1 00:00:01,720 --> 00:00:08,000 Speaker 1: All Zone Media. Welcome to a special May Day episode 2 00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:11,520 Speaker 1: of vicd app and here I'm your host, Mia Wong. 3 00:00:13,480 --> 00:00:17,599 Speaker 1: It wasn't too long ago that unions were finished. The 4 00:00:17,680 --> 00:00:21,760 Speaker 1: percentage of American workers in unions plunged towards the single digits. 5 00:00:22,320 --> 00:00:26,079 Speaker 1: The unions that survived, battered and broken shells of the 6 00:00:26,160 --> 00:00:28,840 Speaker 1: mighty behemists that shook the world for one hundred years, 7 00:00:29,640 --> 00:00:33,519 Speaker 1: embraced so called business unionism, which set out not to 8 00:00:33,520 --> 00:00:35,720 Speaker 1: conquer the world in the name of labor like its 9 00:00:35,720 --> 00:00:39,800 Speaker 1: great predecessors, or even really to bargain for higher wages, 10 00:00:40,320 --> 00:00:43,360 Speaker 1: but to make companies profitable in order to keep their jobs. 11 00:00:44,080 --> 00:00:46,480 Speaker 1: They took pay cuts and job losses without a fight, 12 00:00:47,200 --> 00:00:51,240 Speaker 1: forcing their membership into line, and effortlessly crushing the endless 13 00:00:51,240 --> 00:00:53,880 Speaker 1: slates of reform caucuses that sought to put the fight 14 00:00:54,000 --> 00:00:58,640 Speaker 1: back into the working class. Even the cutting edge of 15 00:00:58,720 --> 00:01:02,840 Speaker 1: Marxist theory, health time of unions was over. Workers were 16 00:01:02,840 --> 00:01:08,080 Speaker 1: too adomized, too divided, too far from the immediate processes 17 00:01:08,120 --> 00:01:12,080 Speaker 1: of production, from the discipline of the factory, and from 18 00:01:12,120 --> 00:01:15,280 Speaker 1: the massification of the city. To assemble the working class 19 00:01:15,280 --> 00:01:18,880 Speaker 1: in its old fighting form, there would be riots, To 20 00:01:18,920 --> 00:01:26,760 Speaker 1: be sure, barricades, blockades, occupations, but not strikes. Whatever the 21 00:01:26,840 --> 00:01:30,440 Speaker 1: working class did next, the age of the union was 22 00:01:30,520 --> 00:01:35,520 Speaker 1: over for much of the twenty tens. That prediction was 23 00:01:35,560 --> 00:01:40,400 Speaker 1: a smart bet. The bold proclamation of Wisconsin trade unionists 24 00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:43,320 Speaker 1: that organized labor would turn back the tide of the 25 00:01:43,440 --> 00:01:46,720 Speaker 1: CHEA Party failed to ruin under the failure of their 26 00:01:46,760 --> 00:01:50,760 Speaker 1: attempt to recall Wisconsin's hated union busting governor Scott Walker. 27 00:01:52,080 --> 00:01:56,880 Speaker 1: The CHA Party's march continued unimpeded, radicalizing even further in 28 00:01:56,920 --> 00:02:00,640 Speaker 1: the wake of the twenty fourteen twenty fifteen uprisings Ferguson 29 00:02:00,680 --> 00:02:03,960 Speaker 1: in Baltimore to produce not the victory of the working 30 00:02:04,000 --> 00:02:09,480 Speaker 1: class but Donald Trump. Even success stories like the rejuvenation 31 00:02:09,600 --> 00:02:13,919 Speaker 1: of the mighty Chicago Teachers Union AFT Local one by 32 00:02:13,960 --> 00:02:16,640 Speaker 1: a bold reform caucus called the Caucus of Rank and 33 00:02:16,680 --> 00:02:20,920 Speaker 1: File Educators or Corps, who waged a pair of unexpectedly 34 00:02:21,000 --> 00:02:26,000 Speaker 1: wildly popular strikes, was tainted by the reality of limited 35 00:02:26,040 --> 00:02:29,520 Speaker 1: wins and labor conditions in Chicago schools that remained appalling. 