Click
here to get on our news & bulletins mailing list...
But
before you do so, please read this note. —AB
[[EDITOR'S
NOTE: Unless otherwise noted, historical items appear courtesy of longtime
Nevada reporter Dennis
Myers' Poor Denny's Almanac [PDA]. Items
highlighted in blue are of interest to labor
in particular and seekers of justice in general. Red
means war. Copyright © 2011, 2012 Dennis Myers. More
Myers.]]
Aug.
2012-Aug. 2013: the Barbwire's Silver Anniversary Year
—>Now we go
for gold
Barbwire
by Barbano moved to
the Daily Sparks (Nev.) Tribune
on Aug. 12, 1988, and has originated in them parts ever since.
How
a hall-of-famer's hunch birthed the Barbwire in August of 1987
Tempus
fugit.
Happy
New Year
/ Feliz Año Nuevo
May you and yours enjoy a peaceful and prosperous time
Updated
12 Jan. 2013
Power
politics & prescient predictions
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-10-2013 Daily Sparks Tribune
Nevada
to mining: Never mind (the tax thing)
Hugh
Jackson / Las Vegas CityLife 1-9-2013
Barbano
back on Sam Shad's statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV program
Wine,
winners, whiners & white guys
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-3-2013 Daily Sparks Tribune
Happy
High Holly Days
BREAKING
NEWS AND THEN SOME—>
Bestest
of the grotesquest for 2013
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-27-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
John
Wayne, Michael Moore & Andrew Undershaft
The
guns of mythology
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-20-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Great minds think alike dept.—>Includes an update from Michael Moore
Tit
for Tat: Body blows from Lydia and Kap
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-13-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
 |
| COLIN
KAEPERNICK, CALL YOUR OFFICE — Groucho Marx sings Lydia the
Tattooed Lady in the 1939 Marx Brothers film At the Circus.
The song gained renewed popularity in the 1970's and 1980's on the nationally
syndicated Dr. Demento radio show. |
Posthaste
Letter
Carriers ask you to call
your congresscritters at 202-224-3121 and tell them not
to use the lame-duck congressional session to kill Saturday delivery.
"...all in the
name of holding onto the misguided mandate to massively pre-fund 75 years'
worth of future retiree benefits and to do so within just 10 years."
— National Association of Letter Carriers President
Fredric Rolando
 |
 |
Crash
in Sparks construction zone injures three on Dec. 10
Daily
Sparks Tribune / 12-11-2012
UPDATE: Laborers'
Union Local 169 member Cameron Owens was discharged from
Renown Regional Medical Center on Dec. 11. His father and brother
are both members of the union. He stood with his back to the oncoming
car in the middle of the area behind the rear of the truck at right.
Its hydraulic lift was in the position shown. (Look below the stop
sign on the bus.) Cameron's fellow workers began to shout "car"
as they got out of the way of the auto approaching at 100mph. Cameron
dove to his right, breaking his foot but saving his life. Had he not
moved, he would have been cut in half between the auto and the lift
acting as a blade. He had surgery to place pins and plates in his
foot and is recovering, reinforcing the fact that road
construction work remains one of the most dangerous jobs in the country.
(Photo,
John Russell, Local 169 Field Rep.)
|
 |
Calls
to Action
Hear
Ye! Hear Ye!
Come participate
in the Festival of the Failure of the King Maker.
Where/when: in front of his palace, the Venetian
Casino, 12-12-12 at 12:00
Who: Bring your friends, neighbors and countrymen (members) and celebrate
with us.
Signs will be provided.
Join the Society of Trauma Nurses, Building &
Construction Trades Council of Southern Nevada/AFL-CIO,
Culinary Union Local 226 and the Nevada State AFL-CIO.
FYI: In light of his recent failure, Kingmaker Sheldon Adelson has vowed
to double down in the next presidential cycle.
President Gingrich, anyone?
WHEN:
Monday, December 10, 4:30 p.m.
WHERE: Lloyd George Federal Building / 333 Las Vegas Blvd. S. / Downtown
WHAT: Candlelight Campaign Against Cuts
Tell Senator Dean Heller and Congressman Joe Heck we need
more economic security, not less. Don’t continue to give tax breaks to
the richest 2%. Don’t sacrifice Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid
for the wealthy.
Join
us on Monday, Dec. 10 to send Congress a message!
Peace
on earth, good will to Boise & Nepal
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 12-6-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
BOONSOGGLE
As
massive flooding looms for the region, here's how this sorry state got to
this sorry state —>
Watersports
2012: Reno-Sparks-Washoe governments blew millions, learned little and did
even less after the killer floods of 1986, 1997 & 2005
Teenage
Immigrant Welfare Mothers on Drugs
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-29-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
Triangle
Shirtwaist inferno redux a century down the road: Bangladesh
killer inferno was Wal-Mart sweatshop
Harold
Meyerson / Washington Post / November 28, 2012
3-25-1911:
New York Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
fire kills 146, including 132 girls
UPDATED
SATURDAY, 24 NOV. 2012, 4:12 p.m. PST, 00:12 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
SUNDAY 25 NOV. 2012
—>
NEVADA'S
CANCER KIDS: New lawsuit claims Fallon cancer cluster isn't over and leaking
military jet fuel pipeline is the cause
Superintendent
refuses transfers from suspect school
UPDATED
SATURDAY, 24 NOV. 2012, 1:27 p.m. PST, 21:27 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
Wal-Mart
salaries decried in Reno Black Friday protest
Reno fourth-grader Zachary
Davis spent his Black Friday morning outside a Walmart on East Second Street.
Holiday shopping was not the reason.
Instead, the 9-year-old was protesting with a small group of Renoites, including
his mother, who accused the corporation of unfair labor and wage practices,
which it denies. Store associates average less than $9 an hour (see
below) and many are only offered part-time schedules, according to
IBIS World, a research marketing company.... —>
—>
Story
text, still photos and video from the Reno Gazette-Journal / 11-24-2012
—>
Local workers
protest Wal-Mart / Reno News & Review 11-29-2012
UPDATED
FRIDAY, 23 NOV. 2012, 8:07 p.m. PST, 04:07 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
24 NOV. 2012
—
Hope
you enjoyed a happy Thanksgibleting
Now
dust off your picket signs and get to work!
|
TWO RENO WAL-MART BLACK FRIDAY DEMONSTRATIONS NOV. 23
Wally
World's Fantasyland spin on wages
 |
|
WAL-MART
SUCCESSFULLY SELLS CHEAP SPIN: Wal-Martians on another
planet
Nov. 23, 2012 —
In a statement to NBC used
by Reno's KRNV TV-4, Wal-Mart asserted that "The fact
is, our pay and benefits plans are as good as or better than our
retail competitors, including those that are unionized."
Bullshit.
“Walmart, they
make record profits and here they don't even pay these people
a living wage to feed their families,” Reno protester Mary
Jan Roesler told TV-4. ”I would love to see the Walmart
corporate people try to live off of that.”
A couple of Sundays
ago, CBS TV's venerable 60 Minutes did a piece featuring
vocational education at Truckee Meadows Community College
in Reno. The program spokesman was Ryan Costella, the son
of a Reno union leader who obtained an excellent college education
as a result. He is now reportedly a registered Republican. The
young workers training in his program for Reno metal and high-tech
fabricator Click-Bond gushed about making —> get
ready —> a whole 12 bucks an hour.
How inspiring. How
21st Century. How
Wal-Martian!
What the legit media
fail to report is that $12 an hour is barely above the real-dollar
minimum wage.
The buying power of
the dollar peaked, as did America with its progressive tax structure
and its most egalitarian economy, in 1968 when the
minimum wage rose to $1.60 per hour.
My first job in college
washing dishes at Denny's in 1964 paid $1.25. Adjusted
for inflation (which Congress never did), that's worth about
$9.33 in 2012 dollars. Higher than Wal-Mart today. (See below.)
Had the 1968 minimum
wage of $1.60 per hour been continually adjusted for inflation,
it would be worth $10.64 per hour today, almost exactly what some
established —> but striking —> Wal-Mart
workers told TV network reporters that they currently make.
Wally World also says
it offers health care, but only to full-timers, many of whom can't
afford it. Like so many major employers, Wal-Mart keeps legions
on part-time hours even if they want more. Makes them easier to
fire, even in states with far better labor laws than Mississippi
West Nevada.
Keep up the work and
the good fight.
¡Si se
puede!
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew
Barbano
CesarChavezNevada.com
NevadaLabor.com
Barbwire.TV
CWA 9413/AFL-CIO
|
|
Definition
of chutzpah
Video:
Walmart claims $12.40 an hour is average pay, CNN says it's $8.81
By
Michael Allen, OpposingViews.com / Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Walmart
is facing mass employee walkouts this week over low wages, unsafe
working conditions and poor benefits.
Walmart's vice-president of communications David Tovar
defended the company’s wage and labor practices on CNN on
Tuesday, which seemed to contradict actual Walmart pay.
Tovar said: “Our average rate is about $12.40 an hour for
a full time associate. We also offer comprehensive benefit packages
as low as $17 a pay period, which is very affordable. We also
pay quarterly bonuses, which is something that not a lot of retailers
do.”
However, CNN host Carol Costello told Tovar that independent
research has shown that the average hourly rate of pay at a Walmart
store is $8.81 an hour and the average yearly salary
for Walmart employees is $15,500, which is $370 above the
federal government’s definition of the poverty line, report
RawStory.com and ThinkProgress.org.
Costello said: “Walmart made a whole lot of money last year,
billions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars. Why not
at least negotiate with [employees] so that they can live a better
middle-class lifestyle?”
Tovar said that Walmart can’t negotiate with unions because
its employees are not unionized. However, he did not mention how
Walmart is trying to get the National Labor Relations Board to
treat the employees as if they were a union by preventing employees
from striking.
Tovar added: “It’s the same people that the unions put
up every year, and have been doing it for years. A lot of that
is smoke and mirrors, and is not having an impact. In fact, our
associates have said to us, ‘Why aren’t we speaking
out more?’ Which is why I’m doing shows like yours and
others.”
|
UPDATE:
FRIDAY, 23 NOV. 2012, 6:13 p.m. PST, 02:13 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
24 NOV. 2012
—
DEAR
HELLRAISERS: WELL DONE. The morning activity at the E. 2nd
St. Wal-Mart was covered
on KOLO TV-8/ABC (5:00 p.m.) and KRNV
TV-4/NBC (12n, 4:00, 5:00 and 6:00 p.m.) I included both locations
in my e-bulletin sent out in the wee hours. KTVN TV-2/CBS ran only national
stuff, reinforcing my long-held opinion that of the four local TV news
departments, they are by far the most corporate and reluctant to do
anything that might ever piss off an advertiser. TV-2 viewers were thus
kept in the dark about local protests.
TV-4 and TV-8 went to the morning picket on Second St. which they probably
would not have known about save for the bulletin hereinbelow. TV-8 quoted
the Wobblies statement about the National Labor Relations Act protecting
striking workers from firing or retaliation. The Wobblies probably got
better turnout at the Kietzke location at mid-day.
TV-4 reported that protests
will continue thru Christmas, so PLEASE keep me informed.
More would have shown up
with earlier notice. Organize!
No matter —> We got on TV so in society's opinion, we have been
validated as officially existing.
Anyone who has photos of
the picket lines I can put up at NevadaLabor.com, please send
them to me.
Keep up the good work and
the good fight.
¡Si se puede!
Be well. Raise hell.
In Solidarity,
Andrew
Barbano
CesarChavezNevada.com
NevadaLabor.com
Barbwire.TV
CWA 9413/AFL-CIO
UPDATE:
THURSDAY, 22 NOV. 2012, 4:11 p.m. PST, 00:11ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
23 NOV. 2012
—
Reno,
Nev., USA (U-News) — Reno will see at least two Wal-Mart
demonstrations on Black Friday, Nov. 23.
The first will take place from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m. at 2425 E. Second
Street just east of the Martin Luther King Highway (Interstate 580),
across from the unionized Grand Sierra Resort. It is being organized
by local affiliates of OURWalmart, a group of Wal-Mart workers standing
together nationwide to improve working conditions at the world's largest
retailer.
"Please come by for as much or as little as you can. We need to
show that union pride and solidarity are strong in northern Nevada,"
one of the organizers said in a statement.
At 12 noon, workers will gather in front of the Wal-Mart location at
4855 Kietzke Lane.
The demonstration will "defend workers' rights under section 7a
of the National Labor Relations Act making it unlawful for an employer
to retaliate for concerted actions by employees to improve conditions,"
a spokesman stated.
Media may talk with any demonstrator at the event. This thing appears
to be organically organized Occupy-style.
Facebook page for this event
Nov.
23 picketing in support of Wal-Mart workers
Facebook
/ 11-21-2012
OURWalmart -->
http://ourwalmart.org
Nevadalabor.com
Wal-Mart Nevada War Room
Bulletins will be updated here as news breaks.
Feel free to send stuff.
BLACK FRIDAY DOUBLE-TALK: The term has several meanings and was
most recently co-opted by modern retailers naturally enamored with operating
in the black, meaning profitably, as opposed to the red, meaning...well,
pick your favorite red state.
