Vol. 78/No. 5      February 10, 2014

They are also making a special effort to get back to the nearly 3,000 who signed up in the fall subscription campaign to discuss the importance of renewing and continuing to get the working-class news and revolutionary socialist viewpoint the newsweekly provides.

“I like the coverage the Militant brings us on people fighting for their rights around the world, we especially appreciate the articles on Cambodia and Bangladesh,” Gilbert Walker, a house contractor, told supporters in Seattle when they visited him Jan. 25. Walker and Sinath Yin, who works in a plant manufacturing air conditioners, are both originally from Cambodia and subscribed in the fall drive. They signed up for a three-month renewal. “Cambodian workers only make $60 a month and want raises and for that the government has killed some protesters,” Walker said.

Two subscribers renewed when supporters attended a meeting of El Comité Pro Reforma Migratoria y Justicia Social (Immigration Reform and Social Justice Committee) that discussed plans for protesting discrimination against immigrant workers.

“Our aim was to combine going door to door in a couple of working-class buildings we hadn’t visited, before calling back to see subscribers in apartment blocks nearby,” Pamela Holmes reported from London Jan. 25. The team sold six introductory subscriptions, one to Mehmet Sucu at a local café. He was interested in the paper’s coverage of the struggle of the Kurdish people for independence in Syria, Iran, Iraq and Turkey.

“We also visited four subscribers,” Holmes said. “One asked us back the following weekend when he would have money to renew, and another invited us to come back in a couple weeks for more political discussion.”

Four participants in a Jan. 25 action of 300 in defense of abortion rights in Austin, Texas, decided to take advantage of the offer to try out the Militant, reported Cindy Jaquith from Houston. Eight participants got single issues. “Many were struck by the article in the Feb. 3 issue on ‘Women’s Rights Supporters in Malaysia Defend Abortion,’” she wrote. “They were also attracted by the breadth of the international coverage, such as the article on the Chilean port workers and the firsthand coverage of the explosion in the animal feed plant in Omaha.”

On Jan. 26 seven Militant supporters traveled from Montreal to Ottawa, Ontario, on buses organized by the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, reported John Steele from Montreal. “Two are relatively new supporters who have not previously participated in demonstrations. We joined postal workers and supporters to protest projected layoffs of 6,000 to 8,000 postal workers and end the abolition of door-to-door delivery.”

Twenty participants bought copies of the Militant, one renewed his subscription for a year. His friend, who is an artist, bought a copy of The Cuban Five: Who They Are, Why They Were Framed, Why They Should Be Free. He promised to attend and build the Feb. 6 showing at the University of Montreal of the watercolor paintings by Antonio Guerrero, one of the Five.

The Cuban Five is one of nine Pathfinder titles on special offer with a subscription. (See ad below.) More than 750 of these books were purchased by working people during the fall drive. The offer is still available for those who take out a new subscription or renew.

Supporters of the Militant translate articles into French every week and post them on www.themilitant.com. A worker originally from the Congo living in Montreal signed up to receive these articles and asked supporters to come back so he could buy books on special. When they visited Jan. 25, he wasn’t home, but his wife got him on the phone. After some discussion, they got the French editions of Thomas Sankara Speaks, Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power and The Cuban Five.

To renew or get a trial subscription, mail in the coupon on page 2, or contact a distributor listed on page 8 or the Militant at (212) 244-4899.
 
 
Related articles:
‘Militant coverage totally different from local papers’
 
 
 
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