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Free Geek E-waste posses TOXIC DUST to Portland neighborhood!

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 03:02:49 +0000

Free Geek Recycles and destroys thousands of PC’s a Year……are they exposing the volunteers to toxic dust?

Prison computer recycling put staff, inmates at risk, NIOSH finds

Federal prisoners and staff overseers were exposed for years to excessive levels of toxic heavy metals during computer recycling operations.

By Rutrell Yasin
Jan 22, 2010

Federal prisoners and staff overseers were exposed for years to excessive levels of toxic heavy metals during computer recycling operations, according to a report from the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health.

A lack of biological monitoring and industrial hygiene data inside the prisons, however, prevented NIOSH from documenting any health problems from these illegal levels of exposure.

The NIOSH report was submitted to the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General in December as part of a systemwide review of all the federal prison recycling centers.

The report covered conditions at federal prisons in Atwater, Calif.; Elkton, Ohio; Texarkana, Texas; and Marianna, Fla., between 1997 and 2003. NIOSH investigators visited the facilities from 2008 through 2009.

NIOSH found that prison staff and inmates had been exposed to illegally high levels of toxins for years at all of the facilities it inspected, except the one at Marianna.

The recycling operations involved prisoners breaking up computer components, often with hammers, at for-profit prison industries. NIOSH concluded that, for years, these recycling operations lacked adequate containment to prevent workers from being coated with dangerous amounts of lead, cadmium and other heavy metals inside the hardware.

“Computer components came into loading bays, they were handed to crews of inmates who broke them up with hammers and the only containment was a cardboard box,” said Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), a service organization that focuses on employee-related environmental issues.

“It was difficult for NIOSH to document harm to individuals based on absence of any data,” Ruch said. His group has assisted the Bureau of Prisons employee, Leroy Smith, who exposed the hazard. The Justice IG review was prompted by complaints filed by Smith in 2004.

The NIOSH report concluded that managers failed to:

Conduct adequate planning and job hazard analysis before initiating electronics recycling operations.
Identify potential health hazard in a timely manner and, as a result, adequate hazard controls were not established for several years at some prison facilities.
Provide any training, guidance or oversight to address health hazards associated with electronics recycling to staff and inmate workers.

According to the NIOSH report, it appears that Smith’s disclosures have led to new hazard-reduction practices.

PEER officials hope that those responsible for the hazardous working conditions will be held accountable.

“When the Justice Department IG finally completes its investigation, we hope that it names the particular federal managers responsible for these dangerous conditions and recommends appropriate disciplinary action,” Ruch said.

Broken or outdated monitors, video game systems and keyboards may contain lead, mercury, and other toxic materials that could harm people and contaminate soil and water.

This is why I ask? WHY HAS DEQ NOT TESTED LEAD MERCURY AND OTHER TOXIC levels around the FREE GEEK facility! Where is OSHA?

Does a non profit not have to prove it is not a hazzard to the community like a for profit business?

When most people think of recycling, they picture green bins full of glass, newspapers and plastic milk jugs set out on the sidewalk for trash day. But old electronics devices also contain valuable materials that can be reclaimed–along with poisonous substances that should be kept away from people and out of the environment.

Toxic TVs

As technology advances, consumers want the latest and greatest electronics. As a result, more and more e-waste is generated every year. Hazardous materials are contained inside most consumer electronics, including:

Computer CPUs and monitors
Keyboards
Power supplies
Speakers
TVs
DVD and VHS players
Cellphones
Video game systems
Printers
Telephones
Microwave ovens
Toasters
Pagers
Surge Protectors
Fax Machines

Color cathode ray tubes (CRTs), found in older TVs and computer monitors, contain several pounds of lead. The poisonous metal mercury is used in circuit boards. Other toxic materials found in electronics include chromium, cadmium, zinc, and brominated flame retardants.

What Happens to Old Electronics?

In 2005, the EPA estimated that:

45% of consumer electronics are stored or reused;
44% are sent to landfills or incinerators; and
11% are recycled.

When old electronics get thrown into the trash, the poisons inside them can leach into soil and groundwater through a landfill or be vaporized in an incinerator (see Turning Trash into Electricity). These contaminants damage human and animal nervous systems, and some are known to cause cancer.