Black Friday originally referred to the stock market crash of 1869,
followed by 1929's Black Thursday and Black Tuesday, which foreshadowed
Great Depression I, all caused by unregulated Wall Street speculation
with other people's money. Sound vaguely familiar? Whether or not 2013
will bring GD2 remains to be seen. So take President Bush the Lesser's
economic advice and shop till you drop..
BARBWIRE BY BARBANO IN THE THANKSGIBLETING DAY SPARKS TRIBUNE —>
John
F. Kennedy's 2013 inaugural address
An update of one of my golden oldies. Keep it for reference come Jan.
21.
SUPPORT THE RETURN OF RENO-SPARKS
COMMUNITY TV. If this year's elections didn't convince
you of the need for non-corporate filtered news, arts and public affairs,
the 2013 legislature certainly will. Join up at ReSurge.TV --> http://resurge.tv#donate
Thank you.
Hope
you and yours enjoyed a happy Thanksgibleting. Now dust off your picket
signs and go to work!
¡Si se puede!
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew
Barbano
CesarChavezNevada.com
NevadaLabor.com
Barbwire.TV
CWA 9413/AFL-CIO
|
Anatomy
of the Walmart Strike: Walking Out, One Day at a Time
By David Bacon, Truth-Out.org Op-Ed / Tuesday, 20 November 2012
[EDITOR'S
NOTE: This one hits home. Like the writer and so many in the story, I was
also fired for union organizing.]
Wal-Mart
files charges against UFCW, Black Friday strike still on
Reuters / 11-16-2012
John
F. Kennedy's 2013 inaugural address
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-22-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
 |
|
Michael
Moore and Crackers the Corporate Crime-Fighting Chicken assert that
they have been thrown out of better places.
|
SATURDAY,
17 NOV. 2012, 1:59 p.m. PST, 21:59 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
Wal-Mart
files charges against UFCW, Black Friday strike still on
Reuters / 11-16-2012
Nevadalabor.com
Wal-Mart Nevada Archive
UFCW
settles with Raley's. Contrary to Raley's PR, this was not their first strike
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-15-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
SATURDAY,
17 NOV. 2012, 12:08 p.m. PST, 20:08 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
The
Twinkie Defense
Call
to action
from AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka
Wall
street vultures are blaming workers for getting rid of your sweets—and
that’s just not right.
You might have heard that Hostess Brands, the company that makes Twinkies,
Ding Dongs and other desserts, filed for court permission to go out of business,
and that its blaming a worker strike for the shutdown.
The Wall Street hedge fund managers who run the company have squeezed every
cent out of Hostess for eight years. And they’ve put their friends with
no experience in the baking industry in high-level management positions.
Hostess workers believe in their company, and we need to stand with them—sign
our pledge to support workers, not greedy CEOs who will cut and run for
a quick buck.
What’s happening here is a classic Bain Capital-style assault—blame
the little guy to cover the greedy corporate policies that are gutting the
middle class.
It’s not just happening to the workers who make the great products Americans
love. What’s happening at Hostess is happening to workers all over this
country. It’s wrong. And it has to stop.
Crony capitalism and poor management drove Hostess into the ground, not the
workers who are now paying the price. In this struggling economy, the greedy
corporate executives are willing to let 18,000 people lose their jobs—just
so they can pad their pockets.
Hostess' executives are now blaming workers who’ve offered their company
multiple concessions and want it to succeed.
This is what’s wrecking our
country.
Workers have borne the brunt of bad decision-making by executives who didn’t
know anything about the baking business. And they’re the ones getting
fired?
These brave workers need to know
we stand with them—and we’ll stand with everyone who will take a
stand against the corporate race-to-the-bottom.
In Solidarity,
Richard
Trumka
President, AFL-CIO
Editor's
note: Brother Trumka might have added that bankruptcy court is the newest
tool in the union-buster's kit to void union contracts and break unions.
MORE:
Union
workers refuse to act like ding-dong little cupcakes /
Union statement via Sacramento Bee, 11-13-2012
Bakery,
Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union/AFL-CIO
Why
rednecks didn't vote for Obama
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-15-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
WEDNESDAY,
7 NOV. 2012, 12:24 a.m. PST, 08:24 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
— Somebody place a want ad for campaign managers.
WOULD'A
COULD'A SHOULD'A DEPT. Come Wednesday, Nov. 7, Sen. Harry Reid and Nevada
Democrats may rue not having nominated Sheila Leslie for U.S. Senate.
Be well. Raise hell. — From Barbwire
by Barbano / Daily Sparks Tribune / 11-1-2012
TUESDAY,
6 NOV. 2012, 1:26 p.m. PST, 21:26 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
— From Danny Thompson / Nevada State AFL-CIO
Teamsters
14 needs help! There is a decertification vote on Thursday at Coca-Cola.
When: Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Thursday, November 8, 2012
Where: Coca Cola Bottling
230 N. Mojave Road / Las Vegas, NV
Times: Wednesday 8AM to 6PM Anytime
Thursday, 8AM to 6PM Anytime
I am asking that leaders and members join with Teamsters 14 to show solidarity
and strength.
For more information, contact Lynn
Griffith.
TUESDAY,
6 NOV. 2012, 10:37 a.m. PST, 18:37 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
2004
KERRY-BUSH INSTANT REPLAY IN THE BUCKEYE STATE
GREG PALAST REPORT FOR AMY GOODMAN'S DEMOCRACY NOW: Ohio
– Wrong Ballots for Black Voters Investigation Uncovers Thousands at
Risk of Ballot Loss
Unions
file charges of Romney profiteering on General Motors bailout
Author Greg Palast offers free downloads of new book "Billionaires and
Bailout Bandits"
MONDAY,
5 NOV. 2012, 9:46 p.m. PST, 05:46 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
TUESDAY 6 NOV. 2012 —
Vote
early and often
|
|
Michael
Moore and Crackers the Corporate Crime-Fighting Chicken assert that
they have been thrown out of better places.
|
Messages
from the Mahatma: Michael
Moore makes a helluva case as to why you should vote whether you want to or
not
MONDAY,
5 NOV. 2012, 3:38 p.m. PST, 23:58 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
POLITICAL
LAUGH OF THE DAY (and perhaps the year)
PHONE CALLER FROM NEVADA
STATE DEMOCRATIC PARTY (a young lady with an English accent): "May I
speak to (a certain person)."
BARBANO: "Negatory."
ENGLISH LADY: "Would
you like to speak to a Spanish speaker?"
BARBANO (Laughing):
"You're very young, aren't you? That wasn't Spanish, it was CB Radio."
ENGLISH LADY: CLICK.
Where
are Johnny Cash and CW McCall when we need them?
No
Hallowe'en Prank
Nevada Division
of Welfare will now follow the law and allow employees to vote
The following e-mail from a state employee arrived on Oct. 31:
|
TO: Editor, NevadaLabor.com
Hello.
I thought you may find
it interesting to know that after all the scrutiny that our office
has gone through with the lawsuit due to the whole voter registration
issue, it is kind of ironic that even though the NRS (Nevada Revised
Statutes) allows for administrative leave so that we as state employees
have the time to go out and vote, our department office manager and
his boss have stripped us of this right and said this time off will
not be allowed.
You
were the one who broke this story and I hope that you bring light
to this new issue. I am a mother of small children and with sicknesses
and picking children up from and dropping kids off at school we do
not have the time to do many things. I will quote the NRS below. I
have contacted the presidential campaigns, you, the AFSCME
and next shall be the governor's office. I work at the Kings Row office
in Reno, NV.
Nevada Administrative
Code (NAC) 284.586 —
Civil leave with pay to vote
(NRS
284.065, 284.155,
284.345)
— Civil leave with pay must be granted to allow an employee time
off to vote subject to the conditions established in NRS
293.463. If an employee determines he or she will need time off
to vote, he or she must submit a request for civil leave with pay
to the person authorized to grant such leave before the day of the
election.
[Personnel Div., Rule VII
§ E subsec. 7, eff. 8-11-73]—(NAC A by Dep’t of Personnel, 10-26-84;
A by Personnel Comm’n by R145-05, 12-29-2005)
UPDATE 11-2-2012:
KRNV TV-4 aired a story about this on Friday, Nov. 2, noting that
the situation has purportedly been "cleared up," although
NDW admitted no error. An NDW spokeswoman said that workers who wish
time off to vote must request it ahead of time. In his interview,
Secretary of State Ross Miller merely reiterated the law. (The piece
is not available online.) TV-4 obscured the identity of the complaining
workers.
|
Union
Says Reno V.A. Retaliated Against and Fired Whistleblowers
KRNV TV-4 / 10-29-2012
As
in 2008, the Salt Lake Tribune endorses Obama
SNOPES.com / 10-24-2012
Unions
file charges of Romney profiteering on General Motors bailout
Author Greg Palast offers free downloads of new book "Billionaires and
Bailout Bandits"
Dreams
of Redemption on All Saints Day
A presidential candidate Nevadans
can and cannot vote for + Reid regrets
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 11-1-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
HOPE
YOU WORE HALLOWE'EN ORANGE
FOR THE SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS
...all
of whom are represented by a labor union
Kiss
the Reno Aces goodbye —>NOW
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-25-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
We
don't need no education, Part XII
And
we don't need no evolution, 'nuther
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-18-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
ED
Part XI
Instant
replay of rape and pillage
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-11-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Endorsed
candidates (.pdf):
Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO
Endorsed
candidates/statewide, complete (.pdf): Nevada State AFL-CIO
MONDAY,
8 OCT. 2012, 11:58 a.m. PDT, 18:58 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
AT&T
workers demonstrate today at AT&T Reno
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
|
Special
notice to Sparks Tribune readers
In its 25th year as
a daily, the 102 year-old Sparks Tribune moved to twice-per-week
publication as of 1 Sept. 2012. Alas and alack, the publishers
have not done a very good job informing our readers and the general
public. I've been getting phone calls. The print edition will now
be published on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Four longtime columnists have
been retained: David
Farside, Jake Highton, Harry Spencer and the Barbwire.
The newspaper's website will continue to publish stories on a daily
basis.
My annual Labor Day
column appeared in the Sept. 3 Reno Gazette-Journal.
I also highly recommend
journalist Mark Robison's extensive piece Hard
Labor: Nevada
unions tout role in helping workers, firms, economy in the
Sunday 2 Sept. 2012 RGJ (starting on page one of the Reno
Rebirth section of the print edition). Therein, union men Jim
Burrell, Paul McKenzie and Guy Louis Rocha did the movement
proud. [Click here
to access the shocking but not surprising graphic included in
the print edition but not on the RGJ website.]
The RGJ also used
a photo and information from this NevadaLabor.com
golden oldie.
Hope
you enjoyed a happy Labor Day. Stay tuned. Be careful.
Be cool.
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew
Barbano
|
Former
Teamsters Local 533 Business Agent Al Tarson dies
UPDATE
9-23-2012: WE WON! Guy Richardson
was inducted into the Nevada Press Association Hall of Fame in Las
Vegas on Sept. 22. Guy and another first-time nominee, longtime Las Vegas
Review-Journal Carson City Bureau Chief Ed Vogel, bested seven
other worthy contenders. Guy's widow, Zoe Rose, flew in from Ohio for
the honors, as did his daughter and son-in law from Sparks. Thanks be to all
of Guy's former colleagues who sent endorsements. I'll publish them shortly.
FRIDAY,
21 SEPT. 2012, 6:31 a.m. PDT, 13:31 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
EXCLUSIVE:
RTC trying to give away
$50 million+ in corporate welfare
U-News
/ 9-21-2012
// Updated 9-24, 9-25, 9-27, 10-1, 10-22-2012
MEDIA ILL-ADVISORY:
SAVE THE TAXPAYERS $50 MILLION ON THE LAST DAY OF SUMMER
TO: Heavy hitters in the legit media
FROM: The dinosaur cheap seats in the back of the bus at the Sparks Tribune
RE: Please do your freakin' job this morning
Dear Mostly-Newbie Media Types:
This week, you totally missed that T.J. Maxx and Old Navy will
be closing tax-producing stores to score legendary chunks of corporate welfare
at the Sparks Marina. Wal-Mart is next in line. (9/20
Barbwire)
You've ignored the growing evidence, including his own admissions, that the
miraculous Heath Morrison Washoe graduation rate increase was mostly
reshuffling the deck. See
"We Don't Need No Education",
now in its 11th installment.
Most of you have overlooked the recently published Office of Medical Inspector's
Report detailing dastardly deficiencies and occasional death at Reno's
Ioannis A. Lougaris Veterans Administration Medical Center. (9/13
Barbwire)
I'll cut you some
slack. Everybody's short-staffed these days. Me, too. I've thus spared every
expense to hand you an easy one for a slow news Friday, a smoking gun rollover,
your chance for painless redemption and you don't even have to go to confession.
Show up at the Reno bus cave this morning and you can save the taxpayers more
than $50 million. My treat. Buy me a beer or sacred wine next time you see
me.
