The March 4 Jobs before the G20 Summit is Growing!

Breaking News Bulletin:

United Steel Workers Union and United Electrical Workers have endorsed and are mobilizing.

These are two powerhouse unions with a long and rich history
with international headquarters in Pittsburgh Pa.

Join USW – UE and many, many others on Sunday, Sept 20th, 2 p.m.
In front of Monumental Baptist Church, Soho Street & Wylie Avenue in Pittsburgh

If your community, union or student group is not already on board—there is still time to get involved.

• Endorse – Organize – and Mobilize!
  
• Distribute flyers and send out email notices.
• Bring a bus, van or car from your city, town or neighborhood – tell us so we can plan parking.
• Donate $ so that those without funds can attend.

VERY IMPORTANT: Please REGISTER for the Tent City.

If you are going to be participating at the ‘Solidarity with the Unemployed’ Tent City following the March 4 Jobs—it’s critical to register to make sure there are resources and space available. Space is limited. Pre-registration is required.

Register at http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20register.shtml

---

We need your help:

• Funds are urgently needed to help subsidize buses and vans and to assist with organizing costs for the "March for Jobs." - http://bailoutpeople.org/donate.shtml
• Volunteer - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Download leaflets at http://www.bailoutpeople.org/pdfs/g20leaflecolor.pdf
• Join the BOPM Facebook Group - http://www.facebook.com/business/dashboard/?ref=sb#/pages/Bail-Out-The-People-Movement/112781742929
• Follow BOPM on Twitter - http://twitter.com/bailoutpeoplem
  

Why are we demanding jobs or income at the G-20 Economic Crisis Meeting in Pittsburgh in September?

30 million people in the U.S. are
unemployed or underemployed – We say NO!

---

What is the G-20?

It’s a group of Treasury officials and central bankers from 20 countries, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Its goal is to protect bank profits, whatever it costs the people of the world.

The U.S. delegation is led by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Ben Bernanke, head of the Federal Reserve System (The Fed). They organized a bailout of the banks, insurance companies and stock brokerages that totals $12.6 trillion--or $42,105 for every adult and child in the U.S.

• How much is a trillion dollars? It is 1,000 billion. And a billion is 1,000 million.

The Federal Reserve controls this money, yet most people have never heard of it. The Fed has seven governors, all bankers, appointed by the U.S. President for 14-year terms. George W. Bush appointed Bernanke Chairman of his Council of Economic Advisors and then head of the Fed. The Fed operates in secrecy, even from Congress, yet makes decisions affecting whether we work, have homes, or eat.

Geithner, the former chief of the NY Federal Reserve Bank, worked with the Fed under the Bush administration to devise the bank bailout. He invented the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) and eight other programs to funnel taxpayer money into the banks. His top aide is from Goldman Sachs Bank. He changed bank regulations to prohibit congressional audits of the Federal Reserve.

Who is representing the people at the G20 conference? No one!

Profit recovery for banks –
Jobless ‘recovery’ for workers

The bailout for the banks:

• $12.6 trillion in handouts, loans and guarantees.
• Bonuses: Since the bailout, six banks that got our money are giving $74 billion in bonuses – double last year’s.
• Even TARP chief Neel Kashkari says the bailout is “Rich bankers bailing out rich bankers, using the taxpayer’s credit card.”
• The New York Times said the bailout of banks by taxpayers is a “Partnership in which one partner robs the other.”
• Sen. Dick Durbin said, “We’re facing a banking crisis that many banks created – still they are the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill, and they frankly own the place.”
• Representative Alan Grayson, House Financial Services Committee, said of the Fed: “We are seeing a transfer of trillions of dollars of wealth from the taxpayers to the bad banks…. We have become the saps for Wall Street.”
• Who got bailed out: Citigroup, AIG, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Bear Stearns, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo. Some have now merged into larger, more powerful monopolies.
• Result: The banks are making huge profits again and concentration of wealth is in fewer hands. Instead of more regulation, they demanded and got less. The UN says just 500 rich people in the world earn more than the 416 million poorest people, and this is getting worse.
• Instead of creating jobs they are demanding speedups. Corporate profits go up; wages go down and jobs or hours decrease.

Bailout money for us:

• $8.2 billion

This is less than one-thousandth of the $12 trillion the banks have received.

Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, most of this went to state unemployment insurance programs or job training programs—for JOBS THAT ARE NOT THERE. Just $25 a week went to those receiving unemployment insurance.

• Result for us: 30 million people in the U.S. are unemployed or working involuntary part-time.

Wall Street admits unemployment will be permanently high. Unlike other times when workers were called back, millions of jobs have been terminated. Others have had their hours cut. There are fewer jobs now than in 2001, although 12 million new workers have joined the labor force.

• Fewest young men have jobs in 61 years of record keeping.
• Teenagers age 16-19 suffer 78% unemployment.
• For youth and people of color, this is worse than the Great Depression.
• Foreclosures are continuing at record levels this year.
• People are running out of unemployment benefits.
• Personal bankruptcies are up again.
• Retirees have lost 22% of their benefits, forcing seniors to work--but there are no jobs.

Will going to Pittsburgh make a difference for me or my family?
Yes!

We are demanding a public jobs program and forcing corporations to hire so everyone in need is guaranteed a livable income. Only a mass movement of the people on the march, holding protest meetings and organizing in our communities, schools, unions, and places of worship, can change our lives. We must represent ourselves. It’s not easy, but it can be done.

You can start by bringing friends together in your home. You can invite an organizer from the Bailout the People Movement. Then you can do your block, your neighborhood, your workplace, school or place of worship.

If you have a job now, you can only protect it and your wages and benefits by joining the movement for jobs. With millions out of work your boss will use the competition among workers to get cheaper labor to replace you, make working conditions harder, or lower your wages.

PITTSBURGH IS JUST THE BEGINNING OF THIS MOVEMENT

How can I get there?

We are working hard to raise funds for buses, cars, and vans to caravan to Pittsburgh. You can help. Donate, or have a yard sale, bake sale, raffle or dinner. Even one dollar will help.

WORKERS ARE CONNECTED ALL AROUND THE WORLD

The G-20 bankers come together to make profits off the backs of the world’s people. Our lives are all connected now. Unemployment anywhere in the world is unacceptable. At the time of the G-20 Pittsburgh conference there will be protests in cities worldwide. We can compete against each other and die, or unite and have a better life now and for our children. A job is a right!

Join the March for Jobs, Pittsburgh, September 20!

