[All photos by Anne C. Savage, special to Eclectablog] As lawmakers and other political movers and shakers in Michigan gathered together in the cozy warmth of Michigan’s State Capitol Building for Governor Snyder’s 2016 State of the State Address, over 500 protesters from around the state gathered in the frigid cold outside to demand substantive action by the state government […]

A shocking bit of terrific journalism by Bloomberg Business published this week shows just how far Walmart is willing to go to crush any chance for its employees – called “associates” – to unionize. The piece, titled “How Walmart Keeps an Eye on Its Massive Workforce”, reveals that they hired defense contractor Lockheed Martin to spy on their employees in […]

Photo by Anne C. Savage. “Great way to build a political movement. Those of you who defended the Netroots Nation takeover by #BlackLivesMatter need to explain this.” I’m on a number of private national listservs for progressive activists, bloggers, and organizers. This demand was thrown at those of us on one of them who defended the BLM protest at the […]

A group of 13 Greenpeace protesters are suspended from the St. Johns Bridge over the Willamette River leading to the Portland, Oregon harbor. The icebreaker MSV Fennica has been in the harbor for repairs and planned to return to Shell Oil’s artic drilling area. Oil drilling there cannot take place without the equipment being delivered by the Fennica. They are […]

Shoot ’em? Teana Walsh, an assistant Wayne County prosecutor posted this on her Facebook page after watching images of protesters and rioters in Baltimore following the homicide of Freddie Gray: So I am watching the news in Baltimore and see large swarms of people throwing bricks, etc at police who are fleeing from their assaults … 15 in the hospital […]

As Netroots Nation lands in Detroit, it does so during an unprecedented time in our country’s history. In an attempt to get over 90,000 water customers to pay upwards of $90 million in unpaid water bills. Over ten thousand Detroit residents have already had their water source eliminated in this draconian effort. Meanwhile, major businesses still have water flowing despite […]

Michigan anti-union Republicans: Solving non-existent problems since 2011 Photo credit: Anne C. Savage, special to Eclectablog During the 2011-2012 legislative session, House Republican Tom McMillin introduced House Bill 5024 which would impose $1,000/day fines on individuals engaging in illegal picketing in our state and $10,000/day fines for unions that sponsor or promote illegal picketing events. In other words, the picketing […]

He was depressed don’tchya know [Photo credit: RTAmerica | Wikimedia Commons] John Pike, the UC-Davis university police officer who painted a line of seated, subdued students participating in an Occupy protest received a workman’s compensation payment last week to the tune of $38,059. Apparently, he was depressed and suffering from anxiety after receiving death threats for his inhumane treatment of […]

Constituents send a message to the Tea Party loyalist: You’re in Washington to represent all of us. While U.S. Congressman Kerry Bentivolio and Speaker John Boehner hobnobbed with supporters at an undoubtedly pricey fundraiser at the Townsend Hotel in Birmingham on Friday, constituents from across Rep. Bentivolio’s district banded together outside. And they had plenty to say to their Congressman, […]

No, we are NOT letting this go

Tomorrow night is Michigan Governor Rick Snyder’s State of the State address. Given his track record over the past year, particularly in the past two months, there’s no reason why any of us should believe a word he says. He spent $144,000 to run a full page ad in the Wall Street Journal, bragging about crushing our labor unions by making Michigan the 24th Right to Work for Less state, something he claimed he was not interested in doing. He’s made it harder for Michigan women to obtain legal abortions. He’s raised taxes on over half of Michigan residents, hitting those hurting worst the hardest. He’s basically done everything possible to make Michigan hostile to workers and a low-wage Mecca for businesses with a little far-right conservative ideology thrown in for good measure.

Meanwhile, Republicans voted a known perpetrator of election fraud, Jase Bolger, as the Speaker of the House again.

If you are in the Lansing area tomorrow afternoon/evening, consider joining the AFL-CIO and others from around the state to protest what Governor Snyder and his drunk-with-power ideologically-driven Republican colleagues have done and continue to do to our state.

Details are after the jump.

Signs, signs, everywhere signs

This is a collage of photographs I took during the Vaginas Take Back the Capitol event last week.

Click on “Read Full Story” below to see an interactive image of the poster where you can zoom in on the image to see the signs better or download the large file to print.