Longtime Barbwire readers have long been aware that the Regional
Transportation Commission of Washoe County has never been known as a good
steward of the public purse. (See NevadaLabor.com
for decades of complaints about their extravagant management subcontracting,
among other sins.)
This morning, RTC will consider draining the road improvement fund established
by the sales tax approved by voters in 2008. They plan to hand it as pure
profit to rich guys who don't need it.
Inside word is that three of the five board members are already wired, but
hope springs like the sieve eternal in the pre-lobbied world of local government.
THE STING: Basically, some heavyweight developers want to cash in what
are known as impact fee credits. Builders are notorious for charging homeowners
full retail for impact fees but rather than turn the money over to the government,
they make required improvements themselves, usually on the cheap. This explains
why you get a lot of short-lived roads in new developments which are then
turned over to the government to fix and maintain. Buy low, sell high.
Impact credits get carried forward for 10 years. Alas, some of the big boys
have found themselves on the end of that chain letter and want a public bailout,
cash for the credits at retail rather than at cost. (Projects that low-balled
and failed to pay area-standard construction wages may get stuck for the difference.
That should liven up some homeowners' association meetings.)
Why these credits exist in the first place, your guess is as good as mine.
Maybe the next step is an international derivatives market. If you think this
stuff is a bit hard to understand, then you've gotten the point. Somebody
call Goldman-Sachs.
Apparently, RTC's own lawyer has told them all this foolishness is illegal
but who cares? It's only public money and most of them will be out of office
shortly. Somebody call Goldman-Sachs.
THE AWFUL TRUTH: "Funding sources available to RTC for the purchase
of impact fee credits are not allowed under current state law.
If the Board desires to pursue the purchase of impact fee credits, the use
of sales tax could potentially be allowed contingent on legislative approval
modifying the Nevada Revised Statutes to allow such use." [Staff Report,
Agenda Item 6.1(c), page 1, emphasis added]
Translation: It's against the law but go ahead and do it anyway. Somebody
call Goldman-Sachs.
I can see the arguments before the legislature now: The previous commission
put us on the hook and the big boys are going to sue our asses, so please
bail us out and let us hand over the taxpayers' money. We'll just do without
roads. We can always get a loan from Goldman-Sachs.
As Justice Louis Brandeis once wisely stated, sunshine is the best
disinfectant.
And so, dear media types in the Age of Aquarius on this last day of
a long hot summer, let the sun shine in.
WHEN: 9:00 a.m. Friday Sept. 21
WHERE: The RTC Bat Cave
Under the Martin Luther King Highway US
395/580 across from Wooster High
2050 Villanova Drive [] Reno, NV 89502
WATCH OUT for nearby NHP school zone speed traps that you may zoom
past coming off the freeway.
WHO: Here's Regional Transportation Commission contact info for voters
who might want to drop a comment to the members, e-mail addresses below.
Ron Smith, Chair, CIty of Sparks
Bob Larkin, Vice-Chair, Washoe County
Dave Aiazzi, City of Reno
Dan Gustin, City of Reno
Bonnie Weber, Washoe County
rsmith@cityofsparks.us
(Ron Smith),
blarkin@washoecounty.us (Bob Larkin),
aiazzi@cityofreno.com (Dave Aiazzi),
gustind@cityofreno.com (Dan Gustin),
bweber@washoecounty.us (Bonnie Weber),
Please send me a copy:
<barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us>
In
addition to the 9-27 and 10-18 Barbwires,
the above U-News Bulletin generated the following RTC stories in the corporate
media
U-News Too—>Wal-Mart
Black Friday picketing which otherwise would have gone unheralded
We
don't need no education, Part XII
And
we don't need no evolution, 'nuther
Election
ploy? Aiazzi wants to sweep road construction tax funds to schools, legal
or not
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-18-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
New
stores at Legends raise questions about STAR bonds
KRNV TV-4 (NBC) / Reported by Ashley Cullins / Video clip hereat / 10-1-2012
Please
don't cook or eat the books
ITALIAN
STEREOTYPE VALIDATED: Aiazzi and DiLoreto almost throw blows
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-27-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Legendary
problem
Whether Sparks development project is really working
goes unexamined
By
Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 9-27-2012
Chapter
and verse according to RTC
Daily Sparks Tribune / 9-25-2012
RTC
credit buyback program decried as bailout for Reno-area developers
Reno Gazette-Journal
/ Front page above the fold/ 9-22-2012
RTC
board explodes over proposed buy-back program using taxpayer funds
KRNV
TV-4 / 9-21-2012
NevadaLabor.com/U-News
also generated TV and print coverage of the Nov. 23 Reno Wal-Mart Black Friday
picketing
ALSO:
Nevada Division of Welfare will now follow the law and allow
employees to vote
MACHINE POLITICS:
America's greatest 20th Century philosopher, Scrooge McDuck, once
said "in a world full of little men with their big machines, the only
solution is for another little man to build a bigger machine."
Here's a modest start.
SUPPORT
THE NEVADA CITIZEN TV PROJECT to re-establish a non-corporate community
channel in these parts. Is it needed? Just try to find all of the above elsewhere
in one place, in depth and in context.
As the late, great Travus T.
Hipp used to say, I may be wrong, but I'm never uncertain.
It's certainly important to anyone of the opinion that little things like
$50 million in corporate welfare giveaways might matter.
You may support the cause at ReSurge.TV
Turn on, tune in and tell a friend.
Be well. Raise hell.
_________
Andrew Barbano is a 43-year Nevadan and
editor of NevadaLabor.com. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.
For much more on Nevada governmental corporate welfare addiction, go to Cabellyup.com/
and the Barbwire Corporate Welfare Archive.
Barbwire by Barbano has
originated in the Sparks Tribune
since 1988 and has occasionally appeared in most Nevada newspapers, usually
when the boss has been out of town.
-30-
The
flipside from an old fry cook
Legit
media stenographers fail to pop the corporate welfare question
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-20-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
A
great week for scandals
We
Don't Need No Education, Part X
The school district master chefs
continue cooking the books
[UPDATE
9-17-2012] —
TOLJASO DEPT. The
Awful Truth: "Successes and Challenges" indeed —> As only
the Barbwire predicted last spring, Dr. Heath Morrison's disappointing third-year
graduation rate explains why he got outta Dodge after year two.
Teachers'
business tax petitions hit Nevada streets while Chicago teachers do likewise
Damning inspection report brings union call to oust Reno VA hospital leadership
State ignores voter registration lawsuit until the
day after this column printed
NEEDED NOW MORE THAN EVER: New community TV channel
Barbwire by Barbano / Humongously expanded from the 9-13-2012 Daily Sparks
Tribune
The
Post-dated Recession:
Pay me now or pay me later
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-6-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
 |
SUFFRAGETTES
2012 (Bruce
Thompson Federal Courthouse, Reno NV Aug. 26, 2012) —Left
to right, the signs read Your Body, Your Way / We Can Do Better
/ (Missouri
Republican Rep. and U.S. Senate candidate Todd) Akins
can kiss my voting booth / My Body My Choice. There are actually
six readable signs in the photo if you count "sandwiches"
in the upper left background and "Do Not Enter" to the right
of Ms. Your Body, Your Way — which adds a nice touch of
irony to this energetic demonstration on a sunny Sunday morning. Somewhere,
Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Margaret Sanger, Victoria
Claflin Woodhull, Alice Paul, Lucy Burns, Jeannette Rankin, Nancy
Gomes, Mary Gojack, Bella Abzug, Jean Ford and legions of iron-jawed
angels are smiling.
|
|
|
Lie
when that pollster calls you
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-26-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
You
can't handle the truth
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-19-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
You've
lived here too long when...
PLUS:
Myth Rumpney & Retro Ryan Alert
77th Anniversary of Social Security celebrated statewide Tuesday
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-12-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
BREAKING
NEWS
MONDAY,
8 OCT. 2012, 11:58 a.m. PDT, 18:58 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
AT&T workers demonstrate today at AT&T Reno
Oct. 8, 2012
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
JIM BURRELL, PRESIDENT
Communications Workers of America Local
9413/AFL-CIO
(775) 338-4719
AT&T
WORKERS WILL DEMONSTRATE AT RENO AT&T OFFICES TODAY
RENO, NEV. — Members of Communications Workers of America/AFL-CIO
will demonstrate at AT&T offices at 1450 Vassar Street in Reno today
beginning at 4:00 p.m. PDT. Between 100 and 200 are expected. Most will
have arrived by 5:30.
AT&T has been enjoying record profits in the billions but its western
workers have labored without a contract since April 7. The biggest issues
are health care and job security.
The Reno demonstration follows August work stoppages
(a union strike followed by a company lockout) on both the east and west
coasts triggered by illegal company unfair labor practices. There was
also a walkout in May.
“Contract negotiations are never easy,” CWA District 9 Vice-President
Jim Weitkamp said in August. “But when AT&T violates the
law repeatedly, the process really can’t work. Given AT&T’s
record profits, tax breaks and jaw-dropping executive compensation, there
is no reason for them to insist on lowering the standard of living of
a single worker.”
Sparks-based CWA Local 9413/AFL-CIO
is the longest continuously operating labor organization in Nevada. Beginning
as the Washoe Typographical Union in the days of the Comstock Lode, it
once counted Mark Twain among its members.
Communications Workers of America/AFL-CIO now represents thousands of
Silver State workers including telecommunications (AT&T statewide,
CC Communications in Fallon), health care (St. Mary's Regional Medical
Center), Naval Air Station Fallon support staff, Clark County employees
(school police, district court marshals, district attorney investigators,
park rangers) and law enforcement personnel in Henderson and Elko.
CWA represents approximately 18,000 workers at AT&T West. These employees
maintain and repair the fiber and copper networks which carry regular
telephone and cellular telephone signals. They repair and install residential
and business telephone systems, install AT&T’s video products
and provide service and sales to AT&T customers.
AT&T is the largest and most profitable company in the communications
industry and the 12th biggest company in America. In 2010, AT&T recorded
profits of $19.86 billion on revenues of $124 billion. Last year, AT&T
made $20 billion in profits. |
HOT
AUGUST STRIKE!
|
WE'RE
OUTTA HERE!
|
 |
|
Reno,
Nev. — CWA Local 9413 members and some of their closest friends
picket in 100-degree heat at the AT&T facility on Capital Blvd.
in southeast Reno on August 7.
|
|
|
|
Reno,
Nev. — THE GATHERING STORM: CWA Local 9413 members take a break
from 100-degree heat at the longime AT&T Vassar Street facility
in southeast Reno on August 7.
|
|
CWA
sisters (above) march in 100-degree heat next to busy traffic at
heavily-traveled Kietzke Lane and Vassar Streets in Reno, just up
the block from AT&T offices (right).
|
 |
|
The
company vs. the workers
"Who
you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" —Chico Marx
We just want to bargain
fairly," Local 9413 President Jim Burrell told the Reno Gazette-Journal
(8 Aug. 2012). (Burrell carries the red flag in the foreground
of the top photo, above.)
"We want what is
fair and this is maintaining what benefits we have," Burrell
said.
"We aren't asking
for increases," he added
So far, the National
Labor Relations Board has issued a complaint against AT&T West
in response to two unfair labor practice charges filed, and is reviewing
several other charges.
"Contract negotiations are never easy, but when AT&T violates
the law, the process really can't work," said CWA District
9 Vice President Jim Weitkamp. CWA represents about 18,000 AT&T
West workers.
About 3,200 members of CWA Local 1298 in Connecticut who work at
AT&T East also engaged in a two-day unfair labor practice strike.
|
Aug. 7,
2012
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
JIM BURRELL, PRESIDENT
Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO
(775) 338-4719
AT&T
WORKERS STAGE TWO-DAY WALKOUT IN EAST AND WEST
RENO,
NEV. — Members of Communications Workers of America/AFL-CIO have walked
off the job at AT&T in two large regions.
Triggered by company unfair labor practices, the work stoppage affects Nevada,
California, New York, New Jersey and all of New England.
Workers have placed informational picket lines at 1450 Vassar and 1375 Capital
Blvd. in Reno.
The work
stoppage follows a similar walkout in May. Workers
have labored without a contract since April 7, 2012, at a time when AT&T
has reported billions in profits. The biggest issues are health care and job
security.
UPDATES:
RENO KRNV TV-4 STORY —> Our
press release vs. AT&T's much longer one
CWA
DISTRICT 9 (California/Nevada) —> AT&T WORKERS ON STRIKE
Cold
Reality TV
Life is a bitch and the bitch is
television
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 8-5-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Fear
is a Liar
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-29-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Heat
and light for the Hall of Flames
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-22-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED
TUESDAY, 17 JULY 2012, 5:14 p.m. PDT, 00:14 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT July 18 —
Feeney
hospitalized in Oregon. Concert off. BBQ, music and party still on.
Anne
Feeney has been hospitalized in intensive care in Oregon. All we know
is that her symptoms included low blood pressure. It does not appear to be
life-threatening. We regret that she will not be able to entertain her union
brothers and sisters in Reno tonight. Say a prayer or send some good vibes
to your concept of an almighty if you relate to such.
