The Hawkeye Worker

U.S. Government Steps Up Deportations Against Haitians

hawkeyeworker — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 02:04:30 +0000

Another example of the criminal policies of imperialism: after pursuing a policy of destruction and domination against Haiti since its independence, after overthrowing the Haitian government in the wake of last year’s earthquake, using it as an excuse to establish even tighter control, after re-introducing cholera to the island and massacring its people, after banning the most popular political party in Haiti, the anti-imperialist Fanmi Lavalas, the United States government lifts the ban on deportations of Haitian citizens in America and moves to renew its assault on them.

Citizenship for all! Sitwayènte pou tout!

January Issue of The Hawkeye Worker is Out!

hawkeyeworker — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 04:44:45 +0000

The first issue of 2011 can be downloaded here. You can also pick up a copy for 25 cents at one of the following events:

11th – Rally to Defend Marriage Equality @ the Iowa Capitol in Des Moines. 9AM. Sponsored by One Iowa; endorsed by Socialist Action and the Justice for Our Neighbors Coalition.

22nd – Dinner & film screening of The Trotsky, a revolutionary comedy. Check back here for location and time.

Video from Immigrant Rights Forum

hawkeyeworker — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 00:41:37 +0000

Yesterday’s forum received notable press coverage, from the Gazette to KGAN to, of all places, Florida Today.

Below is the link to a recording of the full event.

http://www.neighborhoodnetworknews.com/video/wmf/political/socialists/cr_sc121810.html

The Hawkeye Worker Goes to Print!

hawkeyeworker — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 20:33:11 +0000

Today is the release day of The Hawkeye Worker, a local monthly supplement to the nationwide Socialist Action newspaper. The Hawkeye Worker is home to Iowa-specific news from a working class, non-corporate viewpoint and features updates on local S.A. campaigns. With no corporate sponsorship, The Hawkeye Worker is funded entirely by those whose interests it defends: yours!

The December 2010 issue will be available for purchase at tomorrow’s immigrant rights forum (see post to the right or the Facebook event page) and can be downloaded for free here: hawkeyeworker_dec2010

Tomorrow: Public Forum: Defend Immigrant Rights and Make C.R. a Sanctuary City!

hawkeyeworker — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 20:24:36 +0000

Latino, black, Asian, Arab and white, immigrants with and without papers, we are all Iowans. Immigration policies that limit our civil rights and divide our families are barbaric and untenable.

Come to our public forum to discuss with and hear from Socialist Action activists and a guest speaker from El Salvador on the repression that immigrant communities face today and how legality for all those without papers will improve the lives of all workers in the U.S.

Come and sign our petition to make Cedar Rapids a sanctuary city for undocumented workers! Say no to raids and deportations!

1:30 to 3:00 PM at the Paul Engle Center.

Sponsored by Socialist Action. Contact marlonxpierre@gmail.com for more information.

Socialist Action Iowa 2010 Election Statement

hawkeyeworker — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 18:01:45 +0000

Election time is coming, and working people in Iowa, like their counterparts across the country, are being bombarded by messages from their mis-leaders in the AFL-CIO bureaucracy to cast their ballot for the so-called “friends of labor” Democrats in order to “keep out the right” and “promote a dialog for change.” But as in past years there are no substantial differences between the twin parties of capital. Though former governor and current Republican nominee Terry Branstad may offer a more firey anti-immigrant rhetoric than his Democratic opponent Chet Culver, such as his reactionary call to bar the children of undocumented workers from attending public schools, both candidates are fundamentally the same on all the major issues of the day. Socialist Action opposes any support for the two corporate parties, as well as fringe pro-capitalist parties like the Libertarians.

There are two ballot measures being presented this year. Socialist Action endorses a ‘Yes’ vote on Measure 1, which would dedicate a portion of sales tax revenue for the preservation of natural resources.