Bail Out the People Movement
Pittsburgh, 412-780-3813
New York, 212-633-6646
bailoutpeople.org
March4Jobs@gmail.com

Photos from Block Party in Pittsburgh

G-20 activists want emphasis back on the economy

from http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09235/992692-482.stm

G-20 activists want emphasis back on the economy
Sunday, August 23, 2009
By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

City officials and local media have spent too much time focusing on disputes over protest permits and the possibility of violence during next month's G-20 summit, neglecting the serious economic concerns behind those protests, one group of activists said yesterday in the Hill District.

"We're not interested in all the talk about permits and troublemakers," said Larry Holmes, a spokesman for Bail Out the People and a community organizer from New York City. "People are suffering. They need jobs."

Mr. Holmes spoke with reporters on a grassy lot at the corner of Soho Street and Wylie Avenue in the Hill, where his group plans to launch a "national march for jobs" on Sept. 20, the Sunday before world leaders gather in Pittsburgh.

The site, owned by neighboring Monumental Baptist Church, will also host a tent city for unemployed and homeless people and their supporters from Sept. 20 through the end of the two-day summit, on Sept. 24 and 25.

"We feel that we need to stand up and be vocal," said the Rev. Thomas Smith, the church's pastor. "We need to make sure people have decent jobs to realize the American dream."

On Friday, Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said all five groups seeking protest permits around the summit will be given conditional approvals for events in Downtown, the South Side, North Side and the Strip District. The city will also create two protest zones near the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown.

Bail Out the People, a national group based in New York that grew from outrage over the billions of dollars in government money given to failing banks last year, has asked for approval for its Hill District march and the use of Allegheny Commons Park on the North Side Sept. 19-25 and Market Square on Sept. 24 and 25.

Organizers are planning to start the march at 2 p.m. on Sept. 20, and it will end at the Hill's Freedom Corner.

Mr. Holmes said he was hoping for an "enormous" gathering, with potentially thousands of marchers, including prominent civil rights and union leaders. There are tentative plans for buses to come from New York City, Detroit, Chicago and other cities.

"We need everybody to know this is going to be a peaceful event. This is going to be an orderly event," Mr. Holmes said.

He and other organizers are concerned that Pittsburgh's heavy emphasis on security -- officials hope to have as many as 4,000 police officers on city streets -- will dissuade some people from participating in protests.

The Wylie Avenue tent city will allow people who can't afford to stay at hotels to be near Downtown during the summit.

"We'll take as many as we can," the Rev. Smith said.

He said the site would have Porta-Johns and water, and the church is seeking volunteers who can donate food or time to help organize the march and the tent city.

Anyone interested in volunteering is asked to call 412-780-3813 or send an e-mail to March4Jobs@gmail.com.

Jerome L. Sherman can be reached at jsherman@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1183.
First published on August 23, 2009 at 12:00 am

Youth jobless stats “beyond scary; they’re catastrophic,” says NY Times Columnist Bob Herbert
Sept. 20 Pittsburgh march for jobs right on time

On Sunday, Sept. 20 a National March for Jobs will step off from the historic Hill District in Pittsburgh, PA just prior to the G20 summit declaring that the unemployed, the homeless, the hungry and the poor must no longer be invisible and silent. This is particularly urgent for young workers as highlighted by New York Times columnist Bob Herbert this week. (www.nytimes.com/2009/08/11/opinion/11herbert.html)

Herbert wrote, “Two issues that absolutely undermine any rosy assessment of last week’s employment report are the swelling ranks of the long-term unemployed and the crushing levels of joblessness among young” workers. … The plight of young workers, especially young men, is particularly frightening. The percentage of young … men who are actually working is the lowest it has been in the 61 years of record-keeping, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.

“Only 65 of every 100 men aged 20 through 24 years old were working on any given day in the first six months of this year. … For male teenagers, the numbers were disastrous: only 28 of every 100 males were employed in the 16 through 19-year-old age group. For minority teenagers, forget about it. The numbers are beyond scary; they’re catastrophic.”

Herbert called the 0.1 percent unemployment drop in July “wildly deceptive,” because the decline was “not because more people found jobs, but because 450,000 people withdrew from the labor market. They stopped looking, so they weren’t counted as unemployed.”

Herbert noted that "The country has lost a crippling 6.7 million jobs since the Great Recession began in December 2007. No one is predicting a recovery in the foreseeable future powerful enough to replace the millions of jobs that have vanished in this historic downturn."

The magnitude of the jobs crisis is giving momentum to the September 20 National March for Jobs. On Monday, August 10, the San Francisco Labor Council unanimously passed a resolution endorsing the march, which reads in part:

"Whereas, there is no recovery in sight from the current economic crisis. Although government measures have enabled Wall Street to pocket hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, still unemployment, foreclosures and poverty continue to soar; and

Whereas, in September the eyes of the world will be on Pittsburgh, where the G20 countries will meet on what to do about the global crisis, and this will be an excellent opportunity for labor and its allies to present OUR workers’ recovery agenda; and...

Resolved, that the San Francisco Labor Council endorse the March for Jobs in Pittsburgh on September 20, 2009, and the Global Week in Solidarity with the Unemployed, on the occasion of the G20 summit in that city." (read the full resolution at : http://www.bailoutpeople.org/sflc.shtml)

The ILWU (International Longshore Workers Union) Local 10 and the Letter Carriers Union Local 214 have also passed similar resolutions in support of the March for Jobs.

There is much work to be done in the next few weeks. Here's how you can help:

• We need your help! Funds are urgently needed to help subsidize buses and vans and to assist with organizing costs for the "March for Jobs." - http://bailoutpeople.org/donate.shtml
• Become a local organizer - help organize a "Jobs or Income Now" caravan (cars, vans, bus, etc) to Pittsburgh for the G20. http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Volunteer - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Download leaflets at http://www.bailoutpeople.org/pdfs/g20leaflecolor.pdf
• Join the BOPM Facebook Group - http://www.facebook.com/business/dashboard/?ref=sb#/pages/Bail-Out-The-People-Movement/112781742929
  

Unemployment "by far, the nation's biggest problem and should be it's No. 1 priority"

Unemployment "by far, the nation's biggest problem and should be it's No. 1 priority"

A Scary Reality
By BOB HERBERT

But for American workers peering anxiously through their family portholes, the economic ship is still sinking. You can put whatever kind of gloss you want on last week’s jobs numbers, but the truth is that while they may have been a bit better than most economists were expecting, they were still bad, bad, bad.

Some 247,000 jobs were lost in July, a number that under ordinary circumstances would send a shudder through the country. It was the smallest monthly loss of jobs since last summer. And for that reason, it was seen as a hopeful sign. The official monthly unemployment rate ticked down from 9.5 percent to 9.4 percent.

But behind the official numbers is a scary story that illustrates the single biggest challenge facing the United States today. The American economy does not seem able to provide enough jobs — and nowhere near enough good jobs — to maintain the standard of living that most Americans have come to expect.