Playing
with fire
Too
stingy to pay for fire protection but not to raise taxes and blame unions
PLUS: Legendary labor folksinger Anne Feeney
plays Reno July 17Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-15-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
If
you give it away, you can't sell it
How
the Beehive State bested Nevada by investing in education rather than prostituting
to corporations
High-tax Utah has now surpassed Virginia on the Forbes
list of most business-friendly states
Tax-the-workers Nevada is at the bottom of the barrel, as usual
By Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 7-12-2012
God
looks nothing like Charlton Heston
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-8-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED
THURSDAY,
5 JULY 2012, 1:51:43 p.m. PDT, 13:51:43
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
Demonstrations
July 9 & 12 at Sen.
Heller's office
 |
FROM: Danny L.
Thompson, Executive Secretary-Treasurer
Nevada State AFL-CIO
In the last decade, more than 50,000 manufacturing facilities have closed,
six million manufacturing jobs have been lost and the U.S. trade deficit has
grown. And we’ve seen outsourcing spread to other sectors, like call
centers and financial services. If we want to rebuild our economy, we need
to stop sending good American jobs offshore.
SENATOR
HELLER - IT IS TIME TO BRING JOBS HOME
UPCOMING ACTIONS
RENO: Join with IUPAT leaders delivering a letter to Senator
Heller’s Reno office asking him to vote in favor of the Bring Jobs Home
Act. This action is taking place on Monday, July 9, 2012 (1:00 –
2:00 p.m. PDT) at Senator Heller’s Reno District Office at the Bruce
Thompson Federal Building, 400 S. Virginia Street (at Liberty Street,
downtown) Suite 738, Reno, NV 89501. For more information or to RSVP, contact
Chad Smith or call 443-924-8616.
LAS VEGAS: Join
with other Nevada labor leaders outside Senator Heller’s Las Vegas district
office to ask for his support for the Bring Jobs Home Act. The event
will take place on Thursday, July 12, 2012 (12 Noon – 1:30 p.m. PDT)
outside the Lloyd George Federal Building, 333 Las Vegas Blvd.
South, Suite 8203, Las Vegas, NV, 89101. For more information or to RSVP,
contact Shannon Marietta
or call 702-459-1414.
Call Senator Heller today at 1-888-659-9401
Tell him to vote
for the Bring Jobs Home Act (S. 2884).
Burn,
baby, burn
UPDATED
MONDAY,
2 JULY 2012, 4:04:39 p.m. PDT, 23:04:39
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
MURPHY'S LAW POETIC
JUSTICE DEPT. —> At about 12:30 p.m. PDT, roughly 28.5 hours after
the divorce of the City of Reno and Washoe County fire departments, a major
forest fire broke out in one of the two newly unprotected county areas. At
about 1:45 p.m. PDT, I saw one U.S. Forest Service and three Reno Fire Department
trucks "speeding" to the scene more than an hour after the fire
started. Glad I don't live up there in the high rent district. In addition
to their taxes, I've gotta hunch their fire insurance rates just went up.
—> AB
July
2 Reno Gazette-Journal front page headline: Washoe
County fire district starts 'flawlessly,' fire chief said
Washoe
County Commission Republicans raise taxes and cut fire protection to damage
union
Reno
News & Review / 6-28-2012
i'toon:
Fertilizing
apples with citizens as mushrooms
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 7-1-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED
FRIDAY,
29 JUNE 2012, 6:19 p.m. PDT, 01:19 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT June 30—
(U-News) — NO
STRIKE —> Teamsters vote to ratify new
contract with Reno-Sparks-Washoe bus system
Pension
abuse: Right wing Chicago group makes up stats to damage Nevada PERS
Reno
News & Review / 6-28-2012
We
Don't Need No Education, Part VIII
Departing
Reno-Sparks-Washoe school boss admits cooking the books
Eighth in a series on the collapsing future of Nevada education
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-24-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated 7-17-2012
UPDATED
SATURDAY,
23 JUNE 2012, 12:03:40 a.m. PDT, 07:03:40
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT June
23 — On
this date in 1419,
Pope Martin V made his predecessor, deposed Pope John XXIII, cardinal
bishop of Tusculum [EDITOR'S
NOTE: The latter John XXIII is often termed an anti-pope
who ruled during the Great Western Schism. He is obviously not the revered
20th Century John XXIII]; in 1863 at Dayton, Nevada, John
Thoroughman enlisted in the army for three years and was inducted at Fort
Churchill (after Civil War service, he ended up in the Ormsby County Poor
Farm where he died); in 1910,
legislation protecting labor unions from antitrust law, previously passed
by the House, was defeated by the House after President Taft threw his efforts
into the fight against a measure he called "class legislation" (three
Democrats voted to support Taft: Joseph Sherley of Kentucky, Robert
Page of North Carolina and George Bartlett of Nevada); in
1938, a mobile NBC television unit was shooting footage in front of Radio
City and recorded the suicide leap of a Girl Scouts secretary from the Time
and Life building; in 1941, lyricist Robert Hunter, author of one of
the iconic lyrics of a generation, "Lately it occurs to me/What a long,
strange trip it's been", was born in San Luis Obisbo; in 1960, the United
Nations ruled that Israel acted illegally when its agents kidnapped Adolf
Eichmann from Argentina; in 1964, Henry Cabot Lodge resigned as
U.S. ambassador to Vietnam so he could return to the United States after unexpectedly
winning the New Hampshire presidential primary election as a write-in candidate;
in 1970, Harold Lee Linville of Reno, Nevada died in Phong Dinh
province, Vietnam (panel 9w, row 84 of the Vietnam wall);
in 2003 in Grutter vs. Bollinger, the U.S. Supreme
Court ruled in favor of the University of Michigan Law School using
race as a factor in deciding admissions because of "the educational benefits
that diversity is designed to produce. These benefits are substantial. ...
In order to cultivate a set of leaders with legitimacy in the eyes of the
citizenry, it is necessary that the path to leadership be visibly open to
talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity. All members
of our heterogeneous society must have confidence in the openness and integrity
of the educational institutions that provide this training. As we have recognized,
law schools 'cannot be effective in isolation from the individuals and institutions
with which the law interacts...'"
UPDATED
FRIDAY,
22 JUNE 2012, 9:00:06 p.m. PDT, 04:00:06 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT June
23 — On
this date in 1891, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Field and
District Judge Matthew Deady of Oregon organized the new U.S. Court
of Appeals for the ninth circuit in San Francisco with Ernest Hawley
of Carson City, Nevada as crier; in 1914, with the state fiscal year a week
short of complete, the state workers injury insurance system reported that
there had been 1,203 injuries and twenty nine deaths during the year to date
and that more than $201,000 in claims had been paid out with $227,000 paid
in as premiums; in 1917 in front of the White
House, arrests began of National Women's Party volunteers who were
protesting President Wilson's failure to support federal suffrage,
and they were imprisoned at Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia where on
15 November 1917 the warden ordered guards to begin brutalizing the protesters
to break their will (EDITOR'S
NOTE: as dramatized in the Hilary Swank film Ironjawed
Angels]; in 1932, the Nevada Public Service Commission
ordered the Western Pacific Railroad, which shut down its Sand Pass
station without obtaining PSC permission, to reopen the station (the station
was located between Flanigan and Gerlach); in 1944, President Roosevelt
signed legislation creating the GI Bill of Rights; in 1956, the California
Highway Commission decided to relocate U.S. 40 from Donner Lake to Floriston,
bypassing Truckee; in 1968, Classical Gas by Mason Williams
was released; in 1969, the legendary one and only album of Blind Faith
was released; in 1980, Mohawk-Algonquin Kateri Tekakwitha, known as
the Lily of the Mohawks, was beatified by the Catholic Church.
BREAKING
NEWS
UPDATED
FRIDAY,
22 JUNE 2012, 10:59 p.m. PDT, 05:59 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT June
23 —
Reno-Sparks transit strike possibly averted
UPDATED
THURSDAY,
21 JUNE 2012, 1:08 a.m. PDT, 08:08 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
(U-News) —
As Charlie Brown might say, rats!
| WHITE
RATS — MV Transportation has imported strikebreakers to ride Reno-Sparks-Washoe
RTC buses as passengers to learn the routes and the town as best they
can before the June 22 strike/lockout deadline. They can be identified
by their white shirts and black pants. From all of us who have been through
this a few times before, welcome to déjà vu all over again.
Stay tuned and keep NevadaLabor.com
posted. |
ALSO
—As predicted last year, mass firings have begun as the union busters
take over St. Mary's Regional Medical Center in Reno as of June 30 . Looks
like the Hot August Strike season may come early this year. Stay
tuned and keep
NevadaLabor.com posted. [NevadaLabor.com
Health Care War Room]
UPDATED
WEDNESDAY, 20 JUNE 2012, 12:49 a.m. PDT, 07:49 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
(U-News) —
Last Friday, June 15, Teamsters Local 533 sent a letter of termination
to MV Transportation, contract operators for the Regional Transportation System
of Washoe County's Reno-Sparks-Washoe bus and senior/disabled transit system.
The letter served notice that the union is terminating the interim collective
bargaining agreement between the workers and company effective at 11:59 p.m.
PDT on Friday, June 22, 2012. Union drivers and support staff can strike anytime
thereafter. A strike or company lockout of workers would be nothing new in
the contentious relationship between the
workers and whichever hired gun that local elected officials have retained
to ramrod the public transit system. Stay tuned.
Updated
WEDNESDAY,
20 JUNE 2012, 12:27:56 a.m. PDT, 07:27:56 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
On this date in 1874, Congress
ordered a takeover of the white-administered Freedman's Savings and Trust
Company, a bank created in 1865 to help former slaves make the transition
to freedom that had been subverted by white overexpansion, mismanagement,
abuse, and fraud and by the Panic of 1873; in 1879 in Elko, the
Nevada Board of Regents met, approved the principal's salary (the state university
then included pre-collegiate instruction) and approved the janitor's salary,
and adjourned; in 1900, German minister
(ambassador) Baron von Kettler was killed by a Beijing street crowd,
triggering the 55-day siege of the international compound of embassies representing
western governments occupying and exploiting China; in 1917,
newspapers were making a fuss over William Teller,
a Shoshone from the Duck Valley reservation, because he purchased a liberty
bond (war bond); in 1927, federal narcotics officer George O'Neil
arrested alleged Elko bootlegger Helen Wong for brewing rattlesnake
whiskey (using a diamondback at least four feet long) which she insisted was
Chinese medicine; in 1940 with war still 17 months
away, President Roosevelt jolted Washington by forming a coalition
war cabinet, appointing Republicans Henry Stimson as secretary of war
and Frank Knox as navy secretary (the move that for some reason convinced
many in Washington that FDR would not seek a third term); in 1972,
Richard Nixon, John Ehrlichman and H.R. Haldeman met about Watergate,
and the tape recording of their conversation later became famous when an 18-and-a-half
minute section of it was found erased; in 1979
at a routine Managua checkpoint during the last days of the Somoza dictatorship,
ABC News reporter Bill Stewart, lying face down on the street, was
executed by a member of the Nicaraguan guardia while (unknown to the
killer) a camera rolled, and the footage helped dissolve U.S. support
for the tyrant, an incident later dramatized in the Joanna Cassidy/Nick
Nolte film Under Fire in which a Nicaraguan woman is portrayed
saying, "Fifty thousand Nicaraguans can die...Maybe we should have killed
an American journalist fifty years ago." (The guardia had been
formed by the United States Marines in 1927 during a U.S. occupation of Nicaragua
and became the Somozas' personal terror force).
NAGPAC's
Ghost Riders Saddle Up Again
Blackguards
challenge Nevada's legendary None of the Above ballot option
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-17-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
UPDATED
9-6-2012:
Federal appellate judges put None of the Above back on the November
ballot. Alleluia!
The
Rocking Ghosts of Del Mar Station
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 6-10-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated:
THURSDAY,
7 JUNE 2012, 10:30 a.m. PDT, 17:30 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
Updated:
WEDNESDAY,
6 JUNE 2012, 1:44 a.m. PDT, 08:44 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
D-Day
Jack Newfield on
the assassination of Robert Kennedy:
I tried to read the Los Angeles papers, filled with sidebar stories about
violence in America. Sociologists, politicians, and religious leaders blaming
movies, comic strips, and television. None seemed to think that Vietnam, or
poverty, or lynchings, or our genocide against the Indians had anything to
do with it. Just popular culture like [the film] Bonnie and Clyde,
never political institutions, or our own tortured history. ... Now I realized
what makes our generation unique, what defines us apart from those who came
before the hopeful winter of 1961, and those who came after the murderous
spring of 1968. We are the first generation that learned from experience that
things were not getting better, that we shall not overcome. We felt,
by the time we reached thirty, that we had already glimpsed the most compassionate
leaders our nation could produce, and they had all been assassinated. And
from this time forward, things would get worse: our best political leaders
were part of memory now, not hope. The stone was at the bottom of the
hill and we were alone.