Melquist Launches MelquistReport.com

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 04:59:55 +0000

In an effort to expose the crimes of our revolutionary friends at Free Geek and beyond. Troy Melquist has launched a copy of the Drudgereport with daily briefings on the national political climate.

CLICK TO VISIT

IWW hires elderly to protest as Union heads stay home!

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 18:07:11 +0000

ALBANY — As Circuit City Stores Inc. Tuesday projected it will post a first-quarter loss of as much as $90 million, it wasn’t getting much sympathy from protesters in front of its local store.

They were members of the Industrial Workers of the World union, and on Tuesday they were protesting Circuit’s firing of 3,400 employees around the country. The company had dismissed the higher-paid workers in March, replacing them with lower-paid new hires as part of a cost-cutting plan.

“It’s the most incredibly outrageous act by a corporation today,” said Paul Poulos of Hartwick, who was passing out fliers that read “Boycott Circuit City.”

Circuit City has offered to hire back the workers after a 10-week “cooling-off” period, but at reduced pay.

“It’s an unprecedented way to trim costs,” said Greg Giorgio, an OTB channel announcer from Altamont who also produces a labor show on WRPI. He held up a sign that said “Circuit City — Ultimate Corporate Greed.”

The manager of the Crossgates Commons store declined to comment, except to say that the protesters — standing on the sidewalk in front of the store — were not on store property. A spokesman at the Richmond, Va.-based company also declined to comment.

Circuit City officials say the layoffs were part of the company’s attempt to save money in light of worse-than-expected earnings due to poor sales of large-screen televisions.

It now expects a loss from continuing operations before income taxes of $80 million to $90 million for the first quarter of its 2008 fiscal year. The company has also said it is closing seven domestic stores, a Kentucky distribution center and 62 company-owned stores.

Circuit City has long struggled for market share against Best Buy Co., and analysts have said each of Best Buy’s locations bring in about twice as much revenue as its smaller rival. Both have seen fierce competition from Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

In a research note Monday, analysts at Stifel, Nicolaus & Co. said Best Buy, the nation’s No. 1 electronics retailer, has “significant competitive advantages” and is “well positioned to take business from both Circuit City’s operational changes and closed Tweeter and CompUSA stores.”

Tweeter Home Entertainment Group Inc. said last month that it is closing 49 of its 153 stores and laying off about 650 workers.

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IWW Thugs Terrorize 8 Star Bucks in Texas!

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 17:59:34 +0000

Steamed Baristas Shut Down Fort Worth Starbucks Drive-Thru, Demand Affordable Healthcare and Paid Sick Days for those with H1N1

Submitted by Anonymous on Fri, 12/18/2009 – 12:17pm.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
IWW Starbucks Workers Union (Industrial Workers of the World)
Contact: Michele Cahill, 817-368-5892

December 18, 2009

Steamed Baristas Shut Down Fort Worth Starbucks Drive-Thru to Demand Affordable Healthcare and Paid Sick Days for those Diagnosed with H1N1

Press Conference: December 18, 12:00 noon, 8th and W. Rosedale Starbucks, Fort Worth

Fort Worth, TX- Baristas and community supporters at the 8th and Rosedale Starbucks shut down the store’s drive-thru this morning and delivered a list of demands including affordable health care options and sick days for those displaying H1N1 or other cold and flu symptoms. Starbucks doubled the cost of the company health insurance plan in September, leaving many workers unable to afford treatment because of sky-high deductibles and premiums.

“We’ve had enough. Baristas should not be forced to expose customers to H1N1 or other contagions and stay sick longer, just in order to be able to make the money they need to support their families and pay astronomical health care costs. We’re making $7.30/hr., that’s a nickel above minimum wage,” said IWW Barista Michelle Cahill.

The protesting baristas are members of the Starbucks Workers Union, which is an international campaign of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) labor union. The store action makes the 8th and Rosedale location the first Starbucks in Texas to have a public union presence.

Baristas decided to move toward unionization after many workers were forced to continue working while displaying intense H1N1 and other flu symptoms, enhancing the likelihood of spreading the flu virus. The baristas are demanding that those who display H1N1 or other cold and flu symptoms be excused from work with pay to avoid exposing customers to Swine Flu.