The country has lost a crippling 6.7 million jobs since the Great Recession began in December 2007. No one is predicting a recovery in the foreseeable future powerful enough to replace the millions of jobs that have vanished in this historic downturn.

read the full editorial here

A Global Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed

September 20 - 25

(During the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh)

Yes to Jobs & Human Needs; No to War & Wall Street Greed

• Sunday, September 20 - Rally & March for a Real Jobs Program
• Building a Tent City in Pittsburgh for the Unemployed & Supporters the weekend before the G-20 Summit
• Organizing Caravans of Unemployed People and Supporters to Converge on Pittsburgh during the week of September 19-26
• Marches, Protests and Events Before and During the G20 Summit addressing demands such as: Bring the Troops Home from Iraq & Afghanistan Now! & Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, World-Renown Political Prisoner, Journalist, Activists and 'Voice of the Voiceless!"
  

In September the eyes of the world will be on Pittsburgh, where the G20 countries will meet to consider what to do about the biggest global economic crisis since the 1930s. The heads of governments, finance ministers and central bankers that will be in Pittsburgh for the summit hear the concerns of bankers and corporate executives all the time. They need to listen to the voices of the millions of people who have lost their jobs and their homes because of the crisis. The Bail out the People Movement, a coalition of community, labor, religious, and grassroots activists, wants to help dramatize the crisis of joblessness, and the need for action both in the U.S. and worldwide to the G20 summit. It is now clear that the stimulus legislation passed by the U.S. Congress in March has done little to stop the loss of jobs. There is no recovery for the unemployed, the underemployed and the poor; and things are only getting worse. This is why we’re asking you to help make the idea of a Global Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed from September 19 through September 26, the week of the G20 Summit, a reality.

A TENT CITY AND MARCH FOR JOBS On Sunday, Sept. 20, the tent city will open with a rally and march for jobs. The main site for the tent city will be next to the Monumental Baptist Church in an historic section of the African-American community of Pittsburgh called “The Hill.” This location is just a short walk or march from the convention center where the G20 summit will be held, and from the rest of downtown Pittsburgh. Unemployed people and their supporters will inhabit the tent city from Sept 20 through Sept. 25. Additional locations for other encampments in Pittsburgh are being considered as well. This is why we’re asking you to help make the idea of a Global Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed from September 19 through September 26, the week of the G20 Summit, a reality.

IF YOU ARE STRUGGLING TO SURVIVE – THIS IS A WEEK OF SOLIDARITY WITH YOU The Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed is also a week of solidarity with those who have lost their homes to foreclosures and evictions; those who have been forced to take part-time or temporary jobs because there are no full-time jobs; workers who have seen their wages and hours cut; autoworkers whose plants have been closed; immigrant workers who are fighting for their rights; communities that are fighting gentrification and budget cuts to social programs; students who are being forced out of school because of the debt burden and rising tuition cost; the survivors and displaced victims of the Katrina/Rita hurricanes and the government's criminally negligent response; poor and working people everywhere, especially in poor countries who are bearing the cruel brunt of the economic crisis; workers everywhere fighting for the right to organize and in the U.S. for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act in the U.S.; All who need single payer health care; retirees who need their healthcare & pensions safeguarded; and young people, especially Black and Latina/o youths whom the system has condemned to a jobless future.

IT’S TIME TO BAILOUT THE UNEMPLOYED WITH A REAL JOBS PROGRAM In the days before and during the G20 summit, events and marches will take place to emphasize this central point: More than just another stimulus package is needed. It’s time for a serious, direct and massive jobs program on par with the Works Progress Administration of the 1930s. We must fight for a real jobs program for the unemployed and underemployed that pays a living wage performing socially meaningful work; and an income for those unable to work. Any claim that the resources for a serious jobs program are not available must be rejected. If governments, particularly the U.S. government, can make available trillions of dollars for bailing out banks and corporations as well as funding the Pentagon’s endless wars, & Occupations, they can find the resources to bail out the unemployed and underemployed.

THIS IS A GLOBAL CALL BECAUSE JOBLESSNESS IS A GLOBAL CRISIS Mass unemployment is a global phenomenon. The right to a job at a living wage must be a global demand. Instead of being pitted against each other, unemployed and working people across the world can only improve their conditions by working and fighting together for their common interests. Activists and organizations everywhere are encouraged to support the Global Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed and organize events in conjunction with it.

DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING'S FINAL CAUSE: THE RIGHT OF ALL TO A JOB OR AN INCOME The need and the right of everyone to either a job or a guaranteed income is the cause that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. dedicated the last year of his life to. The present global economic depression has made King’s last cause even more urgent today than it was when he was alive. Dr. King also knew that: no matter the magnitude of suffering, governments do not respond if those who are suffering remain invisible and silent. Even a history-making president like Obama is still not a substitute for the mass movement for social justice. During the depression of the 1930’s, President Franklyn Delano Roosevelt once told labor leaders who were asking him to do more to help workers and the poor “I agree with you, know make me do it”. FDR’s advice applies to Pres. Obama to. The purpose of the Global Week of Solidarity with the Unemployed is to make sure that people who are usually ignored are seen and heard.

ORGANIZING CARAVANS OF UNEMPLOYED PEOPLE AND SUPPORTERS TO PITTSBURGH Over the next 10 weeks, organizing will be going on in every region of the country to bring caravans of unemployed people and supporters to Pittsburgh in Sept.

THINGS THAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP:

• Have your Union/Community/Religious or Student Organization.endorse - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20endorse.shtml
• Donate to help with organizing expenses - http://bailoutpeople.org/donate.shtml
• Organize car/s vans/ trucks & buses from your locality to participate in the caravans to Pittsburgh - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml
• Have an Organizer address a meeting of your organization - http://bailoutpeople.org/cmnt.shtml
• Volunteer your time to work on this project - http://www.bailoutpeople.org/septg20volorgcents.shtml

Bail Out the People Movement
Solidarity Center
55 W. 17th St. #5C
New York, NY 10011
212.633.6646
www.BailOutPeople.org
Email: bailoutpeople.org/cmnt.shtml

A Call for a Global Mobilization

A Call for a Global Mobilization
Against the G20 Summit in
Pittsburgh, PA

September 24-25, 2009

ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE – BUT WE MUST FIGHT FOR IT!

BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE

• JOBS & SOCIAL NEEDS--NOT WAR AND GREED
• FREE MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
• SHUTDOWN THE RACIST PRISON INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX

G20 ORGANIZING MEETING IN PITTSBURGH , SUNDAY, JULY 12

The third G20 summit is going to be in Pittsburgh , Pa. on September 24 and 25, 2009. The challenge before the movements for economic and social justice, as well as the antiwar movement, is that the next meeting of the powers that govern the world economy be met with a powerful mass mobilization demanding that jobs and social needs, not war and greed, prevail--here in the U.S. and across the world.

