We Charge Genocide!

By James Thompson and A. Shaw

Workers in the United States and around the world unite to renew the 1951 petition “We Charge Genocide” submitted to the General Assembly of the United Nations by the Civil Rights Congress and others. The 1951 petition opposed the genocidal violence towards African-Americans in the United States at that time. This renewal opposes the contemporary genocidal violence towards African-Americans in the United States and it is a plea for relief from the United Nations.

The United Nations declared that genocide imperils world peace. The opening statement of the 1951 petition “We Charge Genocide” reads “The responsibility is particularly grave when citizens must charge their own government with mass murder of its own nationals, with institutionalized oppression and persistent slaughter of the Negro people in the United States on a basis of ‘race,’ a crime abhorred by mankind and prohibited by the conscience of the world as expressed in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 9, 1948.”

The international legal definition of the crime of genocide is found in Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.

Article II describes two elements of the crime of genocide:

1) the mental element, meaning the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such, and

2) the physical element which includes five acts described in sections a, b, c, d and e. A crime must include both elements to be called “genocide.”

Article III described five punishable forms of the crime of genocide: genocide; conspiracy, incitement, attempt and complicity.

64 years after the original petition “We Charge Genocide” was filed, the people of the United States continue to be subjected to the most violent terrorism by the government. One sector of the population, African-Americans, has borne and continues to bear the brunt of this terrorism. The terrorism is multifaceted and includes murders of individuals by the police, mass incarceration, unbearably high unemployment rates, homelessness, lack of access to healthcare and education, drug infestation, soaring crime rates, endless wars and capital punishment.

According to the NAACP, 76 “unarmed men and women of color” were murdered by police officers between 1999 and 2014.

The 1951 petition “We Charge Genocide” points out that violence on our shores leads to violence against other countries and this insight is just as true today as it was then.

We demand that the genocidal violence against African-Americans in the United States end immediately. The recent increase in police murders of African-Americans in the United States must cease immediately. If these senseless murders continue, it will become readily apparent to all that these acts may be a result of some deranged national policy. Similarly, we will not tolerate mass incarceration and astronomical unemployment rates any longer. The lack of affordable housing, and diminishing access to healthcare and education leads to drug infestation and soaring crime rates and this must be reversed if we are to continue as a civilized society.

The lack of opportunity for young black people in the USA propels them towards either mass incarceration or military service. Mass incarceration and military service are modern day forms of slavery. We demand that young African-Americans have opportunities to be productive members of society and fulfill their potentials.

The death penalty must be stopped on a national level. It has been disproportionately administered to African-Americans in the USA. It is inherently cruel and unusual punishment. It is an egregious violation of human rights. It is genocidal.

Please join the fight for justice in the USA and to end the genocidal practices against African-Americans. Do this to honor Michael Brown, James Byrd, Eric Garner, Walter Scott, Eric Courtney Harris and many others.

Please click on the link to sign the petition:

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/we-charge-genocide-1?source=c.em&r_by=8638452

You can view the videos of the Rally against Republicans held on 2/28/2015 in Houston which was organized by the Houston Socialist Movement at the following links:

http://youtu.be/eH5gteUx_HQ

http://youtu.be/dQZmH5LH-ug

http://youtu.be/55MI956srIc

http://youtu.be/SugVZPSzoJE

http://youtu.be/NeqoRM8X2d4

http://youtu.be/HekqSmY0QHw

http://youtu.be/CKpvEzZOm-Q

February 25, 2015

Picket tomorrow against Harper’s so-called anti-terror bill

A picket has been organized against the Conservative Party’s misnamed anti-terror bill:

Shelly Glover, MP’s office
Thursday, Feb. 26, 4:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
213 St. Mary’s Road (near Traverse)

All groups are welcome, including to speak and co-sponsor.

* * * * *
Harper’s legislation will enable the RCMP and CSIS to crack down on all resistance in Canada, against democratic and workers’ struggles.

