The issue of gay marriage is without question an issue of civil rights. Gay people deserve every right that every other person has. No matter what opponents of gay marriage believe, how dare they call for a vote on the rights of others? Do people get to vote on where you live? Do people get to vote on where you are allowed to travel? Do people get to vote on whether you are allowed to practice your cultural or religious beliefs?

In fact there was a time when people did vote on such things. After the Civil War, the elite in the South mobilized white voters based on fear and racism, to oppress the newly-freed black people. The Jim Crow laws denied the civil rights that black people were entitled to as citizens. Black people were limited by law to live, work, and travel only in places that the white majority determined were acceptable. Laws were put in place that made it illegal for people of different races to marry. And laws were put in place that took away the rights of black people to even vote.

No one today would argue that these sort of limitations on the rights of black people were okay just because a prejudiced majority of white southerners voted on it. So how can we stand to watch the same thing done to gay people? The methods are the same. Politicians play on people’s prejudices and insecurities, saying that gay marriage would be an attack on the institution of marriage. They make people afraid of allowing gay people to have the rights that straight people enjoy.

Marriage is not just a title. It carries with it legal rights. How many health care plans have provisions for spouses? Without the right to marry, gay partners aren’t always covered. What about hospital visitation rights? Without the right to marry, gay partners can be denied hospital visits. What about the right to adopt children? Married couples are given preference in adoption. Without the right to marry, gay people can be denied the right to have families.

Of course it’s not the same everywhere. In some states like Massachusetts, gay people have every sort of protection. They have the right to marry and the right to adopt children. They have the right to rent or own homes, to work, and go to school without discrimination. They have the right to receive the benefits offered by their partners’ employers. But in other states like Alabama, discrimination in housing, work, or school is not illegal. What’s worse, there are the laws banning marriage and adoption by gay couples. How can two sets of rights exist in the same country?

In fact the practice of state governments deciding which rights people are entitled to has always been the way for the federal government to avoid dealing with prejudice and injustice. When the civil rights movement was tearing down racist laws in the 1960′s, the politicians pretended to support the civil rights movement while hiding behind the right of states to define local laws and customs. Is it different today?

President Obama has no intention of using the power of the federal government to defend the rights of gay people. He has made it clear that his statement is a personal opinion. He says that he supports the right of states to decide.

Gay marriage is a civil right, and just like every civil right that has been won in this country, it will only happen if people force the law to change. Until then the politicians will use people’s rights as a tool to position themselves. Regardless of what they say, we should not accept that people’s rights are put up for a vote in the elections. We should demand full civil rights for everyone in this country, including gay people, without compromise.

If we want an education, we have to borrow. If we want to live in a home, we have to borrow some more. If we have an unexpected medical expense or a car repair or we have children or if the bills go up or the rent is due – in every case the options are the same, go even further into debt. Even for things like gas and groceries we have to rely on our credit cards more than our own paychecks. Everything we need in life seems like just another way to go further into debt.

Individuals with debt are made out to be the bad guys, as if they couldn’t control their spending and brought the situation on themselves. Debt isn’t an individual problem or a character flaw. Debt is a regular part of life – an economic condition that we’re forced into without a chance to escape. And today, the reality is that workers have taken on tens of thousands of dollars of debt just to have an even lower standard of living than before.

Most people who decide to go to school do so to get a better paying job, to escape falling into debt. But now the cost of education is increasing to record levels and there are fewer jobs available that require a degree. Since 2007, the number of unemployed college graduates has nearly doubled. So today more college graduates are finding themselves in the same spot they would have been in if they hadn’t gone to school in the first place.

But the difference now is when they leave college and start looking for work, they start out with a mountain of debt. What was supposed to be a head start, is now actually setting many young workers back – graduating with an average of $25,000 in debt. Once a student graduates it’s time to shovel on the rest of the debt that has now become a part of everyday life.

Wages have dropped further and further behind the rising cost of living. To make up for low wages and just to get by, workers have to rely on credit cards or check cashing centers that scam people out of their money. Average credit card debt is now $15,956 per household.

None of this debt includes all the money people had to borrow just to buy a home to live in. The banks tricked people into buying homes and then jacked up the interest rates to levels where people couldn’t afford to keep their homes. Housing prices soared and the banks made out like crooks. Millions of families lost their homes or are still losing them and millions more owe the banks more money than what their homes are even worth.

