Calendar
Register here for the February 21 XRUS Open House
xrus_chapter_engagement@
I don’t know how to do this, but I’m going to keep doing it anyway.
To Join Zoom Meeting https://us06web.zoom.us/j/
Meeting ID: 873 8882 4824
Passcode: 042428
Speaker: Amit Singh
Based on personal experiences during his two to three weeks stay in China with his partner and child, the speaker will put forward observations, stories and interesting encounters. The speaker will try to highlight contradictions in Chinese society, capital and state, and would focus upon the present state of the Chinese economy, education, health and other parameters. The talk will also dwell upon how to characterize China. Should China be characterized as capitalist/state-capitalist or market socialist (socialism with Chinese characteristics) or semi-peripheral or imperialist or semi-colonial or oppressed or oppressor? Should the emergence of China as a competitor of the US in many areas be seen as a great anti-imperialist development? Or, can it be argued that Chinese capitalist development will lead to inter-imperialist conflicts and wars throughout the world? How much power do the Chinese working class assert in China? Should the present Chinese model be followed by other countries? The speaker will also touch upon the state of productive forces, science and technology in China, and will also assess the Chinese military capabilities. During the whole talk, the speaker will aim to compare Chinese, Indian and the US development with the help of figures, tables and other visuals.
Dr. Amit Singh finished his Masters and PhD in Mechanics from University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, where he had been involved with anti-war and labor organizing efforts at Minneapolis. Currently, he is a faculty at IIT Bombay, India, where he is involved in the struggles around working class-caste issues including resistance against attack on freedom of expression, on academic freedom and attack on national minorities.
https://www.me.iitb.ac.in/
An immersive archival documentary that reanimates the clash between the then-emerging World Trade Organization (WTO) and the more than 40,000 people who took to the streets of Seattle to protest the WTO’s impact on human rights, labor, and the environment.
Want to chart the degraded trajectory of the U.S. power elite even further? Then grab a ticket to the mind-melting mash-up film HELLO DANKNESS, which takes surrealistic satirical aim at our present political calamity. Together, these films form a double-header charting the precipitous decline of the AmeriKKKan ruling class
To Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/
Meeting ID: 873 8882 4824
Passcode: 042428
• +1 646 931 3860 US
• +1 669 444 9171 US
Speaker: Roger Harris
On February 12, the imperialist newspaper Financial Times published the results of a poll claiming that 72% of respondents felt Venezuela was ‘moving in a positive direction’ after the kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on January 3rd. They also claimed that US-supported Maria Corina Machado enjoys commanding popularity over interim President Delcy Rodriguez, even though President Trump has admitted that Machado doesn’t have enough support or respect within Venezuela to lead the country.
The poll was commissioned by a senior adviser with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and was conducted by a USAID-aligned non-profit organization.
Roger Harris, a Venezuela solidarity activist and independent journalist, has just returned from Venezuela and will update us on current developments in Venezuela since January 3rd, as well as resistance to the US attack within Venezuela.
Roger Harris is on the board of the Task Force on the Americas and the secretariat of the US Peace Council. He is active in the Sanctions Kill campaign and the Nicaragua Solidarity Coalition. He is a founding member of the Venezuela Solidarity Network. His writings may be regularly found at Counterpunch, LA Progressive, Antiwar.com, and the Orinoco Tribune.
Israel and the United States have struck Iran. In the last hour, large clouds of smoke could be seen billowing from areas in central Tehran. The site of impact in the downtown area appeared to be in close proximity to Iranian government buildings. A US official confirmed that the United States is participating in the strikes, and that the US is coordinating with Israel in launching the attack.
The United States and its proxy military base of Israel are openly and brazenly attacking a sovereign nation’s capital. They are doing so in an attempt to ignite a regional war that would multiply the suffering of the Iranian people and the people of the wider region. The US and Israel continue to demonstrate that the real threats to the Middle East are Zionism and imperialism.
This escalation would not be possible without the military cargo being sent from the US to the Zionist entity. The only way to curb US imperialism worldwide is through a people’s arms embargo.
From the belly of the beast, we say: Hands off Iran, hands off our region! Arms embargo now!
