Concerned Families of Westchester Newsletter
April 4, 2022
Hello All – Today, April 4th, is the anniversary of the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King in 1968. He was only 39 years old when he died. Here is what our friends at the MLK Institute for Nonviolence (White Plains) have to say about this:
April 4th is the 54th anniversary of the assassination of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Dr. King's efforts to advance civil and human rights were influenced by the teachings of Jesus, and also by the philosophy of nonviolence espoused by Mahatma Gandhi. As difficult as it must have been, he actually loved his enemies. Such a love requires a person with an inner strength beyond the —the overly-simple belief that they could kill the dream just by killing the dreamer. They didn't understand just how many African Americans deeply respected Dr. King's work. They couldn't see that "turning the other cheek" is not always meek submission, but that nonviolent resistance is actually a powerful weapon when used by those who understand Dr. King's principles. The people who award the Nobel Peace Prize, however, had no difficulty recognizing the global significance of Dr. King's efforts. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. spent a lot of time in jail so that today's young people shouldn't have to. He died working for their freedom. We hope they will continue the work to keep his dream alive.
Each year in January, when we celebrate MLK's birthday, official memories usually stop at the (1963) "I have a dream" speech," or at the 1965 march in Selma. But in the years of his life that remained, King brought his civil rights crusade to the North, encountering and exposing brutal racism. He expanded on his life-long vision of economic justice for all, a social-democratic program based on an African-American alliance with the US trade union movement that would bring into reality a program similar to that of today's Bernie Sanders, but a half-century earlier. And supporters of Peace remember King for his bold speech at the Riverside Church in NYC, exactly a year before his death, when he broke the civil-rights movement taboo and spoke out against US imperialism and the Vietnam War. That he was murdered while he was in Memphis supporting a strike of municipal sanitation workers, and while planning a "Poor People's March" on Washington, DC, pretty much sums it up. He was a man who had so much to offer American, and from whom we are still learning.
Beauty as Fuel for Change 2022
CFOW's new initiative, Beauty as Fuel for Change, is now launched. Our founding statement says: "At this time when our #Democracy is at a crossroads, CFOW embarks on a new initiative for 2022. As Community leaders of this initiative, Concerned Families of Westchester stalwarts hope to inspire an exploration of expressive, creative visioning. We want to plant seeds of positive representations, to interrupt the negative, divisive patterns we live with today. A project to change the conversation, with creative expression that is hopeful and helpful and inspires us to create a better world! This is a vehicle for positive imaginings & a way to reach out beyond borders to build bridges between activists in all arenas and to let us unleash the power of creativity in our human community!" To learn more, go to our Facebook Group. To contact the project organizers, email BeautyAsFuel@gmail.com. To see some Action, check out our solidarity-with-Ukraine sunflower seed distribution at last Saturday's CFOW vigil in Hastings.
CFOW Nuts & Bolts
Please consider getting involved with Concerned Families of Westchester. Weather permitting, we meet for a protest/rally each Saturday in Hastings, at 12 noon at the VFW Plaza (Warburton and Spring St.) A "Black Lives Matter/Say Their Names" vigil will be held on Monday, April 4th from 5:30 to 6:00 pm in Yonkers at the intersection of Warburton Ave. and Odell. If you would like to join one of our Zoom meetings, each Tuesday and Thursday at noon, please send a return email for the link. Our newsletter is archived at https://cfow.blogspot.com/; and news of interest and coming events is posted on our CFOW Facebook page. If you would like to support our work by making a contribution, please send your check to CFOW, PO Box 364, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY 10706. Thanks!
Rewards!
We have some excellent Rewards this week for stalwart readers. First up is a beautiful antiwar song from Eric Bogle, "The Band Played Waltzing Matilda." [h/t JG] And next is some fast-moving stepping from "Band Odessa." There are lots more from both performers on YouTube. Enjoy!
Best wishes,
Frank Brodhead
For CFOW
CFOW Weekly Reader
Featured Essays
(Video) "Plot to Overturn the Election": Frontline/ProPublica Report Shows How Trump's Lies Became GOP Dogma
From Democracy Now! [March 29, 2022]
---- A federal judge ruled Monday that former President Trump and his lawyer John Eastman "likely" committed multiple felonies in their bid to block certification of Joe Biden's Electoral College victory in the 2020 election, ordering them to turn over hundreds of emails to the House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Despite the court order and numerous revelations coming out of the January 6 committee, some two-thirds of Republican voters believe Biden's election was illegitimate. "The stolen election myth is animating the Republican base to this day," says Frontline correspondent A.C. Thompson, whose new documentary, "Plot to Overturn the Election," premieres today on PBS and tracks how lies about election fraud made their way to the center of American politics. [See the Program] And you can see the PBS program, "Plot to Overturn the Election," here.
