75 Years Ago Today, the First Occupy

Michael Moore December 30th, 2011
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/75-years-ago-today-first-occupy

On this day, December 30th, in 1936 -- 75 years ago today -- hundreds of workers at the General Motors factories in Flint, Michigan, took over the facilities and occupied them for 44 days. My uncle was one of them.

The workers couldn't take the abuse from the corporation any longer. Their working conditions, the slave wages, no vacation, no health care, no overtime -- it was do as you're told or get tossed onto the curb.

So on the day before New Year's Eve, emboldened by the recent re-election of Franklin Roosevelt, they sat down on the job and refused to leave.

They began their Occupation in the dead of winter. GM cut off the heat and water to the buildings. The police tried to raid the factories several times, to no avail. Even the National Guard was called in.

But the workers held their ground, and after 44 days, the corporation gave in and recognized the UAW as the representative of the workers. It was a monumental historical moment as no other major company had ever been brought to its knees by their employees. Workers were given a raise to a dollar an hour -- and successful strikes and occupations spread like wildfire across the country. Finally, the working class would be able to do things like own their own homes, send their children to college, have time off and see a doctor without having to worry about paying. In Flint, Michigan, on this day in 1936, the middle class was born.

But 75 years later, the owners and elites have regained all power and control. I can think of no better way for us to honor the original Occupiers than by all of us participating in the Occupy Wall Street movement in whatever form that takes in each of our towns. We need direct action all winter long if we are to prevail. You can start your own Occupy group in your neighborhood or school or with just your friends. Speak out against economic injustice at every chance you get. Stop the bank from evicting the family down the block. Move your checking and credit card to a community bank or credit union. Place a sign in your yard -- and get your neighbors to do it also -- that says, "WE ARE THE 99%." (You can download signs here and here.)

Do something, anything, but don't remain silent. Not now. This is the moment. It won't come again.

75 years ago today, in Flint, Michigan, the people said they'd had enough and occupied the factories until they won. What is stopping us now? The rich have one plan: bleed everyone dry. Can anyone, in good conscience, be a bystander to this?

My uncle wasn't, and because of what he and others did, I got to grow up without having to worry about a roof over my head or medical bills or a decent life. And all that was provided by my dad who built spark plugs on a GM assembly line.

Let's each of us double our efforts to raise a ruckus, Occupy Everywhere, and get creative as we throw a major nonviolent wrench into this system of Greed. Let's make the politicians running for office in 2012 quake in their boots if they refuse to tax the rich, regulate Wall Street and do whatever we the people tell them to do.

Happy 75th!

Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa was buried in cement at General Motors' HQ

Book claims Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa was buried in cement at General Motors' HQ

Has one of America's most enduring mysteries been solved?
Lydia Warren
26th December 2011
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2078470/Teamsters-boss-Jimmy-Hoffa-buried-cement-General-Motors-HQ.html

The disappearance of Teamsters union boss Jimmy Hoffa remains one of America's most enduring mysteries.

But now, nearly four decades after Hoffa vanished, his driver has claimed he knows where he is buried – and how he got there.

Resting place? Informant Marvin Elkind claims a mob boss insinuated Hoffa was buried at the Renaissance Center in Detroit, Michigan - now General Motors' HQ

‘It was his own people who did it,’ Mr Elkind said in excerpts of a new book published in the New York Post, adding Mafia member Tony Jack insinuated he was responsible.

The startling claim comes 36 years after Hoffa, who led the labour union for 13 years, vanished while on his way to meet two mobsters he knew well, Anthony Provenzano and Tony Jack – real name Anthony Giacalone.

The Renaissance Center was under construction when he disappeared.

Mr Elkind explains how, during a Teamsters conference in 1985, he was among a group of men walking from the city’s Omni International when the Center came into view.

Tony Jack nodded toward the tower’s base and said, ‘Say good morning to Jimmy Hoffa, boys’, Mr Elkind alleges in The Weasel: A Double Life in the Mob by Adrian Humphreys.

He also describes the rush to build the Renaissance Center following the disappearance of Hoffa – and claims the body was buried in wet cement.

‘There was a mad rush to get the concrete poured,’ the New York Post quotes the book as saying.

Hoffa was declared legally dead July 30, 1982, when he would have been 69.

He was a union stalwart, serving as its General President from 1958 to 1971 and playing a key part in its growth and development.

During his term as its leader, membership surged to more than 1.5 million members, becoming the largest single union in the country.

As well as a role as Jimmy Hoffa's driver, Mr Elkind had careers as a loan collector, a boxer - and a police informant.

He was working as a busboy in a Toronto restaurant frequented by Jimmy Hoffa's crew when he was poached as a driver.

Mr Elkind initially said he didn't want the job, but he was told: 'Nobody's asking you.'

He began testifying against the mob when police discovered he'd worked with a con man. They gave him an ultimatum - tell or be charged.

The book, by Canadian reporter Adrian Humphreys, follows his life.

It takes its title from Mr Elkind's nickname, The Weasel, which he claims was his boxing moniker - rather than to do with his snitching.