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Today's Stories October 22, 2007 Ishmael Reed Should Blacks Go Green? October 20 / 21, 2007 Alexander Cockburn The Man Who Builds Hillaryworld Tariq Ali A Massacre Foretold Jeffrey St. Clair Greetings from Echo Park Andy Worthington The Shame of Diego Garcia Mike Whitney Housing Flameout Daniel Wolff Play It As It Lays David Rosen Deviants on Parade: Folsom St. Fair and America's 4th Sexual Revolution Saul Landau David and Goliath in Iraq Ron Jacobs COINTELPRO and the Panthers Robert Fantina The Strange Love of Mitt Romney and Bob Jones David Heleniak Erring on the Side of Hidden Harm Joe Allen Hoffa Brown-Nosing at UPS Prairie Miller Lions for Lambs Poets' Basement Gibbons, Holt and Buknatski Website of the Weekend Crash!   October 19, 2007 John Ross Che's Mexican Legacy Sheldon Rampton Shared Values Revisited: a Case Study in the Limits of Propaganda Rahul Mahajan A Tale of Two Atrocities: Blackwater and Haditha Devra Davis Deadly Secrets: Chemical Pollution and Cancer Christopher Brauchli Blasphemous Science Wadner Pierre Haiti After the Deluge Bill Quigley Jailed for Justice Website of the Day Textbook Sticker Shock   October 18, 2007 Saree Makdisi Academic Freedom is at Risk Meg Dwyer What I Learned from 9/11: Who Wouldn't Want Us Dead? Alevtina Rea Sketches of Russian Life Norman Solomon The United States of Violence Kristoffer Larsson Something is Rotten in Sweden Harvey Wasserman Nukes are Back and So are We Website of the Day Eve Ensler: "A Filibuster Would Stop This War"   October 17, 2007 Steve Niva Counter-Insurgency, American-Style Andy Worthington The Case of Mohamed Jawad Alan Farago The Credit Shock Russell Mokhiber The New Billionaire-Criminal Class Sharon Smith Democrats, AWOL When It Mattered Mike Whitney Time for the Banks to Face the Hangman Robert Fantina Iraq, Iran and the US: Business as Usual Chris Irwin Where Have All the Rednecks Gone? Website of the Day Sex Ed at Oral Roberts University October 16, 2007 Peter Linebaugh Doris Lessing and the Dynamite Prize Paul Findley Follow the Leader: The Open Secret About the Israel Lobby Robert Bryce Inconvenient Corrections: Al Gore's Wacky Facts Uri Avnery The Mother of All Pretexts Paul Craig Roberts The Iraqi Genocide Ray McGovern What Did Nancy Pelosi Know About NSA Spying and When Did She Know It? Norman Solomon The Pro-War Undertow of the Blackwater Scandal Martha Rosenberg The Curse of Cymbalta William S. Lind Out of the Frying Pan Joel S. Hirschborn Time to Boycott Voting Website of the Day Pipeline Through Paradise: Big Oil's Arctic Play   October 15, 2007 Gary Leupp Response to an Angry Marine Andy Worthington A Gitmo Detainee Finally Gets a Break Heather Gray Al Krebs, a Fighter for Family Farmers John Walsh Blacks Turn Against the War: Why Won't Liberals Join Them? Joshua Frank Nobel Gore? Dave Lindorff Slaughter of the Innocents in Iraq Matt Vidal Squaring the Circle on Children and Health Care Ali Khan Pakistan's Constitutional Mess Sen. Russ Feingold The CIA's Detention and Interrogation Program Johnny Barber The Balm of a Peace Process Infuses the War on Terror Website of the Day The Real Gore October 13 / 14, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Al Gore's Peace Prize Wajahat Ali Privatizing Terror, Outsourcing Diplomacy: an Interview with P. W. Singer Jeffrey St. Clair A Half Mile of Hell Ralph Nader Impeachment, Cowardice and the Democrats David Heleniak Gitmo at Home Laura Carlsen Plan Mexico and the Billion Dollar Drug Deal Brian Cloughley The Flat Drug World Richard Rhames Here Come the "Bankrupted Social Security" Scamsters, Again Ron Jacobs For the Sake of a Future Fred Gardner The Overrated Importance of Being "On Message" John Ross The Betray Us Flap Russell Hoffman Another Pro Nuker Wins the Peace Prize Missy Beattie Will Someone Please Give Lou Dobbs a Lobotomy? Poets' Basement Gibbons, Buknatski and Ford Website of the Day "Psychokiller", the Blackwater Version October 12, 2007 Cindy Sheehan Leadership Void Brendan Cooney Washington's Holocaust Deniers Alan Farago Gore Still Lost Florida Jan Oberg Gore's Peace Prize, a Grand Misjudgment M. Shahid Alam The Mercenary State: Pakistan's Killer Elites David Macaray Lies About Teachers and Unions Julia Kendlbacher Urban Legend, We Love Our Forest People Peter Rost, MD Drug Money and the Clinton Campaign Website of the Day Nader Live: "Things are a Lot Worse Than We Thought" October 11, 2007 Al Giordano Bill Clinton as Ambassador to the World? Saul Landau Killing for Profit: Blackwater in Iraq Jacob G. Hornberger The Failed Legacy of Interventionism William S. Lind The Iraq Mirage Joshua Frank Big Sky Rebels Josh Mahan Colorado River Blues Pat Williams Where Are You, Paul Wellstone?     