Advoken's Blog

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Retired labor union official, newspaper editor/reporter, and community worker. Also community activist.

Category: Democracy

  • Blind patriotism can lead to facism – A reprise

    David Newby, president emeritus of the Wisconsin AFL_CIO, ran across a blog of mine from September, 2016, and felt that even now, nine years later, what I wrote then is most apropos today. Anyway, judge for yourself. You may read that post by clicking here.

  • Hope in Our Bleak Times

    Yes, the world is in a horrifying mess, but I look back just in the past 92 years of my life to see we’ve been here before. 

  • We Can Make Wisconsin Progressive, Again … IF

    Rather than being content to sit back and cry in their beer over the 2016 election losses, some 200 or more activists gathered in Stevens Point on a cool summer weekend to see if they could fashion a way to restore Wisconsin to its former place as a beacon of progressivism. For the most part,…

  • Democracy for the Elites

    The signs are unmistakable: the United States is sliding more and more deeply into a caste system, not much unlike the Indian system that created a caste of “untouchables.” An untouchable was unlikely to ever climb out of the hole into which society placed him or her. Now, this blessed nation which became great during…

  • The Crime of Voter Suppression

    You know what’s a crime?  It’s when one group seeks to block other citizens from voting. Yet, that has been the goal of the Republican Party in the current election.  They’ve made no bones about setting up barrier after barrier to make it difficult for people to vote, particularly low-income persons and minorities. The most…

  • Censorship at the Checkout Counter

    Roundy’s Inc. has basically cornered the food market business in the Milwaukee area, as its Pick ‘n Save and Metro Market Stores have garnered more than half of the grocery business. It’s only natural then that the alternate weekly newspaper, Shepherd Express, which distributes its free weekly papers each Wednesday throughout the area, would find…

  • A Liberal’s Lament: Preaching to the Choir!

    Why is it that I have the impression that liberals are losing the battles?  Yet, I wonder:  How can that be when you analyze the polls about various issues and find the public as a rule favoring individually virtually every major progressive piece of legislation? Take the idea of taxing the wealthy and the corporations. …

  • A rightwing trend on NPR?

    As a regular donor to WUWM, I must say the NPR station’s decision to drop Alternative Radio is a sad one, indeed.   I’ve been told the hour long program which has been on WUWM at 8 p.m. Sunday nights was dropped as of last Sunday, May 2. Alternative Radio has been one of the few…

  • Lessons from Howard Zinn:

    Just 12 years ago this coming May, Howard Zinn spent two memorable days participating in Wisconsin Labor History Society events: our annual conference held in 1998 in Oshkosh and the Bay View Tragedy event a day later in Milwaukee. This marvelous man, whose life was spent using history to spur ordinary folks to recognize their…

  • Who REALLY Won in Massachusetts?

    Scott Brown, so full of glee that he joyously peddled his daughters as “available,” (though one apparently wasn’t), proclaimed his Massachusetts seat win was a “people’s victory.” Wrong! The winners were those who would do very little to really help ordinary folks, middle class working families and the struggling poor.  The winners were: The health…