Refinery Reflections
One night in March of 1983, I had dinner on the stove and was building a fire when the phone rang. It was the foreman Charlie from the ARCO Refinery at Cherry Point, Washington. I was living in Bellingham then, about thirty miles away, and supporting myself by painting houses and working the occasional shutdown …
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They Picked Up Each Otherโs Children: Chicagoโs Spontaneous Resistance
An interview with Kingsley Clarke on resistance against Trumpโs War in Chicago. Hard Crackers: Earlier this week theย National Guard and ICE were deployed to San Francisco, followed by a flurry of messages, alerts, and coordination as people tried to figure out whatโs coming. As we know, the Trump administration has already called off the operation. …
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At the Bus Stop
Itโs a quiet afternoon at work, but Iโm worn out from not sleeping well and decide to head home early. The regional rail is all messed up right now, so I take two subways and then walk a few blocks to wait for the bus. As I get to the stop, a woman asks if …
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An amazing meeting of miners and environmentalists from across โYugoslaviaโ
We came together on a playing field beside a derelict Olympic size open air swimming pool built by the local miners. We are in the small mining town of Breza, about half an hour’s drive from the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo. The swimming pool, its construction by miners after WW2, and its present decay is a …
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Interview with Palmira Figueroa of National Day Laborers Organizing Network (NDLON)
Hard Crackers reached out to NDLON after we had read, in a New York Times article, about the organizationโs involvement in the protests after the death of Roberto Carlos Montoya, a day laborer who had been waiting for work outside a Home Depot in Los Angeles. We interviewed Palmira Figueroa who is NDLONโs Communications Director. …
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Unbuild these Walls: Why Immigrant Justice Needs Abolition
Interview with Silky Shah Silky Shah has been an immigrant justice organizer for over two decades. She is currently the executive director of Detention Watch Network, a national coalition working to abolish immigrant detention in the U.S. We met up recently in Chicago at the annual Socialism Conference. We were both on a panel with other …
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From the Archives
โRemember What My Number Isโ: RIP Toots Hibbert
54-46 was Toots Hibbertโs prison number.ย He sang it out loud on the electrifying track 54-46 Thatโs My Number (1969), one of a crop of tunes that made Toots and the Maytals a household name on the island of Jamaica and soon thereafter in a lot of other places too.ย Toots Hibbert, the reggae singer, …
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“Preserving Our Capacity to Act:” An Interview with Kristian Williams
Hard Crackers:ย If I understand correctly the argument you’ve made about the efficacy of riots, it’s that they impose, far more effectively than legal limits, that communities can place new limits on police brutality. That seems quite evident in what’s happening now at the official political/media level.ย They can’t seem to move fast enough to …
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