Measure 2, which proposes to call a statewide Constitutional Convention, is being used by the Establishment Right and enemies of civil rights to roll back the tremendous gain that the Iowan people have made – the victory of marriage equality over chauvinism & discrimination – and amend the State Constitution so that the second-class status of LGBTQ citizens is codified into the highest laws of the state. Marxists believe in fighting every measure that seeks to disrupt the class unity of the working class, like the way the gay-straight divide weakens our common fight against capitalism. We also believe that racism, sexism and homophobia are just so many tools of the ruling capitalist class to further oppress and hold down the working class beyond the level of standard wage labor exploitation. VOTE NO ON MEASURE 2, and tell the state that whether you’re gay or straight, you will not stand for discrimination!

When it comes to endorsing candidates, Socialist Action adheres to three principles. First, the candidate must stand on a clear working class program. Even if that program is not explicitly socialist it must be a labor oriented program that bases itself on the concrete needs of the workers and their allies. Second, the candidacy cannot be seen as an end unto itself. The ballot box is an important arena of struggle for working people but it is not the arena of struggle. Under the “dollar democracy” that capitalism affords us, elections are, as Karl Marx once said, a chance for the working class “to choose which particular representatives of the exploiting classes are to repress them.” So labor candidacies must have the perspectives of building existing social movements, such as a workers’ or socialist party, a union campaign, the defense of immigrant rights etc. And third, Socialist Action does not endorse candidates who stand on a cross-class platform that is not explicitly for the working class and its allies.

With those criteria in mind, there is not much to choose from this election cycle. As a first preference, Socialist Action endorses the act of spoiling your ballot by leaving the candidates’ section blank as a register of protest against the politics of the ruling elite. If spoiling your ballot is not amenable to you, Socialist Action calls to vote for candidates of the Socialist Workers’ Party, which, although we do have serious criticisms of the SWP (Socialist Action was founded in 1983 after being undemocratically expelled from the SWP for defending the practices of internal democracy in the Party and adherence to the program and method of Trotskyism), represents a class vote for socialism against the bosses’ politics.

Here are the SWP candidates on the ballot:
David Rosenfeld and Helen Meyers – Governor and Lieutenant Governor
Margaret Trowe – Secretary of Agriculture
Rebecca Williamson- U.S. Congress, District 3

Of course, whether Branstad or Culver win the election, it will fall on working people to continue their struggle against austerity, education cuts, and the repression against our immigrant and LGBTQ brothers and sisters. Only by continuing these struggles and breaking the movement and union allegience to the Democratic Party can we lay the groundwork for the construction of a mass party of labor that will fight in our own interests. In Connecticut, Socialist Action is running Christopher Hutchinson for U.S. Congress to build our Party and agitate directly for socialism, and the South Carolina Labor Party is for the first time running against the Democratic and Republican parties to agitate for labor’s class independence.

The biggest battles are yet to come. If you agree with the perspectives laid out in this election statement, we invite you to join Socialist Action and help us fight for a world without wars, cutbacks and discrimination.

VIDEO: S.A. Speaker During Debate Picket

hawkeyeworker — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 05:12:53 +0000

(Click on the title header to see video; window does not display in page preview.)

Dual Protests in Defense of Education

hawkeyeworker — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 02:26:03 +0000

Socialist Action and the Wild Rose Collective gathered outside the C.R. School District Board Secretary’s Office as part of the National Day to Defend Education, demonstrating in defense of education and public services, raising the demand of “Money for jobs & education, not wars and occupation!” and “If capitalism can’t afford our education, we can’t afford capitalism!”

After its conclusion the rally regrouped outside of Coe College, where a picket was being held outside of the gubernatorial governors’ debate between Democratic incumbent Chet Culver and former governor Republican Terry Branstad. Around 25 people were present for this, all protesting the cruel consensus of the two major parties on all the major issues, the fact that both represent fundamentally anti-worker policies that seek to make the people of Iowa pay for a recession created by the bosses through savage cuts in education and public services.

Passers-by and picket participants responded positively to our militant slogans, as did a few Culver supporters, union members with whom we had discussions with about the flawed strategy of the Hawkeye Labor Council, the regional AFL-CIO affiliate, pumping money and man-power into the Democratic Party, effectively placing their hand straight into the mouth that bites them.