On this
date in 1856, President Franklin Pierce suffered an indignity
endured by no other elected president -- he was denied renomination by his
party, James Buchanan winning the Democratic presidential nomination
instead [EDITOR'S NOTE: President
Pearce is a direct ancestor of George W. Bush. His mother's maiden
name was Barbara Pierce. George the Lesser certainly staggered
in his ancestor's footsteps.]; in 1859, an exploring party led by army topographical
engineer James Simpson passed Carson Lake; in 1864, residents of
the Territory of Nevada voted for delegates to a constitutional convention
preparatory to statehood; in 1911, debts of the closed Searchlight Bank
in Clark County, in receivership for three years, were paid at 25.5 cents
on the dollar; in 1928, a plane carrying Will Rogers landed
upside down in Las Vegas, but the comedian was uninjured and he continued
east in another plane on his way to an appearance before the Republican
National Convention in Kansas City (the next day the Rogers plane made an
emergency landing in Wyoming, smashing the undercarriage); in 1936, Mr.
and Mrs. Clifford Hansen of Reno put their hydroplane, Singer Miss
2nd, into the water at Tahoe City to make preparations for the summer
speedboat races; in 1944,
reporter Martha Gelhorn, denied press credentials for the D-Day
landings, stowed away on a hospital ship and got ashore by carrying a stretcher;
in 1944, it was business as usual away from Normandy: 1,795 Corfu
Jews arrived in Greece on the way to Auschwitz, where all but
200 were gassed and the remainder made slaves; in 1963, Alaska Governor
William Egan turned back the $300 honorarium due him for speaking at
the University of Nevada commencement, specifying that it be used as a scholarship
for a deserving Nevada student; in 1966, Robert
Earle Garey of Las Vegas died in Quang
Nam province, Vietnam (panel 7e/row 133 of the Vietnam wall); in
1968, Robert Kennedy died; in 1971, April Kestell of Reno graduated
first in her law school class at the University of San Francisco (which
she attended on a full scholarship), winning the ancroft/Whitney Prise and
the Haley Award after editing the law review; in 2004, Donald R. Currey,
a geography professor who achieved immortality of a sort by cutting down
a bristlecone pine in eastern Nevada (such pines are the second oldest living
things on earth), died in Utah.
Travus
T. Hipp & Tales of Nevada's Futures Passed
Expanded from the 6-3-2012 Daily
Sparks Tribune
Travus
T. Hipp leaves us laughing and forewarned
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-27-2012 Daily
Sparks Tribune
SPECIAL
WARNING / Updated 5-26-2012: If you plan on attending
Travus T. Hipp's memorial service, please consider driving up the back way/southern
route via Nevada Highway 50 East in Carson City. The Virginia City Memorial
Day Parade starts today at noon and there has been road construction on Geiger
Grade, the direct route from Reno. The weather also may be wet and blustery.
Safe journey.
Updated:
FRIDAY,
25 MAY 2012, 2:44 a.m. PDT, 09:44 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
WEDNESDAY,
23 MAY 2012, 5:40 p.m. PDT, 00:40 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT 24 May 2012 —
TUESDAY,
22 MAY 2012, 11:36 a.m. PDT, 18:36 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
SUNDAY,
20 MAY 2012, 6:32 p.m. PDT, 01:32 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT 21 May 2012 —
Followed
by a moon shadow
 |
|
TRAVUS
T. HIPP, 1937-2012
|
|
ADIÓS, COMPADRE
— Our friend Travus,
75, passed away peacefully between 2:00 and 3:00 a.m. PDT on 18 May
2012 at his home in Silver City, Nevada. The
sun is in eclipse as I write this at 6:30 p.m. on May 20.
SLIGHT CHANGE OF
VENUE (5-22-2012) — Adiós in Silver City, Nevada, Saturday,
May 26, 2012 —>
The auld church where Travus lived and died is too small for the expected
multitude, so gathering, gnoshing and remembering will commence at the
Silver City Community Center, 385 High Street, at 10:00 a.m. PDT. Bring
food if you want but most important, bring yourself and all your memories.
Memorial service starts at High Noon. Travus will be buried next to
his rock star companion Lynne Hughes, a short walk away. My remembrance
of Lynne from the 3-21-1993 Daily Sparks Tribune will posted
with Travus' formal obituary
at this website. All memories
accepted for permanent posting hereat. Thanks for all your kind
words. Keep up the good work and the good fight.
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew
Barbano
|
|
|
Morrison
& Maurins: M&M's hard to swallow
Seventh
in a series on the collapsing future of Nevada education
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded
from the 5-20-2012 Daily Sparks
Tribune
Updated:
MONDAY,
14 MAY 2012, 4:22 a.m. PDT, 11:22 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
Memorial
service for former Teamsters Local 533 business agent
Don Bouma set for Sunday, May 27, 2012, in Sacramento, Calif.
Updated:
SUNDAY,
13 MAY 2012, 1:41 a.m. PDT, 08:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
—
All
that's missing is an enemies list
Sixth
in a series on the collapsing future of Nevada education
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded
from the 5-13-2012 Daily Sparks
Tribune
Updated:
SUNDAY,
6 MAY 2012, 5:56 p.m. PDT, 00:56 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT
MONDAY
7 MAY 2012
—
Playing
Dixieland - The shell game continues
Fifth in a series on the
collapsing future of Nevada education
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 5-6-2012 Daily
Sparks Tribune
May
5, 2012 — ¡Viva
huelga!
U-NEWS
FROM Barbwire.TV, SATURDAY,
5 MAY 2012, 4:35 p.m. PDT, 23:35 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — Reno
AT&T union workers remain on the picket line at AT&T in southeast
Reno. Charges of illegal unfair labor practices have been filed with the National
Labor Relations Board. Communications Workers of America/AFL-CIO General
President Larry Cohen may call a national
strike of more than 40,000 workers from the west (District 9, HI, CA, NV)
to the mid-Atlantic states (District 4) to the northeast (Distict 1) as early
as Monday, May 7. Members have already
voted 93% to 7% to authorize a strike. The decision as to whether or not to
allow workers to wear the patch (below) on the job seems to be completely
arbitrary at the whim of lower managers. AT&T wants to kill retiree health
insurance starting on 1 Jan. 2013, a benefit in existence since the 1940's.
AT&T has refused to even discuss the issue. Stay tuned. Be well. Raise
hell.
Back
to the table: AT&T Bargaining Updates from Local 9400
AT&T
union workers locked out in Reno
by Michael Wolfe
KTVN
TV-2 News / 6:30 p.m. PDT 4 May 2012
RENO,
Nev., USA — AT&T employees say they were barred from work because
of a sticker they wore supporting their union in health care negotiations.¡¡
The union members say AT&T told they couldn't work as long as they
sported the offending sticker.
Employees we spoke to said they want to make their opposition to AT&T's
proposed health insurance rate hike known.
"We will be here until they make some movement, we're not asking for
a lot. There's nothing offensive about this sticker, it's telling the truth,"
says Jim Burrell, president of Communications
Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO.
AT&T released a statement to Channel 2 News saying employees could return
to work easily saying: "Technicians who come to work appropriately without
the offending sticker will be welcomed back. We are continuing to negotiate
with the union and remain committed to working together with them to bargain
a fair contract that will allow us to continue to provide and protect high
quality middle class careers for our employees."
Copyright
©
2012 Sarkes-Tarzian, Inc.
U-News
UPDATE: Burrell reports that CWA employees have been locked out at various
locations in several states. Union members
will picket through the weekend at AT&T's facility at 1375 Capital Blvd.
in southeast Reno inside the Dermody Industrial Park. More than 200 service
calls were missed on May 4 as more than 60 workers picketed. Those not locked
out refused to cross the picket line. They have worked without a contract
since April 7.
 |
|
The offensive
sticker which is absolutely legal for union workers to wear on the job
under long-established labor law.
|
California
CWA workers locked out
Santa
Rosa Press Democrat via Chicago Tribune / 5-4-2012
Updated:
FRIDAY,
4 MAY 2012, 4:53 p.m. PDT, 23:53 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
U-NEWS
FROM Barbwire.TV
RENO, NEV. 5-4-2012 (U-NEWS) — Watch Reno's KOLO
TV-8 this evening for an update on the fabled Flagger
Moms of Orange Cone Hell.
Reporter Terri Russell today interviewed Laborers'
Local 169 flagger and traffic control supervisor Marlinda Ebbert
on a job in Sparks.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, road construction and especially
traffic control is one of the most dangerous jobs in the country, even during
a tight economy. In 2010 (the
latest national stats available, see page 3), 68 people died in "highway,
street and bridge" construction accidents, 25 of whom were "workers
killed struck by vehicles."
The Nevada Dept. of Transportation reported "one death and close to 700
work zone crashes in active Nevada work zones last year,” according to
NDOT Director Susan Martinovich in an April
20 statement.
Local 169 flaggers have come up with the equivalent of a criminal profile
of the person most likely to kill them: If you see a 30-ish woman on a
cel-phone driving a tan SUV with a Nevada license plate, run. She won't see
you even if you hurl your 10-foot stop sign thru her windshield like a javelin.
Alas, Nevada drivers are far worse and much more dangerous than tourists.
A couple of years ago, a Local 169 flagger was struck in downtown Reno by
a young woman piloting a Camaro who intentionally sped up while heavy equipment
was crossing the area, endangering her life. The flagger could have been killed
had he not jumped away at the last second.
"You're trying to get me fired!" screamed the late-for-work kamikaze.
A Yellow cabbie rushing for a fare at Circus Circus seriously injured a Local
169 flagger near St. Mary's Hospital four years ago. The cabbie pled guilty
and the injured flagger won a cash settlement in court.
Clock here for the original National Safety
Council Award-winning Flagger Moms of Orange Cone Hell campaign.
TOMORROW
—> Cinco de MayDay / UPDATE: Event
Facebook Photos
The Industrial Workers of the World (aka The Wobblies) union
and the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada are jointly producing
a May Day / 1 de Mayo Reno Rally, Celebration and Demonstration for Workers
Rights in downtown Reno on Saturday, May 5, 11:00 a.m. PDT.
Workers will gather
for death-defyin' speechifyin' at the Mapes Graveyard in front of the City
Hall Black Tower at First and S. Virginia streets.
Inglés contact: Paul at 775-513-7523;
Par Español, contact Elvira at 775-379-9054. Facebook: Reno
May Day/Primero de Mayo 2012
This is not be confused with the commercial event being held the same day
at the Grand Sierra Hotel-Casino.
NOTE: International Workers' Day is fundamentally an American holiday.
It commemorates what is known as the Haymarket Massacre in Chicago in 1886,
in which several demonstrators at a mass rally for an eight-hour workday were
killed. Labor Day is celebrated on MayDay, May 1, worldwide, save for the
U.S., which moved it to September back in the McCarthy Red Scare era of fear
and loathing.
BARBWIRESQUE
MEDIA MEANDERINGS
SUNDAY, May 6 —> Barbwire
by Barbano in the Sunday Daily Sparks Tribune: The fifth
installment in the series "We Don't Need No Education," a continuing
embarrassment for the Washoe County School District and its departing CEO.
Also: The real reason that President Obama is coming to Reno on May
11.
COMING
SOON / Mark your calendar
—>
TUESDAY, May 29 —>
Unions Fight Back5:30 p.m. PDT, Northern Nevada Labor Temple,
1819 Hymer Ave., Sparks. Rank and file members get the opportunity to ask
questions directly of officeholders and community leaders. Union members
only. Talk to your shop steward and bring a friend. Pizza provided. (Last
month it was Chinese food but not Chinese pizza. Why not? They invented pasta.
Just ask Marco Polo.) Info: Liz Sorenson, 775-322-9413.
SUNDAY, June 3 —> 5th Annual Cops
& Burgers + Show 'n' Shine, Grand Sierra Resort parking lot,
11:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. PDT. Special Olympics benefit. Contact Gary
Brown, UAW Local 2162/AFL-CIO, 775-856-1459. To donate a raffle prize, contact
Neal Grows, 775-972-7456. Info: CopsAndBurgersReno.com
SATURDAY, June 16 (new date) —>
Reno-Sparks NAACP Annual Freedom Fund Awards Banquet, 6:00 p.m. PDT,
Mandalay Ballroom, Circus Circus Hotel-Casino, Fifth and Sierra streets, downtown
Reno. Sponsorship and ticket info: RenoSparksNAACP.org
Contact: Barbano, 775-882-TALK
(8255).
SUPPORT
THE NEVADA CITIZEN TV PROJECT, a new channel and network for the
many voices of activists, artists and magnificent misfits in a non-corporate
environment. For more info or to ante into the game, go
to ReSurge.TV to donate. (U-News postal service mailing address, below.)
Please let me know if you need a letter for your e-board. Thanks to those
who have already stepped up.
Stay warm and bring the heat.
Be well. Raise hell.
In Solidarity,
Andrew
Barbano
U-News
P.O. Box 10034
Reno, NV 89510
775-882-8255 [882-TALK]
CesarChavezNevada.com
RenoSparksNAACP.org
NevadaLabor.com
Barbwire.TV / ReSurge.RV
May
1, 2012
Happy
Labour Day!