While families were being forced into foreclosures, the banks claimed they didn’t have enough money and the government gave over $12 trillion in bailouts or zero percent loans. This, along with tax cuts to corporations and the wealthy, has created the largest public debt in history – over $15 trillion.

So, on top of all the debt we already took on for our education, our cars, our healthcare, our homes and our daily necessities, now we have to pay for the economic crisis through the gutting of public services and social programs. Our libraries, schools, hospitals and even fire departments are shutting their doors to pay for this debt. Public transportation, programs for children and the elderly and student aid are all being completely cut or gutted. And the cutting of social programs without our wages getting any better means that we need to take on even more debt just to get by.

We are being more heavily chained to debt than ever before. If we need to go into debt just to get what we need, then we can’t even afford to live a decent life. We have to take two steps backward for every step forward.

In the past, this was called being an indentured servant. But today, we’re just called workers.

But of course we aren’t taught this version of history in school. We are taught that only great leaders, politicians and geniuses make history, not us. But nothing could be more wrong. Would there have been an end to slavery in this country without a massive struggle and a civil war? Would people have won the right to have unions without hard-fought strikes? Would civil rights for black people have been won without confronting the racism of
this society? Every change worth writing about in the history books has been a struggle by workers, the poor, and oppressed people against exploitation.

So what about now, in the 21st century? Our lives are under attack from every angle.
Unemployment is the highest it’s been in thirty years. Those of us who are lucky enough to have jobs are facing major cuts. If we have pensions, they’re on the chopping block. If we have health care, they’re jacking up our premiums. And day in and day out we do more work for the same pay. Meanwhile our society is falling apart. Our schools are facing cuts, and those students lucky enough to graduate with the hope of college find themselves in massive debt. Social services that care for the elderly and disabled are being slashed,
and programs that help poor families are being cut.

But not everyone is suffering. The banks have received $13 trillion dollars in bailouts and loans since 2008. And they aren’t experiencing the crisis at all. They are making record profits, the highest since World War II. Every day we pay a little more, and they profit at our expense. This crisis is not only the experience of American workers. In Greece, Spain, Italy and all over Europe, we have seen the same attacks –workers forced to pay for the crisis. The wealthy elite are pushing people beyond their limits.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. We’ve already seen the beginnings of resistance. Greece
and Spain have had massive strikes against the attacks. And here in the U.S., we saw the Occupy movement, where thousands of people protested the banks and corporations.
We don’t have to look too far back to see what May Day could mean. In 2006 millions of
immigrant workers in the U.S. protested a proposed bill to limit immigrant rights. Chicago’s meat packing industry was shut down. The port of Los Angeles was closed. And countless restaurants and shops across the U.S. were closed. On that May Day it was clear whose power really makes society run – those who do the actual work.
This is what May Day should mean. Imagine if the working class was organized to use that power here in the U.S. and in the rest of the world as well. We could not only stop the attacks of the banks and governments. We could put an end to their system of exploitation once and for all. No wonder they don’t want us to know our own history.

All Work & Bad Pay

Millions of immigrants came to the U.S. in the late 19^th century. Their wages were so low, entire families, including children, had to work just to survive. The average worker toiled for twelve hours a day, seven days a week. Working conditions were horrible, from cramped sweatshop factories to dangerous coal mines. Workers also faced constant attempts by the bosses to speed up work, cut their pay, and lay them off during the off-seasons. All of these things made workers fed up and ready to fight to change their conditions.

Never Wait – The Fight For Eight

In the 1880s, workers in the U.S. began to push for a shorter workday. The eight-hour movement spread throughout the working class. May 1, 1886 was chosen for a nationwide strike, to force those in power to recognize the eight-hour day. The leaders of the main union, the Knights of Labor, were afraid to launch a real fight, but at the local level, workers led by revolutionary socialists prepared for a major clash with their employers and the police. On May 1^st, over 350,000 workers stopped work in 12,000 work places across the nation. Many of these struggles won shorter work hours, though the government did not recognize the eight hour day.

The Haymarket Tragedy

On May third in Chicago, police opened fire on striking workers killing six. Then on May fourth, the local revolutionaries organized a rally at Haymarket Square to protest the police. As the last speaker finished, a bomb exploded, killing seven cops. No one knows who threw the bomb, but immediately police opened fire on the unarmed workers.