36 00:02:30,840 --> 00:02:33,280 Speaker 1: Even as the left returned in the wake of Occupy 37 00:02:33,440 --> 00:02:38,240 Speaker 1: Ferguson and the election of Trump, union membership continued to plunge, 38 00:02:38,919 --> 00:02:43,160 Speaker 1: and capitalists and Marxist alike continued to herald the union's demise. 39 00:02:44,720 --> 00:02:52,280 Speaker 1: They were wrong. History, it seems, delights in irony. It 40 00:02:52,360 --> 00:02:55,800 Speaker 1: was the dead enders, fighting hopeless battles and reform caucuses, 41 00:02:55,840 --> 00:03:00,000 Speaker 1: losing union election after union election. It was the Wobbles Fire, 42 00:03:00,240 --> 00:03:04,280 Speaker 1: losing campaign after losing campaign, desperately trying to organize the 43 00:03:04,360 --> 00:03:09,160 Speaker 1: unorganizable fast food and retail workers. It was rank and 44 00:03:09,200 --> 00:03:13,520 Speaker 1: file Marxist trade unionists waiting sixty long years, their comrades 45 00:03:13,560 --> 00:03:18,200 Speaker 1: dead and gone, for somebody, anybody, to hear their plans 46 00:03:18,200 --> 00:03:22,359 Speaker 1: for shutting down Capitol's logistics networks. It was Labor Notes, 47 00:03:22,520 --> 00:03:27,000 Speaker 1: sixteen staffers compiling endless analyzes of labor struggles for a 48 00:03:27,040 --> 00:03:30,280 Speaker 1: crowd that couldn't have filled a baseball stadium. Who was right? 49 00:03:31,880 --> 00:03:36,480 Speaker 1: Unions are back, While still small compared to the height 50 00:03:36,520 --> 00:03:40,000 Speaker 1: of union power in the nineteen fifties, twenty twenty three 51 00:03:40,120 --> 00:03:44,080 Speaker 1: saw a wave of massively popular strikes waged by unions 52 00:03:44,120 --> 00:03:47,520 Speaker 1: from the massive behemoths like the UAW in the Writers 53 00:03:47,560 --> 00:03:51,760 Speaker 1: Guild to tiny independent coffee unions whose members. Larger existing 54 00:03:51,880 --> 00:03:54,200 Speaker 1: unions are rather spin on than spend a single cent 55 00:03:54,280 --> 00:03:59,040 Speaker 1: attempting to organize. Only the director intervention of the President 56 00:03:59,560 --> 00:04:01,960 Speaker 1: to break a rail workers strike before it could start, 57 00:04:02,440 --> 00:04:05,520 Speaker 1: and the last second portrayal of Teamster's leadership stops twenty 58 00:04:05,600 --> 00:04:08,520 Speaker 1: twenty three from being this largest strikewave of the modern era. 59 00:04:10,000 --> 00:04:14,120 Speaker 1: Basking in his triumphs and conspiring to win more was 60 00:04:14,200 --> 00:04:19,440 Speaker 1: labor Notes. Labor Notes is a curious beast. It is 61 00:04:19,480 --> 00:04:23,320 Speaker 1: simultaneously a journal that publishes news about labor struggles, a 62 00:04:23,360 --> 00:04:26,919 Speaker 1: network that brings together a group of disparate rank and 63 00:04:26,960 --> 00:04:32,160 Speaker 1: file union reform movements largely but not exclusively from the US, 64 00:04:32,200 --> 00:04:35,480 Speaker 1: maintaining a strong emphasis on solidarity and organizing with workers 65 00:04:35,480 --> 00:04:39,800 Speaker 1: in Mexico, and a labor conference that runs every two years. 66 00:04:41,880 --> 00:04:45,200 Speaker 1: It is a relic of another time, whose time it seems, 67 00:04:45,920 --> 00:04:50,080 Speaker 1: has come again. Labor Notes was founded in nineteen seventy 68 00:04:50,200 --> 00:04:53,400 Speaker 1: nine as a way to coordinate and expand the interunion 69 00:04:53,440 --> 00:04:56,800 Speaker 1: connections formed to the United Mine Workers of America's nineteen 70 00:04:56,839 --> 00:05:01,360 Speaker 1: seventy nine bituminous coal strike. It's one of the last 71 00:05:01,400 --> 00:05:06,440 Speaker 1: direct connections to the era where labor was strong unwittingly 72 00:05:06,560 --> 