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por Mark Carney

Pro labor rights organizations protest at SF City Hall. ­(PHOTO BY MARK CARNEY)

­Seeking to end the problem of wage theft, many progressive San Francisco organizations held a rally on Thursday, Nov. 18, on the steps of City Hall. The event, part of the “National Day of Action Against Wage Theft”, took place in cities across the U.S., and was intended to draw attention to an issue that affects many low-income U.S. workers, and particularly immigrants.

The participating groups, which included Young Workers United, the Chinese Progressive Association, La Raza Centro Legal, the Filipino Community center, and Pride at Work, is urging greater enforcement of labor laws, and the creation of a citywide Low-Wage Worker’s Bill of Rights. Appearing in support of this proposal, Supervisor David Campos said, “It is a San Francisco value that the rights of workers are protected.”

In San Francisco itself, most wage theft victimizes immigrant workers, according to many of the speakers. Even though San Francisco has an hourly minimum wage of $9.92, many workers receive a lower wage—sometimes as little as $5. “Immigrant workers don’t receive the minimum wage, or overtime, or get rest periods. Sometimes, after working all day, they don’t get paid at all,” said Renee Saucedo, of La Raza Centro Legal Day Laborer Program.

The Chinese Progressive Association (CPA), an organization that advocates for the rights of Chinese-American laborers, recently completed a thorough study on the working conditions of Chinatown restaurant workers. Minimum wage violations and lack of overtime pay are so common, according to Alex Tom, executive director of the CPA, that “eight million dollars in wages have been lost. Workers who try to obtain their rightful wages are sometimes fi red, or have their schedules changed, as retaliation.” And, as in many immigrant communities, fear of their employer often prevents them from ever taking action. “Some of them, after winning their claim for back-wages, are afraid to pick up their checks. The checks just sit there,” he added.

Whereas most Chinese immigrants work in restaurants or in the garment factories in the Bayview, Chinatown, or SOMA (South of Market) neighborhoods, Latino immigrants work in a wider range of industries: Males often work in restaurants or as construction day laborers, while females work in restaurants or as ­domestic workers. Although the typical hourly wage for a day laborer is $15, those who wait on the street, or outside building supply stores, usually make between $8 and 12 per hour, according to Renee Saucedo, of La Raza Centro. Saucedo, who runs a program at La Raza that guarantees participants $15 per hour, said that “day laborers who look for work on the street do not always receive the agreed-upon wages at the end of the day…sometimes they aren’t even paid.”

Domestic workers, too, have problems obtaining their wages, and because they work inside their employer’s house, they can even be subject to sexual harassment. “When they ask for the wages they have earned, they are threatened with the loss of their job, or even with deportation,” Saucedo noted.

Farmers market and growing food at home might become illegal

by Rady Ananda, Food Freedom

By a vote of 74 to 25, at noon on Dec. 17, the U.S. Senate voted for cloture on S 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act, which means it must now be voted on in the full Senate within 60 days. All amendments to the controversial food control bill must be completed by that time.

One of S 510’s supporters, Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, opposed cloture because modifications to the bill do not reflect its original intent, he said on CSPAN. Chambliss fully supports giving the FDA more power over the US food supply, but is unhappy with the Manager’s Amendment submitted in August.

He objects to the small farm exclusion on the grounds that the $500,000 annual gross revenue limit is an arbitrary number that is too quickly reached by small farms. He called for numerous amendments to the bill as it appears today.

Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio supports S 510, and called out the statistics by the Centers for Disease Control that report there are 76 million food-borne illnesses a year, with 5,000 resulting in death. What Brown did not say was that the FDA — the very agency further empowered by S 510 — is responsible for the approval of pharmaceutical drugs that result in 100,000 deaths a year.

None of the supporters of S 510 will acknowledge the corrupt nature of the Food and Drug Administration. Monsanto executives now work at the FDA or on President’s Obama’s Food Safety Task Force. What legislators continue to ignore from the public is that we do not support giving federal agencies even more power — especially over something as inherently private as food choices.

None of the legislators will discuss the FDA raids on natural food operations, which sickened no one, while it allowed Wright County Egg to sicken people for decades before finally taking action. Yesterday, Senator Bob Casey informed his Pennsylvania constituents that the $1.6 billion price tag for S 510 will stop food smuggling in the United States. I kid you not: “These provisions add personnel to detect, track and remove smuggled food and call for the development and implementation of strategies to stop food from being smuggled into the United States.” Is food smuggling a problem in the United States? Well, the “biggest food smuggling case in the history of the U.S.” busted wide open in September.

Eleven Chinese and German executives were indicted for bringing in $40 million worth of commercial grade honey over a fi­ve-year period, reportedly to avoid paying $80 million in import fees. (No wonder they tried smuggling.)

That amounts to 3 percent of the 1.35 billiondollar honey market over a five-year period.

Since that was the biggest food smuggling bust, food smuggling is not the problem. Clearly. It hardly seems worth it for the U.S. taxpayer to cough up $1.6 billion so the FDA can stop such illegal activities, especially in our current economic recession.