Afterward eight revolutionaries were tried and convicted on charges of inciting a riot, even though there was no evidence. Two were executed and one committed suicide in prison. The government used this incident to attack workers everywhere, and try and crush the workers’ movement. But the example of the Haymarket revolutionaries inspired thousands more to take up the cause. In 1889, workers’ organizations around the world chose May first, as a day to honor their memory and continue the fight.

May Day – Forgotten in America, Celebrated Around the World

To destroy the memory of May Day the government emphasized Labor Day as a patriotic holiday to take its place. Unfortunately most Americans aren’t given the chance to know what May Day really is. But in most of the world May Day is still celebrated. Isn’t it about time we began to reclaim our history? American workers’ struggles could inspire the world once again.

Lately, this election has become focused on who is better for working people when it comes to the economy: Obama or Romney?

Romney isn’t even able to pretend to be on the side of workers. He is a long-time investment banker with a personal fortune of over $250 million. He made over $20 million dollars for the last two years in a row. When Romney was trying to appeal to workers at a NASCAR event, all he could say was that his best friends are the owners of the teams.

In his campaigning, Romney has promised he will not increase taxes on the super rich – he has even said he plans on lowering them. When it comes to banks and corporations, Romney says he will cut their tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent. Whether it is tax rates, waging war, the lives of women, social services, or anything that matters to working people – Romney is clearly on the other side, representing his pals in the elite club of the ruling rich.

For Obama, despite all his campaign promises, after nearly four years of bailing out the banks, the corporations, and the rich, after continuing to slash funding for health care, education and social services while increasing funding for wars, after all of that and much worse – this time he promises he will really represent working people.

Obama’s current sales pitch for the economy is the auto industry. He says that his policies saved the auto companies and can be used throughout the country to help the economy recover. He carefully leaves out an important part of the story – the facts!

This auto bailout was more than a bailout. It forced the auto workers to make huge sacrifices. The Obama administration imposed wage cuts, health care cuts, pension cuts, and massive layoffs on auto workers. And a year later, auto companies made record profits because they pushed more work onto fewer workers and paid them less to do it. That’s not a solution for working people – it’s a nightmare.

And now that the country is becoming angrier at the amount of money flowing into the pockets of the super rich, Obama has suddenly turned into a champion for working people. He promises he will raise taxes on the richest Americans, who are among the wealthiest people in the world. He says they should pay the same tax rate as working people. What a joke! The richest people in the world should pay way more than working people.

But even if this proposal was ever passed, there are so many tax tricks and loopholes that the super rich would continue to get out of paying more money. Even now they regularly get away with paying less than their official rate. But that doesn’t matter because at the same time, like Romney, Obama is proposing to lower the taxes of corporations from 35 percent to 28 percent (only three percent higher than Romney’s proposal). So as working people are doing more work than ever recorded in U.S. history, and as U.S. corporations are making the most money ever recorded – Obama promises to lower the taxes of corporations.

If this political comedy show weren’t about our lives it might even be laughable. But it’s not funny. Democrat or Republican, Obama or Romney, lethal injection or the electric chair – these aren’t real choices. These are politicians competing over who will represent banks and corporations and the super rich – not who will represent working people.

What is wrong with this picture? What if Trayvon Martin was a white teenager? Zimmerman would have been behind bars minutes after the shooting. But a young black man carrying a bag of skittles and an iced tea? According to the police, that’s a credible threat to a grown man with a gun.

Since Trayvon Martin’s murder, the media has done an excellent job of smearing his reputation and putting his past under the microscope. So what if Trayvon was caught with marijuana? One in five American teenagers has smoked marijuana. Many of them smoke regularly. Does that mean 20 percent of teenagers can be shot dead on the street? Even more ridiculous is the idea that Trayvon’s hoodie made him seem threatening. How many teenagers wear a hoodie every day—are they criminals?

Behind this whole discussion is an unspoken assumption – if you are black, you are guilty until proven innocent. Ask any young black man – How many times do strangers cross the street to avoid you? How many times are you followed in a store because they think you are stealing something? How often are you stopped on the street for some bullshit reason, simply because the police find you suspicious? In fact a black youth is five times more likely to go to jail as a white youth.

And this racism isn’t limited to young black men. Look at the case of Henry Louis Gates Jr. He is a 58 year old professor at Harvard, one of the most prestigious universities in the world. In 2009, he was arrested while trying to open the door of his own home after it got stuck. The cops assumed that a black man trying to open a door in a nice neighborhood must be a criminal. Professor Gates was handcuffed and taken into custody. He was only released after the cops found out that he is a famous Harvard professor – guilty until proven innocent.

