Amerikkka or America: The Line is In Smithfield
Smithfield Hog Packing Plant in Tar Heel North Carolina now has 2 notorious distinctions.
Home of one of the several airports that serve the CIA’s privatized “extraordinary rendition” program. Private firms are used to fly detainees to other countries to be brutally tortured. The New York times has reported (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/31/national/31planes.html?) the Johnston County Airport has been a transfer point to fly War On Terrorism detainees to secret black sites around the world.
I pray every single one of you that reads this blog contacts your member of Congress. Urge them to support thorough investigations of the CIA’s “Extraordinary Rendition” program. And support the Smithfield Workers fight for a paid holiday on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Every single one of us should have a paid holiday on this day. To honor the 500 year struggle for liberation from slavery that continues today in places like the Sudan. Read the following action alert regarding the fight of Smithfield Hog Packing plant workers. Follow the link and tell Smithfield that the 5500 African American and Latino workers will honor Martin Luther King Jr and the civil rights movement. No work on this day. It is claimed for the working people that make this country great! Read on:
“Workers at Smithfield work hard and have a dangerous job.
Smithfield kills 32,000 pigs a day at their Tar Heel plant and
workers get very little respect from their bosses. For years,
workers have fought for our right to choose a union, and they
are determined to win that fight.
The workers’ struggle has been inspired by leaders like Martin
Luther King and Cesar Chavez. On Tuesday, workers in the plant
tried to present a petition to Smithfield for a paid holiday on
January 15th. Management insulted the workers by refusing to
take or even to look at the petitions. Since then management has
told them that workers who do not work will be given penalty
points, which in some cases will result in termination.
Act now:
- Call Smithfield at (910) 872-0032
- Send Smithfield a petition:
http://www.unionvoice.org/ct/e7S3Dx51jqmx/
This is a way for management to show their respect for the
Smithfield workers. They are mostly African American and Latino,
5500 strong, and they want to participate in a local event to
celebrate Dr King and Cesar, who spent their lives fighting for
workers and poor people.
Please support the workers: tell Smithfield management to give
workers a paid holiday on January 15th. Please, either call
Smithfield directly at (910) 872-0032, or click the link below
to send a petition to Smithfield demanding the paid holiday.
http://www.unionvoice.org/ct/e7S3Dx51jqmx/“
From Jobs with Justice www.jwj.org
January 14th, 2007 at 12:15 am
32,000 a day? WOW! Has to be a thousand people working at least.
How are they supposed to unionize?, North Carolina has one of the worst illegal alien infestations on the east coast! There is absolutely no hope for unions when people can work for lower wages, and utilize phony documents. These places need to be cleaned out, just like the swift plants, and then huge fines dumped on the owners. This is so out of hand, illegal labor has destroyed working wages, it isn’t their fault, but if they are there, American business will use them because it is more profitable and they are more pliable. And because these American businesses are scum.
What hope does a union have with illegal people who don’t want to be known, don’t want to make waves(can’t make waves I should say) while legal workers struggle for their rights?
The illegals have to go. The employers must be fined. Otherwise hoping for a union is not possible. Sad but true, in any other country, you cannot be illegally working because they HAVE unions. No union member would allow such things.
When I lived back east the union builders regularly forced the authorities to shut down employers working with illegal crews, to preserve themselves and their wages. How long are you going to get union jobs if no one does anything about people who will work for less. These people are known as SCABS in the olden days.
What to say about rendition, but it pretty obvious the law is quite dead in America to some. Time for a comeback.
January 14th, 2007 at 12:36 am
Glenn,
‘been eatin the pork stuff on the bone these days - the end product be a bit juicier. Enjoyed some Utah green jellow at an Orem goat fuc… the other pm, and walked away with a gold-embossed B of M - will miracles ever cease?
January 14th, 2007 at 10:15 am
I was going to write screw these union people, hire illegals, I want my 99 cent a pound , extra thick, from the meat case bacon. However I am willing to pay the difference.
Fried on a heated rock down in the desert at 6 AM down in Moab with a beer in my hand.
Pork on the bone, oh yeah. Let’s buy a dead pig and roast it Hawaiian style. Sis and Jeff roasted another one for their 10th, at the ranch. I didn’t make it.
January 14th, 2007 at 10:32 am
At first, I thought this was about Smithfield, Utah. But yeah, since the meat packing industry starting hiring large numbers of illegal immigrants the prevailing hourly wages in the industry are way down. Time to put some executives in jail.
January 14th, 2007 at 5:10 pm
Hmm, maybe I didn’t get the point of this post. There are many businesses open on MLK day. I just dropped my car off at a shop today and they will be open tomorrow working on it. Are you going to cover all of them as well?
January 15th, 2007 at 11:08 am
Good grief they already get 12 personal days a year plus holidays and vacation what more can workers ask for ? I am not going to contact this company to demand that they get yet another paid day off.