The G20 summits are taking place in response to the greatest worldwide economic crisis since the 1930s. However, the purpose of these high-level meetings of governments and bankers is not to rescue the people of the world from depression-level unemployment, evictions, homelessness, poverty, social and economic inequality, and war. These summits are about fixing the economic and financial order that puts profits before people--and fixing that system by creating more poverty, misery and suffering.

The last G20 summit, held in London in early April, was met with massive protests both there and throughout Europe. Now that the G20 is coming to the U.S. , it is up to activists and organizations in the U.S. to take up the challenge of uniting and working together to organize a mobilization for Pittsburgh during the summit.

Many had expected New York City to be the location of next G20. Yet once it was confirmed that Pittsburgh would be the summit location, organizers immediately began preliminary logistical planning for a mass mobilization there in September.

Organizing for the G20 summit in Pittsburgh was the central theme of a People’s Economic Summit meeting in New York City on May 31. Consistent with the theme of that summit, “A New World Is Urgently Needed–But We Must Fight For It,” the more than 200 activists and 35 organizations in attendance agreed to work tirelessly over the summer to expand the network of grassroots activists and organizations to bring thousands of protesters to Pittsburgh .

Activists at the People's Economic Summit also agreed that the response to the next G20 should not be confined to the U.S. and that there should be a global response to the summit. Accordingly, activists and organizations across the world will be urged to endorse this call for protest against the G20 summit meeting in Pittsburgh and to organize globally-coordinated protests during the summit in September.


FREE MUMIA AND THE G20

Political activist and journalist, Mumia Abu-Jamal, possibly the most well-known political prisoner in the world, has resided for almost 27 years on Pennsylvania's death row. For the past 14 years, he has resided in a small cell in the triple-maximum-security, SCI-Greene Unit, about 50 miles away from Pittsburgh . Mumia’s case combines the realities of the systemic racism in the courts and prison system in the U.S., together with police brutality, judicial misconduct and political repression. High on the list of demands of our protest at the G20 must be freedom for Mumia and an end to the racist prison industrial complex that is devouring so many young people of color.


G20 PROTEST PLANNING MEETING – SUNDAY, JULY 12 IN PITTSBURGH

There will be a G20 organizing meeting for activists and groups both in and outside of the Pittsburgh area on Sunday, July 12, 3 p.m. at La Roche College (time and location of meeting subject to confirmation)

The potential for a massive global mobilization in September is truly infinite. Together, let’s begin the work required to realize that powerful potential.



Another world is possible, but we must fight for it.

The Bail Out The People Movement

Facing evictions, repression, no jobs Workers, youth open fightback at Tent City

By Kris Hamel
Tent City, Detroit

June 16—Hundreds of poor and working people have gathered at the National People’s Summit

and Tent City in downtown Detroit to put forward the people’s vision of a future with guaranteed jobs and income, universal health care, housing and utilities, and all rights that working class people are currently denied under the capitalist system.

Tent City marchers in Detroit. WW photo: LeiLani Dowell

More than 330 people registered for the four-day event. They have come from throughout metro Detroit and Michigan—even workers from the Upper Peninsula are at Tent City. Workers and activists from Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and more are represented.

The People’s Summit and Tent City, based in Grand Circus Park from June 14-17, was called in response to the National Summit of big-business CEOs and executives being held at the General Motors Renaissance Center—GM’s world headquarters.

“They’re going to regret the closing of 14 plants and the laying off of General Motors workers, because the workers are fighting back!” said Frank Hammer, a retired United Auto Workers International representative and leader of the Autoworker Caravan, as he opened the rally after a militant demonstration outside the big-business summit today.

More than 500 workers, including many from around Michigan and Ohio, marched in front of the GM Renaissance Center demanding jobs and human needs, not corporate greed. “The workers have spoken—keep the plants open!” was one of many chants that thundered from East Jefferson Avenue as dozens of cops and private thugs stood in formation guarding the privately owned Ren Cen.

As the workers marched and rallied for jobs, Richard Dauch, CEO of American Axle and Manufacturing, Inc., addressed the capitalists inside, along with former Michigan Gov. John Engler.

Dauch wrested tremendous concessions from striking UAW workers in 2008, cutting wages and benefits in half. Workers were promised their jobs would be saved, but now Dauch has broken that vow and the American Axle plant in Hamtramck, Mich., located within the city of Detroit, has closed.

Engler was rewarded for his gutting of welfare and education in Michigan with his appointment as president and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers.

The People’s Summit and Tent City opened with a dynamic State of Emergency Fightback Rally on June 14. A host of speakers reiterated the theme that workers and poor people must fight back to reclaim their right to jobs, homes, equal quality education, and social and economic justice. “I declare a state of emergency!” said state Sen. Hansen Clarke, sponsor of a bill in the state legislature for a two-year moratorium on foreclosures and evictions.

Other speakers included Detroit Councilperson JoAnn Watson; the Rev. Ed Rowe of Central United Methodist Church, a base of many struggles for social and economic justice; Maureen

Taylor of Michigan Welfare Rights Organization; Teresa Gutierrez of the May 1 Coalition in New York City; foreclosure-fighting attorney Vanessa Fluker; Sandra Hines of the Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures and Evictions; Marguerite Maddox of Paws with Cause, a disability-rights organization; youth and union organizer Dante Strobino of Durham, N.C.; recently- convicted people’s journalist Diane Bukowski, who was charged with felony counts while trying to report on pedestrian deaths resulting from a police chase; and Baldemar Velasquez of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee.

Special sessions at the People’s Summit on June 14 discussed the immigrant rights struggle. Organizers with Fight Imperialism, Stand Together (FIST), a militant national youth organization, talked about the problems facing students and young workers today. Another special session heard from Dieter Ilius of the German Metalworkers Trade Union.

June 15 started with a mass leafleting outside 36th District Court, three blocks from Tent City. Activists distributed hundreds of “Know Your Rights” leaflets to homeowners and renters facing foreclosures and evictions. 36th District Court is the busiest foreclosure court in the United States. A militant picket line and demonstration demanding a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions took place outside the court at lunchtime.

A “Corporate/Banker Devastation Tour” caravan departed Tent City for the GM Ren Cen to pick up big-business meeting participants who were “cordially invited” to see the real Detroit and what corporate greed has done to the city’s people. None of them had the guts to board the van and face reality. Nevertheless, many out-of-town People’s Summiteers and some media joined the tour and viewed foreclosed homes, abandoned neighborhoods and closed plants.