00:05:09,359 Speaker 1: tasked with keeping the flame of labor alive during the 73 00:05:09,400 --> 00:05:14,640 Speaker 1: neoliberal downpour, Two weeks ago, they held their largest conference 74 00:05:14,680 --> 00:05:19,320 Speaker 1: ever FO Five hundred people crammed into the Wyatt Regency 75 00:05:19,800 --> 00:05:24,839 Speaker 1: next to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. At least a thousand 76 00:05:24,839 --> 00:05:28,720 Speaker 1: people who tried to register were turned down. I personally 77 00:05:28,800 --> 00:05:32,200 Speaker 1: watched interested workers turned away at the door because the 78 00:05:32,279 --> 00:05:35,359 Speaker 1: venue's conference halls had already reached the mass capacity for 79 00:05:35,440 --> 00:05:42,320 Speaker 1: fire safety. Labor we can safely say is back. It 80 00:05:42,400 --> 00:05:45,600 Speaker 1: is returning to the South the great rock unions have 81 00:05:45,680 --> 00:05:48,840 Speaker 1: shattered upon for one hundred years. It's moving in new 82 00:05:48,880 --> 00:05:54,960 Speaker 1: directions towards service workers previously thought impossible to organize. Most 83 00:05:55,000 --> 00:05:58,600 Speaker 1: of all, it's moving towards something we'd almost forgotten was possible. 84 00:06:00,240 --> 00:06:04,960 Speaker 1: It's moving towards victory. The first thing you noticed about 85 00:06:05,040 --> 00:06:10,080 Speaker 1: Labor Notes is it's staggering diversity. Young punks and battle 86 00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:13,240 Speaker 1: jackets sat on benches next to old anti war protesters 87 00:06:13,240 --> 00:06:17,960 Speaker 1: from the sixties. Independent trade unionists and feminist activists in 88 00:06:18,080 --> 00:06:23,440 Speaker 1: Mexico rubbed shoulders with battle hearted American union nurses. White 89 00:06:23,440 --> 00:06:26,320 Speaker 1: middle aged longshore men and women plotted with young, queer 90 00:06:26,360 --> 00:06:30,080 Speaker 1: Amazon warehouse workers to maximize the power of logistics strikes. 91 00:06:31,200 --> 00:06:34,560 Speaker 1: You saw old industrial organizers from the sixties, passing down 92 00:06:34,640 --> 00:06:38,120 Speaker 1: lessons and tactics and stories of strikes that otherwise would 93 00:06:38,120 --> 00:06:42,520 Speaker 1: have vanished into the mists of history. Media workers fighting 94 00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:46,760 Speaker 1: for their first contract, the lowliest rank and file workers 95 00:06:46,880 --> 00:06:51,479 Speaker 1: chatting in breakout groups with union presidents. For all the 96 00:06:51,520 --> 00:06:53,760 Speaker 1: talk I've done in this show about how many union 97 00:06:53,880 --> 00:06:57,159 Speaker 1: organizers are trans, even I didn't expect to see this 98 00:06:57,240 --> 00:07:02,000 Speaker 1: many trans people, It's a cross section of the American 99 00:07:02,040 --> 00:07:06,880 Speaker 1: working class come to fight, and that, above all, is 100 00:07:06,920 --> 00:07:11,440 Speaker 1: what this Labor Notes conference was about. Fighting. The most 101 00:07:11,440 --> 00:07:14,040 Speaker 1: direct conflict came on the first day of the conference, 102 00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:17,680 Speaker 1: when Palestinian union activists called for a pro Palestine demonstration 103 00:07:17,760 --> 00:07:22,120 Speaker 1: outside the hotel. The cops arrested three people in an 104 00:07:22,120 --> 00:07:27,080 Speaker 1: attempt to clear the street. This, rather predictably, was a 105 00:07:27,160 --> 00:07:31,600 Speaker 1: terrible idea. Instead of backing down, the crowd of several 106 00:07:31,720 --> 00:07:35,240 Speaker 1: hundred union