Nathan Newman wrote:
>What's amazing to me is that this list is all so excited about the French
>protests with relatively little celebration of the largest rallies in Los
>Angeles history
-Not true at all...Why do you always have to set up these spurious oppositions?
I'm not setting up the spurious oppositions, you are.
You celebrate the French union protests and bemoan the lack of same in the US, while ignoring the union role in those mass immigrant rights rallies. These rallies didn't come out of nowhere-- not that the unions are the only actors, but the unions centered in Los Angeles were some of the biggest players a few years ago in launching the Immigrant Worker Freedom Ride and they've been helping to network labor, religious and community leaders around the rights of immigrants for the last few years.
Los Angeles just elected the first latina as a head of a major labor federation and, again, this isn't irrelevant to the story of this past weeks' events.
You complain that I engage in negativity, but all I hear on this list is negativity about US unions (and progressive politics much of the time) and when they play a really positive role, that is almost completely ignored because it doesn't fit your narrow frame of selfish self-obsessed union leadership.
Let me reprint what the AFL-CIO published as their official position at the beginnning of this month on the issue of immigration: http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/thisistheaflcio/ecouncil/ec02272006e.cfm
" America deserves an immigration system that protects all workers within our borders-both native-born and foreign-and at same time guarantees the safety of our nation without compromising our fundamental civil rights and civil liberties.
Any viable solution to this crisis must address the reasons why people are coming to the U.S. Most immigrants come from countries where the international development process has failed, and many are from countries where International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and trade policies have weakened countries' economies and labor protections, causing a devastating impact on all workers. In some developing countries, IMF policies have caused public-sector workers to lose their jobs and their union protections, forcing them into competition in the private sector, where few, if any, jobs are available, driving down wages and working conditions even further. Trade agreements such as the North American Free Trade Agreement undermine the agricultural economies of developing countries, leading workers to leave the fields and consider moving north. Without rising living standards abroad for workers and the poor, the pressure for illegal immigration will continue and escalate.
At the same time that global forces are pushing workers to our borders, judicial and public policies toward immigrants have created new so-called pull factors for migration into the United States, namely, an incentive for employers to recruit undocumented immigrants for economic exploitation. ..The broken immigration system has allowed employers to create an underclass of workers, which has effectively reduced working standards for all workers. Immigrant workers are over-represented in the highest risk, lowest paid jobs, but the exploited immigrants do not work in isolation. U.S.-born workers who work side by side with immigrants suffer the same exploitation...
Immigrant workers, like all workers, should be full social partners. We will continue to support effective, credible and enforceable rights for all workers, regardless of their country of origin or immigration status. At the same time, we will ensure that our member mobilization efforts include our immigrant brothers and sisters, and ultimately place immigration squarely within a progressive and sustainable economic agenda that benefits all working families in our nation."
This is the political context of full union support for mass demonstrations across the country in defense of immigrant workers rights.
And you're so busy slobbering over French union protests, you can't even notice the stellar and admirable political work and views of US unions and their role in the last week's protests here in the US.
Nathan Newman