Casey Keeling, another union barista at the store, said, “Watching our coworkers be forced to serve customers while they were sick with H1N1 was the last straw. Something needs to change- in our workplace and in this country. We have decided to form a union to fight for affordable health insurance, paid sick days, a fair wage, and secure work hours. And they could at least give us a first aid kit for the store.”

While portraying itself as a ‘socially-responsible’ employer, all of Starbucks’ retail hourly workers in the U.S. are part-time employees with no guaranteed number of work hours per week. According to Starbucks figures released to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 40.9% of its employees (including managers) are covered by the company health care package, a lower percentage than the oft-criticized Wal-Mart, which insures 47% of its workforce.

Since the launch of the IWW campaign at Starbucks on May 17, 2004, the company has been cited multiple times for illegal union-busting by the National Labor Relations Board. The company settled numerous complaints against it and a judge’s guilty verdict on more than 30 additional rights’ violations was recently upheld on appeal by the Board in D.C. Starbucks’ large anti-union operation is headed by CEO Howard Schultz and operated in conjunction with the Akin Gump law firm and the Edelman public relations firm.

The IWW Starbucks Workers Union is a grassroots organization of over 300 current and former employees at the world’s largest coffee chain united for secure work hours and a living wage. The union has members throughout the United States and Canada fighting for systemic change at the company and remedying individual grievances with management.

Union baristas, bussers, and shift supervisors have fought successfully toward improved scheduling and staffing levels, increased wages, and workplace safety. Workers who join the union have immediate access to co-workers and members of the community who will struggle with them for a better life on the job.

###

www.StarbucksUnion.org

Free Geek Donations given to business not Needy!

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 20:42:45 +0000

Oregon Non Profit takes donations from business and secretly gives them away to other business and not the needy!

Free Geek of Portland Oregon is chartered as a non profit business to grant computers to schools & charitable organizations in our community who in turn benefit others. Free Geek accepts computers and computer related hardware in any condition. They ask you to bring your stuff over regardless of whether it is functional or not. Free Geek proudly participates in the Oregon E-Cycles program which offers free and convenient recycling of computers, monitors, and televisions for all Oregonians.

Free Geek has traditional called upon the business community of Portland for both Hardware and cash donations. As a non profit, Free Geek always is looking for ways to make ends meet. They have recieved grants from several foundations and cash from the tax payers of Oregon!

What Free Geek fails to inform anyone is apparently, if your a for profit business in need of computers and a friend of Free Geek, you can get an office full of computers refurbished from the donations of other for profit business firms!

We uncovered a coffee shop called Red and Black in Portland Oregon which recieved free computers from Free Geek to support its business operations! The Red and Black Coffee shop thanked Free Geek for the Free Stuff! The Red and Black website says the following:

“www.freegeek.org
A collectively-run non-profit that recycles and refurbishes computers and electronics. Free Geek provided our office equipment and the free computers in the dining room! Thank you, Free Geek!”

We called Free Geek on Feb 5th, 2010 and asked for free office equipment and computers for our website business. The person answering the phone named Richard said, “We do not give grants to Business unless you are a non profit.”

We uncovered the following:

1. Free Geek is a IWW Union Shop ran by Richard Seymour – Head of the IWW collective at Free Geek.

2. Red and Black Coffee shop is also a IWW collective business.

3. The computers and Office equipment were given to Red and Black to support the IWW and the shop!

4. This donation was a breach of the NON PROFIT entity status of Free Geek mission as a Non Profit.

Why do we care?

For one, it is fraud! No business gives donations to a Non Profit if they were told the donations are going to other business that may compete with you! It is fraud to be a Non Profit and wrongfully give away the donated hardware, cash, and other office furniture to organizations that are not part of your Non Profit status statement!

I highly doubt that anyone will be giving to Free Geek when this type of activity is uncovered!

Anwar al-Awlaki, to attack U.S. before Spring

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 08:03:02 +0000

BY James Gordon Meek
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU

Thursday, February 4th 2010, 12:08 AM
WASHINGTON – Counterterror chiefs fear Al Qaeda in Yemen may soon be sending American jihadis recruited by a radical cleric to attack the U.S., the Daily News has learned.

