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“Legal Observer Training,” hosted by Ohio Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild

Wednesday, June 9, 6-7:30pm, this on-line event requires advance registration

The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) Legal Observer program is part of a comprehensive system of legal support designed to enable people to express their political views as fully as possible without unconstitutional disruption or interference by the police and with the fewest possible consequences from the criminal justice system.

Wednesday, June 8, 2022, 6:00 – 7:30 PM
There are many ways to join the movement for reproductive freedom - if you're not sure where to start, looking for more information, or want to deepen your involvement, then join Pro-Choice Ohio as we Ramp Up for Repro!  Our monthly Ramp Up for Repro trainings will further acquaint you with political advocacy tactics, repro lingo, and help you find the best way to get involved. Every month, we'll dive into movement ecology, abortion messaging, the current landscape of abortion access, and provide next steps for you to take action!  Register here. 

Columbus is witnessing two labor movements, and while Starbucks United has had success, the other more local of the two, Wex Workers United, says it is in a standoff with its boss, the Ohio State University.

Wex Workers United or “WWU” and its affiliate union, AFSCME Ohio Council 8, first asked OSU for voluntary recognition three months ago because an “overwhelming number” of Wexner Center for the Arts employees support unionization, but there’s been no answer from the university.

If OSU refuses to allow the union, Wexner Center workers would take a vote. But OSU, WWU, and the State Employment Relations Board or SERB, must first come to an agreement that a vote should be made, and the university hasn’t consented to this either.

Ohio should be the next to formally abolish the death penalty. How can we ask a heavily armed population to stop solving its problems through murder when that's exactly what Ohio insists on the right to do?

According to two levels of our justice system, as it's called, Barry Lee Jones was sentenced to death in Arizona with inadequate and incompetent legal representation. Many observers of the case suspect he was innocent. But the U.S. Supreme Court just ruled (6 to 3) that the conviction must stand, and that only in very limited cases can bad legal representation matter.

Any state, such as Ohio, that keeps the death penalty on the books is keeping it in place even for those never given a fair trial.

Since 1973, at least 187 people who were wrongly convicted and sentenced to death have been exonerated, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Early Franklinton and Columbus’ forgotten beginnings

Dismissed, when even noticed by City government and city residents alike, Columbus’ historical, political, economic, social, and cultural origins lay in Franklinton. The district is now on the southeastern edge of downtown but it was long the center. Historians, geographers, archaeologists, and genealogists can read the signs on the ground and in the libraries. But they are unknown to most residents including the governing class and their inseparable developers. Among many reasons are Columbus’ lack of any traditions of professional self-study, the failings of its educational and cultural institutions, and the disinterestedness of its journalists. (See my essays on the City of Columbus and the University District in Columbus Free Press; contrast them, for example, with Ed Lentz’s Columbus Dispatch’s antiquarian vignettes always taken out of historical context and without consideration of significance. Franklinton is not in the index of only serious scholarly book on Columbus, Kevin Cox, Boomtown Columbus. Ohio State University Press, 2021)

On May 4, the Israeli Occupation High Court approved one of the largest forcible transfers of Palestinians from their land since 1967. Over 1,300 Palestinian residents of Masafer Yatta, an area in the south Hebron hills, are facing forced displacement by Israeli forces on a moment’s notice. Palestinian Bedouins have lived on this land for 918 years. 

Masafer Yatta is an area in the South Hebron Hills area of the occupied West Bank consisting of fourteen Palestinian villages that is home to 13,000 inhabitants. Its economy is based on farming and raising of sheep and goats.  In the 1980s, the Israeli army designated part of this area a closed military zone for training and sought to remove the communities for this use. Palestinian residents have continually faced demolition of their homes, cisterns, water mains, roads, structures, and schools. Israeli military equipped with bulldozers destroys it all. Israel forbids Palestinians to build homes on their own land, connect to water and power grids, and graze livestock. 

Saturday, June 4 and Sunday, June 5, this on-line event requires advance registration

The Revolutionary Socialism Conference (RSC) is a two-day event of panel presentations and discussions concerning the most critical issues facing revolutionary socialists and the question of organizing the class struggle today. The RSC focuses on the development of revolutionary theory and practice as an urgently needed political focus and orientation that is distinct from socialist reformism that has become the dominant expression on the political left.

The RSC aims to bring together members of existing organizations, collectives, groups, coworkers, individuals, and all who want to engage and exchange with others who align with a revolutionary socialist outlook or are moving in the direction towards revolutionary socialist politics, activism, and organization. Another intention of the conference is to create the groundwork for facilitating communication, coordinating action, and establishing methods of collaboration between groups and individuals across the country and beyond borders.

Spend enough time in America’s biggest little city with over one-thousand Libertarians and you’ll start to understand why Johnny Cash shot a man in Reno just to watch him die. However, that would be a violation of the non-aggression principle –– commonly known as “the NAP” to Libertarians, who will also debate the topic ad nauseam until you’ll want to take one yourself. Every two years, the members of America’s biggest little political party engage in the usual shenanigans that make it the third largest in the nation, albeit a distant third. This year’s convention was held at the notable Nugget Casino Resort and featured divided factions, drama, spirited debates and just plain spirits to decide the party’s future. After all, Libertarians know plenty about nuggets, whether they’re made of gold, weed or chicken.

Friday, June 3, 12noon-1pm, this on-line event requires advance registration

In January 2022, Intel announced plans to build the largest semiconductor chip manufacturing facility ever built in New Albany, Ohio. The initial investment of $20 billion is the largest single private-sector investment in Ohio history. This initial phase is expected to employ not only Intel staff but construction and service industry workers. This development raises questions over the lasting impacts this facility will have on Ohio. Where will these new employees come from and where will they live? What are the long-lasting impacts on our water and energy resources? What kinds of transportation infrastructure investments should we make to protect our quality of life? How will this affect Ohio’s economic future? This summer, CURA brings together industry experts, researchers, and government leaders for four online-only webinars to discuss these topics and more!

Panel discussion members

• Robert Vogt, Real Estate Market Analyst at VSI