Chicago Mayor Issues Defiant Call For A General Strike

It's never happened before because the working class has never been unified nationwide before. Soybean farmers in Utah are not connected to teachers in Boston or steelworkers in Pittsburgh or auto manufacturers in Michigan or nurses in San Diego. There's never been a singular cause that affected all of those groups of people at the same time.

If it ever could happen, it would be because the President was a colossal dipshit who fucked every aspect of the economy across the country, except that would almost certainly cause the legislature to put an end to such rampant and corrupt tyranny.

Right?

Right?
- no, the official party platform of the GOOP is “whatever Drumpf says”.
  this party also controls the legislature
The last time people across the country organized general strike of sorts the government went into action to make a law that made it illegal for unions to organize such a thing.
And with this corrupt Congress and this idiot president and this ridiculous SCOTUS, I think it's likely they will worm their way into making a law that makes it illegal for any citizen to strike for any reason.
Trump already illegally outlawed government unions. And nothing, absolutely nothing, was done about it.
- The people strike.
  Congress says: that's illegal now!! Go back to work!
  Why the fuck would we? Literally what could possibly convince people that the gov is going to arrest a million people for striking? Genuinely, how braindead are people that that is a concern?
There’s never been a singular cause that affected all of those groups of people at the same time.
The attack on Pearl Harbor and 9/11 were both pretty unifying. The former had an immediate and unambiguous opponent with Imperial Japan. 9/11 took weeks and months to figure out what happened and who did it, so it didn't have as immediate a response.
- For sure, there have been events that affected all Americans in various ways, good and bad, but the context of the conversation is events that would encourage a general labor strike. The moon landing, world wars, the Great Depression, the Macarena, big things happen. I probably could have been clearer by saying that nothing in history has unified the American working class as a singular political group to use our power as a labor force to exert pressure to stop oligarchical abuses by means of a general strike, but that seems overly pedantic.
You think soy bean farmers are working class?
- Yes, farmers do labor to produce things. That makes them workers.
- I'm seriously curious, why do you imply they aren't?
- Yeah, the guy who owns the farm that borders my yard is just some dude with a full time job. He spends a couple days driving a big tractor thing planting in the spring, and several more days in the fall driving a different big tractor thing around to harvest it. Soybeans and corn on rotation.

There has never been a true, nationwide general strike in the United States, though a series of post-World War II work stoppages remembered as the “great strike wave of 1946” mobilized five million American workers demanding leaders to address economic instability and untenable working conditions.
In its aftermath, congress cracked down with the Taft-Hartley act, a legislation prohibiting a broad range of union tactics, including calling for political strikes. The 1947 law is still in place, despite repeated attempts to repeal it.

Oh, imagine that.

Can't have the uppity peasants upending the status-quo, can we?

Finally someone calling for it. Let's hope we can get it done and make it happen.

Untill they swear her in and while this government is shut down I'm not doing shit.

Her?
- I believe a Congress women is not being sworn in since she said she would vote to release the files and the speaker of the house is blocking that. Without swearing in she is effectively unable to officially partake in votes.
- I think they are referring to the US Speaker of the House refusing to swear in Adelita Grijalva after she won a special election in Arizona.
- Sabo, the cat ;)
I've been holding on to a bunch of those exact stickers for awhile now. Hope I can start slapping them up places soon!

I'm dubious that a general strike is possible in the US. All of the other countries that have had massive strikes affecting large chunks of the market were driven by large unions. Our unions don't have that sort of sway and they rarely help others to maximize their diminishing bargaining power with the ongoing degradation of workers rights. Importantly this also happens on the supply side, the consumer side will just buy it tomorrow instead usually. A day of no productivity has much bigger consequences.

That being said, I'll definitely participate.

I fear that the average american can't afford to strike, because of the lingering threat of poverty from losing employment and getting crushed by outstanding debt. But this is a sign, that there are already not enough worker's rights.
From far away it looks like a construct.
- Far too many Americans don't even get sick leave at their jobs.
The UAW was planning a general strike for May 1st 2028. I don't know how willing they'd be to start a wildcat general strike, but they may join one.
https://may1.uaw.org/
- What is the point if scheduling a strike so far in advance? Also, aren't UAW leadership aligned with Trump?
- Basically letting the turnip destroy the country for nearly 4 years...
The article says that a 1947 law makes it almost impossible for unions to organize a general strike.
- It's preferable to break that anti-labour red scare law if it means avoiding the country getting to the point where civil war happens instead.
- Anything that would cause real economic damage and put power back in the hands of workers will be treated as "illegal" regardless of what the books say. But what could they realistically do, arrest everyone in their homes who didn't go to work that day?
  Wildcat strikes are "illegal" in the sense that your employer is allowed to retaliate with firing you or docking pay if you do so. I highly doubt someone's going to prison for not showing up at a regular job.
- Just corporate dictatorship things...

