It’s a Party…a COMMUNIST PARTY!

I know I have a pretty huge following out there on the internet, being Montana’s only known Communist blogger and all. In fact, I bet that many of you out there have been thinking these past two-some years, “This Red Montana guy is pretty rad, I wish I could totally party down with him.”

Well now you can.

This Wednesday, the 15th — TWO DAYS FROM NOW — I’ll be hosting the coolest pro-union get toether this little town has seen in decades. I cordially invite you to the…

Employee Free Choice Act Letter-Writing Party
Hosted by the Butte area Young Communist League
WHEN: Wednesday, April 15th — 7:30pm
WHERE: Butte, MT (contact me for the address…all are welcome, I just don’t want to publicize it on the blog)
WHAT: We’ll be writing letters to Montana’s Senators to tell them that we support the Employee Free Choice Act. This week is the Senate recess, so they’ll all be in the State. It’s the best time to get in touch with our people in Washington. If we get enough people to show up to make it worth doing, we will discuss plans to hand deliver the letters to the Senators’ local offices. Oh, and there will be some light refreshments served.

Again, everyone is welcome. If you want to swing by, contact me for the address. And bring  a friend. Bring four friends. Bring 100. Bring your grandma. Any pro-labor letter writers are welcome. We’ll have paper and pens and all that jazz available, so don’t worry about a thing (although if you wanna throw a few cents in to the paper fund we’ll gladly let you utilize our donation jar). We’ll also have good company, snacks, communist propaganda, maybe some tunes, some and a little time to munch & mingle.

So please, please, PLEASE get in touch with me, and swing by Wednesday night. I would really like to see as many people as possible. See you there!

Announcing MTFreeChoice.Info

The past couple weeks I’ve really been hammering on the Employee Free Choice Act on this blog, and it has become the semi-official cause of the Butte-area Reds at the moment. Toward that end, we’ve published a website about the Employee Free Choice Act — what it is, why it’s good, what you can do to help, etc.

http://www.mtfreechoice.info/

Please go ahead and check it out! I hope it will help some of you pro-labor people get involved and take action. Also, if you could, we have a flyer up for the website, and I’d really appreciate it if you could print out a few copies and help spread the word around Montana.

We’ll probably be trying to ramp up the actions around this issue, each one building on another. First we’ll hand out some flyers/leaflets, then if we generate a “buzz”, get a petition table set up. And if that goes really well, possibly even having a rally or demo of some sort. So anyway, please help get the word out about the Act and the website, and stay tuned for any updates.

Montana: Mobilize for EFCA!

On March 11th, the Employee Free Choice Act was re-introduced to Congress. It is currently in both houses as Senate bill S. 560 and House bill H.R. 1409. It’s time for Montanans to organize and put the heat on our representatives in Congress to pass this historic piece of legislation. Here’s how you can help:

1. Get educated. Not sure about the Employee Free Choice Act? Read up on how these bills would help workers and the American economy. Check out this fine article from the People’s Weekly World: America’s Choice: Union Yes!
2. Contact your Senators and Congressmen. The Missoula Area Central Labor Council is trying to get as many people to write letters to their representatives as possible. As of this writing, none of our people in Washington have sponsored either bill. Tell them that it’s important for them to get behind it TODAY!
   • Senator John Tester (D): You can e-mail Sen. Tester here. You can also contact one of his offices or write him. The information is available here.
   • Senator Max Baucus (D): E-mail Sen. Baucus here, or contact/write one of his offices (information available here).
   • Congressman Denny Rehberg (R): You can use the House’s e-mail search to find Congressman Rehberg’s e-mail here. Or, you can write/locate his office with the information given here.
   • If you live in another state (or are registered to vote there), you can find out if your Senators & Congresspeople are co-sponsors of these bills at the Library of Congress’ Thomas Database. If they are, write/call/fax them and thank them. If not, write them and tell them that you support workers’ right to organize and the Employee Free Choice Act.
   • If you are new at this or aren’t sure what to say, use one of the sample letters that the Missoula Central Labor Council sent me. If you want to write something more personal, great, but just remember to keep it short and sweet. It’s better if we get many people to send concise letters than a few people to send lengthy ones.
3. Get your friends, family, comrades, whoever to do the same! Big business and the ultra-right is trying to twist the truth to make EFCA sound like an assault on workers. This is an outright lie! Let’s get as many working-class people and allies to stand up and say that we want our right to organize protected.