America’s most senior intelligence officials told senators on Tuesday an attempted strike by terrorists within six months is “certain.”

“There was nothing specific any of them were alluding to,” a senior counterterror official told The News. “But we certainly have indications that Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has a variety of plans to strike the United States.”

Anyone who thinks underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was “the only one trained to execute a plan would be incredibly naive,” the official said.

Radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni-American, is now on a targeting list signed off on by the Obama administration, The News has confirmed.

Asked by Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.) Wednesday about the “hypothetical” targeted killing of an American “cleric” overseas, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair explained why they’d draw a bull’s-eye on someone like Awlaki.

“We don’t target people for free speech. We target them for taking action that threatens Americans,” Blair told the House Intelligence Committee.

“If we think direct action will involve killing an American, we get specific permission to do that,” Blair added.

Awlaki befriended several 9/11 hijackers while an imam at mosques in San Diego and Washington’s Virginia suburbs.

From Yemen, he traded e-mails with the Fort Hood mass killer, U.S. Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, and with Nigerian rich kid Abdulmutallab, whom he also likely met with, according to the sources.

“We don’t know how many additional Americans he’s gotten to,” the senior official said of Awlaki, who escaped a Dec. 24 U.S. air strike aimed at Al Qaeda in Arabia leaders.

Awlaki told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that Abdulmutallab was his “student” but he didn’t give him a fatwa – a religious order – to bomb a U.S.-bound jetliner. He did allow that he’s looking over his shoulder due to his unapologetic ties to the other killers.

Special operations units are actively targeting Al Qaeda leaders in Yemen with air strikes, but a source insisted they’re not conducting any ground raids yet.

Meanwhile, three U.S. troops were killed and two wounded by a bomb in the lower Dir Valley of Pakistan, officials said. They were the first known U.S. military fatalities in the lawless region near the Afghan border.

U.S. Central Command said the troops were part of a training mission. Dir is due south of Chitral, where many sources have pinpointed the CIA’s hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

A military spokesman said U.S. special operations forces have been part of a program to train Pakistan’s tribal Frontier Corps.

jmeek@nydailynews.com

Free Geek Listed As IWW Collective!

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 05:11:13 +0000

The Website RED AND BLACK list Free Geek as IWW workers Collectives. Here is the Cut n Paste listing the ANARCHO Business groups Free Geek gives free stuff too! Free Geek Donations of hardware are frittered out to the ANARCHO groups under the arm of the IWW!

PDF copy here. The website proclaims this to Free Geek: PDF copies are provided as Proof since IWW teams routinely browse this site and remove incriminating links.

This group proudly flies the IWW Logo!

www.freegeek.org
A collectively-run non-profit that recycles and refurbishes computers and electronics. Free Geek provided our office equipment and the free computers in the dining room! Thank you, Free Geek

Has Free Geek gave your business free computers? Probally not! But they do live on donations. I wonder if any coffee shops in competition to RED AND BLACK gave free geek money or hardware? That would be a very sticky point…..give Free Geek money or hardware from your Coffee shop and then find it given to your competitor for free! NICE JOB FREE GEEK!

Worker Collectives

Free Geek
www.freegeek.org
A collectively-run non-profit that recycles and refurbishes computers and electronics. Free Geek provided our office equipment and the free computers in the dining room! Thank you, Free Geek!

People’s Co-op
www.peoples.coop
An all-vegetarian, member-owned, collectively-managed grocery store. People’s also hosts a great year-round farmer’s market every Wednesday!

Magpie Messenger Collective
www.magpiemessenger.com
Portland’s collectively-run bike messenger service.

Stumptown Printers
www.stumptownprinters.com
Portland’s collectively-run print shop.

A Better Cycle
www.abettercycle.blogspot.com
A worker-owned bike shop in Southeast Portland.

Muddy Waters
www.muddywatersportland.com
A newly non-profit, worker-run coffee shop in Southeast Portland.

Northstar Infoshop
www.northstarinfoshop.org
A worker-owned bookstore opening in Portland in the summer of 2010! A small selection of Northstar’s books is available for sale at the Red & Black Cafe.