It's been a hot minute since a headline made me say "whoa" out loud

Summoning people of all backgrounds to unite and take a stand against President Donald Trump’s “tyranny,” the “ultra-wealthy” and corporate greed, Johnson said, “We are going to make them pay their fair share in taxes to fund our school, to fund jobs, to fund healthcare, to fund transportation.”
“Democracy will live on because of this generation,” he proclaimed. “Are you ready to take it to the courts and to the streets?”
It was an audacious declaration from the mayor, who has risen to the top of Trump’s list of enemies as he resists the vicious immigration operations and arrival of hundreds of National Guards currently shaking Chicago.

https://generalstrikeus.com/

It’s really needed at this point

Honestly massive applause for Brandon Johnson. There are so many performative voices that call for a general strike, but it's so rare to see someone with political power and a national stage call for one.
- Unironically let's go Brandon!

New event for the no kings movement. Along with taking to the streets people who normally cant make it or are to anti social can start calling out the same day.

Can we do the next one on a weekday?
- Everyday should a be a part of the no kings movement. Week ends plus week days. Hell we got some holidays coming up. No kings day on halloween is going to be great.

The Europeans are way ahead of the Americans in this regard.

We need to stop paying taxes.

I stopped the day he was elected, opted out and put what would be going to taxes into a VT and VXUS index funds, hopefully to cover me when the time comes to pay.
I realize that's investing in fascist companies enabling this, but I will Shashank Redemption crawl through fascist shit to not fund this administration and cover my own ass.
Best plan I could think of, I'm all ears if someone has a better idea. So far, I'm up.
- I stopped paying taxes on the last tax day. My wife and I cheated our asses off on our taxes and I changed my business around to make my money much harder to track. I've also gotten very good at creating charitable donations and keeping records. My wife, unfortunately, works for the state gov, so its a lot harder to hide her money, but we do our best to pay as little as possible through use of charitable donations, depreciation of assets, and a host of other tricks. I doubt she'll spend more than 5k in taxes this year. A huge decrease from what she spent last year. I will be paying nothing because, to the government, I appear unemployed.
  If even roughly 30% of US taxpayers did this, it would absolutely cripple the federal government. They would not be able to fund their gestapo, they would be forced to make concessions and the executive administration would lose a ton of power. This is the way to bring down Trump. Not violent revolution -- legitimate looking tax trickery. The IRS doesn't have the staff to deal with it and with them receiving less and less money it would just be a downward spiral of helplessness for them.

Has a politician ever called for a general strike in US history? He's actually encouraging crippling his own economy?

Our economy is already dead unless you're a tech monopoly.
We operate in a faith based monetary system in a global economy. Dear leader is destroying the faith and the global ties. The economy is already dead, they are in the final stages of replacing you with computer and robot
If the US falls any further under oligarchy control there won't be an economy to work with, either because it'll all be more or less centralized under various groups and various levels of control or because it'll get too top heavy and collapse. Better to burn the old growth and start over now rather than let it fester and deal with a far far bigger fire.
- Wut. We need to cripple the economy. The general strike is our most powerful tool
  I'm saying that it would be remarkable for a politician to call for that, and asking if it's the first time in history.

Thanks Huff post, we need this idea to get talked about throughout the media and start gaining momentum. Even just the threat of a general strike will get a response, and any kind of work stoppages even if short of a general strike will cause enough disruption to get a response.

All you need to do is shutdown AWS for a few days. All the apps will fail and the corporations will lose all that advertising money.

Finally some political leadership. Now get UAW and teamsters and longshoremen on board. The teachers and nurses. The rest will fillow

The guy is a mayor, and finds himself on the national stage. He is now a target of trumps. Staying in the public eye is self preservation. Not saying it can't lead in the right direction.
That said, the major unions are run by poloticians as well. And laws don't favor them on this. So they will stay out of it unless you get some new little guys who get elected to leadership by claiming they will do these things. But trump supporters are common enough in such unions that it would be challenging for that to happen. It's more likely the unions unofficially join in after critical mass is achieved. Thier leaders don't want to go to jail.
The UAW I could see getting onboard, but the Teamsters are so full of MAGA members and Trump loving leadership, I'd be astonished if they did.
- I think you misunderstand teamsters. Why do you have this perception?

This is TERRORISM under NSPM-7! If they DONT want to be Considered Terrorists they MUST shoot up a Church in a MAGA hat!

I don't think Americans have it in them to do a general strike. Too much apathy and cowardice.

Or anyone else for that matter. People are extremely stupid.
Americans are too over leveraged and in credit card and medical debt.

Jesus. Since when does BuzzFeed own HuffPost?

That hurts my brain. what!?

If people simply drove the speed limit and didn't speed, if they took longer at lights to make a left hand turn then traffic would back up. Its the same effect as a general strike but without the target on your back.

Don’t block traffic. I’m all for a general strike, but keeping people from getting places has a lot of potential consequences that we don’t need to be responsible for. Everything from medical events to job interviews to court times could have pretty expensive or otherwise costly fallout. It’s putting the risk/target on someone else’s back instead of you making the statement yourself. It’s not just inconveniencing people. If you want to take a stand, take the risk yourself.
Nobody to sell them a coffee? Nobody to unlock the store at opening time? That’s fine.
- While I mostly agree with the sentiment, blocking traffic can still be effective. Maybe only block/hinder places like shopping malls and other capitalist structures. Leave the public roads and access to hospitals/courts alone. The goal is to bring nationwide GDP to as close to a halt as possible, since wealth is the only thing these people care about.
Like work-to-rule.

There’s no way this will happen at any level that will make a difference. And it’s too bad, as this is probably the only way to cripple his regime.