activists almost immediately surrounded the lone car and 107 00:07:35,280 --> 00:07:39,520 Speaker 1: demanded they let their prisoner go. What happened next, to 108 00:07:39,680 --> 00:07:43,560 Speaker 1: use a technical term, fucking ripped. A bunch of kids 109 00:07:43,600 --> 00:07:46,880 Speaker 1: had a rave to the changing police sirens. A fifty 110 00:07:46,960 --> 00:07:49,440 Speaker 1: year old white dude from the electrical worker stood next 111 00:07:49,480 --> 00:07:53,040 Speaker 1: to me, a Chinese Transzoman from a podcast union, a 112 00:07:53,080 --> 00:07:57,239 Speaker 1: bunch of longshore men, teamsters, staffers from unions. You wouldn't 113 00:07:57,240 --> 00:08:00,920 Speaker 1: believe even if I told you Palestinian trade union activists, 114 00:08:01,040 --> 00:08:04,120 Speaker 1: nurses punkt from independent unions. No one else in the 115 00:08:04,120 --> 00:08:08,720 Speaker 1: crowd could have named. An entire mass of unionists stood 116 00:08:08,720 --> 00:08:11,640 Speaker 1: their ground and refused to let the cops take one 117 00:08:11,640 --> 00:08:15,920 Speaker 1: of ours. A tradeswoman with drums marched around the police 118 00:08:15,920 --> 00:08:18,000 Speaker 1: car and we're all saying, which side are you on? 119 00:08:19,520 --> 00:08:22,600 Speaker 1: After two hours, the police gave up to a crowd 120 00:08:22,680 --> 00:08:26,600 Speaker 1: screaming Union power at the top of our lungs. It 121 00:08:26,680 --> 00:08:29,720 Speaker 1: was an incredible display of solidarity that set the tone 122 00:08:29,760 --> 00:08:32,680 Speaker 1: for the rest of the event. We were going to 123 00:08:32,679 --> 00:08:35,320 Speaker 1: fight the bosses together and fuck them if they came 124 00:08:35,360 --> 00:08:40,559 Speaker 1: for us. This is not to say there weren't divisions. 125 00:08:42,200 --> 00:08:44,640 Speaker 1: A group of protesters broke away from the cop car 126 00:08:44,720 --> 00:08:48,320 Speaker 1: to demand that Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, the darling of 127 00:08:48,320 --> 00:08:51,719 Speaker 1: the Chicago Teachers' Union, come tell the cops to let 128 00:08:51,720 --> 00:08:56,360 Speaker 1: our people go. Now. Whether or not this would have 129 00:08:56,440 --> 00:08:59,880 Speaker 1: worked is up to some debates. These cops were not 130 00:09:00,080 --> 00:09:03,160 Speaker 1: Chicago police departments. They were the cops of Rosemont which 131 00:09:03,240 --> 00:09:07,520 Speaker 1: is technically a separate entity from the city of Chicago. However, 132 00:09:08,240 --> 00:09:11,760 Speaker 1: Labor Notes staffers and securities tried to stop the protesters 133 00:09:12,000 --> 00:09:15,560 Speaker 1: from reaching Brandon Johnson and ended up throwing punches at 134 00:09:15,559 --> 00:09:20,319 Speaker 1: the protesters. As to quote one observer, union brother fought 135 00:09:20,440 --> 00:09:25,000 Speaker 1: union brother. This fight reveals one of the important tensions 136 00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:29,240 Speaker 1: in the movement. Should unions continue to back imperfect center 137 00:09:29,320 --> 00:09:34,040 Speaker 1: left politicians in exchange for some political benefits, or should 138 00:09:34,040 --> 00:09:36,679 Speaker 1: they take a hard line against politicians who betray their 139 00:09:36,679 --> 00:09:41,880 Speaker 1: fundamental political principles. Brandon Johnson is a microcosm of the debate. 