Even worse is the case of 68-year-old retired Marine, Kenneth Chamberlain Sr. Last November while sleeping in his home in White Plains, New York, Chamberlain triggered his medical alert device by accident. The cops showed up and refused to believe Chamberlain that he was OK and didn’t need help. The cops busted down the door, shouting racial slurs. Then they shot Chamberlain with a tazer, with rubber bullets, then finally with a gunshot to the chest. No police were charged. The case wasn’t even national news until Trayvon Martin was shot and the media wanted another sensational story. Otherwise, Chamberlain would have been just another entry in the police record.

These cases show the racism of this society in the most shocking extreme. But these are just the most visible symptoms of a deeper problem. Twenty five percent of black families live in poverty compared to eight percent for white families. Schools in mostly-black urban centers receive one third of the funding of schools in mostly-white suburbs. There are more black men in jail or on parole today than there were slaves in the South before emancipation. In other words, black people have fewer opportunities, fewer jobs, and are more likely to be jailed or killed than anyone else. And we are supposed to believe this is their fault?

This society blames, frames, deprives, and denigrates black people from the day they are born. And when someone like Trayvon Martin is killed, he is blamed for his own death! To pretend there can be justice in this environment is a sick joke.

No amount of racist blame can hide the truth. The real criminals are those who are destroying the future of a whole generation of young people. The banks and corporations are profiting more than ever. But young people face a future of less education, more unemployment, and increasing hopelessness. And the racism of this society assures that black youth receive the absolute worst treatment. This system of exploitation only serves the wealthy elite. We need to a build system that serves the needs of everyone, regardless of color. Only then can we have real justice.

Where Will Our Tax Money Go in 2013?

• $89 billion will be spent on the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan.

• Another $750 billion will be spent on other military development.

• $516 billion will pay for past military costs.

• The oil and gas industry will receive up to $41 billion in subsidies.

• $36 billion will be spent on new nuclear power plants.

• The Federal Bureau of Prisons will receive more than $6.9 billion, increasing their funding by 4.2%.

Who Pays the Taxes? The Workers Do!

• In 2010-2011, the personal income taxes from our jobs provided 52.5% of General Fund revenues in California. So more than half of the money our state government spends comes from workers’ pockets.

• Nearly 30% of State funding comes from sales tax. This consists of items we decide to buy, such as cell phones, groceries, or clothes.

• In other words, over 80% of the money collected by the State comes from workers, when you add sales tax and our personal income taxes.

• Even though conservative politicians claim that immigrants use our resources without contributing to the tax system, immigrants pay an around $11 billion in income taxes, sales, and other taxes.

Corporations Hardly Pay Anything!

• Corporate tax is only 11.3%, even though these companies are all profiting in the billions.

• Oil companies like Chevron who profit in the billions, pay $0 in oil extraction taxes.

• GE corporation paid $0 in corporate taxes last year, while receiving $182 billion in bailouts.

There is No Prize in The Price We Pay!

Considering how much money goes to warand corporate interests, it’s obvious that this system and its tax policies do not serve ordinary people. Most families struggle from paycheck to paycheck, but we’re being forced to pay the most. What would our lives be like if the taxes we paid actually improved roads and schools, and expanded social service programs? What kind of lives could we have if the money we contributed met our needs instead of the needs of the wealthy? We should be outraged that the work we do and the taxes we pay serves a system we do not control.

For most working people, there has been no sign of the economic crisis going away. Our lives have not gotten any easier as we are continuing to live in a crisis every day. So, why is that we’re being told again and again that the U.S. economy is recovering? Why are we hearing repeatedly that the worst of the crisis is over from the Obama administration and the corporate media. For ordinary people, the crisis isn’t over – it’s getting worse.

In fact, there is a recovery happening in the economy – but it is not a recovery for working people. When the media and the politicians say the economy is improving they mean one thing – banks and corporations are making more money, and this is the only recovery that is happening.

For the top 500 U.S. corporations, profits have 23 percent since before the crisis hit in 2007. And for the richest people in the U.S., the top 1 percent, they have been the only ones getting richer during this period. In 2010, the first year the recovery is said to have happened, they increased their income by more than 12 percent. And for the last three months of 2011, they became $554 billion richer. On average, the richest 1 percent controls more than 38 percent of the wealth in the U.S. The 400 richest Americans have more wealth than the bottom 150 million Americans put together.