There is no “balance” in the bill. It gives free reign to the government’s security apparatus at the same time it attacks Canadians’ rights and freedoms.

There is no evidence that the government needs to give such power to secret, actually political police. Historically, such legislation has always been used once passed:  to outlaw socialist parties (1918), crush the Winnipeg General Strike (1919), outlaw the Communist Party (1931, two years before Germany and Japan, and 1939), and imprison hundreds of innocent people during the FLQ crisis.

As found by the Royal Commission on Certain Activities of the RCMP (1977), even without such laws the police carried out serious criminal activities against progressive organizations, including the Communist Party, many of which remain unpublished and secret to this day.

So it can safely be said, the bill is unnecessary and is intended to create fear and conformity among Canadians with the Conservative Party’s definition of terrorism.

The Communist Party is wholly opposed to terrorism as a tactic in the mass struggles for democracy and socialism, but the Conservative government is using this bill to instill fear in the general public and to draw attention away from its own pro-terror policies such as bombing Yugoslavia and Libya, helping Ukraine’s pro-Nazi regime which is terrorizing its population and banning the Communist Party there, and deporting U.S. military veterans who are opposed to war crimes to serve lengthy sentences in U.S. military prisons – pursuing a pro-war crime agenda.

The Communist Party completely rejects the idea that this bill is needed to counter so-called “eco-terrorism” or the serious, false charge against Aboriginal rights activists that they are terrorists. The proven use of agents provocateurs in anti-globalization protests by police shows who are the real criminals.

The bill targets the resistance to corporate control of Canada.

The bill’s first target is the international unity of working people, Arab and non-Arab, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, Russian and non-Russian.

Who are the Conservative party’s targets-of-choice, the targets of RCMP wrongdoing, jailings and outright banning since the beginning of mercantile and settler colonialism, the Red River Resistance and the Winnipeg General Strike?

Politically, it is socialist parties, especially the Communist Party which supports the resistance against corporate influence and domination and works to build the international unity of working people and oppressed nations (outlawed 3 times).

In terms of the people’s resistance, it is the trade union movement and oppressed nations, Aboriginal peoples and Quebec’s movement for self-determination and equality.

The anti-terror legislation is certain to broaden the dirty tricks, secret police wrongdoing and repression.

That is why the Communist Party in Winnipeg will hold a picket to protest the new bill this week.

Everyone is invited to bring their signs and messages of resistance.

Vive la resistance,
Penner-Bethune Club, Communist Party of Canada

Information: Darrell Rankin (204) 792-3371

http://www.usw.org/act/oilsafety

Safe Refineries Save Lives

USW oil workers have been forced into an unfair labor strike against the oil industry. These brave sisters and brothers are fighting for safe workplaces and communities. The companies’ bad faith bargaining, including refusal to bargain over mandatory subjects and undue delays in providing information, impeded bargaining and led to the strike. You can help stand with our brothers and sisters by clicking http://www.usw.org/act/oilsafety to sign our petition telling oil industry management and federal, state and local officials that we all want safe refineries. Safe workplaces don’t just protect workers, but also the communities where we live and work.

Washington, DC.    On Tuesday, February 3, 2015, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) reintroduced HR 676, his single payer Improved Medicare for All  legislation, in the current 114th session of Congress.  The bill was introduced with 44 co-sponsors in addition to Conyers. 

Calls to congressional offices by supporters of single payer healthcare have already increased the number of co-sponsors to 46.

“Under H.R. 676, every resident of the United States would receive a card at birth that would guarantee access to a full range of medically-necessary services that include primary care, dental, prescription drugs, mental health and long term care,” said Conyers.  The bill assures to all patients free choice of physician or health care provider.

Kay Tillow, coordinator of the All Unions Committee for Single Payer Healthcare HR 676, urged everyone to call their congressperson or email them asking that they sign on as a co-sponsor of HR 676.

You can call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask for your representative by name. If you cannot speak to the representative, leave a message and request a response.