Understanding Sunrise, Organizing Methods
By Dyanna Jaye William Lawrence, Convergence Magazine [March 24, 2022]
[FB – This is the second part of an interesting insiders' view of the work and growing pains of the Sunrise Movement. Part one, highly recommended, is about the political strategy that guided the Sunrise Movement from its inception; it can be read here. NB, Convergence Magazine is the new incarnation of "Organizing Upgrade," a useful and insightful platform focused on the work of grassroots organizations and organizers. Check it out.]
---- Sunrise Movement grew from a labor of love by 12 young people, including the two of us, into the most prominent climate justice organization in the country. We put the Green New Deal on the map, strengthened the Left insurgency in the Democratic Party, and helped drive youth turnout to defeat Trump in 2020. Climate change became a political priority for the Democratic Party, and Sunrise directly influenced Biden's Build Back Better agenda. In the last year, though, Sunrise members and observers alike have noted a loss of strategic clarity and organizing power compared to 2017 through 2020. And it's not just Sunrise: the entire Left has struggled to make the jump from punching upwards in the Trump era to winning material reforms in the Biden era. In this essay, we'll pull back the layers of Sunrise's organizing model: how we actually recruited young people and united them in a structure for collective action. We'll first discuss the major influences on Sunrise's organizing and run through how it all played out in practice, the good and the bad. [Read More]
The War in Ukraine
Noam Chomsky: Russia's War Against Ukraine Has Accelerated the Doomsday Clock
An interview with C.J. Polychroniou, Truthout [March 30, 2022]
---- On the current military situation, there are two radically different stories. The familiar one is provided by Ukraine's military intelligence head, Gen. Kyrylo Budanov: Russia's attempt to overthrow the Ukrainian government has failed, so Russia is now retreating to the occupied south and east of the country, the Donbas region and the eastern Azov sea coast, planning a "Korean scenario." The head of the Main Operational Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, Col. Gen. Sergey Rudskoy, tells a very different story (as of March 25): a rendition of George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq, though without the dramatic trappings: … The main goal of the "special military operation" was to defend the Donbass People's Republic from the genocidal assaults of Ukrainian Nazis over the past eight years. Since Ukraine rejected diplomacy, it was necessary to extend the operation to "demilitarization and denazification" of Ukraine, destroying military targets with great care to spare civilians. The main goals have been efficiently achieved exactly according to plan. What remains is the full "liberation of Donbass." Two tales, same ending, which I presume is accurate. The West, quite plausibly, adopts the former story. That is, it adopts the story that tells us that Russia is incapable of conquering cities a few miles from its border that are defended by what are limited military forces by world standards, supported by a citizen's army. Or does the West adopt this story? Its actions indicate that it prefers the version of General Rudskoy: an incredibly powerful and efficient Russian military machine, having quickly achieved its objectives in Ukraine, is now poised to move on to invade Europe, perhaps overwhelming NATO just as efficiently. If so, it is necessary to reinforce NATO's eastern front to prevent the impending invasion by this monstrous force. [Read More]
(Video) Russia Plots Major Donbas Offensive in Eastern Ukraine as Putin Calls for 134,500 New Conscripts
From Democracy Now! [March 31, 2022]
---- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Wednesday Russia is preparing a major offensive in the eastern Donbas region. This comes just two days after Kremlin officials announced plans to "fundamentally" cut back military operations near Kyiv and the city of Chernihiv, though attacks have continued on both cities. We speak with Anatol Lieven, senior fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft…. Lieven talks about the domestic backlash President Vladimir Putin faces from ultranationalists opposed to any peace talks. [See the Program]
Also illuminating re: the war in Ukraine - "The Ukraine Crisis is Splitting the Peace Movement — When it's Needed Most," b [Link]; and "The Ongoing Russian Resistance to Putin's War," by Finley Muratova, The Nation [March 28, 2022] [Link]. Friday's New York Times included a story about Sergei Loznitsa, one of Ukraine's leading documentary film makers. One of his films is a two-hour documentary about the Maidan uprising in Kyiv in 2014, perhaps the most significant step leading to the war. You can see the film's 3-minute trailer here. If you have a WLS library card, you can see the film here.