“It would allow the government, under Maritime Law, to define the introduction of any food into commerce (even direct sales between individuals) as smuggling into “the United States.” Since under that law, the U.S. is a corporate entity and not a location, “entry of food into the U.S.” covers food produced anywhere within the land mass of this country and “entering into” it by insurvirtue of being produced.”

This is absurd. Food smuggling is not the problem with food safety.

Tainted food comes from monopoly operations in a highly centralized food system.  Break up the monopolies and revert to localized food systems to ensure food safety. Let local authorities control local food safety.

Bill 510 will lead end farmer markets, growing food in the backyard

by Mike Adams Natural News

Senate Bill 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act, has been called “the most dangerous bill in the history of the United States of America.” It would grant the U.S. government new authority over the public’s right to grow, trade and transport any foods. This would give Big brother the power to regulate the tomato plants in your backyard. It would grant them the power to arrest and imprison people selling cucumbers at farmer’s markets. It would criminalize the transporting of organic produce if you don’t comply with the authoritarian rules of the federal government.

“It will become the most offensive authority against the cultivation, trade and consumption of food and agricultural products of one’s  choice. It will be unconstitutional and contrary to natural law or, if you like, the will of God.” – Dr. Shiv Chopra, Canada Health whistleblower http://shivchopra.com/?page_id=2.

This tyrannical law puts all food production (yes, even food produced in your own garden) under the authority of the Department of Homeland Security. Yep — the very same people running the TSA and its naked body scanner / passenger groping programs.

This law would also give the U.S. government the power to arrest any backyard food producer as a felon (a “smuggler”) for merely growing lettuce and selling it at a local farmer’s market.

It also sells out U.S. sovereignty over our own food supply by ceding to the authority of both the World Trade Organization (WTO) and Codex Alimentarius. It would criminalize seed saving turning backyard gardeners who save heirloom seeds into common criminals. This is obviously designed to give corporations like Monsanto a monopoly over seeds.

It would create an unreasonable paperwork burden that would put small food producers out of business, resulting in more power over the food supply shifting to large multinational corporations.

­by the El reportero’s news
services

Jaime Morales Carazo

Nicaragua’s vice president said Wednesday he is not planning to comply with a diplomatic deadline to withdraw troops from a border zone with Costa Rica, as tensions flared over a two-century-old territorial dispute. Vice President Jaime Morales Carazo said he rejected the complaints by Costa Rica that Nicaragua was invading its territory – because the territory in dispute belongs to Nicaragua.

Anti-UN protests turn deadly in Haiti

On 15 November, at least one protester was shot dead by a UN peacekeeper following protests against the UN stabilization mission (Minustah) in the cities of Cap-Haitien and Hinche. The growing national antipathy to the UN puts a major questionmark against the international community’s plans to hold presidential and legislative elections in Haiti on 28 November. The UN, with its 8,940 troops and 4,391 police officers is supposed to ensure that the elections are at least peaceful. Even before the killing, the elections were problematic because of the cholera epidemic, which has killed almost 1,000 people, and the authorities’ failure to make ­much progress on rebuilding after the earthquake which demolished most of the country’s infrastructure on 12 January.

Cuba and Venezuela head in divergent directions

Cuba and Venezuela are moving in opposite directions. Venezuela’s President Hugo Chávez visited Cuba this week to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the special partnership signed by the two countries. Cuba’s President Raúl Castro took advantage of this historic occasion to announce that the Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC) would hold its long-anticipated congress in April 2011, nine years later than scheduled, to set out the future direction of the Revolution. Castro presented Chávez with a copy of a key document that will be discussed at the congress: it advocates widening the private sector and attracting foreign investment without renouncing socialism. The irony was unmistakable: Chávez is curbing the private sector, discouraging foreign investment, in the name of socialism.

Costa Rica – no longer the exception to the rule?

Costa Rica faces an “unprecedented crisis of delinquency”. The country once hailed as the exception to the rule in Central America should be seen “in the mirror of Mexico, as [the country] could well be heading down a similar route.” These were the warnings President Laura Chinchilla chose to issue to her people on the anniversary of Costa Rican independence on 15 September. The following day, the country’s unprecedented inclusion on the US State Department’s annual drugs black list shocked local and foreign observers alike, prompting questions as to whether there was no longer any substance to Costa Rica’s traditional reputation as an oasis of peace and social equality in a region otherwise afflicted by violence and poverty.

Brazil sabre-rattles over weak dollar

Throughout the past month, Brazil’s minister of fi nance, Guido Mantega, has made increasingly fi erce criticisms of US economic policy and the developing ‘global currency war’. After the US Federal Reserve Board’s decision to print another US$600bn of cash, commentators fear that there will be a showdown between the US and the world’s emerging economies, led by Brazil and China, at the forthcoming G-20 meeting in Seoul, South Korea, on Nov. 11-12.

­First person account – name omitted

I have an incident to share that occurred late Friday afternoon, November 12, 2010, around 5:15 in the Dayton International Airport.

I realize the publishing this publically on the internet puts me into a delicate situation, given that I am a high profile blogger and author. This is a difficult incident to share, but it needs to be said…Because I will not be a silent victim.

