Recent ZBloggers
Recent Sustainer Blogs
Busted by an Alabama Cop---in Maryland
By Bob Simpson at Apr 11, 2012
For George Corley Wallace, his 1972 Presidential campaign swing through Maryland was one seriously bad trip. He was met by riots in Hagerstown and Frederick, by loud counter demonstrations at Wheaton Plaza and Capital Plaza near DC and was seriously wounded by gunfire in Laurel. And me? I managed to get myself arrested by an Alabama state trooper ------in Maryland no less. ... (More) Comments (0)
Occupy Transit! Transit Workers and the Occupy Movement Team Up
By Bob Simpson at Apr 05, 2012
Calling mass transit “a genuine civil rights issue,” the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU), which represents transit workers across the nation, joined with the Occupy Movement, community organizations and transit riders to demand a revitalization of our transit systems. Citing such problems as “older vehicles, deferred maintenance and longer wait times for overcrowded buses and trains,” the ATU was also critical of service cuts and higher fares which have hit working class riders the hardest.... (More) Comments (0)
Hey Rahm Emanuel: Libraries Are Sacred Spaces
By Bob Simpson at Apr 02, 2012
For the Chicago Public Library system, its deterioration is proceeding with death by a thousand budget cuts, cuts coming from Mayor Rahm Emanuel's office on the 5th floor of City Hall, following up on cuts made by his predecessor Hizzoner Richard M. Daley. Libraries are especially important in working class communities where people have less income and where educational opportunities are generally more limited.... (More) Comments (0)
The Social Worker and the Massacre
By Bob Simpson at Mar 21, 2012
It was corporate gangsterism, worse than than the 1927 St. Valentine’s Day Massacre perpetrated by the Al Capone mob. The 1937 Memorial Day Massacre was the killing not of rival mobsters, but of American working people.... (More) Comments (0)
The War Against Economic Recovery
By Bob Simpson at Mar 11, 2012
Breaking unions or smashing organizing campaigns pushes down wages and reduces pensions, making it more difficult for people to buy products and services. This lack of spending holds back an already weak economic recovery and threatens to unleash what financial writers like to call a double dip recession. ... (More) Comments (0)
Dr. Beatrice Tucker: Home Birth for Chicago's Working Class
By Bob Simpson at Mar 01, 2012
If there were a Nobel Prize for Obstetrics, Dr. Beatrice “Tucks” Tucker and her longtime partner Dr. Harry “Bennie” Benaron would have won one as leaders of the Chicago Maternity Center. From its founding in 1932 until its doors closed in 1973, the Chicago Maternity Center was one of finest obstetrical facilities on the planet.... (More) Comments (0)
By Bob Simpson at Feb 18, 2012
Trucking deregulation has made a mockery of the whole idea of a free market. To say with a straight face that an immigrant truck driver can negotiate on equal terms with a shipping giant like Goldman Sachs’ SSA Marine is ludicrous.... (More) Comments (0)
Alice Peurala: A Woman of Steel
By Bob Simpson at Feb 10, 2012
The fires of steelmaking burned all along the southern shores of Lake Michigan when Alice Peurala entered US Steel's South Works in 1953. Today most of those fires have gone out and with them the thousands of jobs that were once the economic support system for the Southeast Chicago-Gary region, a region that has still not recovered in 2012.... (More) Comments (0)
Hard Work Deserves More Respect
By Bob Simpson at Jan 25, 2012
The warehouses of Will County are only a part of a vast supply chain of exploited labor that begins in the 21st century of sweatshops of China, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Indonesia and other developing countries and then goes through the USA to the shelves of the big box stores with their underpaid and distressed retail workers.... (More) Comments (0)
GOP Economics: Failure Is Not An Option. It’s a Requirement.
By Bob Simpson at Jan 16, 2012
Republicans are very good at confusing people about the economy. Our economic problems are variously blamed on immigrants, blacks, liberals, environmentalists, unions, China, Democrats, women, government regulation or whatever else is the GOP flavor of the week.... (More) Comments (0)
By Bob Simpson at Dec 30, 2011
It’s a hard world...even in a Ben and Jerry’s scoop shop.... (More) Comments (0)
Nurses on the Frontlines of Compassion
By Bob Simpson at Dec 24, 2011
Unless you are wealthy, sick economies are bad for your health. ... (More) Comments (0)
By Bob Simpson at Dec 14, 2011
In the United States, institutional racism results from the social caste system that sustained, and was sustained by, slavery and racial segregation. ... (More) Comments (0)
By Bob Simpson at Dec 02, 2011
“No poor man ever gave me a job.” How many times have you heard that one? Sadly, these words are often spoken by a working class person who should know better.... (More) Comments (0)
By Bob Simpson at Nov 18, 2011
The greed and brutality of our present economic system has become intolerable to many Americans as it undermines living standards and our democracy itself.... (More) Comments (0)