International
Workers' Day is fundamentally an American holiday. It commemorates what is
known as the Haymarket Massacre in Chicago in 1886, in which several demonstrators
at a mass rally for an eight-hour workday were killed.
Reno
May Day Rally this Saturday May 5
FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
Andrew Barbano
(775) 882-TALK [882-8255]
WMD
at Victorian Square - Workers Memorial Day commemoration 4/25
Labor is pushing back against those who say that regulations kill jobs.
At work, lack of proper regulation kills people.
 |
| SPARKS
(4-25-2000) — Nevada workers and public officials commemorate
those injured and killed on the job. From left, labor activist Mike Slater
(back to camera), Charles Cox (United Auto Workers Local 2162), Assemblymember
Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, John Doran (Communications Workers of America Local
9413), and Pat Sanderson (Laborers' International Union Local 169).
[NevadaLabor.com photo] |
SPARKS,
Nev. —> Nevada workers will remember those killed and injured on the
job tomorrow as part of the AFL-CIO's national Workers Memorial Day annual
campaign.
Among other things, speakers will highlight the Silver State's substandard
safety enforcement due to underfunding.
Sponsored by the Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO, the gathering
happens at 4:30 p.m. PDT on Wednesday, April 25, 2012, at the Victorian Square
Amphitheater in downtown Sparks.
Workers and labor leaders will speak. Friends and relatives of Nevadans killed
or injured on the job will be most welcome. Candles will be lighted for those
who gave their lives for a paycheck.
Labor is
pushing back against those who say that regulations kill jobs. At work, lack
of proper regulation kills people. Big-money lobbyists hide under the cloak
of "regulatory reform" because saying "disposable workers"
is not smart PR.
Details at NevadaLabor.com, including a
story and photo of past Nevada WMD ceremonies.
Be well. Raise hell.
_________
Andrew Barbano chairs the Workers Memorial Day
Committee of the Northern Nevada Central Labor Council/AFL-CIO.
_________
"We just come to work here, we don't come to die."
—> Music and lyrics by Coos Bay, Ore., ILWU Longshoreman Harry
Stamper; most memorably interpreted by attorney and former Pittsburgh
Musician's Union President Anne Feeney, who has performed in Reno.
CWA 9413/AFL-CIO
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
The
Mythological Morrison Miracle
Third
in a series on the collapsing future of Nevada education
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded
from the 4-22-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated
4-24-2012 —
Dr. Heath Morrison is in Charlotte, NC, today signing his contract to accept
the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school superintendent position.
The
marshal is getting outta Dodge
So much for Nevada education's strategic plan + 4/25
Workers Memorial Day commemoration
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 4-15-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Breaking
our own backs: If you have kids, move elsewhere
Have teachers made a deal with the devil? / St. Mary's
firings begin
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded
from the 4-8-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Shades
of César Chávez: LV Culinary union and supporters start hunger
strike against Station Casinos
Associated
Press / Daily Sparks Tribune / 4-20-2012
APRIL
12 5:00 p.m. PDT —> Postal workers and supporters rally to save the
system.
Bruce Thompson Federal Building, Liberty @ S. Virginia, Reno
Call
your U.S. senators@ 1-888-863-6103 to vote no on
S. 1789
 |
| FED
UP AT THE FEDERAL BUILDING (9-27-2011) — More than 200
postal workers and members of other unions demonstrate at the Bruce Thompson
Federal Building in Reno in favor of passage of HR 1351, which would remove
the funding drain now threatening the United States Postal Service. The
federal courthouse may be seen in the window reflections of the auto in
the foreground. (NevadaLabor.com
photo) |
|
|
Breaking
our own backs: If you have kids, move elsewhere
Have teachers made a deal with the devil? / St. Mary's
firings begin
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded
from the 4-8-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
 |
Martin,
1968
Trayvon Martin, 2012
On
April 4, 1968, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated
in Memphis, Tenn., while in town to support striking union trash collection
workers.
UPDATE
4-11-2012: The Florida special prosecutor today indicted Trayvon Martin's
killer on charges of second degree murder. He has been arrested.
|
I
can screw up twice as bad for half the price
Barbwire
U-News exclusive leads to judge stepping down
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded
from the 4-1-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
César
Chávez
Celebration X
Saturday
/ March 31, 2012 / Circus
Circus-Reno
Sponsorship
& Ticket Information
Purchase online thru E-Bay's secure PayPal service
View
new television spots
English
/ Español
César
Chávez X
Celebracion
sábado
31 DE Marzo, 2012 en Circus Circus de Reno
Boletos
e información
 |
|
The
César
Chávez Long March
by Reno artist Erik Holland
Mr. Holland will
be selling cards and prints at the March
31 César Chávez celebration at Circus Circus in
Reno. The original watercolor is currently displayed at the Nevada
Legislature in the office of Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas.
Copyright
© 2009 Erik Holland. All rights reserved.
|
|
Obama
pays tribute to late Reno labor leader
|
|
THE
WAY WE WERE — The above is a recently discovered photo
from July 15, 1986. Left to right are Kathy Brown, Culinary Union
Local 86 office manager; Miguel Contreras, Local 86 Secretary-Treasurer;
Local 86 President Bill Uehlein; a lady named Natalie (anyone
who knows her last name, please
write), and César Chávez. This item was first
published in Ahora, northern Nevada's Spanish-English weekly,
on March 26, 2008. (On 3-19-2009, President Obama paid tribute to
Brother Contreras as he spoke in the L.A. building named after the late
labor leader. See the 1986 Chávez Reno archive, below.)
(Photo
courtesy of Dan Rusnak, retired business manager of Laborers'
Union Local 169.)
More stories and photos from César
Chávez's 1986 Reno visit
|
BREAKING
NEWS AND THEN SOME
DoctorLawyerWatch.com
Exclusive
District Judge Brent Adams, who recused himself late in the high profile
Harvey Whittemore cases, now faces a disqualification motion in the bitter,
decade-old litigation between warring U-Haul millionaire heirs
U-News Bulletin / 3-29-2012
Liberty
and justice for some
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 3-25-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Updated:
SATURDAY,
24 MARCH 2012, 5:27 a.m. PST, 12:27 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT and
FRIDAY, 23 MARCH 2012, 3:14 a.m. PST, 10:14 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
 |
Click in the above image
for the Reno demonstration's Facebook page.
Contact: Marianne Denton,
775- 843-9550.
Occupy Carson City will
also demonstrate from 12 noon to 2:00 p.m. on Saturday in front of
the Nevada Legislature on S. Carson Street in the capital city.
Contact: Janette Dean,
775-461-3282
|
|
|
What
Happened to Trayvon Martin —> Explained
Plus a backgrounder and history of the case / Who pushed Florida's fire-at-will
law
With an
exclusive statement from NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous
MotherJones.com / 3-23-2012
Update:
THURSDAY, 22 MARCH 2012, 3:47 p.m. PST, 22:47 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — Sign
the petition to win justice for 17 year-old Florida murder victim Trayvon
Martin. Prosecute
the killer of our son.
CALENDAR
OF IMPORTANT UPCOMING EVENTS
UPDATED
Thursday, 29 March 2012, 03:09 a.m. PDT, 10:09 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT —
UPDATED
Sunday, 18 March 2012, 07:19 a.m. PDT, 14:09 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT — IMPORTANT
UPCOMING EVENTS
RENO,
NEV., 3-18-2012 (U-NEWS) — Sisters and brothers,
I sincerely hope you're not feeling too green in the
gills after St. Patrick's Day. The sure-fire cure lies with increased
blood circulation to clear up your head and mess up your mind. Here are
some timely remedies guaranteed to get your blood percolating and help you
get well quick.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR —> CÉSAR CHÁVEZ
DAY / EL DÍA DE CÉSAR CHÁVEZ
at Circus Circus-Reno on Saturday evening, 3-31-2012, César Chávez's
85th birthday. The 10th Nevada César Chávez Day Celebration
presents us with a serious opportunity to demonstrate union power and solidarity
in a critical year. The 2011 event featured a who's-who of state and local
officials. This year will prove even more interesting with election season
upon us.
On the subject of elections, nominations will soon close for employer, project
and union organizer of the year. Send yours ASAP as well as sponsorship
and table reservations for the event. We especially need support for student
attendance. Doors open at 5:30 p.m., dinner at 7:00. Details attached. More
at CesarChavezNevada.com
Your consideration is appreciated. Thanks for your past support.
Tuesday, March 27 10:00
a.m. PDT: County Commissioner Kitty Jung has agendized a César
Chávez Day proclamation before the Washoe County Commission.
Ramon Chávez, César's nephew, will attend to accept
the honor of behalf of the Chávez family.
Thursday, March 29 3:30-4:30 p.m. PDT: UNR
César Chávez Day II in the rotunda at the Mathewson/IGT
Knowledge Center (aka the new library), University of Nevada-Reno. Info:
Carla Castedo-Testa,
Latino Student Advisory Board, 775-342-7612.
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/events/395005770525806/
Admission free.
SUPPORT
THE NEVADA CITIZEN TV PROJECT, a new channel and network for
the many voices of activists, artists and magnificent misfits in a non-corporate
environment. For more info or to ante into the game, go
to ReSurge.TV to donate. (U-News postal service mailing address, below.)
Please let me know if you need a letter for your e-board. Thanks to those
who have already stepped up.
BARBWIRESQUE
MEDIA MEANDERINGS
RIGHT NOW —> From Barbwire by Barbano in the Sunday
Sparks Tribune: "Earlier this month, the proprietors of the
Renown medical octopus announced a year-long celebration of the institution's
150th anniversary. I am only too happy to do my part. For their part, Renown
management has always wished me well — they wish I was at the bottom
of one." Read about unhealthy
profits plus a Yogi Berra twist.
For a few more painful laughs, check out the untold story about how
Lush Rambo actually got started right here in Nevada --> TWICE!
MONDAY, March 19 —>
Look for my radio face on Sam Shad's Nevada Newsmakers
show Monday, March 19, 12:30 p.m. PDT on Reno's KRNV TV-4 (KENV TV-10 Elko).
Other victims will include Reno Gazette-Journal politics-as-bloodsport
reporter Ray Hagar; State Sen. Greg Brower, R-Raggio; Mary
Lau, President and CEO, Retail Association of Nevada (aka Wal-Mart);
and Connie McMullen, Senior Spectrum Magazine publisher.
To see when the show will hit
your neighborhood, go to the statewide radio and TV rerun schedule at http://barbanomedia.com/shad.html.
Turn on, tune in and tell a friend.
IMPORTANT
EVENTS
WEDNESDAY, March 21 —> Reno City Council candidates address
the Truckee Meadows Democratic Alliance, 7:00 p.m. PDT at Donkeykong
HQ, 1465 Terminal Way, Suite 1, Reno. Info: 775-323-VOTE (8683), <ed@washoedems.org>
THURSDAY, March 22 —> CWA
marches on Verizon in Reno and Las Vegas
From the 3-18-2012 Barbwire: LOST VERIZONS.
My union, Sparks-based Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO,
will demonstrate at S. Virginia and McCarran in Reno starting at 5:00 p.m.
PDT this Thursday, March 22, part of a national day of action spotlighting
Verizon corporate greed. Info: 775-322-9413. In Las Vegas, workers will
rally at the Verizon retail outlet, 3825 S. Maryland Parkway, from 4:00
to 5:30 p.m. PDT. Click
here for info and links.
SAME TIME, SAME OLD STATION. Also on
Thursday 22 March, in southern Nevada, Culinary
Union Local 226 will rally against Station Casinos' institutionalized
maltreatment of workers; 6:00 p.m. PDT at the Red Rock Casino Resort,
11011 West Charleston Blvd., Summerlin. (Ushers will escort participants
to parking.) Info: Cecil Kofford,
702-495-1414.
TUESDAY, March 27 —>
Unions Fight Back meeting, 5:30 p.m. PDT, Northern Nevada
Labor Temple, 1819 Hymer Ave., Sparks. Rank and file members get the opportunity
to ask questions directly of officeholders and community leaders. This month
features candidates for Reno City Council. Union members only. Talk to your
shop steward and bring a friend. Pizza provided. Info: Liz Sorenson,
775-322-9413.
WEDNESDAY, March 28 —> WOBBLIES
FILM FREEBIE. The Reno Industrial Workers of the World
monthly filmfest features Nevada historian Guy Louis Rocha presenting
his magnum opus, Might is Right: Nevada AFL-CIO Labor History.
1. The Comstock Miners Union
http://nevadalabor.com/rocha.html
2. The IWW in Goldfield
3. Hoover Dam
4. Right-to-Work http://nevadalabor.com/barbwire/barb99/barb7-4-99.html
The above links are for those
who want to do a little advance reading ahead of the films. Brother Rocha
will introduce each segment and lead discussion afterward. Free admission
and popcorn. Beverages via no-host bar.
Where/When: Good Luck Macbeth Theatre, 119 N. Virginia, Reno, 7:00
p.m. PDT, Wednesday 28 March. Info: 775-230-5330, e-mail <wobblyfilmseries@gmail.com>
April 28 —> Workers
Memorial
Day. I need volunteers to work on this AFL-CIO national
promotion of worker safety and commemoration of those injured and killed
on the job. It's been a long time since we've focused on this in Nevada.
