Today in labor History January 17, 1969: Black Panther Party members Bunchy Carter and John Huggins died in a shootout with the rival black nationalist Organization Us, during a meeting at UCLA. The rivalry and antagonism between the two groups was deliberately stoked by the FBI’s COINTELPRO, or counterintelligence program. The FBI even sent counterfeit death threats to members of both organizations, making it look like they originated with the other group. #workingclass #LaborHistory #blackpanthers #cointellpro #assassination #fbi #ucla #BlackMastadon

Today in Labor History January 16, 1992: The government of El Salvador and the FMLN rebels signed a peace accord, formally ending their 12-year-old civil war. 75,000 people died in that war, mostly civilians, and mostly at the hands of the military and government-supported death squads. 25% of the population became refugees. The U.S. taxpayers heavily subsided the Salvadoran government and its death squads and also trained many of them at the School of the Americas (AKA School of the Assassins), in Fort Benning, Georgia. The FMLN was named after Farabundo Marti, a Salvadoran revolutionary from the 1930s, who led a communist uprising that created the short-lived Salvadoran soviet, the first soviet in the western hemisphere. The Martinez dictatorship then slaughtered over 40,000, mostly indigenous people, in a genocide known as La Matanza. Martinez was one of the first world leaders to recognize Hitler. #workingclass #LaborHistory #elsalvador #FMLN #FarabundoMarti #imperialism #DeathSquads #communism #indigenous #genocide #CivilWar #SchoolOfTheAmericas #dictatorship #hitler

Research shows it costs taxpayers $31,065 a year to criminalize a single person experiencing homelessness while the yearly cost for providing supportive housing is $10,051. https://housingmatters.urban.org/articles/homeless-encampment-sweeps-may-be-draining-your-citys-budget #homelessness #housing #rent #landlords #police #tax

Avian influenza H5N1 hits child in San Francisco, California. Source of exposure is still undetermined. Director of public health, Crant Colfax is urging everyone to avoid contact with sick or dead birds and all raw milk products.

CIDRAP

San Francisco reports H5N1 avian flu in child

#H5N1 #influenza #flu #birdflu #pandemic #sanfracisco #publichealth

Today in Labor History January 14, 1921: Anarchist environmentalist writer and philosopher Murray Bookchin was born in New York to Russian Jewish immigrants. Before the age of 10, he had joined the Young Pioneers, a communist league for children. As a young adult, he served as a union shop steward for the United Electrical Workers and later, as an autoworker, was active in the 1945-1946 GM strike. In the 1950s he started writing about the environment and, some say, was the first to introduce “environmentalism” and “ecology” to radical politics. He had a vision of an ecological society based on participatory, grassroots politics, in which municipal communities democratically plan and manage their affairs through popular assembly, which he called Communalism, or Libertarian Municipalism. This tendency has been a major influence on PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, as well as the Kurdish People's Protection Units and the Rojava Autonomous Region in Syria. Bookchin’s 1995 book “Social Anarchism or Lifestyle Anarchism” critiqued the tendency of many anarchists toward primitivism, anti-technologism, & individual self-expression at the expense of forming a social movement. #workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #MurrayBookchin #environment #ecology #books #writer #author #nonfiction #union #strike #LibertarianMunicipalism #pkk #kurdish #syria @npub1wceq...lzu8

Today in Labor History January 13, 1894: Anarchist workers in the marble quarries of Lunigiana Sicily rose up in revolt in support of the Fasci Siciliani (Sicilian Leagues). These were among the most exploited and abused workers in Italy at the time. Many were ex-convicts. The Fasci Siciliani, a socialist movement popular from 1891-1894, had risen up against taxes on basic commodities, like bread, and for land reform. The prime minister declared a state of emergency and deployed soldiers and carabinieri. As they tried to disperse the crowd, shooting broke out, killing a carabinieri and a protester, while injuring several others. Protesters attacked the police stations and stole weapons and burned down the tax building. On January 16, the government declared a state of siege. The surrounded the town with soldiers. They fired into the crowd, killing eleven protesters. The authorities arrested hundreds of protesters. They sentenced anarchist Luigi Molinari to 23 years in prison. Later that year, an anarchist killed French President Carnot, while another anarchist attempted to kill Italian Prime Minister, Crespi. #workingclass #LaborHistory #police #policemurder #sicily #anarchism #carabinieri #socialism #massacre #acab #policebrutality #italy #sicily #prison

Today in Labor History January 13, 1920: Security police working for the Social Democratic government in Germany slaughtered 20-42 workers in the Reichstag bloodbath. The massacre occurred as left-wing socialists and the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) were demonstrating for unrestricted organizing powers. Around noon, workers left their workplaces, effectively shutting down Berlin’s largest companies, including Siemens and Daimler. At least 100,000 workers amassed in front of the Reichstag. According to some, protesters tried to force their way into parliament, when Sipo cops opened fire. However, demonstrators contend that the cops opened fire without warning and without provocation. #workingclass #LaborHistory #communism #reichstag #germany #police #acab #massacre #berlin #weimar #socialism #policebrutality

Thus, Luigi Mangione is considered a terrorist, but white supremacists murdering activists, and cops killing civilians, are not. And, of course, people dying from dangerous products, unsafe workplaces, denied insurance claims, that's just a cost of business. #murder #terrorism #luigimangione #policebrutality #whitesupremacy #insurance