Hi,

We support the efforts of the USW union to improve the wages and benefits as well as working conditions of the striking refinery workers. Jobs in refineries are dangerous and require a high level of skill. As we know from the BP disasters, mistakes can cause catastrophes for the surrounding communities and the environment. These workers deserve to be compensated well and treated fairly. Failure to bargain fairly in these negotiations will only reflect the Shell Oil Company’s lack of regard for the workers and the communities in which their enterprises are located.

That’s why I created a petition to Ben van Beurden, CEO, Royal Dutch Shell Oil Company, which says:

“We support the striking Steel Workers at the refineries in Texas City, Texas. Their struggle is the struggle of working people in this country and around the world.”

Will you sign this petition? Click here:

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/we-support-the-usw-strike?source=c.em.mt&r_by=8638452

Thanks!

Published time: February 09, 2015 10:12
Edited time: February 09, 2015 19:16

http://on.rt.com/aby93h

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (Reuters / Francois Lenoir)

 

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, referring to Nazi Germany’s four-year occupation of Greece and a forced war-time loan during World War II that saddled the Greek economy in huge debt, wants Berlin to pay reparations.

Tsipras, leader of the anti-austerity Syriza party, said Athens had a “historical obligation” to claim from Germany billions of euros in reparations for the physical and financial destruction committed during Nazi Germany’s occupation of Greece.

Beyond the historical obligation, he said Greece had “a moral obligation to our people, to history, to all European peoples who fought and gave their blood against Nazism,” he said in a keynote address to parliament on Sunday.

READ MORE: Euro hits 11yr low after ‘anti-austerity’ Syriza election win

The Greek leader’s comments have resonated far beyond Athens as they place the issue of his country’s recent massive bailout at the behest of international creditors in a whole new light.

After Nazi forces took control of Greece in 1941, the stage was set for one of the bloodiest confrontations of World War II as Greek resistance fighters put up a fierce struggle to end the occupation.They were powerless, however, to prevent the Third Reich from extracting an interest-free 476 million Reichsmarks loan from the Greek central bank, which devastated the Greek economy.

A 2012 report by the Bundestag, Germany’s lower house of parliament, estimated the value of the loan at US$8.25 billion. Greece, however, puts the value of the loan at €11 billion, the To Vima newspaper reported in January, citing confidential financial documents.

Dear Sisters and Brothers,

You are invited to participate in the upcoming “Rally against Republicans, Who are Hurting Us!” on Saturday, February 28, at 2 pm, on the sidewalks at the intersection of Harrisburg and Macario Garcia (Hwy 90) in Houston.

The purpose of the Rally is to expose the Republicans and the Far Right for their increasingly dangerous attacks on workers, people of color, women, immigrants, LGBTQ communities, and the masses as a whole—and to help develop the kind of independent working class political action which will be required to stop these dangerous attacks. This event is being organized by the Houston Socialist Movement.

We are resolutely opposed to the Republicans and the Far Right harming the working class and the masses of people by

• * further militarizing the border
• * supporting racist militias on the border
• * repealing in-state tuition for undocumented college students
• * attempting to end DACA and executive relief for undocumented people,
• * harassing Texas legislators who oppose “Open Carry”
• * making openly racist attacks on people of color, Muslims, and other minorities
• * refusing to expand Medicaid
• * attempting to cut Security and Medicare
• * refusing to adequately fund public schools
• * refusing to adequately fund veterans care
• * opposing improved services for the disabled
• * opposing measures to reduce unemployment
• * opposing a living wage for all workers
• * constantly adding to the legal and economic privileges and rights of the very rich
• * calling for new wars in Iraq, Syria, and Iran
• * giving Latin American governments taxpayer money to repress their people under the  guise of fighting the drug trade

…and more!

We are committed to helping workers and democratic-minded people of all nationalities understand that these problems are rooted in the capitalist system and that socialism here in the United States and around the world is the answer to these problems.

We hope you will plan to join us for the Rally on Saturday, February 28. If you would like more information, please call (832) 692-2306.

In Solidarity,

Houston Socialist Movement

Hi,

President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry and Senator John McCain have dishonored the people of the United States by their support of the fascist government in the Ukraine. Any military assistance to the anti-Semitic, anti-worker government in the Ukraine would be an act of provocation towards Russia. Working people do not need a war with Russia which without doubt would be catastrophic to Europe and the United States at the very least. We must not forget that we can all be cremated equally!

That’s why I created a petition to The United States House of Representatives, The United States Senate, and President Barack Obama, which says:

“We oppose sending military support of any kind to the fascist government in the Ukraine!”

Will you sign this petition? Click here:

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/no-to-war-with-russia?source=c.em.mt&r_by=8638452

Thanks!

http://tinyurl.com/pyhvg5n

Editors’ note:
Not everyone in France, evidently, has the passion for free speech recently expressed in the slogan,  “Je Suis Charlie.” At MLT, our Books Editor Roger Keeran received this appeal from Aymeric Monville, editor-in-chief of Editions Delga. We urge all to sign the petition.  A review of the book in question first appeared in the Socialist Voice, Ireland. It was reposted to MLT at http://mltoday.com/review-stalins-wars-from-world-war-to-cold-war-19391953

Paris, Feb. 6, 2015

Dear MLT Editors and Readers,

We had the great honour to publish some of your books in French and we wanted therefore to inform you about this disturbing development.