140 00:09:43,040 --> 00:09:46,240 Speaker 1: On the one hand, he was elected with enormous resource 141 00:09:46,240 --> 00:09:50,160 Speaker 1: expenditure from the Chicago teachers' unions. On the other hand, 142 00:09:50,280 --> 00:09:53,400 Speaker 1: he's been locking immigrants into berculosis ridden camps as the 143 00:09:53,440 --> 00:09:58,360 Speaker 1: city lurches from crisis to crisis. Even many of Chicago's 144 00:09:58,360 --> 00:10:00,440 Speaker 1: other unionists were never happy with with him in the 145 00:10:00,440 --> 00:10:03,680 Speaker 1: first place, as he failed to use his previous position 146 00:10:03,800 --> 00:10:06,720 Speaker 1: to come to the aid of striking nurses. When the 147 00:10:06,760 --> 00:10:11,080 Speaker 1: two points of view collide, there's a fight on a 148 00:10:11,160 --> 00:10:15,080 Speaker 1: national level. The conflict is the question of Joe Biden 149 00:10:15,080 --> 00:10:20,760 Speaker 1: in Palestine. At Labor Notes itself, there's strong support for Palestine. 150 00:10:21,400 --> 00:10:24,960 Speaker 1: Palestinian solidarity panels were packed to the rafters with workers 151 00:10:24,960 --> 00:10:28,720 Speaker 1: from every sector imaginable and activists from across the world. 152 00:10:29,160 --> 00:10:32,960 Speaker 1: I saw UAW workers deeply unhappy with their union leadership's 153 00:10:33,000 --> 00:10:36,720 Speaker 1: decision to endorse Biden, a decision made by maybe five 154 00:10:36,800 --> 00:10:39,040 Speaker 1: members of an executive committee with how to vote from 155 00:10:39,040 --> 00:10:44,640 Speaker 1: the union. Theren lies the issue, as much as Labor notes, 156 00:10:44,679 --> 00:10:48,960 Speaker 1: represents the bleeding edge of the labor movements. UAW president 157 00:10:48,960 --> 00:10:52,839 Speaker 1: Sean Fein, fresh off the uaw's astounding seventy three percent 158 00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:57,240 Speaker 1: victory at a Volkswagen factory in Chattanooga, gave the conference's 159 00:10:57,280 --> 00:11:02,040 Speaker 1: closing address. The remain means massive bastions of conservatism and 160 00:11:02,080 --> 00:11:05,400 Speaker 1: the labor movement, who have actively fought against even statements 161 00:11:05,440 --> 00:11:12,120 Speaker 1: on Palestine, much less concrete actions. Unions are still weak 162 00:11:12,480 --> 00:11:15,560 Speaker 1: and the positions of activists within them are still tenuous. 163 00:11:17,360 --> 00:11:20,680 Speaker 1: Even more favorable shops have yet to turn broader popular 164 00:11:20,720 --> 00:11:25,640 Speaker 1: support among rank and file workers for Palestine into substantive 165 00:11:25,720 --> 00:11:29,400 Speaker 1: strike actions, and it's deeply unclear to me if any 166 00:11:29,400 --> 00:11:43,800 Speaker 1: such action is possible at all. My pessimism on labour's 167 00:11:43,840 --> 00:11:47,559 Speaker 1: willingness and ability to stop the genocide in Palestine, a 168 00:11:47,640 --> 00:11:51,600 Speaker 1: pessimism reinforced by watching the rapid spread of student campus 169 00:11:51,640 --> 00:11:57,480 Speaker 1: occupations while labor remains silent or perhaps more precisely dormant, 170 00:11:58,600 --> 00:12:02,640 Speaker 1: is broadly intention with my optimism and effectively everything else 171 00:12:02,640 --> 00:12:06,200 Speaker 1: that I saw there. There was incredible organizing going on 172 00:12:06,240 --> 00:12:10,280 Speaker 1: at labor notes. People are coordinating rank and file links 173 00:12:10,320 --> 00:12:14,040 Speaker 1: between unions whose staffers and leaderships hate each other for 174 00:12:14,160 --> 00:12:17,200 Speaker 1: grudges whose origins have passed into the mists of time. 175 00:12:18,320 --> 00:12:22,360 Speaker 1: There was quite serious talk about plans to line up 176 00:12:22,440 --> 00:12:26,720 Speaker 1: contracts to expire in twenty twenty eight to effectively create 177 00:12:26,800 --> 00:12:31,559 Speaker 1: a miniature general strike, or perhaps more precisely, to create 178 00:12:31,600 --> 00:12:34,320 Speaker 1: a version of what's called the Spring offensive in Japan. 