Suds, Snacks, and Socialism
at the Starry Plough
The Global Struggle for
Women’s Rights
March is the month when we honor the history of approximately half the world’s population. On this day before International Women’s Day, our speakers will discuss some pioneers in women’s reproductive freedom in the U.S., and women’s movements in Ireland, Iran, and beyond.
Emer Martin – Award-winning Irish novelist; Co-founder of Saoirse Hurriya (Palestinian/Irish Solidarity Committee); member of Fremont Education Association
Negeene Mosaed – Founder, Berkeley Network for Palestine; member, Democratic Socialists of America; owner/operator, Berkeley Community Physical Therapy, a community clinic for the people of Berkeley
Marsha Feinland – Member, Peace and Freedom Party State Executive Committee, and California Teachers’ Association (retired); Former commissioner, Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board
*Organizations listed for identification purposes only.
Please help us celebrate our return to the Starry Plough by ordering food and/or drinks.
Please arrive early to place your order so that you do not miss any of the presentations.
An open discussion will follow the presentations.
We will be accepting donations which will be divided among the sponsoring organizations.
This event is sponsored by the Alameda County Peace and Freedom Party,
the Alameda County Green Party and Bay Area System Change Not Climate Change.
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Dr. Roger Bales, PhD, environmental engineer and climate scientist
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Kathleen Dowd, CNM, NP, MSN, nurse midwife and maternal-health leader
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Dr. Nina Hasen, PhD, Vice President of HIV and TB Programs at Population Services International
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Fred Lipschultz, PhD, senior climate scientist and expert in global warming research
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Devorah Lyn, co-chair of the Jewish Earth Alliance, mobilizing the Jewish community on climate change and ecological stewardship
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Dr. Ernest Moy, MD, MPH, previous Executive Director of the VHA Office of Health Equity
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Dr. Greg Spooner, PhD, physicist and nonviolent activist in climate justice movements
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Dr. Sharon Goldfarb, DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, clinician-scientist, nurse practitioner, and public health advocate
Email strike.debt.bay.area@gmail.com a few days beforehand for the online invite. All are welcome!
For our February, 2026 meeting we will be reading and discussing the first three chapters of A Paradise Built in Hell by Rebecca Solnit (Amazon) (Alibris). For our March meeting we will finish the book.
The most startling thing about disasters, according to award-winning author Rebecca Solnit, is not merely that so many people rise to the occasion, but that they do so with joy. That joy reveals an ordinarily unmet yearning for community, purposefulness, and meaningful work that disaster often provides. A Paradise Built in Hell is an investigation of the moments of altruism, resourcefulness, and generosity that arise amid disaster’s grief and disruption and considers their implications for everyday life. It points to a new vision of what society could become-one that is less authoritarian and fearful, more collaborative and local.
Strike Debt Bay Area hosts this non-technical book group discussion monthly on new and radical economic thinking. Our first book was Doughnut Economics, and our most recent books were What’s Left – 3 Paths Through the Planetary Crisis, The Age of Insecurity and Elinor Ostrom’s Rules for Radicals. For the rest of our reading list see here.
On Saturday, March 14, we’re coming together for a Mass Training to prepare to shut it down on May Day: No Work. No School. No Shopping.
This is bigger than organizing towards a single day of action. This is about building a mass non-cooperation movement to confront fascism and defend our communities.
We are watching an authoritarian project consolidate power in real time. Billionaire oligarchs hoarding wealth. Corporations collaborating with repression. Immigrants targeted. Dissent criminalized. Rights and public goods stripped. This is how fascism advances: by dividing working people, concentrating power, and normalizing cruelty.
But history teaches us something else: fascism is not inevitable. It is defeated when ordinary people come together and refuse to comply.
Mass non-cooperation looks like working people withholding our dollars and our labor.
It looks like students walking out.
It looks like knowing your rights to call out sick if you fear retaliation for striking.
It looks like communities standing together so tightly that attacks on one of us are met with collective resistance from all of us.
And it requires practice. Preparation. Strategy. Skills. Courage. Coordination for mass power to reach mass disruption.