Click here to access the story and
photo of our 2000 Sparks event. Contact: Barbano,
775-882-TALK (8255).
May 5 —> IWW May Day / 1
de Mayo Reno Rally, Celebration and Demonstration for Workers
Rights; downtown Reno, Saturday, May 5, 11:00 a.m. PDT. Volunteers
needed. Contact Paul at 775-513-7523, <palan80@hotmail.com>;
Spanish speakers may contact Elvira at 775-379-9054. Facebook: Reno
May Day/Primero de Mayo 2012
June 3 —> 5th Annual Cops &
Burgers + Show 'n' Shine, Reno Grand Sierra Resort parking lot,
11:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. PDT. Special Olympics benefit. Contact Gary
Brown, UAW Local 2162/AFL-CIO, 775-856-1459. To donate a raffle
prize, contact Neal Grows, 775-972-7456. Info: CopsAndBurgersReno.com
June 16 —> Reno-Sparks NAACP Annual Freedom Fund Awards
Banquet, Circus Circus-Reno. Sponsorship and ticket info: RenoSparksNAACP.org
Contact: Barbano,
775-882-TALK (8255).
Stay warm and bring the heat.
Be well. Raise
hell.
In Solidarity,
Andrew
Barbano
U-News
P.O. Box 10034
Reno, NV 89510
775-882-8255 [882-TALK]
CesarChavezNevada.com
RenoSparksNAACP.org
NevadaLabor.com
Barbwire.TV / ReSurge.RV
3-17-2012
/ Happy St.
Patrick's Day
UPDATED
Saturday, 17 March 2012, 00:01:24 a.m. PDT, 07:01:24 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT
— On this date in 1875, the Washoe Club in Virginia
City moved to the Reynolds building on B Street just north of the courthouse;
in 1897 after the Nevada Legislature hastily made boxing legal, a
heavyweight title fight between Ruby Bob Fitzsimmons and Gentleman
Jim Corbett was held in Carson City (as late as 1999, the film of
the fight received a vote in a Village Voice poll of film critics as the
best film of its decade); in 1922
in New York, a parade celebrated the liberation of most of Ireland but
one sign carried by a women's society read "We know no south, we
know no north, we know only Ireland"; in 1928, Knights of
Columbus official Joseph Becker said in Salt Lake City that being
raised by mothers and being taught in school and church by female teachers
were making boys effeminate; in 1928, federal prohibition agents interrupted
and dispersed a high school fraternity dance at Moana Springs; in 1932,
New York Governor Franklin Roosevelt moved into the lead over U.S.
House Speaker John Nance Garner for the first time in a crude public
opinion survey being conducted by the Nevada State Journal, Elko Free
Press and Las Vegas Review Journal; in 1939, the Nevada Legislature
was trying to wrap up business for the year, and the clock had been stopped
at midnight on March 16; in 1955, Anais Nin married Rupert Pole
in Quartzsite, Arizona, neglecting to inform or divorce her husband, Hugh
Guiler; in 1965, The Beatles announced the title
of their next movie would be Eight Arms to Hold On To You (it was
released as Help!); in 2003, the contributions of U.S. socialists
were finally recognized on a coin when the Alabama quarter was released
with socialist and IWW leader Helen Keller featured.
Helen Keller/November
3 1912: "If I ever contribute to the Socialist movement the
book that I sometimes dream of, I know what I shall name it: Industrial
Blindness and Social Deafness."
UPDATED
Friday, 16 March 2012, 18:31:39 p.m. PDT, 01:31:39 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT
— On this date in 1892, the Nevada State Journal reprinted
a melancholy report from the fading mining camp of Pioche: "The furnaces
were shut down Monday, February 29th, at 5:30, and the employes at the
smelter and upon the Pioche and Jack Rabbit railroad were given their
time. About fifty men altogether were laid off from the smelter and railroad.
They are making arrangements to leave camp. Our streets are nearly deserted
now. Thus doth our glory fade."; in 1912, former first lady Patricia
(Ryan) Nixon was born in White Pine County, Nevada; in 1936, Eugene
the Jeep, a gift to Olive Oyl from her Uncle Ben, was
introduced in the
comic strip Thimble Theatre ; in 1942, Fats Waller recorded
Jitterbug Waltz for Bluebird Records; in 1942, more than 1,816
Jews from Pochep, Russia, were massacred; in 1953, the Nevada Assembly
killed a civil rights bill not by a straight vote but by "indefinite
postponement"; in 1964, with Beatlemania still in full throat, Can't
Buy Me Love (Capitol 5150) went straight to number one the instant
it was released on the strength of a million and a half advance orders;
in 1997, Nevada's first professional historian, Russell Elliott,
died after a distinguished career that produced a half dozen books on
Nevada, including the standard History of Nevada (Elliott was hired on
September 1, 1949, by the University of Nevada as an assistant professor
of history and political science at a salary of $3,600 a year); in 1984,
Jesse Jackson won the Mississippi Democratic caucuses, the first instance
in U.S. history of an African American candidate winning a presidential
preference contest; in 2012, the centennial of the birth of former first
lady Pat Nixon in Ely, Nevada (see 1912 above) is being commemorated
in Ely and in Yorba Linda, Calif., at the Nixon Library.
The
Ides of March 2012
Ecce Cesar!
UPDATE ON THE
IDES OF MARCH, Thursday, 15 March 2012, 12:27:09 a.m. PDT, 07:27:09 ZULU/GMT/SUT/CUT
— On this date in 44 BC, Roman military
dictator Julius Caesar was assassinated; in 1939, The Third
House, a satirical show about Nevada legislators staged by legislative
attachés, was held for the 1939 session with only the Assembly
participating; in 1945, the King Cole Trio was number one in
the first Billboard magazine albums chart (Nat Cole
later abandoned jazz for MOR ballad singing, but his trio's recordings
are still widely admired); in 1954, The Chords (one of the "hallway
groups" that harmonized in school, on streetcorners, or in the subway)
recorded Sh-boom as the B-side of a 78 record on the Cat
label, setting off the doo-wop era (unfortunately, a white group called
The Crew Cuts quickly covered the Chords version, draining away
the Chords' earnings and their hit); in 1956, My Fair Lady opened
on Broadway; in 1957, a one-day delay in delivery of a gambling regulation
bill to Governor Russell six days before the end of the 1957 legislature
raised questions of whether the governor had to act on it before the end
of the session or could wait until after the lawmakers went home, which
would determine whether the '57 or '59 legislature would vote on overriding
a veto; in 1988, a four-day battle began
in the area of Halabja on the Iran/Iraq border during which the city was
gassed by what the Reagan administration said was an Iranian attack
(fourteen years later, the second Bush administration changed that
story as part of its campaign for war, claiming the attack was launched
by Saddam Hussein's forces, then charging that "he gassed
his own people"). [EDITOR'S
NOTE: In a 1991 report which appeared after the Kuwait/Gulf War and was
thus ignored, the San Francisco
Chronicle published an extensive
article with expert analysis from the U.S. Army War College concluding
that the dead had not been gassed at all.]
More
sucker punches from Lush Rambo
Barbwire
by Barbano/ Expanded
from the 3-11-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Corpo-Dems,
Labor-Greens and golden mensches
Also:
Jeanmarie Simpson previews her new play in Reno March 9, Carson City March
10
 |
|
Jeanmarie
Simpson
|
Barbwire
by Barbano/ Expanded
from the 3-4-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Leaping
back to the future
Update:
WEDNESDAY, 29 FEB. 2012, 3:41 a.m. PST, 11:41 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT — On
this date in 1968, President
Johnson's National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (also known as
the Kerner Commission) warned that racism was causing America to move "toward
two societies, one black, one white — separate and unequal."
(New York Times)
This
bitch just isn't sexy enough
A
domestic cartel fixes the price of gasoline
while politicians
say nothing can be done and media sit shiva.
Such is BigOil's power to intimidate while hiding in plain sight.
Barbwire by Barbano/ Expanded from the 2-26-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Democrats
helped elect Republicans Halseth and Heck
By
David McGrath Schwartz / 2-22-2012 Las Vegas Sun
Red
line in a new bottle:
We are caged for
slaughter in an electronic zoo
Expanded
from the 2-19-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
God
herself decrees every sperm is sacred
Plus:
Bogus Beach Boys Grammy Awards claim
Barbwire
by Barbano / Expanded from the 2-12-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
Update:
SATURDAY, 11 FEB. 2012, 01:59:50 a.m. PST, 09:59:50 ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
On this date in 1870 at the Carson City branch of the U.S. Mint,
the first coin (a seated liberty dollar) was struck; in 1916, Reno's Twentieth
Century Club heard author Jean Morris Ellis (Character Analysis)
speak on eugenics; in 1937,
General Motors
signed an epochal agreement recognizing the United Auto Workers and
protecting striking workers from prosecution after plant
workers seized the Fisher Body plant in Flint, Mich., and held it for
44 days but AFL President William Green, who was not involved,
condemned the settlement as a defeat for labor: "All the laboring men
of the country have been injured by the General Motors settlement" (and
in D.C., a U.S. Senate committee revealed that GM had paid nearly half a million
dollars over two years — about $6,900,000 in 2005 dollars — to the
union-busting Pinkerton Detective Agency);
in 1942, Nevadan Karetaro Ishii of Sparks was fired from his job with
the Southern Pacific Railroad after 22 years (he was rehired the day
after the war ended); in 1962, former Nevada assemblymember and senator
Newt Crumley, who brought big name entertainment to the Commercial
Hotel in Elko in 1941 and later owned the Holiday Hotel in Reno, died in a
plane crash; in 1969, Corporal Thomas Bennett,
a medic, was killed while trying to rescue a fellow soldier, the end of two
days of heroic actions for which he received the Medal of Honor, the only
conscientious objector so honored during the Vietnam war (see citation
below); in 1979, followers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini came to power
when Iranian Prime Minister Shapur Bakhtiar stepped down after serving
for 37 days following dictator Reza Pahlavi's flight from the country
(during those 37 days Bakhtiar dismantled the hated Savak secret police).
Thomas
Bennett
Citation
For
conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity in action at the risk of his life
above and beyond the call of duty. Cpl. Bennett distinguished himself while
serving as a platoon medical aidman with the 2d Platoon, Company B, during
a reconnaissance-in-force mission. On 9 February the platoon was moving
to assist the 1st Platoon of Company D, which had run into a North Vietnamese
ambush, when it became heavily engaged by the intense small arms, automatic
weapons, mortar and rocket fire from a well fortified and numerically superior
enemy unit. In the initial barrage of fire, 3 of the point members of the
platoon fell wounded. Cpl. Bennett, with complete disregard for his safety,
ran through the heavy fire to his fallen comrades, administered life-saving
first aid under fire and then made repeated trips carrying the wounded men
to positions of relative safety from which they would be medically evacuated
from the battle position. He valiantly exposed himself to the heavy fire
in order to retrieve the bodies of several personnel. Throughout the night
and following day, Cpl. Bennett moved from position to position treating
and comforting the several personnel who had suffered shrapnel and gunshot
wounds. On 11 February, Company B again moved in an assault on the well
fortified enemy positions and became heavily engaged with the numerically
superior enemy force. 5 members of the company fell wounded in the initial
assault. Cpl. Bennett ran to their aid without regard to the heavy fire.
He treated 1 wounded comrade and began running toward another seriously
wounded man. Although the wounded man was located forward of the company
position covered by heavy enemy grazing fire and Cpl. Bennett was warned
that it was impossible to reach the position, he leaped forward with complete
disregard for his safety to save his comrade's life. In attempting to save
his fellow soldier, he was mortally wounded. Cpl. Bennett's undaunted concern
for his comrades at the cost of his life above and beyond the call of duty
are in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflect
great credit upon himself, his unit, and the U.S. Army.
Update:
FRIDAY, 10 FEB. 2012, 2:53:20 p.m. PST, 10:53:20
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
VALENTINES
FOR VETERANS
 |
VAlentines
(10 Feb. 2012) — Nevada Alliance for Retired Americans/Gail
Bishop Chapter VA Valentine Volunteers begin their rounds at the
Reno VA Medical Center. Left to right are VAVol Carol Mark,
former Nevada State Board of Education member Peggy Lear Bowen,
Miss UNR Ashton Sunsiri, VAVol Dean Schermerhorn, NARA
event coordinator Gail Dietrich (seated), VAVol Nelson
Dietrich, Miss Reno/Sparks & Miss UNR Pageant Director Shirley
Lunsford and Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak.
|
 |
|
VALENTINE SURPRISE (10
Feb. 2012) — Specialist David Barajas, Jr., home on
two weeks' leave, wanted to surprise his mother and ended up with quite
a surprise himself. David not only got a Valentine, he also got an up-close-and-personal
photo with Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak, left, and Miss University
of Nevada Ashton Sunsiri, right. David is a 2008 graduate of
Reno High School and a member of the Nevada Army National Guard's 485th
Military Police Company stationed in Afghanistan.