179 00:12:35,320 --> 00:12:38,840 Speaker 1: Spring and offensive are the same word in Japanese, and 180 00:12:38,880 --> 00:12:41,680 Speaker 1: so labor unions decided to have their contracts expire in 181 00:12:41,720 --> 00:12:45,760 Speaker 1: the spring, thus maximizing the power of their strikes. This 182 00:12:45,880 --> 00:12:48,480 Speaker 1: effort to have contracts aligned in twenty twenty eight is 183 00:12:49,320 --> 00:12:53,480 Speaker 1: broadly speaking, a larger version of the Spring Offensive. We 184 00:12:53,800 --> 00:12:56,559 Speaker 1: will cover this more in a later episode. For now, 185 00:12:56,679 --> 00:13:00,480 Speaker 1: I think it's enough to say that this cushions and 186 00:13:00,600 --> 00:13:05,319 Speaker 1: organization were quite serious, and there was significant enthusiasm, as 187 00:13:05,360 --> 00:13:09,160 Speaker 1: well as discussions of the potential difficulties of getting people's 188 00:13:09,240 --> 00:13:12,959 Speaker 1: contracts to actually align. People are organizing to bring their 189 00:13:13,040 --> 00:13:17,239 Speaker 1: unions together on a sectoral base to share resources, coordinate, 190 00:13:17,760 --> 00:13:22,080 Speaker 1: set standards for contracts, and generally help each other more 191 00:13:22,080 --> 00:13:25,360 Speaker 1: effectively oppose the bosses and unions that rule them all. 192 00:13:26,920 --> 00:13:30,960 Speaker 1: Labor Notes has also from the beginning been an incubator 193 00:13:31,000 --> 00:13:34,640 Speaker 1: for reform movements inside of unions, attempting to rest control 194 00:13:34,679 --> 00:13:40,319 Speaker 1: from corporate administrative caucuses. These reform movements almost always lose. 195 00:13:41,040 --> 00:13:44,400 Speaker 1: The last fifty years is littered with defeats in union 196 00:13:44,440 --> 00:13:48,760 Speaker 1: election after union election with sub ten percent turnout, and 197 00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:53,000 Speaker 1: yet little by little, these groups are starting to win. 198 00:13:55,200 --> 00:13:57,480 Speaker 1: We heard from a number of smaller rank and file 199 00:13:57,559 --> 00:14:01,240 Speaker 1: efforts that had successfully taken control of their unionians. The 200 00:14:01,320 --> 00:14:04,960 Speaker 1: first major victory was a rank and file slate taking 201 00:14:05,000 --> 00:14:12,079 Speaker 1: over the management of notoriously corrupt Clickish Teamsters. Now I 202 00:14:12,240 --> 00:14:17,840 Speaker 1: have my issues with the new Teamsters leadership too. There 203 00:14:17,880 --> 00:14:21,800 Speaker 1: are something like two entire hours of this show dedicated 204 00:14:21,840 --> 00:14:24,520 Speaker 1: to how angry rank and file teamsters were over the 205 00:14:24,560 --> 00:14:27,560 Speaker 1: fact that UPS workers didn't go on strike last year 206 00:14:27,680 --> 00:14:32,360 Speaker 1: due to their leadership cutting a deal with management. But 207 00:14:32,480 --> 00:14:36,120 Speaker 1: on a broader level, the victory of the Teamsters reformed 208 00:14:36,120 --> 00:14:39,120 Speaker 1: slates and the defeat of one of the oldest union 209 00:14:40,200 --> 00:14:42,480 Speaker 1: I don't know if administrative caucus. 210 00:14:42,200 --> 00:14:48,160 Speaker 2: Is really a that's a bit of a euphemism for 211 00:14:48,480 --> 00:14:53,840 Speaker 2: the ups sort of corrupt leadership, dictatorship, but their victory 212 00:14:54,240 --> 00:14:57,320 Speaker 2: on a broader level was a sea change in American unionism. 