A special session on organizing mass protests outside the G20 summit to be held in Pittsburgh heard from dozens of people with ideas on how to build a broad-based coalition to challenge the mass meeting of capitalists from the richest countries on Sept. 24-25. Special sessions on the crisis in education and how to fight foreclosures provided an opportunity for activists to exchange ideas on furthering these struggles.

Hundreds of People’s Summiteers marched from Tent City down Woodward Avenue to the GM Ren Cen on June 15. “Bail out the people! Not the banks!” and other chants echoed loudly throughout downtown Detroit as marchers carried banners and signs demanding jobs, health care, education, immigrant rights, jobs not jails for youth, reproductive justice for women, an end to foreclosures and evictions, and many other demands.

In the evening a rally to stop police brutality and killings denounced the many injustices of the criminal injustice system that incarcerates millions of oppressed people. Speakers included Larry Hales of FIST, himself a survivor of police brutality and ongoing harassment; former prisoner Joshua; Kevin Carey and Charlotte Diggs of Detroit People’s Task Force, who are investigating the many irregularities in the Detroit Crime Lab; Ron Scott of the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality; and LeiLani Dowell of FIST, who chronicled the police brutality and injustices facing lesbian, gay, bi and trans people.

June 16 began with a militant demonstration led by people with disabilities in front of the Grand Circus Park station of the Detroit People Mover, an elevated rail system that is inaccessible to people in wheelchairs. Participants marched and wheeled down Woodward Avenue to the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center, where they spoke out at a session of City Council. Councilwoman JoAnn Watson commissioned the council’s research department to begin an immediate investigation into the lack of elevators at the Detroit People Mover stations so as to implement meeting the needs of Detroiters with disabilities.

Musicians, poets and spoken-word artists have rounded out the days at the Tent City with performances after each evening’s rallies. A delicious dinner has been prepared by volunteer activists and served every evening to more than 300 people at Grand Circus Park.

The People’s Summit and Tent City has received widespread coverage by the big-business-owned media. Every day the people’s struggle has been highlighted on local television, radio and in newspapers.

The strength and success of the People’s Summit and Tent City, the feeling of fightback and solidarity expressed by all its participants, will not end when the final tent is taken down on June 17. There is the sense here that this is the beginning of a mighty struggle to reorder the priorities of society, to demand and fight for jobs and all human needs and to put corporate greed and the profit system into the dustbin of history where they belong.

June 26 United Nations news conference on ‘jobs for all’

Bail Out People Movement: Solidarity Center
55 West 17th St. Suite #5C, New York, NY, 10011
212-633-6646 http://www.bailoutpeople.org/ Email:bailoutpeople.org/cmnt.shtml

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 19, 2009


June 26 United Nations news conference on ‘jobs for all’
To announce Sept. 24 & 25 mass protests at the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh
1-2 p.m. at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, First Ave. & 47 St., New York, N.Y.


The Bail Out the People Movement (BOPM) and the Million Worker March Movement, along with labor and community activists will hold a news conference on June 26 at the United Nations to coincide with the final day of the U.N. Conference on the Economic Crisis. Organizers will announce plans for a protest at the next G20 summit scheduled in Pittsburgh on Sept. 24-25, and invite you to endorse this action.

The themes of the June 26 press conference will be “Jobs for All the World’s Unemployed” and “Solidarity, Not Competition.” BOPM activists note that the International Labor Organization counts global unemployment at about 1.6 billion and growing. In the U.S. alone, 25 million people are either unemployed or underemployed.

The U.N. Conference—also known as the G192—had earlier been scheduled for June 1-3. Non-cooperation from the world’s most powerful economic countries, especially the U.S., forced its postponement until June 24-26. This conference, called by the President of the General Assembly Miguel D’Escoto Brockman, is aimed at representing all U.N. members in confronting the worldwide economic crisis and not just the restricted elite powers of the G8 or G20.

The G20 meeting had originally been set for New York in September, but in fear of major protests was later moved to Pittsburgh. The Bail Out the People Movement is making logistical arrangements for a major two-day protest in Pittsburgh Sept. 24-25 and has filed for permits.

"The rescue plans put into effect by Washington and the other world powers are clearly aimed at boosting profits and encouraging global competition of workers," said Larry Holmes, a national organizer with the Bail Out the People Movement. "Permanently high unemployment is acceptable to the bankers and governments, but not to us. Our movements put people before profits. We break with the idea that we must be sacrificed on the altar of profits or that anyone can benefit from that strategy. Only the united struggle of the masses of people will win any improvement in our lives."

"We're inviting representatives from U.S. unions, other worker, community and social organizations to attend and make one-minute presentations," Holmes continued. "We're also asking for statements of solidarity from labor organizations around the world to be read at the press conference.”


-30-

BOPM protest targets foreclosure auction

This last Sunday, Bail Out the People (BOPM) confronted the REDC's foreclosure auction held at the Grand Hyatt, with a hundred people -- more than double the size of the March Javits Center action -- on the sidewalk in front of the auction marching, chanting and condemning the public spectacle organized to profit from the misery of displaced homeowners. While the big-business media portrayed the auction as a chance to “put people who otherwise couldn’t afford it into homes,” BOPM activists interrupted that mortgage industry propaganda – identical to the justification for subprime mortgages – by exposing the auctions as scams and demanding an immediate moratorium on all foreclosures and evictions. “Our position was not against the people who came to find affordable housing,” said Larry Holmes, “but to warn them that the auctions themselves are fraudulent, with most of the properties scooped up, or already taken, by banks and real estate players. Plus, the few who do find deals could end up having their homes auctioned off in a year if they lose their jobs in the layoffs epidemic that is sweeping the nation. Housing is a human right, which is why we’re calling for an end to foreclosures now.”

The protest was covered by local TV news on Channels 2, 4, 5, 7, 9 and 11.

Media coverage of Sunday's demonstration:

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/video?id=6852870

http://wcbstv.com/video/?id=128677@wcbs.dayport.com

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/foreclosed-homes/photo//090607/ids_photos_ts/r2307028844.jpg/

Protest the G20 in Pittsburgh

A CALL FOR A GLOBAL MOBILIZATION
AGAINST THE G20 SUMMIT IN PITTSBURGH, PA., U.S.
SEPTEMBER 24 AND 25, 2009
ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE – BUT WE MUST FIGHT FOR IT!
BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE

JOBS & SOCIAL NEEDS--NOT WAR AND GREED

The third G20 summit is going to be in Pittsburgh, Pa., on September 24 and 25, 2009. The challenge before the movements for economic and social justice, as well as the antiwar movement, is that the next meeting of the powers that govern the world economy be met with a powerful mass mobilization demanding that jobs and social needs, and not war and greed, prevail--here in the U.S., and across the world.

read more

NATIONAL People’s summit and tent city – DETROIT

Home | DONATE | Contact Us | Subscribe to email list | People's Summit Blog | Videos | Press Releases |

(All events take place at Grand Circus Park, Woodward at E. Adams, unless otherwise noted.)

