect.

All of this, while Obama, his departed ambassador and a number of US generals continue to insist that their job in the land that the US has occupied for seven years is nearly done. There are many in Iraq who are far from convinced; the Sons of Iraq leadership, the chief of the Iraqi military and even Saddam Hussein's most loyal deputy, Tariq Aziz, who said Obama would leave Iraq to the wolves if he continued the pull-out.

In truth, the much-vaunted 31 August combat withdrawal deadline is largely about symbolism and emotional detachment from a war that Obama reluctantly inherited.
Coppied by http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/15/christopher-hill-iraq-obama