I will share the facts of the incident in as a matter of fact manner as I can.

I checked into my flight and had a boarding pass printed that included “plus infant.” My baby and I were flying from Dayton, OH, to San Antonio, TX, so I could run in the San Antonio Half Marathon.

I was taking my baby along because he is still breastfeeding for part of the day.

I entered the security line, removed the special formula that I had with me for the baby, as well as my quart size baggie with my other liquids. I went through the x-ray machine and metal detector, carrying the baby, with no incident.

Because I was traveling with baby formula, I knew to expect that they would test it with the paper circles for explosives.

The TSA agent took all of my belongings over to the table in the center of the explosive screening tables.

She asked me, “Are you aware of the NEW policies for carrying liquids through security that were instated 4 years ago?” (capitalized to show the emphasis that she placed on that word.)

I replied, “Yes, I fly with him every several weeks.”

She scanned the formula, then turned to me and said, “Remove your shoes and stand on that black mat for a patdown.”

I said, “OK, what do I do with the baby?”

“You cannot be holding him.” (I am traveling alone.)

So I placed him into his stroller. She instructed me, “Spread your feet apart and hold your arms out to the side.” I obliged.

She patted my left arm, my right arm, my upper back and my lower back.

She then said, “I need to reach in and feel along the inside of your waistband.”

She felt along my waistline, moved behind me, then proceeded to feel both of my buttocks. She reached from behind in the middle of my buttocks towards my vagina area.

She did not tell me that she was going to touch my buttocks, or reach forward to my vagina area.

She then moved in front of my and touched the top and underneath portions of both of my breasts. She did not tell me that she was going to touch my breasts.

She then felt around my waist. She then moved to the bottoms of my legs.

She then felt my inner thighs and my vagina area, touching both of my labia.

She did not tell me that she was going to touch my vagina area or my labia.

She then told me that I could put my shoes on and I asked if I could pick up the baby, she replied Yes.

She then moved back to my belongings to fi nish scanning them with the paper discs for explosives. When she fi nished she said I was free to go.

I stood there holding my baby in shock. I did not move for almost a minute.

I stood there, an American citizen, a mom traveling with a baby with special needs formula, sexually assaulted by a government official. I began shaking and felt completely violated, abused and assaulted by the TSA agent. I shook for several hours, and woke up the next day shaking.

Here is why I was sexually assaulted. She never told me the new body search policy. She never told me that she was going to touch my private parts. She never told me when or where she was going to touch me. She did not inform me that a private screening was available. She did not inform me of my rights that were a part of these new enhanced patdown procedures.

When I booked my ticket, I was given no information that the TSA had changed their wand and unintrusive patdown procedures to “enhanced” patdown procedures that involved the touching of all parts of your body, including breasts and vagina on women and testicles and penis on men. I was not informed by any signs on the front side of security about the new procedures. I had not seen any media coverage about the issue, so I had no idea that this was a new government sanctioned policy.

Another important piece in this story, the Dayton airport does not have the new body scanners. I was not given any other search options. It was enhanced patdown, or nothing. (And I would have opted for the body scanner, if I were going to be subject to a sexual assault.)

I asked to speak to a supervisor immediately. I had a very unpleasant conversation with him that lasted 20 minutes. I moved to the back of the security area, made a few phone calls, including to my lawyer. He did some quick research, and learned that I had indeed been sexually assaulted because she did not follow the SOP (standard operating procedure) for the new search.

During our fi rst conversation, the TSA acting manager of the shift told me that the TSA agent who sexually assaulted me was supposed to inform me about the new search procedure and tell me when and where she was going to touch me. He also apologized on behalf of himself and on behalf of the agent who sexually assaulted me. I was not allowed to speak to the agent who sexually assaulted me, nor did the acting manager provide me with her name. (I did not have the presence of mind to look at her nameplate, as I was in shock.)

I also spoke with the Dayton police, the Dayton airport police, and left a message for the TSA manager for the Dayton airport.

I intend to request the TSA to arrange for counseling services to be provided to me, so I can deal with the aftermath of the sexual assault that took place, caused by the specifi c touching actions and failure to inform me of the policies by the TSA agent.

I am speaking out against the TSA and share my sexual assault case to ensure that this does not happen to anyone else, anywhere.

I will not be a silent victim of sexual assault by a TSA agent. Total Sexual Assault.

I am calling for immediate change to this new enhanced body patdown search.

I am calling for the TSA agent who sexually assaulted me to be fi red.

I am calling for you, a fellow American, to stand up against these new enhanced full body patdown search procedures of the TSA.

Please note: I do plan on fl ying back to Ohio on Monday, because it will take me too long to drive home from Texas. I do not however intend to fl y again until this search policy of sexual molestation is revoked by the TSA.

I will leave you with this thought: “It is acceptable and encouraged that a TSA government offi cial can do something to an American citizen that US military personnel cannot do to a member of the Taliban.”

*UPDATE: Thank you all for the links and information about where and with whom I can share this. I am continuing to take action.

Please feel free to leave other helpful information you fi nd. I will be turning on comment moderation for the remainder of the day.