May Day 2013
Early on in the May Day USA
celebration at Elmwood Park, Philadelphia. We got some good speeches about
how May Day got started back in the
late 1880s and how it, and the need for labor unions, continues today.
The lefty website Daily Kos started up a labor
section in 2011, reflecting the growing closeness of the two groups.
We had a group of schoolchildren with us.
Ideally, the Disney corporation would
work to improve conditions for workers in Bangladesh, where there have
been a number of terrible
incidents lately, but their labor conditions and labor laws are at too
low a standard for Disney to work with.
Maryta Fields did a great job singing the national anthem.
Gee, I wonder why there's such a strong push for school
privatization? Hmm, could it be that the
National Education Association was the top
labor contributor (with nearly $15 million) to political parties in
the 2011-2012 election cycle? From the Wall
Street Journal:
Charter schools have spread across the
country while generally keeping organized labor out, with operators saying
they can manage schools better when their staffs aren't unionized. But
labor groups are now making a big push to get a stronger foothold in this
educational realm.
Our crowd grows even bigger. Large group lines up for hot dogs.
May Day is a big
tradition in Russia of course, given the labor roots of the Communist
Party. China, also being (at least officially) communist, also recognizes
May Day. Iranian workers are not
at all pleased with their government.
View as I took off around 4:30. Very nice day with good weather!
PRAWN