213 00:14:59,120 --> 00:15:02,040 Speaker 1: Their victory was followed by the victory of Sean Fain 214 00:15:02,120 --> 00:15:06,520 Speaker 1: in the UAW, a man who, as much as he's 215 00:15:06,640 --> 00:15:11,360 Speaker 1: angered members by endorsing Joe Biden walked into Labor Notes 216 00:15:11,440 --> 00:15:13,920 Speaker 1: and gave a speech about the class war and the 217 00:15:13,960 --> 00:15:19,320 Speaker 1: authoritarianism of corporate greed. Certainly there was much to annoy 218 00:15:19,400 --> 00:15:22,920 Speaker 1: trade activists concerned with Palestine in the sense that his 219 00:15:23,040 --> 00:15:26,960 Speaker 1: central metaphor labor was the arsenal of democracy. Was in 220 00:15:27,040 --> 00:15:29,680 Speaker 1: bad taste as he described the unions that he leads 221 00:15:30,560 --> 00:15:36,560 Speaker 1: as the successors of Liberator B fifty two bombers, which not, 222 00:15:37,080 --> 00:15:39,680 Speaker 1: you know, not precisely the metaphor ed shoes, as your 223 00:15:39,720 --> 00:15:45,240 Speaker 1: own members are protesting the bombs following over Gaza. But 224 00:15:45,360 --> 00:15:48,640 Speaker 1: on the other hand, if a giant speech about the 225 00:15:48,640 --> 00:15:52,400 Speaker 1: class war and the need to organize across borders is 226 00:15:52,560 --> 00:15:57,440 Speaker 1: now the conservative wing of progressor trade unionism. The future 227 00:15:57,880 --> 00:16:02,360 Speaker 1: is bright. The kind of militant union actions we've seen 228 00:16:02,440 --> 00:16:05,680 Speaker 1: over the past year have coalesced into a sort of 229 00:16:05,680 --> 00:16:09,640 Speaker 1: strategy of fight as you build. It is based on 230 00:16:09,960 --> 00:16:15,040 Speaker 1: a very basic strategy that you would think unions would 231 00:16:15,040 --> 00:16:19,440 Speaker 1: have already been doing. However, Comma, see everything I've ever 232 00:16:19,480 --> 00:16:25,280 Speaker 1: said about administration, administrative caucuses, and business unionism and corporate unionism. 233 00:16:25,800 --> 00:16:29,560 Speaker 1: The strategy is, if you win things for people, more 234 00:16:29,600 --> 00:16:34,680 Speaker 1: of them will join unions. This strategy is already bearing 235 00:16:34,720 --> 00:16:39,520 Speaker 1: fruit in Chattanooga and has international implications as well. We 236 00:16:39,640 --> 00:16:43,360 Speaker 1: heard from organizers that workers in Mexico and China were 237 00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:49,320 Speaker 1: keenly watching the UAW strikes, and for good reason. These 238 00:16:49,320 --> 00:16:53,400 Speaker 1: strikes are ultimately their fight too, and slowly but surely 239 00:16:54,360 --> 00:16:59,080 Speaker 1: workers across the world are starting to realize it. The 240 00:16:59,200 --> 00:17:03,080 Speaker 1: degree of Internet nationalism at this labrynes was remarkable. I 241 00:17:03,120 --> 00:17:06,320 Speaker 1: came into an early China panel fully expecting the same 242 00:17:06,400 --> 00:17:09,040 Speaker 1: kinds of praise for the CCP that I've seen in 243 00:17:09,160 --> 00:17:13,320 Speaker 1: other leftist events held in the city of Chicago, most recently, 244 00:17:13,400 --> 00:17:18,640 Speaker 1: the sort of fiasco China panel held at Socialism Conference 245 00:17:19,080 --> 00:17:23,800 Speaker 1: that degraded into an argument about whether or not Brazil, Russia, India, 246 00:17:23,960 --> 00:17:28,679 Speaker 1: China and South Africa socialist. Here there was none of that. 247 00:17:30,440 --> 00:17:33,520 Speaker 1: For sure, there were some slightly weird German maoist defending 248 00:17:33,560 --> 00:17:37,160 Speaker 1: the Cultural Revolution, but on the other hand, there wasn't 249 00:17:37,200 --> 00:17:40,960 Speaker 1: any defense of Chinese capitalism or their failed bankrupt model 250 00:17:41,040 --> 00:17:47,400 Speaker 1: of corporate unionism. On top of cross border organizing sectorially, 251 00:17:48,040 --> 00:17:51,000 Speaker 1: the conference has a deep and ingrained pro immigrant position. 