October 10, 2007 Michael Yates Travels Across Greenspan's America Gary Leupp Spreading Awareness or Smearing a Religion? David Macaray How Wal-Mart Can be Beaten Alan Farago Corruption and the Law of Intended Consequences Tom Clifford Homeless in Their Own Land: Iraq's Deepening Refugee Crisis Col. Douglas MacGregor Washington's War Sunsara Taylor Nooses at Columbia George Wuerthner Behind the Bovine Curtain Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz Indigenous Peoples' Day Michael Dickinson Forgetting Lennon's Birthday Website of the Day Paying for War   October 9, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts Blinded by Ideology: Cato, Trade and Outsourcing Andy Worthington Fourth Whistleblower Rocks Guantánamo Alan Farago The Fall of Florida's Largest Land Developer Brian Eno Exporting Democracy with Missiles David Rovics The RIAA vs. the World Farzana Versey Two Lovers and the Funeral of Secularism Andrew Buncombe and Omar Waraich Musharraf's Landslide Website of the Day Romney and the Wheelchair Bound Medical Marijuana Patient   October 8, 2007 David Macaray Lesbians for Hillary? or Teamsters for Hillary? Jeff Ballinger Nike, Steroids and Marion Jones Brian Eno This Ban Won't Stop Us Christopher Brauchli Translating Bush Louay Safi End the Disgrace of Guantánamo Matt Reichel Homocide by Cops at the Phoenix Airport Dave Lindorff Finally, A Good Day for the Constitution Thomas P. Healy The Politics of Mercury Pollution Martha Rosenberg E. Coli Spreading Slaughter Allowed to Stay Open Richard Rhames A Democrat's Lament Website of the Day Not All Italians Love Columbus   October 6 / 7, 2007 Alexander Cockburn A Rainbow Over a Graveyard Norman Finkelstein Jeffrey Goldberg's Prison James Bovard Are Presidents Entitled to Kill Foreigners? Patrick Cockburn The Invasion of Afghanistan, Six Years Later Jeffrey St. Clair At Disaster Falls Ralph Nader Where Are the Lawyers of America? Ray McGovern So Who's Afraid of the Israel Lobby? Saul Landau A River Runs Through It Ben Tripp Bring on the Next War! Terry Lodge The Grateful Dead Body Parts Delivered to Your Door Reform Act Seth Sandronsky Market Mystification and the Liberal Virus Kevin Funk / Steve Fake Divestment and Darfur Missy Beattie In the Custody of Bush and Cheney Website of the Weekend Snoop Dogg vs. Bill O'Reilly   October 5, 2007 Andy Worthington The Anonymous Victims of Guantánamo David Macaray De-Skilling America's Labor Force Lee Sustar The Democrats and Iran: Can They Sink Any Lower? Dan La Botz Cincinnati Six Years After the Killings and the Riots Aaron Hess Hate Week Comes to Campus William A. Cook Unmasking AIPAC Website of the Day Range of Memory   October 4, 2007 Uri Avnery The Power of the Israel Lobby Dave Marsh Dick Cheney, a Eulogy Valerio Volpi How Italy Became a Launching Pad for the US Military Cecilie Surasky Dissenting at Your Own Risk Dave Lindorff Remaking Iraq, as Vietnam Norman Solomon Sputnik, 50 Years Later Laura Carlsen Costa Rica and CAFTA: Memo Reveals Manipulation Scheme Walter Brasch When Compassion Fails: Bush and the Children's Health Act Ben Terrall Haitian Human Rights Advocate Kidnapped William S. Lind Beyond the OODA Loop Website of the Day Musicians in Handcuffs   October 3, 2007 Vijay Prashad Gang of Four Anita Sinha Black Ties and Bulldozers in New Orleans Winslow T. Wheeler Posturing at the Petraeus Hearings: Where was the Oversight? Sharon Smith The Kucinich Quandary Jeff Leys Our Bonhoeffer Moment Sen. Russ Feingold We Must End This Tragedy Mohamad Bazzi Playing Into the Hands of Ahmadinejad Brenda Norrell A Cry from the Top of the World Robert Weissman No Sex, Still a Scandal at the IMF Website of the Day Jena by Mellencamp   