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB7fshPvt9M

Updated 06/06/09

Four Days of Active Resistance, Political Discussion and Strategizing for a
“People's Stimulus Plans” and an “Economic Bill of Rights”
for Working People and the Poor

JOIN the TENT CITY near the NATIONAL BIG-BUSINESS GATHERING at the Renaissance Center

NATIONAL People’s summit and tent city – DETROIT

On June 15-17, 2009, the National Business Summit, sponsored by the Detroit Economic Club, will take place at the Renaissance Center, General Motors Corporate Headquarters. Millionaire capitalists like the heads of Conoco-Phillips, Dow Chemical, General Motors, Chrysler, Humana Inc., Ascension Health, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, BNSF Railway Co., and PVS Chemicals, and well as the presidents of the National Council on Competitiveness and U.S. Chamber of Commerce, will gather at this summit. President Barack Obama and cabinet members have been invited.

These wealthy businesspeople will put their greedy heads together to discuss “innovation and policy ideas in technol­ogy, energy, environment and manufactur­ing.” In other words, they will be strategizing on how to further increase their profits at the expense of the ever-shrinking middle class, the vast working class and the growing millions living in utter poverty.

The National Business Summit will be held in a city with record-high unemployment and poverty rates, lay-offs, budget cuts, school closings, utility cost hikes and shut-offs and massive home foreclosures. With a registration fee of $1,495, it is unlikely that any victims of foreclosures and evictions, let alone laid-off workers, will be able to attend the National Business Summit. No one at this event will be speaking in the interests of those most affected by the economic collapse.

The People’s Summit will be a dynamic event. During the People’s Summit, organizers will implement a moratorium on foreclosure evictions by going into the neighborhoods and supporting homeowners who are willing to confront the bailiffs. If there is a strike, demonstration or sit in, the People’s Summit will join it. The People’s Summit will confront the big-business CEOs and politicians gathering next door. Join us!


Sunday, June 14
Opening Theme: We declare a State of Emergency! Fight back! No business as usual!
12:00 noon – Set-up of Tent City and People’s Summit begins
2:00-4:00 p.m. – Pride and Devastation Tour of Detroit
1:30-3:00 p.m. – Special session: 2004 Opel/GM Strike in Bochum, Germany
3:00 p.m. – Prayer march organized by Joan Gist for City Council
3:00-5:00 p.m. – Special sessions: 1-FIST/Youth Struggle; 2-Immigrant Rights Struggle
5:30 p.m. – Dinner
6:30-8:00 p.m. – State of Emergency Fightback Rally
8:00 p.m. – Concert and cultural program

Monday, June 15
Theme: Detroit’s crisis as a symbol of the country and the planet
8:30 a.m.– “Know Your Rights” leaflet distribution for homeowners and renters at 36th District Court
10:00 a.m.-12 noon: Special session: Organizing for Sept. 24-25 G20 protests in Pittsburgh and 2010 U.S. Social Forum in Detroit
12:30-1:30 p.m. – 36th District Court Street Rally for Moratorium to Stop Foreclosures & Evictions
1:30-3:30 p.m. – Corporate/Banker Devastation Tour of Detroit
1:30-3:30 p.m. – Special sessions: 1- Education crisis; 2- Fighting Foreclosures
4:00 p.m. – Mass March to Confront the CEOs – Gather at Grand Circus Park
4:30 p.m. – March begins down Woodward to GM Renaissance Center
5:00-6:00 p.m. – Demonstration at GM headquarters/site of big-business summit
6:30 p.m. – Dinner
7:30 p.m. – Youth Concert and Rally to Stop the “War on Drugs” and Police Brutality

Tuesday, June 16
Theme: Stop the war on the workers and poor – feed the people not the Pentagon!
10:00 a.m. – Disability Rights Demonstration at Detroit People Mover, Grand Circus Park Station
12:00-1:30 p.m. – Mass Demonstration and Rally for Jobs at GM Renaissance Center
3:00-5:00 p.m. – Special Session: Workers Fighting Back Against Layoffs, Plant Closings & More
5:30 p.m. – Dinner
6:30 p.m. – Rally to Stop the War at Home and Abroad and Cultural Program

Wednesday, June 17
Theme: Confronting the corporate agenda: human rights for all
10:00 a.m.-12 noon – Special Strategy Session to Carry Struggles Forward
12:00 p.m. – Take down begins



THROUGHOUT THE PEOPLE’S SUMMIT & TENT CITY: ●Videotaped testimony and people’s speak-outs on how the crisis affects you ●Discussions and submissions for the People’s Stimulus Plan and Economic Bill of Rights

RAISE YOUR VOICES TO DEMAND:

* Bailout the people!

* Jobs, healthcare, housing and education for all

* Moratorium on foreclosures, evictions and utility shutoffs – housing is a right

* Stop budget cuts and restore social services funding

* Stop tuition hikes and school closings

* Moratorium on layoffs, plant closings, pension thefts and union busting – A job at a living wage is a right

* End racism, sexism and anti-LGBT attacks – equality now!

* Stop attacks on immigrants

* Full rights for disabled people

* Bailout youth and students

* No more police brutality

* Jobs not Jails - For prisoners and ex-prisoners' rights

* Save the natural environment and stop climate change

* U.S. troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan

* Money for jobs and human needs, not war

* And more – bring your own demands!

People's Economic Summit in New York City

Endorse the Call | Volunteer | Become a Local Organizer | Donate | Contact Us

Another world is urgently necessary - but we must fight for it.

Sunday May 31--11 a.m.

Inside tents in DAG HAMMARSKJÖLD PLAZA, 47th St. & 1st Ave.

(in conjunction with the UN Summit on the World Economic Crisis, June 1-3 in NYC)

Two meetings on the world economic crisis are taking place in NYC in less than a month.

One of the meetings is the June 1 - 3 UN General Assembly's International Conference on the Global Economic and Financial Crisis. On Sunday, May 31, the day before the UN meeting, the People's Economic Summit will take place directly across the street from the UN building, under tents in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza. The theme of the Peoples Economic Summit is "A NEW WORLD IS URGENTLY NECESSARY–BUT WE MUST FIGHT FOR IT."