IWW UNION THUGS RUIN STARBUCKS STORE

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 01:21:32 +0000

Starbucks spars over union [Seattle PI]

Submitted by SWU on Tue, 02/17/2009 – 2:06pm.

Drives to organize build to tense legal disputes

By ANDREA JAMES
P-I REPORTER

The scene: An off-duty Starbucks barista lounges at the East Ninth Street store in Manhattan, wearing a union button. A customer, who happens to be a manager at another Starbucks store, enters to buy a drink, sees the button and asks about it.

The dialogue grows hot. Starbucks employees don’t need a union because they get health benefits, a 401(k) plan and stock options, the manager says.

Things then start “to happen really fast and get really loud,” the barista recounts at a trial. “He was in my face, and basically we started having an argument. He got into my face and raised his hands up.”

The barista tells the manager, “You can go f*** yourself, if you want to f*** me up, go ahead, I’m here.”

This drama is part of an 88-page ruling that illustrates the ongoing tension between Starbucks Corp. and the Starbucks Workers Union.

In December, a National Labor Relations Board judge ruled that Seattle-based Starbucks Corp. violated federal labor law by trying to stop union organizing at four Manhattan cafes. Starbucks is appealing the decision.

That trial, which took place between July and October 2007, produced a decision that reads at times like a reality-TV script, revealing Starbucks baristas and managers yelling at each other, mishandling blenders and cursing.

Union sparring at Starbucks cafes? It wasn’t supposed to be that way.
Both sides

In the 1980s, Starbucks unionized before Howard Schultz took over as chief executive officer in 1987. He gave baristas health care plus a share of the profit. When the AIDS epidemic was at its height, Starbucks paid for terminal illness care for employees for 29 months until the government took over.

By 1992, the company was union-free.

“I was convinced that under my leadership, employees would come to realize that I would listen to their concerns,” Schultz wrote of that time in his book “Pour Your Heart Into It.” “If they had faith in me and my motives, they wouldn’t need a union.”

To this day, the company prides itself on its treatment of workers — baristas receive the same health benefits as headquarters employees with business degrees.

So how is it that a perceived latte-sipping lefty company finds itself in legal disputes with union employees around the country? In recent months, Starbucks has tussled with the Starbucks Workers Union in cases in three states: New York, Michigan and Minnesota. The company has settled three unfair labor practice complaints.

The union says that the Starbucks reality has never been as shiny as its image.

“It’s always been a difficult place for baristas to make ends meet at Starbucks with the insecure work hours and low wages,” said Daniel Gross, a founder of the union organizing efforts who was fired in 2006. (A judge found his termination was unfair.) “The American people were deceived by Starbucks and Howard Schultz.”

Starbucks counters that it treats employees well, that a union wouldn’t necessarily do things better and that union participants make up a tiny portion of a 170,000-”partner” company.

“Starbucks is a pro-partner organization,” said Jim McDermet, senior vice president for Starbucks’ Northeast Atlantic Division. “We really view ourselves as listening to our people and creating an environment where our partners can communicate directly to us.”

Progressive activist Kim Fellner, author of the 2008 book “Wrestling with Starbucks,” said “the truth is somewhere in between.” In her book, she noted that Starbucks treats workers better than many other restaurant companies do and spends substantially on environmental sustainability. She gave the corporation a stamp of “above average.”

Hard economic times will make Starbucks more susceptible to union organizing, said Joseph Michelli, author of “The Starbucks Experience.”

“They’ve really been an amazing company in the way they treated employees,” said Michelli, who studied the company for two years.
Nontraditional union

The Starbucks Workers Union is part of the Wobblies, the nickname for the Industrial Workers of the World union. The IWW doesn’t operate like traditional unions, which focus on contract negotiations and formal bargaining. Instead, it focuses on what it calls “direct action” to win gains for workers.

The IWW says it is anti-capitalist and pro-worker. According to its constitution, “The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. … Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the means of production, abolish the wage system, and live in harmony with the Earth.”

Since Starbucks employees began organizing with the group in 2004, that struggle has played out on company turf.

