Protest Against Plant Closures, New York, 1983 -- Daily LIFT #181

Protest Against Plant Closures, New York, 1983 -- Daily LIFT #181

Fidel Castro Grabs a Dog at the Bronx Zoo, April 1959 -- Daily LIFT #170

Fidel Castro Grabs a Dog at the Bronx Zoo, April 1959 -- Daily LIFT #170

Che addresses the UN General Assembly, December, 1964 -- Che Photo #19

Che addresses the UN General Assembly, December, 1964 -- Che Photo #19

A photo from when Che gave his famous speech to the  19th General Assembly in New York. Che denounced American imperialism and lies and length and quoted from the anti-imperialist Second Declaration of Havana.

It is also remembered for such trenchant moments as when Che said:

The United States intervenes in Latin America invoking the defense of free institutions. The time will come when this Assembly will acquire greater maturity and demand of the U.S. Government guarantees for the life of the blacks and Latin Americans who live in that country, most of them U.S. citizens by origin or adoption.

Those who kill their own children and discriminate daily against them because of the color of their skin; those who let the murderers of blacks remain free, protecting them, and furthermore punishing the black population because they demand their legitimate rights as free men — how can those who do this consider themselves guardians of freedom? We understand that today the Assembly is not in a position to ask for explanations of these acts. It must be clearly established, however, that the government of the United States is not the champion of freedom, but rather the perpetrator of exploitation and oppression against the peoples of the world and against a large part of its own population.

From a collection of Soviet archival photos of Che. The Left Chapter will be doing a daily series of these often unusual Che photos from this archive over the month of February -- some with quotes and history.

Our Real Enemy: US Corporations - Vietnam Veterans Against the War, NYC 1972 - Daily LIFT #109

Our Real Enemy: US Corporations - Vietnam Veterans Against the War, NYC 1972 - Daily LIFT #109

A contingent of  Vietnam Veterans Against the War leads an anti-war march in Times Square, New York City, 1972. One of the banners behind them reads "Our Real Enemy: US Corporations"

Money For Jobs Not For War! - New York, 1983 -- Daily LIFT #107

Money For Jobs Not For War! - New York, 1983 -- Daily LIFT #107

Protesting warships and American military exercises in Central America, New York City Harbor, 1983

Women's Strike for Peace and Equality, New York City, August, 1970 -- Daily LIFT# 85

Women's Strike for Peace and Equality, New York City, August, 1970 -- Daily LIFT# 85

Over 50,000 women marched in New York on August 26, 1970 in opposition to the imperialist war in Vietnam and for equality rights in the United States.

Women's Strike for Equality March, New York, August 1970 -- Daily LIFT #82

Women's Strike for Equality March, New York, August 1970 -- Daily LIFT #82

Karl Marx: Correspondent for "The New York Tribune"

Vintage Leftist Leaflet Project

Leaflet: Karl Marx: Correspondent for "The New York Tribune", Soviet Life 1983

Written by Soviet historian Nelly Rumyantseva for the English language magazine Soviet Life in 1983 this is an interesting overview of Marx and Engels' time as correspondents for the New York Tribune between 1851 - 62. "During that period he and Engels wrote a total of about 500 articles, or an average of 50 articles a year -- something like one a week."

While the relationship began well, and helped Marx get some much needed money, over time it soured with the Tribune publishing much of his later work unattributed or declining to publish pieces altogether.

Rumyantseva also compiled "Marx and Engels on the United States" which was published in English in 1979.

(Click on scans to enlarge)

The policing of fare evasion reveals the twisted agenda of our politicians

What do you do in a city that is beset by terrible housing, social and transit issues due to decades of mismanagement and underfunding by politicians on all different levels of government?

Well, in Toronto you propose a police budget for 2020 that is going to top $1 billion and that will see the hiring of hundreds of new officers. This represents a 3.9% increase over 2019. While the police claim these new cops are needed they always say this, of course, and these are funds that could be put to much better use in meeting essential human needs.

Meanwhile in Kansas City, Missouri lawmakers unanimously voted to make public transit fare free in a visionary step that makes it the first major city in North America to do so. This led Matt Haugen, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America environmental steering committee, to tweet "Now let's do this everywhere".

How are policing and free transit related?

They are closely related as when transit is not free transit riders are invariably subject to policing that is not simply aimed at keeping the system supposedly safe but at catching alleged "fare evaders".  In some cities this is done by departments of the regular police and in others by special police forces dedicated to transit or fare evasion.

Needless to say fare policing ends up reflecting the biases and systemic issues that are seen throughout policing generally. With transit these can be even more greatly pronounced given that transit riders are more likely to be young or to come from racialized, marginalized or working class communities that are already unduly targeted and harassed by law enforcement.

Sometimes the outcomes can be egregious as in the scandal unfolding now in New York City where a police commander is alleged to have specifically instructed officers to target transit users who were black or Latino.

While this is a particularly heinous example it is just at the more extreme end of daily practice. In New York where hundreds of officers have been added to "police" the subway system it has resulted in:

...a wave of overpolicing and violent policing, chronicled in bystander videos that show NYPD officers arresting a woman who makes her livelihood selling churros in a subway station, officers chasing a teenager who hopped a turnstile and then drawing their weapons on him in a crowded subway car, and officers beating teenagers. 

There is also the question of why fare evasion on transit systems is often treated so much more harshly than, say, illegal parking by car drivers.