October 2, 2007 Ibrahim Warde Logical Lies About Bin Laden's Wealth Gary Leupp "I Hate All Iranians": Frank Talk from a Defense Dept. Official David Macaray The Hunt for a Blue November: In Pursuit of the Labor Vote Conn Hallinan Religion and Foreign Policy John Ross The Great American Chess Match Alan Farago Ripping Off Miami's Poor Sonja Karkar The Right to Exist: States or People? Niranjan Ramakrishnan The Meteor and the Mahatma Website of the Day Grandin on Che's Legacy   October 1, 2007 Al Giordano The Clinton Campaign's Reckless Race for Big Money Donors Paul Craig Roberts From Burma to Iraq: Hypocrisy Rules the West Moshe Adler The Crimes of Microsoft Ingmar Lee My Kayak Journey Down the Wild Pacific Coast John V. Walsh Ahmadinejad is Not My Enemy Norman Solomon Political Science and Truth of Consequences Roger Burbach Historic Victory in Ecuador for the Left Ramzy Baroud The Politics of Assassination Stephen Lendman The Maestro of Misery: Greenspan's Dark Legacy Susie Day Honey, I Shrank the Military! Website of the Day Letters from Fort Lewis Brig   September 29 / 30, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Clinton Time: Do We Set Our Clocks Forward or Back? Uri Avnery So What About Iran? Andrew Cockburn Iraq's WMD Myth: Why Clinton is Culpable Jeffrey St. Clair Through the Gates of Lodore Wajahat Ali The Good, the Bad and the Iraqi Andy Worthington The Curse of the Military Commissions Don Santina Ethnic Cleansing in San Francisco Ralph Nader Free Lunches, for Corporations! Fred Gardner The Man Behind the MoveOn Ad Seth Sandronsky The US Economy Since 1980 Gideon Levy The Children of 5767 William S. Lind A Ticking Bomb Reza Fiyouzat An Anti-Imperialist Case Against a Nuclear Iran Richard Rhames Wag the Tail, Frag the Dog David Michael Green Buyer's Remorse: Their Purchase, Our Regret Zach Mason Hate and Hope in Herndon Poets' Basement Gibbons, Ali, Davies and Suss Website of the Weekend Domestic Crusaders     September 28, 2007 Kathleen and Bill Christison The Teflon Alliance with Israel Roberto J. González / David H. Price When Anthropologists Become Counter-Insurgents Saul Landau September, the Cruelest Month in Chile Tom Clifford Burma by the Numbers Christopher Brauchli Of Toxic Almonds and Bad Beef Martha Rosenberg Spinning Suicide Statistics Dave Zirin Soldier in Winter: John Carlos Speaks Out on the Jena 6 Laray Polk Bush Library or Lockbox? Binoy Kampmark When Reagan Turned Brown James McEnteer Hell, Columbia: an Academic Hotshot Introduces a Petty Tyrant Website of the Day Concerned Anthropologists   September 27, 2007 Alan Farago Housing Market Crashes and Burns Andy Worthington A Bad Week at Guantánamo Jonathan Cook Why Did Israel Attack Syria? William Hughes Billy Graham, a Prince of War Exposed Ray McGovern Bush, Oil and Moral Bankruptcy Ron Jacobs Joe Biden's Plan to Chop Up Iraq Dave Lindorff Quit the Party! Join the Mass Resignation Movement! Joshua Frank Pruning the Green Party Anne Dachel The CDC, Vaccines and Autism Website of the Day The God-O-Meter   September 26, 2007 Bill Quigley HUD's Home Wreckers Paul Craig Roberts A Pandemic of Police Brutality Jeff Kisseloff Still Smearing Alger Hiss China Hand Is China the True Target of Financial Sanctions Against Iran? Behzad Yaghmaian At the Gates of Paradise Sonja Karkar The Quality of Mercy in Gaza Mike Ferner Interrupting the Empire, 30 Seconds at a Time Col. Dan Smith Freedom to Speak, Freedom to Learn Clifton Ross Bollinger's Barbarous and Ignorant Speech Brenda Norrell A Meeting of Indigenous Peoples in Caracas Website of the Day The Smearing of Jean Maria Arrigo, a Psychologist Opposed to Torture   September 25, 2007 Nicole Colson On the March Against Racism Uri Avnery Foam on the Water Brendan Cooney Ahmadinejad on Broadway: Free Speech? Arrest Him! Harry Browne Bruce Springsteen Comes Home ... to Hell Marjorie Cohn The Drift Toward War with Iran David Macaray The UAW-GM Strike: the Long Knives are Already Out Ralph Nader Hypocrisy and Inverted Priorities in Congress Dan Bacher Schwarzenegger, the Climate Change Hypocrite Anthony Papa Perverted Justice & America's Drug Laws Christopher Ketcham All Politicos Now Classed as Sexual Deviants Website of the Day John Waters