You can look up representatives by zip code here:  http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ 

A complete list of co-sponsors of HR 676 can be found here. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/676/cosponsors?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22HR+676%22%5D%7D  

The Physicians for a National Health Program news release is here.

Doctors group hails reintroduction of Medicare-for-all bill

Single-payer health program would cover all 42 million uninsured, upgrade everyone’s benefits and save $400 billion annually on bureaucracy, physicians say

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, February 4, 2015

Contact:
Mark Almberg, PNHP communications director, mark@pnhp.org

A national physicians group today hailed the reintroduction of a federal bill that would upgrade the Medicare program and swiftly expand it to cover the entire population.

The “Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act,” H.R. 676, introduced last night by Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., with 44 other House members, would replace today’s welter of private health insurance companies with a single, streamlined public agency that would pay all medical claims, much like Medicare works for seniors today. The full text of the bill is available here.

Proponents say a Medicare-for-all system, also known as a single-payer system, would vastly simplify how the nation pays for care, improve patient health, restore free choice of physician, eliminate copays and deductibles, and yield substantial savings for individuals, families and the national economy.

“The global evidence is very clear: single-payer financing systems are the most equitable and cost-effective way to assure that everyone, without exception, gets high-quality care,” said Dr. Robert Zarr, president of Physicians for a National Health Program, a nonprofit research and educational group of 19,000 doctors nationwide.

“Medicare is a good model to build on, and what better way to observe Medicare’s 50th anniversary year than to improve and extend the program and its benefits to people of all ages?”

Zarr, a Washington, D.C.-based pediatrician, continued: “An expanded and improved Medicare-for-All program would assure truly universal coverage, cover all necessary services, and knock down the growing financial barriers to care – high premiums, co-pays, deductibles and coinsurance – that our nation’s patients and their families are increasingly running up against, often with calamitous results.

“Such a plan would save over $400 billion a year currently wasted on private-insurance-related bureaucracy, paperwork and marketing. That’s enough money to provide first-dollar coverage for everyone in the country – without increasing U.S. health spending by a single penny.

“Such a program would also have the financial clout to negotiate with drug and medical equipment suppliers for lower prices, and would further save money through lump-sum budgeting for hospitals.

“In short,” Zarr said, “the enactment of Rep. Conyers’ bill would take us much further down the road to a humane, just and sustainable health care system than the 2010 health law, which, despite its modest benefits, will not be able to control costs and will still leave 31 million people uninsured in 2024, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Millions more will be inadequately insured, with skimpy coverage.”

Zarr pointed out that the Census Bureau reports there were 5.9 million uninsured children in 2013.

“Surveys have repeatedly shown that about two-thirds of the public supports a Medicare-for-all approach,” he said, “and recent surveys show physician support is also strong and growing. Hundreds of labor, civic and faith-based organizations have endorsed this model of deep-going reform.

“As a doctor who sees the children of hard-pressed parents every day, I can tell you that the need for fundamental health care reform has never been greater,” he said. “It’s time to stop putting the interests of private insurance companies and Big Pharma over patient needs. It’s time to adopt a single-payer, improved-Medicare-for-all program in the United States.”

A summary of the basic provisions of H.R. 676 is available here.

http://www.pnhp.org/news/2015/february/doctors-group-hails-reintroduction-of-medicare-for-all-bill

Issued by:

Kay Tillow
All Unions Committee for Single Payer Health Care–HR 676
c/o Nurses Professional Organization (NPO)
1169 Eastern Parkway, Suite 2218
Louisville, KY 40217
(502) 636 1551

Email: nursenpo@aol.com 
http://unionsforsinglepayer.org

https://www.facebook.com/unionsforsinglepayer

02/09/2015

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. We refuse to buy Shell products until the strike is settled.

That’s why I created a petition to Ben van Beurden, CEO, which says:

“We support the striking USW members at Shell Oil Company refineries. We will support the workers by boycotting Shell Oil Company products.”

Will you sign this petition? Click here:

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/boycott-shell-oil-company?source=c.em.mt&r_by=8638452

Thanks!