AFL-CIO Statement on Worker Rights in Venezuela

Dennis Robert Redmond dredmond at efn.org
Fri Apr 26 17:51:05 PDT 2002


On Fri, 26 Apr 2002, Tim Shorrock crossposted:


> From the moment he took office in 1999, Hugo Chávez led an assault on
> freedom of association, attempting to weaken or eliminate the principal
> institutions of Venezuelan civil society, including the unions.

I almost threw my fucking keyboard into the nearest wall when I read this toxic piece of Cold War crap. Then I stopped -- all that nonviolence training, you know -- took a deep breath, made a mental note to buy Grand Theft Auto 3 next weekend and run completely wild in Liberty City, and chilled out via my latest Zen exercise: staring at a 2-meter wall-map of Suomi (80% unionized, don't you know).

There are a lot of good things happening on the ground in the labor movement today. Just as clearly, there's a lot of deadwood in the AFL-CIO which needs clearing out.


> structures. The AFL-CIO will continue to support the CTV, and we will
> continue to condemn actions by the government of Venezuela, or any other
> government, that restrict workers' freedom of association in violation of
> international law.

Before saving other peoples' labor movements, the US union movement needs do something about the 35% of Americans who suffer under Wrong-To-Work statues in the US, or its other ghastly and archaic labor laws.

-- Dennis



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