on Free Speech   September 24, 2007 George Ciccariello-Maher Racist Violence from Jena to Oakland Saree Makdisi The War on Gaza's Children David Keen Action-as-Propaganda: Learning About the Iraq War from Hannah Arendt Sherwood Ross Just How Powerful is the Israel Lobby? Only Cheney Knows for Sure Ron Jacobs Greenspan's Open Secret Donna Saggia The Cult of the Military and the Decline of Democratic Values Mike Ferner Free Speech Takes a Capitol Beating Malini Johar Schueller Norman Hsu is a Model Minority Monique Dols and Dylan Stillwood Ahmadinejad and Columbia Website of the Day The Promotion September 22 / 23, 2007 Alexander Cockburn On Naomi Klein's "The Shock Doctrine" Jennifer Loewenstein Beneath the Hideous Veneer of Security Linn Washington, Jr. The Injustice in Jena: Prosecutorial Misconduct More Dangerous Than Racism Jeffrey St. Clair Going Down in Dinosaur: Oil, Dams and Whitewater (Part One) Alan Farago Genuflecting to China Brian Cloughley Of Hate, Hubris and Atrocities Robert Fantina The Deadly Pattern of US Imperialism Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz Land Tenure and Resistance in New Mexico Jason Hribal Fear of an Animal Planet David Rosen Slugger Sex: Athletes, Violence and Male Sexuality Mike Whitney The Era of Global Financial Instability John V. Walsh Who Will Lead a Filibuster of the Iraq War Spending Bill? Dave Lindorff Why Aren't We Banning Blackwater Here? David Michael Green Hiding Behind a Camouflage Skirt Fred Gardner Claudia Jensen (Look Back in Anger) Cassandra Jones Support Our Mercenaries Roger van Zwanenberg Pluto Press Under Attack by Israel Lobby Poets' Basement Buknatski, Davies and Ford Website of the Weekend "For the Bible Tells Me So"   September 21, 2007 Karim Makdisi Letter from Lebanon M. Shahid Alam A History of Violence Alan Farago Who Will Buy My House? Joshua Frank The Demise of the Congressional Black Caucus Dave Zirin Notre Dame and the Economy of Sports Kenneth Couesbouc A Short History of Lending and Borrowing Dr. Steffie Woolhandler and Dr. David Himmelstein Mass Health Care Failure Ben Terrall The Streets of San Francisco: Where Impeachment is Taken Seriously--By Everyone But Pelosi Steve Fournier Ex-Dems, Sign Up Here Frederico Fuentes, et al Voices in Defense of Bolivia Website of the Day Sabra and Shatila, Remembered   September 20, 2007 Kathleen Christison Whatever Happened to Palestine? Zoltan Grossman An Endless Occupation? Paul Craig Roberts As the Empire Slips: Greenspan and the Economy of Greed Stan Cox and Wes Jackson Carbon-Free and Still Wrecking the Planet Russell Mokhiber AARP to Kucinich: Drop Dead Charles Modiano Jim Crow's Children: the Jena 6, Shaquanda Cotton and Blog Power Raymond J. Lawrence Bush's Worrisome Use of Religion Brendan Cooney Body-Snatched Nation Website of the Day Mind Control for Breakfast   September 19, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts Why Did Senator John Kerry Stand Idly By? Paul Krassner The Power of Laughter Sgt. Martin Smith The New Private Warriors: Blackwater in Iraq Seth Sandronsky Living in a Dilapidated Market: To Rent or Own? Claud Cockburn Looking back at the Great Crash Victoria Buch Israel's Agenda for Ethnic Cleansing and Transfer Robert Weissman Oil Warriors: From Greenspan to Kissinger Mike Ferner Can We Talk? Dan Bacher Schwarzenegger's $9 Billion Boondoggle for Big Water Website of the Day Housing Cost Calculator   September 18, 2007 Mike Whitney U.S. Banks Brace for Storm Surge as Dollar and Credit System Reel Alan Farago Interviewing Alan Greenspan: How 60 Minutes Blew It John Ross America's Great Wall: Where Will the Workers Go When They Finish It? Ron Jacobs Nooses Hung From Jena, La. to College Park, Md. Alex Doherty Britain's 9/11 "Truth Movement": Who's Responsible? September 17, 2007 Marjorie Cohn Erwin Chemerinsky and the Post-9/11 Attack on Academic Freedom Paul Craig Roberts Conservatism Isn't What It Used to Be Ricardo Alarcón The Return of C. Wright Mills Amid the Dawn of a New Era Marc Levy Fake Vets Chasing Fame Eva Liddell In 1969 We Already Knew What 2007 Would Look Like Website of the Day Propaganda: Your Job in Germany. Directed by Frank Capra, and written by Theodor Geisel Sept. 15-16, 2007 Alexander