But for the rest of the population, the official 99 percent, our incomes have dropped 17 percent since 2007. On average, that means workers are making about $4,800 less per year. That’s right – while everyone else is earning less money, the richest Americans and the wealthiest corporations are the only ones that are making more money.

So, where is all this extra money coming from during this so-called recovery? When asked, corporations explain that the source of their improved finances is their huge cuts in costs. And for nearly every corporation the only costs they are referring to are labor costs. The biggest cut in costs comes from layoffs and overall cuts in staffing levels. For the wealthiest corporations the story is the same. During the first year or two of the crisis, corporations were in a panic. Then they laid off a large part of their workforce or reduced it in other ways, and few months later, their profits not only went up, but broke records.

At the same time, if workers have been hired, it’s for less pay, and often part-time instead of full-time. The more layoffs the bosses carry out, the more viciously they think they can cut wages. So, in many cases the newest hired workers are doing more work and earning as little as half what the same job used to pay.

The only thing recovery means is a recovery of profits, a recovery of wealth for banks, corporations, and the super rich. And the only source of that recovered wealth has been by decreasing the amount of wealth going to working people. So, less money is going to workers and more money is going to the bosses. This isn’t a recovery – it’s a robbery!

So what will it mean for the economy to keep recovering, or recover even more? It would just mean that the ruling rich were able to take away even more from working people. And what is the limit to this recovery, how much can they take away from us? How many more workers will be laid off? How many more full-time jobs will disappear or be turned into part-time? How much further will they slash workers’ wages? How much more will they cut our health benefits? And how much more work will they try to pile on to us?

For this system, run by and for the richest 1 percent, there is no limit. They will try to take and take until there is nothing left. The question whether we will let them get away with it.

What they say is at stake are the lives of the 50 million uninsured Americans and many more who will go uninsured for some period of time. The Affordable Health Care Act supposedly addresses these people’s needs by demanding that all Americans take out a health care plan. It imposes some guidelines on the health care companies, imposing restrictions so that they can’t deny patients for pre-existing conditions, and increasing the number of years that young people can be on their parents’ health care plan by two years. Overall the Affordable Health Care Act will bring 23 million uninsured Americans under some health care plan.

At first the lines seem clearly drawn. On the one side is the Obama administration and the Democrats, trying for the first time in U.S. history to impose on the health care companies some kind of health care plan for the masses of uninsured people. On the other side are those who oppose the Affordable Health Care Act – mostly the Republican Party opponents of Obama. Their attitude? If you don’t have health care, and you develop health problems, it’s your own fault. The most important thing is to preserve the right of the health care companies to offer the kind of plans that they currently do, with constantly increasing premiums, and less and less actual health care. They scream about freedom, but the only freedom they are interested in is that of the corporations to exploit our needs for profit. Even the tiny restrictions that would be imposed under the Affordable Health Care act are too much for them. And of course the Republicans also want to score points against Obama for the coming election. For them, this debate is also a piece of political theater.

Melting & Drowning

• The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets have melted by 30% since 1972, and will drive global sea levels up by close to seven feet by the end of the century.
• Coastal floods that occurred every 100 years are now happening every ten years. Four million Americans are at risk in the Gulf States, New York and California.
• Rising seas are threatening island nations like the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu, the Maldives the Seychelles, and Kiribati. By 2100 these countries will be under water.
• The Siberian permafrost, which stores frozen carbon, is melting at an alarming rate, releasing massive amounts of greenhouse gas.

Thirsty & Starving

• Glaciers from California to the Himalayas are quickly melting away, evaporating drinking water for nearly a third of the world’s population.
• Scientists have linked the current famine in Somalia to intense droughts in East Africa.
• Changing rain patterns and warming will cause a 35 percent drop in agricultural output in the U.S. over the next 70 years.

Extremes & Extinction

• 7 of 10 global disasters today are now climate change-related, meaning they are essentially man-made disasters.
• The 10 warmest years on record occurred between 1997-2008. The U.S. could warm by as much as 11 degrees by 2100, increasing droughts, heat waves and desertification.
• Mankind is unleashing the largest mass extinction in Earth’s history. Over a quarter of all living species will be extinct by 2050 at the current rate.