252 00:17:51,880 --> 00:17:54,760 Speaker 1: Sean Fayn is probably the most high profile political figure 253 00:17:54,800 --> 00:17:57,840 Speaker 1: I've seen actually discussing the horrific treatment of migrants at 254 00:17:57,880 --> 00:18:01,360 Speaker 1: the border right now and taking time to remind everyone 255 00:18:01,440 --> 00:18:06,280 Speaker 1: that immigrants are just workers trying to find a better life. This, however, 256 00:18:06,800 --> 00:18:10,920 Speaker 1: makes his support for Joe Biden, the butcher of Yakumba, 257 00:18:10,960 --> 00:18:16,800 Speaker 1: even more questionable. Still, you can see the wheels of 258 00:18:16,880 --> 00:18:21,360 Speaker 1: history turning. You can see it there in the muffled 259 00:18:21,359 --> 00:18:25,560 Speaker 1: buzz of conversations drifting through hallways, in the roar of 260 00:18:25,600 --> 00:18:29,879 Speaker 1: the cheering crowd, in the bright laughs of co conspirators 261 00:18:30,000 --> 00:18:34,040 Speaker 1: who moments before were strangers, and the drowsy chatter of 262 00:18:34,080 --> 00:18:37,119 Speaker 1: abortion workers who let a transwoman sleep on their floor 263 00:18:37,160 --> 00:18:40,119 Speaker 1: to hide from the police in the chance of one 264 00:18:40,200 --> 00:18:42,800 Speaker 1: hundred workers refusing to let the cops take one of 265 00:18:42,800 --> 00:18:47,240 Speaker 1: their own. You can see the outline of the great Leviathan, 266 00:18:47,359 --> 00:18:50,880 Speaker 1: the ruling class thought buried stone dead in the nineteen eighties. 267 00:18:52,000 --> 00:18:55,160 Speaker 1: You can see the working class waking from its day's slumber, 268 00:18:56,040 --> 00:18:58,440 Speaker 1: shaking the sleep from its eyes and the dirt from 269 00:18:58,440 --> 00:19:03,439 Speaker 1: its back for the first time in decades. Hear the 270 00:19:03,520 --> 00:19:06,960 Speaker 1: clatter and the roar as it tests its chains. The 271 00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:12,640 Speaker 1: great behemoth is beginning, just beginning, to assemble the ironwill 272 00:19:12,720 --> 00:19:16,240 Speaker 1: and terrible power necessary to turn its dreams into reality, 273 00:19:16,920 --> 00:19:19,880 Speaker 1: to break its chains and shatter its cage, and reclaim 274 00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:23,440 Speaker 1: the world it built with its blood and sweat and tears. 275 00:19:25,080 --> 00:19:30,439 Speaker 1: That day is not today, it's not tomorrow, but for 276 00:19:30,480 --> 00:19:33,240 Speaker 1: the first time in my life, it could be the 277 00:19:33,320 --> 00:19:36,680 Speaker 1: day after that this has been It could happen here. 278 00:19:37,160 --> 00:19:46,000 Speaker 1: Happy Mayday, everyone, It could happen here. As a production 279 00:19:46,080 --> 00:19:49,080 Speaker 1: of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, 280 00:19:49,160 --> 00:19:51,840 Speaker 1: visit our website cool Zonemedia dot com, or check us 281 00:19:51,840 --> 00:19:54,679 Speaker 1: out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you 282 00:19:54,720 --> 00:19:57,320 Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. You can find sources for it could 283 00:19:57,320 --> 00:20:01,440 Speaker 1: happen here. Updated monthly at cool zone Media Com Slash Sources, 284 00:20:01,440 --> 00:20:02,280 Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.