A user of the Sorbonne University’s Pierre Mendès France Library recently proposed to a librarian that the library acquire the French edition of Stalin’s Wars: From World War to Cold War 1939-1953 by Geoffrey Roberts, professor at the University of Cork in Ireland and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

The book was published in French in 2014 by Editions Delga, and originally published in English in 2006 by Yale University Press.

The proposal received the following response: “The proposed work, although it was written by a university professor, does not in principle seem to us to display the historical and scientific neutrality required for it to be included on our shelves. Nor do the other books published by the same publishing house.”

It appears that, in the past, the library had accepted all our books concerning philosophy and Marxism but has suddenly banned our books about the USSR, including yours and a book of Henri Alleg.

In the sad context of fascization in Europe, historian Annie Lacroix-Riz, design engineer Godefroy Clair and I have launched a petition that 1200 people have already signed.

Here is the site where you can find the petition: http://www.historiographie.info/

Here is the text in English : http://www.petitions24.net/petition_against_censorship_in_french_university_libraries

Sincerely,

Aymeric Monville (editor in chief, Editions Delga, Paris)

• Donations:  Food (non perishable), Diapers, Food Gift Cards

• Monetary Donations

• Picketing Assistance

http://act.credoaction.com/sign/Bernie_Sanders_TPP?

Republicans in the new Congress have already launched a backdoor attack against Social Security and moved to gut Wall Street reforms with more bailout for big banks. And now they are working with the Obama administration for the next big item on their agenda – a titanic corporate power grab called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

We need to fight now to ensure the American public, which has purposefully been kept in the dark about the TPP, knows exactly what is in it.

Fortunately, Senator Bernie Sanders is fired up. He is championing the public interest by demanding the Obama Administration make public the content of all trade agreements such as the TPP.¹ And, this is a key moment for us to stand with him.

Tell President Obama: Make the full text of all pending trade agreements public.

Trade agreements such as the TPP are being negotiated behind closed doors by the governments of a dozen countries (including ours) in collusion with corporate interests. This secret “trade” deal would eviscerate broad swaths of regulations that protect consumers, workers, the environment and the soundness of our financial system. And it would set up a legal regime where corporate profits trump the policy priorities of sovereign governments.

Under a trade agreement such as the TPP, more American jobs would be offshored. Internet freedom would be a joke. Developing countries would lose access to lifesaving medicines. Unsafe foods and products could pour into our country while we’re powerless to stop them. Gone would be the days when the United States could regulate coal exports. The excesses of our crazy intellectual property laws that privilege corporate control over innovation would be both exacerbated and extended internationally. And, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Soon congress will be taking up “Fast Track” legislation which would short-circuit the typical legislative process when trade deals like the TPP come up for a vote. In fact, the reason the corporate lobby is pushing hard for Fast Track is that they know the TPP could not get through Congress without this extraordinary power grab.

You might think a far-reaching proposal such as the TPP would be subject to intense public debate. But the text of the proposed deal is considered classified by our government and even members of Congress have been given extremely limited access to it.

The little we do know about the deal we know because drafts of some of its chapters were leaked last year.

Yet, while the government has kept the public and Congress largely in the dark about the TPP, it has given 600 corporate advisers access to the full text of the proposal. As Senator Sanders has demanded, President Obama’s trade negotiators must “stop operating in the shadows and come clean with details of an agreement.”²

Tell President Obama: Make the full text of all pending trade agreements public.

Senator Elizabeth Warren has warned that trade deals like the TPP could provide an opportunity for “banks to get something done quietly out of sight that they could not accomplish in a public place with the cameras rolling and the lights on.”³

Indeed, leaked chapters of the TPP included provisions that would majorly hamstring the ability of governments to stem the next banking crisis.⁴

Other provisions would allow multinational corporations to sue governments in foreign courts that are staffed by corporate lawyers when governmental regulations cut into corporate profit.⁵

It would be outrageous for the Obama Administration to allow the Republican leadership and their corporate allies within the Democratic party to ram through Fast Track, without allowing all members of Congress, their staff, and the American public to read what is in trade agreements such as the TPP.

This is why Senator Sanders is demanding the Obama administration to at least follow the example of the European Union which has already published the full text of a separate proposed trade agreement with the United States.⁶

Stand with Senator Sanders by demanding President Obama to immediately release the full text of all pending trade agreements.

Thank you for speaking out. Your activism matters

1. Senator Bernie Sanders’ letter to United States Trade Representative, January 5, 2015.
2. Senator Bernie Sanders’ press release, “Sanders Contrasts U.S. Trade Secrecy to EU Transparency,” Sanders.senate.gov, January 7, 2015.
3. Kate Davidson, “Elizabeth Warren: Trade talks could weaken bank oversight,” Politico, May 8, 2013.
4. Zach Carter, “Obama Faces Backlash Over New Corporate Powers In Secret Trade Deal,” Huffington Post, Dec. 08, 2013
5. Ibid.
6. Senator Bernie Sanders’ press release, “Sanders Contrasts U.S. Trade Secrecy to EU Transparency.”