In April 2006, the IWW started a “nutritional initiative” and hired scientists to assess the dietary value of menu items. In June 2006, the union issued a news release on nutrition that generated worldwide publicity.

“The model we’re using is quite different than the mainstream model; it’s a model called solidarity unionism,” Gross explained.

When union member Anna Hurst, a single mother from the Bronx, suffered heat stroke on the job in August 2008, her store manager took her off the schedule for two weeks.

“Anna brought this to the union, and we discussed it as co-workers and began to carry out our action plan,” Gross said.

A dozen baristas and supporters marched in during peak hours to hand a written demand to the manager that Hurst be compensated for the two weeks she was not permitted to work. The union also leafleted customers and picketed on New Year’s Eve.

At the 2007 trial in New York, Starbucks testified that union demonstrations have intimidated customers and employees. The IWW supporters “at times engaged in conduct such as spitting at managers, name calling, various acts of vandalism and blocking access to the stores. In addition, the leaflets distributed by the IWW frequently contained the phone numbers of managerial personnel,” court documents say.

The union denies allegations of spitting and vandalism.

The documents don’t paint Starbucks as innocent — the company developed a national response to the union, collected information on what unionized workers did in their spare time and kept a list of which employees were union sympathizers.

The company transferred employees it labeled as “pro-Starbucks” (least likely to join the union) to keep stores from being too heavily weighted toward the union, court documents say.

The IWW has “learned what Howard Schultz dreads, which is when you use Starbucks’ name, you get a kind of instant publicity effect,” Fellner said.

“I personally think that we progressives would be better served by targeting those corporations that have a much more negative impact on our communities and the global economy. You know, Wal-Mart does spring to mind,” she said.

But Fellner also said Schultz’s pro-partner mantra comes across as benevolently paternalistic.

“It’s a problem because it means that whoever runs the company believes they know what’s better for their workers than their workers,” she said.

Starbucks says it surveys workers to gather their views.
Anti-union?

A 1999 attempt to unionize Starbucks roasting-plant workers in Kent led to a two-year struggle for a contract.

“They were doing union busting,” said John Thompson, current president of International Union of Operating Engineers local 286. “All of the HR department that was hiring, their questions were, ‘Have you ever belonged to a union, has any of your family members belonged to a union, or has any of your friends belonged to a union?’ If you said yes to you or your family, at any time, you were never even considered for employment.”

That bargaining unit dissolved. Thompson said Starbucks was the “worst employer we ever had. They basically did anything and everything in their power to keep the unions out.

“We haven’t gone back after them.”

In fact, no union besides the IWW has tried to organize Starbucks in the U.S. in recent years, the company says. The IWW Starbucks union says it has some 300 members.

Gross, 29, began working for Starbucks in 2003 and had been involved with the IWW before.

He said that he did not choose to work at Starbucks just so he could organize it. Variable work hours are one of the union’s major points of contention, Gross said. An employee must work 20 or more hours per week to be eligible for health coverage at Starbucks. Seventy-one percent of Starbucks employees are eligible, and 65 percent of those in the U.S. take advantage, the company said Thursday.

Starbucks uses an automated scheduling system, where employees indicate which hours they are available. Someone who wants full-time work of more than 32 hours weekly must be open to work at least 70 percent of a store’s operating hours.

“Starbucks can schedule you on any day, at any time within those hours,” Gross said. “How are you supposed to get a second job or plan for child care if you have to be available 80.5 hours?”
Union in a big way

Employees tend to care most about respect and dignity — and they tend to unionize when they’re not getting it, said Mark Theodore, a Los Angeles-based labor law partner at Proskauer Rose LLP.

“It’s rarely about the money,” Theodore said. “It’s usually about giving a person a voice in the workplace. Most people decide for themselves whether they are treated the right way or not.”

Unions, which have diminished in relevance for years, are about to become a lot more relevant, experts say. President Barack Obama won major endorsement from the nation’s labor unions, and he appointed union-sympathetic Hilda Solis as labor secretary.

She supports an Employee Free Choice Act, which would eliminate private ballot voting and make union organizing easier.

“We’re about to go union in a huge way in this country,” said Clarence Belnavis, managing partner at the Northwest office of the national labor and employment law firm Fisher & Phillips LLP.