Cockburn The General Came to Washington Vicente Navarro How the U.S. Schemed Against Spain's Transition from Dictatorship to Democracy Mike Whitney Plummeting Dollar, Credit Crunch Herman Mindshaftgap Has There Ever Been a Surge? If so, Has it a Future? Ellen Cantarow Girls! Music! Palestine! Jordan Flaherty K-Ville: Fox's New Paean to the N.O.P.D. Zachary Hurwitz Julio Cusurichi on Amazonian Development September 14, 2007 Debbie Nathan New York Times reporter was a member of an illegal underage porn site, claims he was only "posing as online predator" Franklin Lamb Sabra-Shatilla, 25 Years Later Patrick Cockburn Greet Bush and Die: The Killing of Abu Risha Farzana Versey The World's Richest Muslim Tycoon Alan Farago This is Florida, Epicenter of the Housing Bust and of Public Corruption Hank Edson Bill's New Book is Giving Me a Headache September 13, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Petraeus Confided Presidential Ambitions to Iraqi Official Scott Vest, former Air Force Captain at Minot The Barksdale Nukes Andy Worthington Guantánamo: "Ghost" Prisoners Speak At Last Michael Baney Mr. Fixit of Quake-Stricken Peru Has Death Squad Past Dr. Susan Block Is U.S. Run by Secret Homintern? September 12, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts American Economy: RIP Stan Goff The Petraeus Report William Blum When Soldiers Mutiny...Only Those Fighting the War Can End It. Manuel Garcia Forgetting 9/11 Debbie Nathan Why One Sex Survey Didn't Make the Big Time               Subscribe Online

October 22, 2007 Surrender to GM and Chrysler The UAW Leadership Sells Out Its Workers By STEPHEN LENDMAN The September and October United Auto Workers (UAW) GM and Chrysler agreements are just the latest examples of union leadership surrender and betrayal. It's an ominous sign of labor's plight and clear indication of what's ahead - more for business, less for workers, and no relief in sight with union bosses out for themselves and more allied with business and imperial interests than their own rank and file. American civilization and labor historian Paul Buhle sees organized labor today in a state of collapse, and labor author Robert Fitch says "American workers are like owners of a family car whose wheels fell off long ago. Each family member (must rely) on their own two feet; they scarcely remember what it was like being able to ride together." Who can dispute it with union membership down from its post-war 1950s high of 34.7% to the lowest private sector level in over 100 years at 7.4% today. In addition, inflation-adjusted wages are stagnant or falling, benefits are being slashed, and Fitch says conditions in the garment and meatpacking industries are as bad today as the ones muckrakers like Upton Sinclair exposed a century ago in his book "The Jungle." He blames it on union corruption at the top in different forms - leaders on the take, siding with business, getting big salaries and fancy perks and more concerned with their own welfare than the interests of their members. Nothing on the horizon points to change with corrupted UAW leaders Exhibit A. Back in June, the UAW reached an agreement with Delphi Corporation that signaled what would follow with the auto companies. Following months of negotiating, it allowed the company to impose pay cuts up to 50%, lay off thousands, and slash health and retirement benefits. It was a win for company and a crushing defeat for Delphi workers. Then in July, UAW and the United Steelworkers reached an agreement with auto supplier Dana Corporation that allows the unions to take over managing worker long-term disability and retiree healthcare coverage. The deal is projected to save Dana over $100 million a year, eliminate $30 - $40 billion in long-term company liabilities, and it gives UAW leadership another chance for what it wanted for years - a VEBA (voluntary employee beneficiary association) agreement putting the union in the healthcare business for the big profit potential it represents. More on that below. In the past, VEBAs proved costly to UAW workers. The union set one up with Detroit Diesel in 1993 that cost company retirees dearly when funds in it ran out in 2004. It happened again to Caterpillar retirees