Unions protect workers and save jobs. They also stabilize a country's economy during hard times.

Joseph Raglione
Gentle readers of this American Chronicle, LabourStart.com is one of the best places to learn how to create and operate a Union...>

In this week's mailing:

Pakistan: Violence targest Lipton tea workers

USA/UK: Trade union congresses go all Web 2.0

Israel: Success for Arab railway workers, antiquities workers fight continues

Union strategies for hard times

PAKISTAN: VIOLENCE TARGETS LIPTON TEA WORKERS

The ongoing struggle by Lipton Tea workers in Pakistan has turned

ugly, as contractors collude with factory management to instigate

violent attacks on the workers. The IUF is calling on Unilever (which

owns Lipton) to stop the violence and negotiate with the workers.

They need all of us to sign up to the latest online campaign:

http://tinyurl.com/qyetop

USA/UK: TRADE UNION CONGRESSES GO ALL WEB 2.0

Two of the world's largest and most important trade union movements

are holding their national congresses this week -- the AFL-CIO is

meeting in Pittsburgh and the Trades Union Congress meets in

Liverpool.

Both organizations are making exceptional use of the Internet, with

dedicated websites featuring streaming video, integration of social

networking tools Twitter, Flickr and Facebook, and more. The TUC

takes things a step forward by allowing visitors to the congress

website to actually post comments and get involved in the discussion.

The sites can be found at

http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/thisistheaflcio/convention/2009/ and

http://www.congressvoices.org/

ISRAEL: SUCCESS FOR ARAB RAILWAY WORKERS, ANTIQUITIES WORKERS FIGHT CONTINUES

Several months ago we told you about the struggle being waged by

Israeli Arabs employed by the country's railways who were threatened

with dismissal due to the fact that they had not served in the army.

This week a long struggle by those workers and their supporters has

resulted in a major win. According to a press release issued by Sawt


el-Amel (The Laborer's Voice), "This morning, [the] Tel Aviv Labour

Court ruled that until a final court decision, Israel Railways cannot

lay off any Arab railway crossing guard as a consequence of its new

employment policy." For the full statement, go here:

http://www.laborers-voice.org/article_details.aspx?TopID=1074&catid=45

We have also been telling you about the struggle of low-paid workers

employed by the Israel Antiquities Authority (both Arabs and Jews) who

have become the latest victims of the process of casualization that

affects workers around the world. Their struggle has included legal

battles, street demonstrations and a big LabourStart campaign, In the

next few weeks we should see some legal decisions -- including results

of the libel action brought by the employer against our partners in

the Workers Advice Center (WAC). WAC has written up a detailed

account which I encourage you to read:

http://www.labourstart.org/israel/wac.pdf

UNION STRATEGIES FOR HARD TIMES

What can unions do as the Great Recession ravages workers and their

unions and threatens to destroy decades of collective bargaining

gains? What must local union leaders do to help their laid off

members, protect those still working, and prevent the gutting of their

hard-fought contracts -- and their very unions themselves? How, in

fact, can local union leaders turn crisis into opportunity?

Check out our brand-new book of the week, just published -- "Union

Strategies for Hard Times". To learn more and to order copies for

yourself and your fellow union members are here:

http://www.labourstart.org/bookshop/?p=81

Remember that every book you order this way helps to support LabourStart.

Thanks very much.

Eric Lee

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Joseph Raglione

About Joseph Raglione
Hi! I am the executive director of the World Humanitarian Peace and Ecology Movement. I began as an environmental activist in 1969 and basically, never stopped! I Graduated College in Social Science and registered as a non-profit corporation in 1988 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I am one of a very few non-profit and generic freedom loving journalists left on Earth, and I continue today to study and to understand the problems connected with human activity on this Planet. My affiliates include: GreenPeace, the Nature Conservancy, the Bio-diversity organization, the Sierra Club, the David Suzuky foundation, the WWF, Amnesty International, World Vision, the IUF organization; as well as the wonderful and independant N.A.S.A. scientists studying our Planet's weather systems. Of course NASA also studies the mysteries of the Eternal Universe with satelite generated images and, over the years, have generously allowed me and thousands of our world scientists to study over their shoulder's via the Internet.
In spite of some past U.S. government repression, NASA continues to provide solid evidence of global warming.
NASA has provided me with pictorial evidence of Rainforest deforestation within: Jakarta, Peru, Africa, Brazil and even in Western Canada!
The motivation for such destruction continues to be (often illegally) for: lumber, for bio-fuels, and for Cattle ranching. Today, the perceived future profits for Palm Oil and for Bio-Fuels are prime motivators for environmental destruction. Small crop farming also contributes but that may be changing as farmers learn to protect the Rain-Forest.
With NASA imaging, there is proof that large city heat traps are helping global warming, and with (infrared images)there is proof that several hundred million gas burning vehicles (including ship and airplanes) presently create a hugh quantity of pollution tracks across both Oceans and Sky.
With oil, gas, Coal and Bio-Fuel heated buildings around the world creating C02 emissions, and with Methane release from all animal species...giant Ozone holes have been created and continue to exist above the North and South Poles. Ozone holes allow the Sun to radiate the Ice Caps and to accelerate the Ice melt, which releases more Methane into the atmosphere, which continues to thin out the Ozone. A vicious circle created by human need and also, unhappily, by human greed!
I have been asked to write to the Prime Minister of Japan to ask him to stop the murderous assault on endangered Whales. Every year, thousands of Whales are killed in the Antarctic with GreenPeace volunteers placing themselves between the Whales and the grenade tipped harpoons, and peope like myself, (I did not forget this is my "Bio," putting my old neck on the line attempting to change the situation by writing thousands if not millions of words!
Are words dangerous?
Over three hundred journalists were killed within the last ten years. You tell me if words are dangerous!
As I write these words, the desperate and starving in Darfur are waiting for rescue. I motivated a few kind hearted California Actors to visit the region and to report back. They did! They then created the Darfur coalition and they continue to fight to save the innocent victims trapped in tents in the desert of the Sudan. Darfuri's were attacked and moved from their homes because somebody believes there is Oil under the Sudan desert.
As I write this, a few sick and desperate people in Iraq are wrapping bombs around themselves in order to die in the name of God, and the list of humanitarian disasters continues. I also contribute information to the Reuter's news service. It is time for a change. Please help make it happen!