The Climate Crisis
War Is Not an Excuse to Ignore Climate Change
By Stan Cox, The Nation [March 28, 2022]
---- While the Ukrainian people bear the lethal brunt of Russia's invasion, shock waves from that war threaten to worsen other crises across the planet. The emergency that loomed largest before Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine began—the heating of Earth's climate—is now looming larger still. The reason is simple enough: a war-induced rush to boost oil and gas production has significantly undercut efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. UN Secretary General António Guterres made that clear in an angry March 21st address blasting world leaders scrambling for yet more oil and gas. "Countries could become so consumed by the immediate fossil fuel supply gap that they neglect or knee-cap policies to cut fossil fuel use," he said, adding, "This is madness." … To achieve mutually assured protection against both global broiling and global war, humanity will have to purge oil, natural gas, and coal from our lives as quickly as possible, a future reality the Ukraine disaster seems to be making less probable by the day. [Read More]
The State of the Union
(Video) "We Just Unionized Amazon": How Two Best Friends Beat the Retail Giant's Union-Busting Campaign
From Democracy Now! [April 4, 2022]
---- We speak with the two best friends who led a drive to organize workers at Amazon's warehouse in Staten Island, New York, and made history Friday after a majority voted to form the first Amazon union in the U.S. We speak with Christian Smalls, interim president of the new union and former Amazon supervisor, about how he led the effort after Amazon fired him at the height of the pandemic for demanding better worker protections. "I think we proved that it's possible, no matter what industry you work in, what corporation you work for," says Smalls. "We just unionized Amazon. If we can do that, we can unionize anywhere." We also speak with Derrick Palmer, who works at the Amazon JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island and is the vice president of the Amazon Labor Union, about intimidation tactics the company used. Reporter Josefa Velásquez covered the union drive for The City and discusses what the victory means for the broader labor movement. [See the Program]
Also of interest on the Amazon workers' victory – "A Cinderella Story: How Staten Island Amazon Workers Won Against the Multi-Billion-Dollar Company," by Josefa Velasquez, The City [April 1, 2022] [Link]; "Amazon Workers Score a Decisive Win in Staten Island!" by Jane McAlevey, The Nation [March 28, 2022] [Link]; "Amazon Workers in Staten Island Clinch a Historic Victory," by Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes [April 1, 2022] [Link], and "Here's How We Beat Amazon: An interview with Angelika Maldonado," Jacobin [April 4, 2022] [Link].
(Video) U.S. Prepares to Arrest Surge of Migrants at Southern Border as It Welcomes 100,000 Ukrainian Refugees
From Demoracy Now! [March 30, 2022]
---- As the U.S. says it will welcome up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees fleeing the Russian invasion, immigration officials say they're preparing for a surge of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border as it ends the Trump-era pandemic restriction Title 42 in response to humanitarian outcry. We speak with Guerline Jozef of the Haitian Bridge Alliance about how Haitian refugees are treated, and with award-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa about the Haitians she met in a migrant caravan. Jozef says President Biden's pledge to welcome Ukrainian refugees, while necessary, is a painful display of the double standard faced by Haitian immigrants and other people of color seeking humanitarian relief in the United States. "Why is it that when it comes to people of color, Black and Brown people, we must continue to push and beg to validate our humanity?" asks Jozef. [See the Program]
Israel/Palestine
"Our land means our existence": Palestinians mark Land Day in Gaza
ByMarch 30, 2022]
---- Thousands of people responded to the invitation that had been playing from buses and mosques in Gaza in the days leading up to Land Day on March 30, 2022. People of almost all ages raised the Palestinian flag and came in waves to the Gaza seaport where the events took place. People entered down a long road which led to the huge stage in the square where leaders of Palestinian factions in Gaza were giving speeches. They all came to mark Land Day, the day which remembers events back to 1976 when six Palestinians were killed protesting the Israeli seizing their land in the Galilee. The photos and names of those killed were hanging on the stage today in Gaza, as people remembered that day, affirmed their right to their land, and raised their voices to reject the occupation. The air filled with patriotic music as the sea wind blew the many flags throughout the crowd. Everyone at the event had their own relationship to the day and its meaning. I walked through the crowd and asked attendees, "What does Land Day mean to you?" Their answers varied according to their ages and circumstances, but most answers included the statement: "the land means our existence." [Read More]
Our History
Honoring Dolores Huerta's Legacy
By David Bacon, The Nation [April 2, 2022]
[FB – Labor journalist David Bacon here assembles some tributes to Dolores Huerta, who at 92 years old is still organizing for California's farm workers and workers in other union campaigns. The first tribute is from Maria Elena Durazo, a California state senator. Read them all!]
---- When I became the first woman of color to lead the Hotel Workers Local 11 of Los Angeles, Dolores Huerta was there to support me. When I became the first woman of color to lead the 800,000 workers of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, Dolores was there to encourage me. And when I became a California State senator, Dolores was there to inspire me. Dolores knew who I was because she knew the world I come from. I grew up in a family of farmworkers. All of us worked in the fields, picking peaches and grapes and cotton, from the time I could walk. I never understood how it could be that our family all worked so hard, and yet never emerged from poverty. In that world of rural California, it was the grape strike and the boycotts that taught us that the only way to end that poverty and stop injustice was to organize together to change it. It was the United Farm Workers who taught us that. For me, Dolores was the best teacher among many good ones, teaching me the power of the union and nonviolent action. Over the years, Dolores became my friend and mentor. In her I could see a woman of color who became a union leader—a leader of our movement for social justice. She never backed down or wavered. If she could do it, so could I. Dolores Huerta turns 92 on April 10. Amazingly (or maybe not), she is still organizing, still fighting, still challenging us all to stand up, organize and make this world a better place. The best way we can celebrate this extraordinary woman is to join her. Every speech I've ever heard her give ends with her getting us all to shout out, "Si, se puede!" So let's shout it out with her now—Si, se puede! [Read More]