in 2005 who'll see their out-of-pocket costs triple by 2010, and the sky's the limit after that. As for Dana Corporation, it got more in the deal as well - the right to hire new workers at half the wages of current ones so older employees can be phased out and replaced with low-cost new ones. The same UAW - company pattern is now in play at GM, Chrysler and Ford. GM workers struck September 24 and returned to work two days later after union negotiators agreed to huge concessions the company demanded and got without breaking a sweat. Workers accepted the proposal by a nearly two to one margin, but in doing it signed away their futures with a deal they'll live to regret. They traded shaky job security today for big contractual givebacks later. The pact affects 73,000 hourly workers at GM's 82 US facilities, and key to it is a VEBA agreement for the UAW henceforth to manage GM's 400,000 retirees' health benefits while letting the company off the hook for what it's been providing since 1964. The GM VEBA amounts to a multi-billion dollar trust fund that will transform the union into a major health care provider, and allow it to reap huge profits by cutting its own members' benefits. For its part, GM is only obligated to contribute $35 billion of the $55 billion it owes retirees. But the deal is even sweeter than that. Health care costs are soaring, and the company's have risen by nearly half since 2003. It's clear what's ahead. The VEBA employee experience at Detroit Diesel and Caterpillar is coming to GM. When funds in it run out, the UAW will cut benefits and hike premiums and co-pays so union profits aren't affected. The agreement also lets GM divert pension fund money to the VEBA trust and allows for worker cost of living increases to go instead toward retiree health benefit expenses making the deal even worse. Other terms agreed to in the contract include a two-tiered wage and benefit package. Under it, new skilled assembly-line workers will get $26 to $32 in hourly wages but less in benefits than current ones for a total compensation package of around $45 an hour compared to about $73 an hour for existing skilled workers. In addition, a new non-core worker group, comprising up to one-third of GM's workforce, will get around $27 an hour in wages and benefits. Both core and non-core employees will henceforth receive less in active-worker-health-care benefits with GM saving billions from the arrangement. The company told Wall Street investors October 15 its 2007 labor costs will drop from $12.6 billion last year to $10.1 billion in 2007 (45% below 2003 wages and benefits paid) with "significant" further declines from 2008 to 2011. Further, GM estimates it will reduce its long-term healthcare obligation to workers by $47 billion and expects over the next four years to retire up to 75% of its current high-paid work force (earning $78.21 in wages and benefits) and replace many of them with low-paid non-core, non-assembly line new hires (costing $25.65 in combined wages and benefits). Employee buyouts, early retirement offers and other downsizing efforts are coming that will let the company eliminate expensive workers and replace them with cheaper new ones. The contract runs four years and includes three lump-sum bonuses but no wage increases so annual cost of living adjustments won in 1948 are ended that over time will cost workers much more. It's a dark new age for GM workers as well as for those at Chrysler and Ford. The days of Walter Reuther-type leadership are long gone. He led the UAW from 1946 until his death in 1970, grew the union to more than 1.5 million members, and over that time delivered for the rank and file like few other labor leaders ever did. He was a union reformer, shrewd bargainer, master strategist, champion of industrial democracy and worker rights and once said "If fighting for a more equal and equitable distribution of the wealth of this country is socialistic, I stand guilty of being a socialist." In fact, he was pro-capitalist, opposed forming a labor party and allied the UAW to the Democrat party and its imperialist agenda. Nonetheless, he won sizable wage increases and a historic tying of them to living costs and productivity gains. He also