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Goodluck to All of You
Rest in Power, Joe Hill – Executed by the State of Utah 100 Years Ago Today
Vergesst Es Nie
Today marks the 77th anniversary of Kristallnacht, “The Night of Broken Glass.”
The plaque reads “This synagogue is 100 years old, and was on November 9th, 1938, on The Kristallnacht, torched by the Nazis.”
Let us never forget.
Chicago Southland Jacobin Reading Group for September
The next meeting of the Jacobin Reading Group for the Chicago Southland will be held at 7 PM on September 15th at Feed Arts & Cultural Center, 259 S. Schuyler in Kankakee.
This time around, the subject is race. Here are the articles we’ll be discussing.
How Class and Race Immiserate – Matt Bruenig explains that class and race operate both separately and together to impoverish huge swaths of American society.
How Race Is Conjured – The Fields Sisters shed light on how the fiction of race hides the real source of racism and inequity in America today.
The Social Construction of Race – Race is a social fiction imposed by the powerful on those they wish to control. Brian Jones says “The whole thing is made up.”
More information is available on the group website and Facebook page.
Come join us!
Myths About Teacher Pensions
Pensions providing secure and stable retirements for teachers, administrators, and public school personnel are under attack. Here are the facts about pensions, from the Chicago Teachers’ Pension Fund.
Source: Public School Teachers’ Pension and Retirement Fund of Chicago
My Schedule for S15
I’ll be spending Independence Day in Chicago, imagining a better society and learning how to build it. This will be my third year in attendance at the annual Socialism Conference, sponsored by the Center for Economic Research and Social Change and the International Socialist Organization.
Here’s my tentative schedule for the weekend.
This conference is the most energizing and intellectually stimulating event of the year for me. It’s nice to be in a crowd of a couple thousand people and know that wherever you turn, the person you see is your comrade.
I hope to see you there!
Fun With Hillvetica Bold
A Bit of Fun
I put this board together for my day job at Learnist. Sometimes I do have a bit more fun than ought to be allowed.
Folk Singalong August 7th
Join us at 7 PM on August 7th at Feed Arts Center.
Running Orders
Here’s a poem, apropos of our times, from co-founder of the Institute for Middle East Understanding, Lena Khalaf Tuffaha.
Running Orders
They call us now.
Before they drop the bombs.
The phone rings
and someone who knows my first name
calls and says in perfect Arabic
“This is David.”
And in my stupor of sonic booms and glass shattering symphonies
still smashing around in my head
I think “Do I know any Davids in Gaza?”
They call us now to say
Run.
You have 58 seconds from the end of this message.
Your house is next.
They think of it as some kind of
war time courtesy.
It doesn’t matter that
there is nowhere to run to.
It means nothing that the borders are closed
and your papers are worthless
and mark you only for a life sentence
in this prison by the sea
and the alleyways are narrow
and there are more human lives
packed one against the other
more than any other place on earth
Just run.
We aren’t trying to kill you.
It doesn’t matter that
you can’t call us back to tell us
the people we claim to want aren’t in your house
that there’s no one here
except you and your children
who were cheering for Argentina
sharing the last loaf of bread for this week
counting candles left in case the power goes out.
It doesn’t matter that you have children.
You live in the wrong place
and now is your chance to run
to nowhere.
It doesn’t matter
that 58 seconds isn’t long enough
to find your wedding album
or your son’s favorite blanket
or your daughter’s almost completed college application
or your shoes
or to gather everyone in the house.
It doesn’t matter what you had planned.
It doesn’t matter who you are
Prove you’re human.
Prove you stand on two legs.
Run.