Thanks for taking the time to get behind this. I feel like we’re on the verge of getting it through this time, but so far there have been only one Republican co-sponsors so it might be a harder fight than expected. We can’t afford to take it for granted that these bills will pass into law. Let’s get out there and mobilize for EFCA!

Happy Thanksgiving!

It’s Thanksgiving. It’s a happy day for me because I love food like you can’t imagine. But as we celebrate the harvest today, we have a lot to be thankful for.

If you’ve got a big old bird in the oven, remember to be thankful to the farm workers who raised it, the workers in the slaughterhouse who prepared it, the truck drivers who brought it to the store, and the store clerks who put it on the shelf and sold it to you!

Be thankful that in a few short months we’re finally going to get rid of the dumbest President the United States has ever had and replace him with someone with a brain in his head.

Be thankful that, for the moment at least, the political momentum in the U.S. has shifted, and we’re no longer drifting rightward but finally toward the left.

So there’s a little bit of “food for thought” while you’re whipping up some “food for gut”. Hopefully I’m not the only one who thought of this. My head is buzzing with ideas so I will probably make a better post here in the next couple days, so stay tuned.

Butte Election Day Update!

I swung by the Civic Center just to see how things were going (having voted absentee about a week ago) and everything appeared to be running fairly smoothly, from what I can gather. There were a lot of people there, but the lines were short enough that everyone could fit in the building, which is good considering it started dumping snow at about 1:30! If you’re putting off voting because you’re afraid you’ll have to wait in the snow, don’t! Go now! DO IT!

UPDATE 2:50 PM: So those crazy text messages have been going around Montana, apparently. People have been texting messages around that say, “DUE TO LONG LINES, OBAMA VOTERS ARE ASKED TO VOTE TOMORROW”. Anyway, hopefully this should go without saying, but it’s a joke. Don’t show up to vote tomorrow.

UPDATE 8:00 PM: Obama has taken a nearly insurmountable lead. I’m not going to call it yet but if he wins one more battleground state, Obama will nail it down. We’ll see!

Montana YCL Blog

Great news, for those of you looking to add a new blog to your list: the Butte-Helena Young Communist League has launched its new, official, shiny and clean blog. Check it out right here: http://montanaycl.wordpress.com/

In addition to posts by yours truly, it will have some updates from our other comrades, as well as official club news and views. It’s a little sparse right now but stay tuned.

Butte, Saturday: “Criminalization of Dissent”

[Note: Forgive me for not posting this sooner. Being the dumbass that I am, it just occured to me today to post this on my blog. I'll most likely be there, so come on down. Here is the press release in its entirety:]

Criminalization of Dissent program in Butte Saturday

Brian Terrell

The public is invited to hear peace activist Brian Terrell who will speak in Butte and Missoula about recent increased governmental surveillance, intimidation and prosecution of nonviolent peace efforts. The “Criminalization of Dissent” program at 1 pm Saturday, April 26, at the Carpenters Union Hall includes a panel discussion with local leaders able to provide both law enforcement and defense of civil liberties perspectives.

In the past 30 years Terrell, who is executive director of Catholic Peace Ministry and lives at a Catholic Worker Farm in Iowa , has chosen to be arrested in protests against U.S. military interventions in Honduras , Puerto Rico and elsewhere. He has provided nonviolent resistance training to others who hope to bring media attention to nuclear weapons, victims of war and other injustices.

In 2004 the Joint Terrorism Task Force subpoenaed Terrell to submit testimony about his participation in an anti-war forum sponsored by the Lawyer’s Guild of Drake University.  The Guild’s records and member list were also subpoenaed. A Georgetown University law professor, David D. Cole , was quoted in the New York Times February 10, 2004 as saying, “I’ve heard of such a thing, but not since the 1950’s, the McCarthy era.” He said “it sends a very troubling message about government officials’ attitudes toward basic liberties.”

The panel discussion following Terrell’s talk features attorney Dierdre Caughlin of the Montana Public Defender’s office, retired Montana District Court Judge Jack Whelan , and longtime state and national ACLU board member Frank Gary .