We called for:
Education for all!
STOP the cuts!
Branstad: ¡No tome nuestro futuro! (Branstad: Don’t take our future!, a reference to the candidate’s reactionary proposal to bar the children of undocumented workers from attending public schools.)

Photos will be posted soon, as will a video of S.A. activist Marlon Pierre-Antoine delivering a speech outside the debate picket.

THIS THURSDAY: National Day to Defend Education and Public Services!

hawkeyeworker — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 00:38:53 +0000

Outside the C.R. Community School District – Board Secretary’s Office
900 Blairs Ferry Rd. NE
Cedar Rapids, IA

* On Thursday, a mass coalition of unions, student groups, antiwar assemblies and socialist parties will be taking to the streets in a National Day of Action to defend education – and vital public services. Say NO to a budget that puts human needs in the backseat to wars & occupations.

All over the country, public education and vital social services are under attack as the Wall Street banksters and their bribed elite who control the mechanisms of government are trying to make us – working people, students, the unemployed, small businesspeople – pay for the recession that they created by slashing vital public programs and/or financing them by increased taxation on the majority. And on October 7th, people from across the U.S. will be going to the streets to demand: NO MORE!

This vicious assault is bipartisan – from Republican Governor Schwarzenegger’s anti-education cuts in California to Obama’s “Race to the Top” program that robs public school teachers of the tools they need to improve their schools. In Iowa:

Democratic Governor Culver instituted a 10% ($600 million) across-the-board cut to the state budget last year that took over $300 million away from the education system and will prevent thousands of low income students from attending college or receiving free / subsidized school lunches.
Republican hopeful Terry Branstad opposes universal access to pre-school and supports a plan to bar the children of undocumented workers from receiving a public education, and is as pro-cuts as Governor Culver.
Both candidates are knee-deep in corruption, with both having been in the pocket of Jack DeCoster, an agribusiness tycoon who bribed state officials to stay silent on the fact that he had been peddling salmonella-infected eggs for years to the general public.

Join us on October 7th. Come to learn more about how this crisis affects you. Come to say no to the politics of greed. Come to learn what you can do to win an economic recovery that puts human needs over the corporate elite!

FB Page: http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=163684923642867
Contact: marlonxpierre@gmail.com or call (319) 550 – 3301

C.R. Antiwar Movement on the Rebound

hawkeyeworker — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 00:55:22 +0000

Socialist Action in Cedar Rapids participated in an anti-war march / protest in the Linndale Mall called for by Women for Peace – Iowa, drawing in total around ten people and raising our demand of “U.S. Out of Afghanistan and Iraq NOW!” amongst the public. We were well received amongst the general public present, highlighting the crucial fact that the majority of Americans are against the brutal policies of imperialism – and reminding those of us in the movement that the key task for anti-imperialists and revolutionaries is to bridge the gulf between silent, passive opposition and open mass action to end the wars and occupations.

Despite being followed by mall security for parts of the march, activists were able to distribute nearly a hundred anti-recruiting pamphlets at the local Army, Air Force, and U.S. Marines recruiting offices, a clear statement against the “poverty draft” that forces young working-class people to fight and die for imperialism just to have a chance at a future. We are hopeful that these pamphlets will change the minds of some desperate youth who are considering the military as their ticket to a better life. Protesters also took a firm stand against FBI intimidation and scare tactics against the movement, with several participants stating their solidarity with those activists in Minneapolis who had their homes criminally raided in retaliation against their anti-war work in the community.

Women for Peace hosts biweekly Mall Walks for Peace every other Sunday at the Linndale Mall from 4 to 5PM. Socialist Action in Cedar Rapids wholly supports all efforts to build the visible ranks of antiwar sentiment and will work to strengthen such actions in the future, bringing with us our convictions in mass action and independent political action of the working class and its allies as the only reliable path to change.

Photos forthcoming.