The Real News Podcast

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Labor militancy can't be stopped: Palestine and Labor Notes 2024 | Working People Jul 18, 2024

Show notes

Two months ago, from April 17-21, workers and labor organizers of all stripes convened in Chicago for the bi-annual Labor Notes conference, which overlapped with the Railroad Workers United convention. As the registration website rightly noted, “Labor Notes Conferences are the biggest gatherings of grassroots labor activists, union reformers, and all-around troublemakers out there." This is not a buttoned up convention of union officials; this is a real grassroots gathering of people on the frontlines of struggle, talking openly, honestly, and strategically about their struggles, victories, and defeats, about what we can all learn from one another as fellow workers and fighters, and about how we can all contribute to growing the labor movement as fellow members of that movement. In this on-the-ground episode, cohosted by Max and Mel Buer, we speak with attendees at the RWU convention, Labor Notes, and participants in the Labor for Palestine protest that took place outside of Labor Notes on April 19.
Speakers include: Johnny Walker, a railroad worker and member of the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers—Transportation Division (SMART-TD) Local 610 in Baltimore; Matt Weaver, who has worked on the railroad since 1994, is a member of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees (BMWED-IBT) Local 2624, where he also serves as legislative director for his state; Marcie Pedraza, an electrician at Ford Chicago Assembly Plant and member of United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 551; Jacob Morrison, a member of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), president of the North Alabama Labor Council, and cohost of The Valley Labor Report; Leticia Zavala, legendary farm labor organizer working with farm workers in Mexico and the United States, and a member of El Futuro Es Nuestro (It’s Our Future), a farmworker caucus within the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC, AFL-CIO); Colin Smalley, president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) Local 777 in Chicago; Berenice Navarrete-Perez, vice president of the Association of Legislative Employees (ALE); Annie Shields, former journalist and union organizer with the NewsGuild of New York; and Axel Persson, a locomotive engineer in France and general secretary of the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT) Railway Workers Union in Trappes.
Additional links/info below…

Labor Notes website, Facebook page, and Twitter/X page
Railroad Workers United website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
El Futuro Es Nuestro – It's Our Future website and Facebook page
Labor for Palestine website
The Valley Labor Report YouTube channel, Facebook page, Twitter/X page, and Patreon
Duncan Freeman, The Chief Leader: "At Labor Notes conference, a sense of mission and solidarity"
Axel Persson, ML Today, "CGT leader speaks to Labor Notes conference"
Martha Grevatt, Workers World, "Militant pro-Palestine demonstration during Labor Notes conference takes the street"

Permanent links below...

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Labor Radio / Podcast Network website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
In These Times website, Facebook page, and Twitter page
The Real News Network website, YouTube channel, podcast feeds, Facebook page, and Twitter page

Featured Music...

Jules Taylor, "Working People" Theme Song

Read the transcript of this podcast here.
Studio Production: Maximillian Alvarez, Mel Buer
Post-Production: Jules Taylor
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Nora Loreto's news headlines for Thursday, July 18, 2024 Jul 18, 2024

Show notes

Canadian journalist Nora Loreto reads the latest headlines for Thursday, July 18, 2024.
TRNN has partnered with Loreto to syndicate and share her daily news digest with our audience. Tune in every morning to the TRNN podcast feed to hear the latest important news stories from Canada and worldwide.
Find more headlines from Nora at Sandy & Nora Talk Politics podcast feed.
Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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Nora Loreto's news headlines for Wednesday, July 17, 2024 Jul 17, 2024

Show notes

Canadian journalist Nora Loreto reads the latest headlines for Wednesday, July 17, 2024.
TRNN has partnered with Loreto to syndicate and share her daily news digest with our audience. Tune in every morning to the TRNN podcast feed to hear the latest important news stories from Canada and worldwide.
Find more headlines from Nora at Sandy & Nora Talk Politics podcast feed.
Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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Referenced articles:
Story 1 – Child and youth advocate in BC calls for radical changes to the child welfare system, after inquiry into torture and murder of boy.
Story 2 – Immigration lawyer David Hirsch Davis, previously sanctioned for sexual assault and professional misconduct, is suspended by the Law Society for 6 months for punching articling student in the groin.
Story 3 – TC Energy loses its bid for $15B in damages over cancelled Keystone XL pipeline.
Story 4 – Six people dead from apparent poisoning in luxury hotel in Bangkok.
Story 5 – ISIS claims responsibility for attack inside Oman mosque where 6 were killed and 28 injured.
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The Trump assassination attempt changes everything | The Marc Steiner Show Jul 16, 2024

Show notes

John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and now Trump. America is no stranger to attempted and successful political assassinations, but something feels different about this time. On July 13, former President Donald J. Trump survived an assassination attempt during a rally in Butler, PA, that left one bystander dead and two others seriously injured. The shooter, identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, PA, is now dead. While Crooks was a registered Republican, and the FBI has yet to identify a motive, the Republican Party has wasted no time in pinning the assassination on Democrats and the left. In response, Democrats and Biden are putting up little defense, capitulating to the right-wing narrative and issuing vague pronouncements against "charged rhetoric" and "political violence." TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez joins The Marc Steiner Show for a breakdown of how the political ground is shifting beneath our feet—and what it portends for the election.
Read the transcript of this podcast here.
Studio Production: Cameron Granadino
Post-Production: Alina Nehlich
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Nora Loreto's news headlines for Tuesday, July 16, 2024 Jul 16, 2024

Show notes

Canadian journalist Nora Loreto reads the latest headlines for Tuesday, July 16, 2024.
TRNN has partnered with Loreto to syndicate and share her daily news digest with our audience. Tune in every morning to the TRNN podcast feed to hear the latest important news stories from Canada and worldwide.
Find more headlines from Nora at Sandy & Nora Talk Politics podcast feed.
Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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Donate to support this podcast
Referenced articles:
Story 1 - Video released that shows that police negligence caused the death of John Ettawakapow.
Story 2 - Encampment dismantled by activists at the University of Manitoba before the university could have "the spectacle they wanted" of taking it down.
Story 3 - Massive protests in Bangladesh over hiring practice changes leaves at least 100 students injured.
Story 4 - Paul Kagame wins Rwandan election with a vote share of 99%
Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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Slavery once split up Black families. Today, prisons do the same thing. | Rattling the Bars Jul 15, 2024

Show notes

The modern prison system's origins in slavery can be seen in telltale signs throughout the system. The system of chattel slavery had no incentive to keep Black families together—in fact, separation was deliberately used to punish the enslaved. Today, the prison system mirrors this in its treatment of families of the incarcerated. Prisoners are denied the opportunity to be fully present parents by the nature of their condition, and further separation from family through visitation denial, relocation, and other means are used as a way to punish and torture inmates. Ernest Boykin, a father of seven, speaks on his personal experience as a formerly incarcerated parent—and everything he did to ensure that he would remain in his children's lives despite the system's efforts to deny him that right.
Studio / Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Audio Post-Production: Alina Nehlich
Read the transcript of this interview here.
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Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and becoming a monthly sustainer.
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