 In Toronto, for example: 

If you hop aboard a Toronto public transit vehicle without paying the requisite $3.25, transit enforcement officers could ding you with a $425 fine.
Drivers, on the other hand, would get a measly $30 ticket for parking in a Green P spot without paying for it.
It's ludicrous when you think about it, and a lot of people are in fact thinking about it right now.

Car drivers also don't have to generally deal with a confrontational wanna-be-cop. They normally simply return eventually to find the ticket. Selective enforcement is made much harder as well given that unlike fare police, traffic enforcement officers will in most cases have no way of knowing the racial, cultural or socio-economic background of the specific driver (though some neighbourhoods can be targeted more than others).

The other fact that politicians hate to talk about is that fare policing is not free. Far from it. In fact tens of millions of dollars will be spent to make the lives of all transit riders more miserable to catch the very small percentage (in Toronto an estimated 5% of riders at the most even if you believe the likely highly inflated speculative estimates) of actual evaders.

The absurdity of spending large sums on policing fares was never more clearly shown than with the Kafkaesque reality that in New York at one point the plan was that the "MTA Will Spend $249M On New Cops to Save $200M on Fare Evasion".

This led Vaidya Gullapalli to note in The Appeal:

The rapid deployment of hundreds of officers at the cost of tens of millions of dollars each year has also raised questions about why the state and city could not find the money to more fully fund a program meant to make subway rides affordable for people living below the poverty line. Fair Fares, a program that anti-poverty advocates pushed for and the City Council passed to make fares half-price for people living in poverty, was rolled out this year. But only 30,000 of 800,000 people who live in poverty are eligible, and the program only received funding for its first six months.

The reality is that mainstream politicians as a rule greatly prefer the narratives around the alleged need for more cops and more enforcement as opposed to working towards fare free transit or investing in housing or poverty reduction strategies. They prefer them even if these efforts would have the same or comparable costs or even if the more progressive options would reduce social and budgetary costs in the long run.

They prefer the boot to the face.

As I have noted before in "The "fare evasion" narrative on the TTC is a total fraud. Here's why" most of the lines that politicians trot out around this are false and amount to the scapegoating of transit riders. Almost all projections of monetary "loss" due to fare evasion are based on myths and are basically wrong. Pretty much every dollar spent policing fare evasion would have been better spent elsewhere.

Of the many strong arguments for fare free transit -- including its importance in the fight against the climate emergency and for greater social equality -- the fact that it would eliminate this layer of policing, harassment and intimidation of transit users ranks right up there.

Imagine a trip on transit that was not simply fare free but where you knew there was no chance that some goon would get in your face about a $3.25 (or less) fare.

Kansas City is making this happen and other cities can and must too.   

"Porn = Violence Against Women": Feminist Anti-Pornography March, New York 1979 -- Daily LIFT #37

"Porn = Violence Against Women": Feminist Anti-Pornography March, New York 1979 

-- Daily LIFT #37

(The Daily LIFT - Leftist Image for Today - is a new The Left Chapter feature posting a daily photo, cartoon, artwork or other image related to leftist history or contemporary realty.)

Let there always be sunshine, children and peace: Youth Peace March New York, 1982 -- Daily LIFT #35

Let there always be sunshine, children and peace: 
Youth Peace March New York, 1982 

-- Daily LIFT #35

(The Daily LIFT - Leftist Image for Today - is a new The Left Chapter feature posting a daily photo, cartoon, artwork or other image related to leftist history or contemporary realty.)

"Harlem Says Slash the Military Budget", 1982 -- Daily LIFT #13

Peace Demonstration, Harlem, New York, Summer 1982

(The Daily LIFT - Leftist Image for Today - is a new The Left Chapter feature posting a daily photo, cartoon, artwork or other image related to leftist history or contemporary realty.)

The Skyscraper - Raymond Corder, Socialist poet, New York, 1921

The Skyscraper

Talk about beauty — Why, boy,  

That scene would fill a blooming sphinx with joy!

 All that steel frame-work bristling in the sun 

Is something we have done.

We are creators, man, 

We sweated, plugged, and built it, span by span 

And every rusty beam that skyward towers 

Is ours -- we built it -- it is ours! 

Sure, buddy, sure, I know 

The boss has got it now -- he'll have to go; 

When we form our Industrial Parliament --

We'll can him subsequent --

But, say, bo, watch them clouds,

 They seem to stand still while that eye-beam strouds 

Across the sky -- she's pretty, ain't she, son? 

That piece of work we've done. 

- Raymond Corder, Socialist poet, New York, 1921

Souvenir Folder of Thousand Islands N.Y. -- 1950 Style

Released in the late 1940's/early 1950's for the growing tourist trade visiting the area, the "Souvenir Folder of Thousand Islands N.Y." is a lovely little keepsake that unfolds to drop down a long row of connected full colour illustrations. The idea was that you were supposed to mail the whole packet to yourself or someone you wanted to share memories of your trip with -- you know, long before instant shares via cell phones and even before personal ownership of cameras (remember those) was widespread.

I am particularly fond of this illustrated folder as I find the small illustrations whimsical, evocative and very charming. I love the almost technicolor tones and the really atmospheric night scenes. I find they capture the essence of the place and time better in many respects than most photographs would.

So here is a trip back to the 1950 Thousand Islands as they should have looked!

Why is this man standing upright alone in a boat at night? Who knows?

My fave of the collection. Beautifully evocative. 

See also: 10 Vintage Toronto Postcard Streetscapes (and one bonus one of Port Credit!)

See also: 11 More Vintage Streetscape Postcards of Toronto, Etobicoke, Hamilton & Oakville