And Starbucks, with centralized management rather than franchisees, is an easy target, he said.

“Name me one state where there’s not a Starbucks. Wouldn’t you want to be the union handling those issues?” Belnavis said.

“Wouldn’t you want to be the entity in there? They’re everywhere.”

P-I reporter Andrea James can be reached at 206-448-8124 or andreajames@seattlepi.com.

See Starbucks Union here

FREE GEEK FOUND TO BE FRONT GROUP FOR RADICAL UNION

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 23:31:09 +0000

The organization Free Geek has been found by myself to be a front group for the radical union IWW! How can I make this claim?

Proof:

1. Radical IWW BOSS Richard Seymour – Former Delegate to the IWW – Leader of the IWW union in Portland and general IWW organizer is listed as the “REGISTERED AGENT OF FREE GEEK.”

See State Doc: Here

A Union BOSS of the IWW is actually incorporator of a NON PROFIT.

We at Troy Melquist dot com has sent a letter to the IRS asking them to review the NON PROFIT status of Free Geek. We believe that it is illegal to register a NON PROFIT and incorporate the same with the benefit of installing your UNION into the organization to profit from the Dues by means of donations!

This is another ACORN folks!

See Letter to IRS:

To Whom this May Concern:

I, Troy Melquist, hereby request that you review the following NON PROFIT business for breaking the rules and regulations of NON PROFIT status:

Official name and address: Free Geek, Inc.; 1731 SE 10th Av; Portland, OR 97214

503.232.9350

TIN or EIN or Federal ID Number or Tax ID Number or Employers ID Number (or whatever you want to call it): 93-1292010

Oregon Business Registry Number: 747743-82

My investigations have brought to my attention the following:

1. Illegally transfering NON POFIT assets and services to other entities to avoid taxation.

2. Providing communication, promotion, and general administrative activities to un registered business and UNION organizations in an attempt to hide income.

3. Illegally breaking election laws by acting as a PAC for various radical movements including the ANARCHO candidates running for election in the state of Oregon.

Please find the documents I provide at troymelquist.com as further investigative information.

Sincerely Troy Melquist

Al Qaeda to use Breast Implants for Suicide Bombers!

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 10:07:14 +0000

Editor’s Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.

LONDON – Agents for Britain’s MI5 intelligence service have discovered that Muslim doctors trained at some of Britain’s leading teaching hospitals have returned to their own countries to fit surgical implants filled with explosives, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.

Women suicide bombers recruited by al-Qaida are known to have had the explosives inserted in their breasts under techniques similar to breast enhancing surgery. The lethal explosives – usually PETN (pentaerythritol Tetrabitrate) – are inserted during the operation inside the plastic shapes. The breast is then sewn up.

Similar surgery has been performed on male suicide bombers. In their cases, the explosives are inserted in the appendix area or in a buttock. Both are parts of the body that diabetics use to inject themselves with their prescribed drugs.

The discovery of these methods was made after the London-educated Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab came close to blowing up an airliner on Christmas Day with explosives he had stuffed inside his underpants.

Keep in touch with the most important breaking news stories about critical developments around the globe with Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence news source edited and published by the founder of WND.

Hours after he had failed, GCHQ – Britain’s worldwide eavesdropping “spy in the sky” agency – began to pick up “chatter” emanating from Pakistan and Yemen that alerted MI5 to the creation of the lethal implants.

A hand-picked team was appointed by Jonathan Evans, the head of MI5, to investigate the threat. He described it as “one that can circumvent our defense.”

Top surgeons who work in the National Health Service confirmed the feasibility of the explosive implants.

In a report to Evans, one said:

“Properly inserted the implant would be virtually impossible to detect by the usual airport scanning machines. You would need to subject a suspect to a sophisticated X-ray. Given that the explosive would be inserted in a sealed plastic sachet, and would be a small amount, would make it all the more impossible to spot it with the usual body scanner.”

Explosive experts at Britain’s Porton Down biological and chemical warfare research center told MI5 that a sachet containing as little as five ounces of PETN when activated would blow “a considerable hole” in an airline’s skin which would guarantee it would crash.