Vol. 73/No. 3      January 26, 2009

On December 7, workers at Poissy went on strike, protesting an agreement between Peugeot and the French government that allows the company to lay off 1,905 workers at the facility. Peugeot had originally requested permission to eliminate 2,900 jobs at Poissy.

The struggle at Talbot is being closely watched throughout French industry because plans have already been announced to lay off 100,000 workers in the auto, steel, shipbuilding, and coal sectors in the near future. If the Talbot workers can force the company and government to back down on the plan to eliminate 1,905 jobs at Poissy, that victory would encourage similar resistance in other industries.  
 
January 26, 1959
Editors, congressmen and ministers are deploring the execution of Batista’s strong-arm men.

We agree that each of these murderers, whose tortured victims are now being dug up by the hundreds from makeshift graves, should receive a fair trial.

But we think that the Castro government asked a reasonable question in response to the outcries.

Why were the editors, congressmen and ministers silent in the terrible years when Batista’s men clubbed and gunned some 20,000 Cuban citizens?

We should like to ask a still more pertinent question of these same suddenly converted spokesmen for fairness, for the protection of the innocent and for due legal process in Cuba.

What are they doing about the atrocities committed in the U.S.A. against the Negro people?  
 
January 27, 1934
The biggest industry in New York, the mammoth hotel and restaurant industry dominated by the biggest banks has flung a challenge to the workers in the industry, and their challenge has been met—the workers have moved for a general strike!

The bosses have spoken in an ambiguous manner for a few months, temporizing for time. Now they are ready, and there is nothing ambiguous about their actions. They struck at the workers in the key hotel of the industry in the heart of the city—the Waldorf Astoria.

With the exception of a handful, the entire kitchen and dining room staff of some 600 workers responded to this challenge by declaring an immediate stoppage. The waiters went into the kitchens, the cooks put out the lights on the stoves. And at 7 p.m. at the height of the dinner hour, “the guests” sat at their tables while the orchestra played to stimulate their appetites.  
 
 
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