It remains to be seen whether these important meetings will get the same kind of attention that the U.S. and world corporate media give to a meeting of the G20--the Group of Twenty finance ministers and central bank governors. This is because in different ways, these meetings are a challenge to the domination of the world economy by the economic system and governments of the G20, especially the U.S. and the other longstanding imperialist powers that still comprise the so-called G7 nations. World events have forced these imperialist powers to incorporate the major developing countries into a broader framework that is now the G20.

The UN conference on the economic crisis, which some are referring to as the G192 Summit--for the 192 member nations of the UN--is, at its most elementary level, a response to exclusionary character of the G20 meetings. On another level, the UN meeting is an attempt by some of the more progressive governments to challenge both the hegemony of the major imperialist powers over the world economy, as well as the capitalist system.

After recently meeting in Cumaná in the Venezuelan state of Sucre, representatives of several governments including Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua issued the April 21 Declaration of Cumaná. Wasting no time to get to its central point, the Cumaná statement begins: "Capitalism is leading humanity and the planet to extinction. What we are experiencing is a global economic crisis of a systemic and structural nature, not another cyclic crisis."

The statement asserts: "It is necessary to develop and model an alternative to the capitalist system. A system based on: solidarity and complementarity, not competition; a system in harmony with our mother earth and not plundering of human resources; a system of cultural diversity and not cultural destruction and imposition of cultural values and lifestyles alien to the realities of our countries; a system of peace based on social justice and not on imperialist policies and wars; in summary, a system that recovers the human condition of our societies and peoples and does not reduce them to mere consumers or merchandise."

In anticipation of the UN meeting, the statement affirms: "The solutions to the global economic crisis and the definition of a new international financial scheme should be adopted with the participation of the 192 countries that will meet in the United Nations Conference on the International Financial Crisis to be held on June 1-3 to propose the creation of a new international economic order."

Because of the unique nature of the June UN conference, a broad coalition of forces is coming together to hold a Peoples Economic Summit in conjunction with the UN General Assembly Conference on the World Financial and Economic crisis. The goal of the one-day People's Economic Summit is to bring together activists, organizers and leaders from the various movements and struggles most impacted by the devastating global crisis around the region, the country, and some from around the world--the people who are loosing their homes, livelihoods, healthcare, education and futures. These are the voices that must be heard by all the governments.

The biggest worldwide economic crisis since the 1930 has re-raised, with even greater urgency, the need for people in the U.S. and people everywhere to liberate them selves from the grasp of the capitalist system, for the sake of self-defense and self-preservation.

One of the panels during the People's Economic Summit, entitled "Another World is Urgently Necessary," will examine the roots of the financial and economic crisis, as well as the case for alternatives to capitalism and imperialism. Another panel, entitled "But We Must Fight For It," will take up the critical discussion of building the mass movement/s and formulating a program and strategy essential to the task of bringing into being a serious mass struggle for jobs, an end to foreclosures and evictions, and new rights for working and poor people.

Along with these and other panels there will be workshops on "Resisting Imperialist War and Occupation," including the central importance of the Palestinian liberation struggle. A major session of the People's Economic Summit will be dedicated to planning major protest at the Next G20 Summit, which is being planned for NYC in late September.

Representatives of progressive governments participating in the UN conference are being invited to participate in the People's Economic Summit.

The views of the governments that signed the Cumaná statement represent the interests of the overwhelming population of the planet, but it may not represent many of the 192 member governments of the UN. Some governments want to limit the UN conference to a discussion of merely reforming the world financial system. A few imperialist super-powers are threatened by any challenge to their global domination. It is not clear whether the U.S. government will attend the UN economic crisis conference, or boycott it as they did the recent UN conference on racism in Geneva.

The main importance of this UN conference is that it is a forum for widening the political struggle against imperialist global hegemony. Our hope is that the May 31 People's Economic Summit will amplify the struggle inside the UN, strengthen it and make it relevant to the struggle in the streets.

What you can do:

1) Endorse

2) Spread the word - forward this message to friends, fellow activists, community organizers, trade unionists, and student organizations. Ask them to endorse and participate.

3) Donate to help with organizing expenses

4) Volunteer

5) Become a local organizer

Undo the Coup at WBAI!

Whose Station? Our Station!
Pacifica National Removes General Manager - Program Director Next?
Gag Rule Imposed on Programmers Who Dissent from National Takeover

* Attend a Public Forum on the WBAI Crisis - Tues., May 12, 7:00 PM at Dist. 1707, 75 Varick St. (n. of Canal St.), 14th Fl., Manhattan (A or 1 train to Canal St.) Sponsor: Ad Hoc Community Activist Coalition on WBAI - for info on this event & those below, call 212-561-7231.

* Attend CEMOTAP's Great Debate: Is the Bloomberg Administration Good for Black People? - Sun., May 17, 6 - 9 PM- Bernard White speaks re WBAI, 7:30 PM - Salem United Methodist Church, 129th & Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd., Harlem

* Speak out at the WBAI Local Station Board mtg., Wed., May 20, 7 PM - place TBA.

************************************************

Fight Back! VOICE YOUR PROTEST * BECOME A WBAI VOTING MEMBER!

* Send an email to the Pacifica National Board at pnb@pacifica.org - which reaches each board member individually, including Grace Aaron. Please send a cc to info@justiceunity.org. Demand Hands Off WBAI Management! Maintain local control of programming!

* Also call Grace Aaron at (310) 286-1011 or (310) 402-4087 with the same message.

* Sign a petition to RECALL Local Station Board members Steve Brown, Mitch Cohen, James Ross, and Carolyn Birden, leaders of the attack on WBAI management.

* At this point, IT IS URGENT THAT YOU JOIN THE STATION (by donating $25 or more or 3 hours of volunteer work) so that you have the right to vote for Justice & Unity board candidates and to recall destructive board members. Call the station's pledge line at (212) 209-2950 - ask them to note on the card that you oppose removal of local management. Or pledge at www.wbai.org.

* Copy and distribute the "Undo the Coup" flyer to get the word out.


Stay updated with: THE WBAI JUSTICE & UNITY CAMPAIGN
(212) 591-2111 * www.justiceunity.org (join our email list there) * info@justiceunity.org




*****************

BACKGROUND ON THE ISSUES AT WBAI:

WBAI is under attack from Pacifica's Interim Executive Director, Grace Aaron of Los Angeles, as well as from the Pacifica National Board majority and the WBAI Local Station Board majority. Exploiting a very real financial crisis at the station, they want to impose their own brand of programming - removing what some label "racial divisiveness and balkanization," meaning community self-determination programs, particularly those by and for the Black community.