Hors d’oeurves and beverages will be available. There is no charge to attend the program. Donations to defray travel costs will be gratefully accepted.

Terrell will also speak in Missoula on Tuesday, April 29 at 7 pm at the University of Montana Law School’s Castle Room.

The program is sponsored locally by the Butte peace group TAPS – Taking Action for Peaceful Solutions, the Montana Tech Peace Seekers Club, and Sacred Ground. Co-sponsors include the University of Montana Law School chapter of the ACLU, the Bitterroot Catholic Worker, the Jeanette Rankin Peace Center and the Western Montana Spirituality Development Council, Missoula .

The Carpenter’s Union Hall is located at 156 West Granite Street . For more information, call 723-3851 .

New YCL Club

As you probably know if you read this blog with any frequency, we recently had some speakers from the Young Communist League come to Butte to give some presentations. Overall, this was pretty successful. I’m going to be honest, we didn’t blow the roof off the joint. The atmosphere was intimate, you might say. But there is some good news.

We are in the process of founding the newest Young Communist League club right here, in Southwestern Montana. Our roster is small at the moment — 3 members — but that’s enough to start an officially chartered club and we’re going to go for it. Our first meeting will be on March 15, so we haven’t decided on a name, structure, or any concrete goals yet, but from our discussion last night we established one very optimistic goal: raise enough money to send one of our members to Cuba in 2008 with the Venceremos Brigade.  This will take a pretty ambitious fund raising campaign, and we’ll probably hammer some more goals out in our inaugural meeting.

If anyone is interested in possibly joining the club just give me a shout!

YCL in MT Update

Alright, I’ve got all the info hammered out and set in stone. Adam and Docia from the YCL will be flying out from NYC to give the presentations I mentioned earlier. Here’s the specific stats:

What: presentation, “Youth and the 2008 Elections”, sponsored by MT Peaceseekers Club
Where: Montana Tech Campus – ELC room 203
When: Wednesday, Feb. 20 – 7:00 PM

What: presentation, “Report Back on 2007 trip to Cuba” still sponsored by Peaceseekers
Where: Montana Tech Campus – ELC room 203
When: Thursday, Feb 21 – 7:00 PM

What: Breakfast for those interested in the Young Communist League, USA
Where: TBA
When: sometime Friday

Punch and Pie.*

And here’s a flyer! YCL Butte Event Flyer

*Punch and Pie not included.

UPDATE: YCL comes to Montana!

I have an update on the story I posted yesterday about speakers from the Young Communist League coming to Butte for a presentation. It looks like it IS going to happen! Here’s the little preview of what it’s all about:

I. Youth and the 2008 Elections
* What’s at stake for youth and students in the 2008 elections
* Why should young people care about and get involved in the ‘08 elections
* What would it mean for youth and students if there was a huge Democratic victory in 2008?

II. Reportback on Trip to Cuba
* A presentation and slideshow on trip to Cuba with the 38th Contingent of the Venceremos Brigade- reviewing what the trip is about, what happened while we were there, different organizations we met and different events that we participated in
* Current overview of the struggle to end the travel ban and economic embargo against Cuba
* Discussion on the fight to free the Cuban 5

Adam Tenney is the National Education Coordinator for the Young Communist League, USA. The Young Communist League, USA is a 87 year old organization that has been fighting for the rights of young people, against racism and for equality and socialism. He is on the Coordinating Committee of the National Youth and Student Peace Coalition (NYSPC) and was a member of the Steering Committee of United for Peace and Justice (UfPJ) from 2006-2007. He went to Cuba in 2007 with the 38th contingent of the Venceremos Brigade.

So there you have the what, how about the when in where? The presentations will take place in Room 203 of the Engineering Lab (ELC) building of the Montana Tech campus at 7 PM on Wednesday the 20th and Thursday the 21st of February. The only thing I can’t tell you right now is which night will be which presentation, but I will edit this post when I know more. Anyway, we’re also planning on having a YCL breakfast if anyone is interested in the Young Communist League, probably on Friday, so if you are interested at all please let us know.

So please, if anyone wants to help spread the word, go for it. Adam and Docia, the two comrades giving the presentation, are flying all the way out from NYC just to spread the good word in Montana, so let’s show them a warm welcome!