got his membership paid vacations, employer-funded pensions, medical insurance with defined benefits, improved safety and health measures, and supplemental unemployment benefits that guaranteed members up to 95% of their pay if they were laid off. That's now lost today with UAW and other union bosses conspiring with business for their own self-interest at the expense of their members. The UAW Chrysler betrayal was as cynical and self-serving as the GM deal. It was packaged around a staged six hour partial walkout of 37,000 of the company's 49,000 work force that was more theater than strike action and another defeat for UAW members unless they reject the agreement as some locals are doing in voting so far. Some local union leaders oppose it as well as the terms agreed to are even more draconian than at GM: -- a new VEBA trust (only for current employees) with Chrysler contributing only $8.8 billion of its $18 billion long-term health care obligation to its 78,000 retirees; new hires will get no retirement health care benefits and will have to enroll in a new health care program that will increase deductibles, co-pays and other out-of-pocket expenses; current retirees for the first time will have to pay out-of-pocket expenses; savings to the company will exceed $300 million a year; -- a two-tiered wage and benefit arrangement with new skilled hires getting as little as $14 an hour or half or less the current pay rate and well below the $19.62 average non-union wage in the manufacturing sector; the agreement lets the company expand the number of low-paid non-core workers as well as be able to designate "Non-Core Facilities" in which the entire workforce will get lower pay and benefits once current employees are phased out; -- new health care concessions similar to what GM and Ford got in 2005 that require retirees to pay part of their rising health care premiums; current worker pension funds will be shifted to the VEBA; -- the elimination of employer-paid pensions for new workers, replacing them with 401(k) plans in which the company will contribute one dollar to be invested in the stock market for every hour worked; -- freedom for Chrysler's private equity firm owner, Cerberus Capital, to downsize and close as many of its plants as it wishes with early retirement offers and employee buyouts ahead so expensive current workers can be eliminated; -- workers' wages will be frozen, and the Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) benefit won in the two month 1970 GM strike is now lost; -- more flexibility for the company to outsource jobs to non-UAW workers at lower pay and benefits; these will include so-called "housekeeping functions" like janitorial and trash handling, grounds keeping, machine and booth cleaning and others; -- freedom for the company to expand the number of low-paid, low-benefit part-time workers as well as long-term temporary ones who can't gain seniority; -- the company freed of any commitment to build vehicles at US assembly plants or guarantee the number of jobs at them plus other thus far unreported worker concessions. The GM, Chrysler and upcoming Ford negotiations herald a new day for UAW workers in the wake of another crushing defeat affecting all working Americans. Gone are one million UAW jobs since 1978 (from 1.5 million to 520,000) along with hard-won gains that took decades to achieve. No longer do men like Walter Reuther represent workers. Today's UAW leadership betrayed its members trust for its own self-interest, and there's no relief in sight for change. Overall, organized labor is on its knees and Wall Street loves it. GM stock alone rose over 5% the day its deal was announced. Looking ahead, there are no easy answers, just tough choices, and job one for working people is to join in solidarity for their own self-interest and survival. Past successes can be regained, but wishing won't make it so. A new political movement is needed based on social equity and justice with a new breed of leaders to head it. The odds for success are long, but the alternative is intolerable. That should be incentive enough to go for it. Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

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