On May 6, Aaron removed WBAI's progressive Black General Manager, Tony Riddle, and replaced him with LaVarn Williams, Pacifica's Interim Chief Financial Officer, from Berkeley, Cal. Another progressive Black manager, Program Director Bernard White, has been harshly attacked by majority board members locally and nationally; he is likely to be fired soon. The Local Station Board reportedly held an "executive session" on April 20 at which the majority did a snap "evaluation" of these 2 managers (over strong minority objections), which initiated the process of firing them. No data was collected and they were given no chance to respond. Riddle had served as manager for 13 months. White, a 30-year station veteran, has recently resumed work after major surgery.

These actions follow Riddle's and White's vocal and written protests about the recently revealed attempt by Aaron to hijack the station by changing the locks on the station's broadcast transmitter room and installing equipment for remote control of programming - all without notifying manager Riddle.

Meanwhile, Aaron has imposed a gag rule threatening any programmer who discusses matters on air that she deems a "risk" to Pacifica will be removed from the air. Already, Wakeup Call programmers Don DeBar and Errol Maitland, who have dissented on the air, have been disciplined.

All these steps are reminiscent of the Christmas Coup of December 2000, when Pacifica changed locks, fired local managers, and purged dissenting programmers & other staff, with the goal of mainstreaming BAI - until a mass movement of listeners and staff fought back and won back control of the station and network.

People's Summits & G20 protest

ATTENTION ACTIVISTS AND ORGANIZERS!
The Bail Out the People Movement is announcing three important projects:

---

FIRST:

PROTEST THE G20 SUMMIT IN NEW YORK CITY!
Saturday, September. 19 & Sunday, September 20, 2009
(tentative dates)
ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE–
BUT WE MUST FIGHT FOR IT!

Bail Out People - Not Banks
Money for Social Needs - Not War and Greed
Jobs, Housing, Healthcare & Education are a Right
Organize - Mobilize - Resist - Unite - Fight Back!

The third G20 summit is going to be in NYC on or around September 20, 2009. The G20 summits are taking place in response to the greatest worldwide economic crisis since the 1930s. However, the purpose of these high-level meetings of governments and bankers is not to rescue the people of the world from depression level unemployment, evictions, homelessness, poverty, social and economic inequality and war. These summits are about fixing the economic and financial order that puts profits before people-and fixing that system by creating more poverty, misery and suffering.

The last G20 Summit held in London in early April was met with massive protests both in London and throughout Europe.
Now that the G20 is coming to the U.S., it is up to activists and organizations here to take up the challenge of uniting and working together to organize the widest protests possible. BOPM urges activists and organizations to endorse the call for protest at the G20 Summit in the fall, and to begin organizing for it. The potential for mass mobilization in September is truly infinite. So let’s begin the work required to realize that powerful potential.

---

SECOND:

THE BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE MOVEMENT INVITES YOU TO A
PEOPLE’S ECONOMIC SUMMIT IN NEW YORK CITY - SUNDAY MAY 31

(In conjunction with the UN Summit on the World Economic Crisis, June 1-3 in New York City)

People's Economic Summit
Starting Time - 11:00 am (tentative)
Inside the People's Summit Tent
in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, 47th St. & 1st Ave.

>From June 1–3, The General Assembly of the UN will hold a summit on the world economic crisis in NYC. The UN is holding its own economic summit out of the concern that the 192 member nations of the UN are being marginalized by the G20 summit meetings.

In conjunction with this meeting, on Sunday May 31, the Bail Out the People Movement will hold a people’s summit on
the world economic crisis in NYC outside the UN under a large tent in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza.

Come to the PEOPLE’S ECONOMIC SUMMIT–Share information and insight on how the economic is affecting poor and working people all over the U.S. and all over the world. Participate in panels and workshops. Help formulate a vision for a future free of social and economic inequality and injustice. Help plan the fight to make that vision a reality.

Planning for the G20 summit meeting in NYC in September, and forming the structures that will make organizing for the G20 inclusive and effective, will be high on the list of priorities at the People’s Economic Summit.

---

THIRD:

Come to the:
PEOPLE’S SUMMIT & TENT CITY:
PROTEST THE “NATIONAL BIG BUSINESS SUMMIT”

JUNE 14-17, 2009
GRAND CIRCUS PARK, DETROIT, MICHIGAN

Four Days of Active Resistance, Political Discussion and Strategizing for a “People's Stimulus Plans” and an “Economic Bill of Rights” for Working People and the Poor

On June 15-17, 2009, the National Business Summit, sponsored by the Detroit Economic Club, will take place at Ford Field. Millionaire capitalists like the heads of Conoco-Phillips, Dow Chemical, General Motors, Chrysler, Humana Inc., Ascension Health, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, BNSF Railway Co., and PVS Chemicals, as well as the presidents of the National Council on Competitiveness and U.S. Chamber of Commerce, will gather at this summit. President Barack Obama and cabinet members have been invited.

These wealthy businessmen (yes, almost all of them are rich white men) will put their greedy heads together to discuss “innovation and policy ideas in technology, energy, environment and manufacturing.” In other words, they will be strategizing on how to further increase their profits at the expense of the ever-shrinking middle class, the vast working class and the growing millions living in utter poverty.

The National Business Summit will be held in a city with record-high unemployment and poverty rates, lay-offs, budget cuts, school closings, utility rate hikes and shut-offs and massive home foreclosures. With a registration fee of $1,495, it is unlikely that any victims of foreclosures and evictions, let alone laid-off workers, will be able to attend the National Business Summit. No one at this event will be speaking in the interests of those most affected by the economic collapse.

The People’s Summit will be a dynamic event. During the People’s Summit, organizers will implement a moratorium on
foreclosure evictions by going into the neighborhoods and supporting homeowners who are willing to confront the bailiffs. If there is a strike, demonstration or sit-in, the People’s Summit will join it. The People’s Summit will confront the big-business CEOs and politicians gathering next door. Join us!

RAISE YOUR VOICES TO DEMAND:
• Bail out the people!
• Jobs, healthcare, housing and education for all
• Moratorium on foreclosures, evictions and utility
shutoffs; housing is a right!
• Stop budget cuts and restore social services funding
• Stop tuition hikes and school closings
• Moratorium on layoffs, plant closings, pension thefts and union-busting; A job at a living wage is a right!
• End racism, sexism and anti-LGBT attacks
• Stop attacks on immigrants
. Bail out youth and students
• No more police brutality
• U.S. troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan
• Money for jobs and human needs, not war

Here's how you can help:

1) Endorse the call to action: http://www.bailoutpeople.org/peoplessummitendorse.shtml

2) Become an organizer: http://www.bailoutpeople.org/g20-peoplessummitsvolorgcents.shtml

3) Donate to help with organizing: http://bailoutpeople.org/donate.shtml

4) Spread the word!