His mom, Blue Star Mother Elizabeth Barajas, works in quality
management at the hospital.
Valentines were produced by local artist Susan Sullivan and were
distributed to each of the roughly 100 inpatients at the Ioannis
A. Lougaris Veterans Administration Medical Center.
And to one surprised veteran who was surprising his mom.
[EDITOR'S
NOTE: The above photo and an expanded version of this story appeared
on page 3-D of the Sunday, 2-19-2012 Reno Gazette-Journal.]
|
REPORT FROM GAIL
DIETRICH (10 Feb. 2012) — We had a wonderful morning. The
beauty queens are not only stunningly pretty, but they are both on scholarships.
Miss UNR is majoring in international affairs and politics and Miss Reno/Sparks is
studying psychology. We could not have had a better reception by the vets
and it caused quite stir around the hospital.
Channel 2 (CBS) spent one hour with us. They interviewed me and the queens
and followed us. Miss Reno/Sparks has a grandfather who is an inpatient and
awaiting airlift to have triple bypass in Palo Alto. After he signed a release,
the TV crews filmed the queen and her grandfather. It could not have been
a better scripted scene. The TV man was so excited. This is the second time
I have done this with him and he and I have an excellent working relationship
now.
The Director of the Beauty Pageant, Shirley Lunsford, has invited my
husband and me to be her guests at the upcoming Miss Nevada Pageant. She thanked
me for asking the girls and I said I felt this was a mutually rewarding relationship.
We plan to work together again.
A young vet had arrived home from Afghanistan today and came to the hospital
to surprise his mother, who works there. We took a photo of him in uniform
with the two queens. He was on cloud nine. I will send him the photo. (EDITOR'S
NOTE: See above.)
Gratitude and huge thanks to Andy Barbano. This would not have been such a
PR success without him. He was a wonderful and accommodating partner who pressed
to make it happen. Thank you Andy!
Our vets were so happy, surprised and appreciative.
No one seemed to know who NARA was but our name is buzzing around the
hospital now. The cards were beautiful too. Thanks to Susan Sullivan,
a professional artist and art therapy professor.
Update:
THURSDAY, 9 FEB. 2012, 2:58 a.m. PST, 10:58
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
VALENTINES
FOR VETERANS THIS FRIDAY
RENO, Nev. [MEDIA
ADVISORY] — The reigning Miss University of Nevada and Miss Reno/Sparks
will join members of the Nevada
Alliance for Retired Americans this Friday morning to distribute valentines
at Reno's Ioannis A. Lougaris Veterans Medical Center.
Shirley Lunsford, Executive Director of the Miss Reno/Sparks Pageant,
will accompany Miss Reno/Sparks Madeline Burak and Miss UNR Ashton
Sunsiri.
"The purpose of the event is to show the compassion, appreciation and
respect the more than 17,000 members of the Nevada Alliance of Retired Americans
have for our veterans on the day our society expresses love," stated
NARA Gail Bishop Chapter
coordinator Gail Dietrich.
"We thank them
for serving our country. We want them to know just how much we value their
sacrifices and cherish them as individuals," Dietrich added.
Beginning at 10:00 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 10, the NARA Valentine Volunteers
will gather at the hospital's 975 Kirman Street entrance. They will be escorted
inside starting at 10:30. No one may enter unless accompanied by hospital
staff.
Valentines were produced by a local artist who wishes to remain anonymous.
The visitors will have one for each of the roughly 100 inpatients at the facility.
On
Feb. 7, 1941, Betty Joyce Luffman was born
in Enid, OK
Barbano
back on statewide Nevada Newsmakers TV/radio program
Corporate
welfare brings Reno and Sparks closer to bankruptcy
Updates:
SUNDAY, 22 JAN. 2012, 12:01 a.m. PST, 08:01
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
THURSDAY, 19 JAN. 2012, 03:52 a.m. PST, 11:52
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
BARBWIRE
AND BALLOT BOXING FROM NEVADALABOR.COM
— LIBERALS PICKET BIDEN IN RENO TODAY
RENO, NEV. 1-19-2012 (U-NEWS)
— Contrary to popular legend, the hotbed of liberalism in Nevada is not
Gomorrah South but the northwest (Reno-Sparks-Washoe County). While voters
in these parts occasionally elect an overt racist or good Christian wifebeater,
a look at state lawmakers over the past four decades reveals a who's-who of
liberalism, including a sprinkling of Republicans.
So it's not at all out of character that liberals from the frozen north will
brave the cold today and picket Vice-President Joseph Biden's rally
at Galena High School out in the high rent district.
Union members, activists in community organizations and Occupadistas will
demonstrate outside Biden's event beginning at 10:30 a.m. PST.
Some signs suggested for diehards who have been encouraged to make their own:
We Demand a Fair Settlement
Protect NV Homeowners
Stop Foreclosures
We are the 99%
Downsize This! (Apologies to Michael Moore)
For more information,
contact the awesome Julie Wedge
at (775) 750-7345.
 |
| BLAST
FROM THE PAST: A PROUD LABOR MAN ADDRESSES NEVADA LABOR
— Sen.
Joe Biden, D-Del., addresses the Nevada State AFL-CIO convention at
the Grand Sierra Resort in Reno on August 21, 2007. |
|
|
A record number of
Americans — 150,000,000 — now live at or below the poverty line.
That's half the freakin' population of the rusty formerly shining
city on the hill. This rich land now sends millions of its children to bed
hungry every night. (Yeah, we know, Newt — they should all go
and get janitorial jobs like your buds in China.)
If we, the great unwashed,
fail to wise up and rise up, corporately schmoozed Democrats will increasingly
take us for granted and treat the entire bottom half as though we are all
black or brown. (Minorities have gotten used to such treatment, which is not
to say they cotton to it.)
On the dimly lit bright side, perhaps it's actually healthy that the former
middle class is now sitting with the ghost of Rosa Parks in the back
of the bus. (Here on the High Desert Plantation, that includes most of us
except teachers and public employees who were thrown under the bus last year
with a little help from our friends.)
As Bob Dylan might ask of formerly upward-mobile American dreamers,
how does it feel?
If you feel like the legendary Fannie Lou Hamer who was famously "sick
and tired of being sick and tired," journey across the railroad trench
and tracks to play a little bump and run with the veep today.
Getting our political and governmental dinosaurs off their big, fat sofas
is a difficult task at best.
Stand with the occupiers before the man comes to occupy your house.
SUPPORT
THE NEVADA CITIZEN TV PROJECT, a new channel and network for the
many voices of activists, artists and magnificent misfits in a non-corporate
environment. For more info or to ante into the game, go to ReSurge.TV.
(U-News postal service mailing address, below.)
If the kids can occupy
Wall Street, we can occupy our fair share of the public TV spectrum.
Unlike the original
structure, there is no public money available to operate this new entity.
The deal the former community station's founding board of directors made with
the City of Reno in 1991 was that half of cable company franchise fees
would be reserved for public access. That would have been $1 million in 2011
from Reno alone. (The original intent of the enabling federal legislation
called for all franchise fees to be devoted to public, governmental and educational
programming. Apparently, today we don't need no education.)
Over the years, a
series of inept managers and hostile public officials in Reno, Sparks and
Washoe starved the community station to death.
Bring the Phoenix back from the ashes in time to fire up the populace.
Please donate what you can afford. To those who have already become founding
supporters, thank you so much and please spread the word.
You may contribute online at ReSurge.TV.
Stay warm and bring the heat.
Be well. Raise hell.
Andrew Barbano
U-News
P.O. Box 10034
Reno, NV 89510
ReSurge.TV.
Checks or money orders payable to U-News may be mailed to the above
address.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR: CÉSAR CHÁVEZ DAY
/ EL DÍA DE CÉSAR CHÁVEZ
at Circus Circus-Reno on Saturday, 3-31-2012, César Chávez's
85th birthday. We enjoyed a great turnout from legislators and other public
officials, Nevada businesses, non-profits and union members last year. Contact
me to reserve tables and sponsorships now. Details at CesarChavezNevada.com.
I'VE SHOWN YOU MINE, NOW SHOW ME YOURS.
You may have already seen my
list of the most powerful Nevadans.
Send me your suggestions and I'll publish them. Thanks to those who have already
responded.
OUR SPIES REPORT: Reno's Atlantis Hotel will break ground on a long-anticipated
high rise and a separate parking garage later this year...About 500 attended
last Friday's memorial service for Washoe Dist. Judge Bob Perry, one
helluva man. Rumor has it that several of his former colleagues will retire
early in the coming months. [From the 15 Jan. 2012 Barbwire in the
Daily Sparks Tribune. Subscribe or remain out of the loop.]
Check out the Barbwire
MLK weekend columns
from the Sparks Tribune, Reno Gazette-Journal and Fresno Bee.
And stay tuned.
Be well. Raise
hell.
CesarChavezNevada.com
DoctorLawyerWatch.com
NevadaLabor.com
BallotBoxing.US
Barbwire.TV
REMEMBERING
MY DAUGHTERS. On Jan. 16, 1959, two babies were
born. They became sisters
in both life and death.
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1929-1968
Newly
uploaded blast from the past for MLK Day —
I
was a teenage racist
Barbwire
by Andrew Barbano / Expanded from the 1-12-1990 Daily Sparks Tribune
This column also appeared in the 1-19-1990 Comstock Chronicle
Updated
and modified versions in the Fresno Bee, Daily Sparks Tribune and
Reno Gazette-Journal Jan. 14-15, 2012
To
get the full picture, I suggest reading all of them, as each contains new
and different information.
Reader comments (positive and negative) will be uploaded soon.
Please send
yours.
Update:
SUNDAY, 15 JAN. 2012, 00:01:11 a.m. PST, 08:01:11
ZULU/GMT/CUT/SUT —
On this
date in 1844, the University of Notre Dame du Lac in Indiana
was chartered; in 1896, U.S. Representative Francis Newlands of Nevada
was appointed to a commission to establish the boundary line between Canada
and the U.S. and also a committee to inquire into the imprisonment of U.S.
Consul to Madagascar John Waller (France conquered Madagascar that
year and sentenced Waller to twenty years in prison on grounds that he gave
military information to the patriot government to try to prevent the French
conquest); in 1920, Republican national chair Will Hays (later Hollywood
morals cop) spoke in Reno; in 1929, Michael King
was born in Atlanta (when he was five years old his father would change
both their names to honor Martin Luther); in 1936, former
Clark County deputy district attorney T.J.D. Salter was named president
of the Winnemucca Townsend Club (Townsend Clubs were chapters of the EPIC
movement [End Poverty In California] that had gone national);
in 1943, former U.S. district judge William
Hastie resigned as Secretary of War Stimson's civilian aide to
protest the government's continuing racial policies of segregation and discrimination
in the armed forces; in 1951, Ilse Koch, wife of the commandant
of the Buchenwald concentration camp, was sentenced to life in prison for
her sadistic treatment of camp inmates and for her collection of gloves,
lampshades and other items made from inmates killed at her order for their
tattoo-decorated skin; in 1962, the North Las Vegas city council voted to
ask U.S. Post Office officials to expand the city's service to the entire
township so that outlying patrons would not have to drive into town to pick
up packages; in 1978, tyrant Reza Pahlavi fled Iran an hour ahead
of the posse; in 1996, Tommy Rettig, "Jeff Miller"
in the first Lassie television series, an actor in numerous
movies and later a computer software engineer, died in Marina del Rey (in
1990, Rettig wrote one of the episodes of The New Lassie, about Lassie
learning to use a computer); in 2005,
during a morning news program on KTNV TV-13 in Las Vegas, weather reporter
Rob Blair referred to "Martin Luther Coon King" and (in
an apology for the first reference) "Martin Luther Kong, Jr.",
prompting a workforce threat of a walkout (Blair was fired the next day).
About
500 attended the Jan. 13, 2012, memorial service for Washoe District Judge
Bob Perry
at the University of Nevada-Reno Crowley Student Union. Several of his former
colleagues will retire early. (Barbwire
/ Daily Sparks Tribune 1-15-2012)
Barbano:
Flurry
of phony corporate conservative petitions blatant attempt to confuse voters
By
Ed Vogel/ Las Vegas Review-Journal / 13 Jan. 2012
Mixed
Mayan mammary metaphors:
Going belly up and upside down
Barbano
by Barbano / Expanded from the 1-8-2012
Daily Sparks Tribune
Former
Teamsters Local 533 business agent Don Bouma dies
The
awful truth hurts so good
Barbano
by Barbano / Expanded from the
1-1-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune
City
of Reno solicits job applications, especially for police officers, thru 1-27-2012
BARBWIRE.TV
REGIONAL SCHEDULE
NEWS
BULLETIN & ALMANIACAL ARCHIVES
Also
see NevadaLabor.com's Statewide U-News Roundup
Home Page |
|
|
Search
this site
Top
of Page
Site
composed & maintained by Deciding
Factors (CWA 9413 signatory)
Comments and
suggestions appreciated.
Click
here to get on our news & bulletins mailing list...
But
before you do so, please read this note. —AB