That’s why we’re inviting you to join us on Saturday, March 14th, from 9-3 pm at Mission High School in San Francisco for the Bay Resistance Mass Noncooperation Training. We’ll cover:
- How to build mass participation for May Day
- How to take on corporations enabling ICE, including Palantir, Home Depot, and Target
- Skills to strengthen campaigns, escalate actions, and expand our organizing
- How to organize your neighbors to stand together against ICE attacks
- How to build a united, sustained movement capable of stopping these attacks for good
This May Day, we will demonstrate our collective power against the greed of billionaires and the politicians they bankroll who are waging wars on working people. But that kind of power doesn’t appear overnight. We build it together.
Whether you’ve been to several Bay Resistance trainings or this would be your first, this is the next step. If you’re experienced, come deepen your skills and help scale this movement. If you’re new, this is your entry point.
Come build the muscle we need for sustained mass action to defend our communities, defend elections, and defend each other. RSVP HERE
Speaker: Grover Furr
To Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us06web.zoom.us/j/
Meeting ID: 873 8882 4824
Passcode: 042428
Khristian Rakovsky, born in Bulgaria, 1873, was a physician, a political activist. He was a Trotsky ally from early on, who helped found Nashe Slovo, a journal edited by Menshevik leader, Julius Martov. He served as a diplomat during the Russian Civil War. He was chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars from 1919 to 1923. From 1923 he was with the Left Opposition. In 1929 Khristian Rakovsky was exiled for his participation in Trotsky’s faction. In 1934 Rakovsky “capitulated” and swore off future Trotskyite conspiracy. The Soviet leadership had evidence that he was lying. Despite this, Stalin permitted him to return to Moscow and gave him a responsible job.
At the 1936 and 1937 Moscow Trials Rakovsky went far beyond criticizing the defendants. He called for their executions before they had even testified!
Grover Furr is a historian of the Stalin period of USSR socialism 1917 -1991. He teaches Medieval English Literature at Montclair State University in New Jersey. Among his previous numerous books: Khrushchev Lied, Blood Lies, Trotsky’s Lies, Yezhov vs. Stalin, Stalin…Waiting for the Truth.
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FOR OUR FULL SCHEDULE OF UPCOMING PROGRAMS,
AS WELL AS PAST PROGRAMS, GO TO ICSSMARX.ORG
NOTE: Our past programs have been recorded, and placed on YouTube. For a listing of our past programs, see the “Icss Marxist” channel on YouTube, and at icssmarx.org.
Public Forum with KSHAMA SAWANT in person!
$20 at the door. No one turned away for lack of funds
How can we build an effective movement to achieve justice & peace?
Trillion$ For Human Needs Not Wars & Environmental Destruction! Abolish ICE! Free Palestine!
Kshama Sawant: ten-year elected socialist to the Seattle City Council, leader of the Revolutionary Workers Party/Workers Strike Back, current candidate for U.S. Congress, leader of Seattle getting highest hourly minimum wage in the nation!
Jeff Mackler: Socialist Action National Secretary, twice a candidate for the U.S. presidency, leader/founder United National Antiwar Coalition, Director Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
hosted by BFUU’s Social Justice Committee
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1-3 PM El Sobrante – NO KINGS Indivisible West CoCo County at San Pablo Dam Road & Appian
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Local elected reps, music, chants, laughers, & fun!
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10 AM – Rally @ Fernandez Park, Pinole
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Hear from Supervisor John Gioia from the Contra Costa Board of Supervisors, Councilmember Alex Walker-Griffin from Hercules, and Councilmember Devin Murphy from Pinole, as well as local poets and organizers. We’ll gather at Fernandez Park and then march to our Peaceful Protest site.
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The rally is limited to 99 people.
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11:00 am – 12:30 pm – Peaceful Protest at San Pablo Ave and Tennent Ave.
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This event will happen rain or shine!
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12:30 – 2:30 pm – BYO Picnic in Community at Fernandez Park
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Bring a musical instrument and a blanket for a picnic in the park afterwards
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We’ll have kids craft activities, tabling resources for the community, and a community art making activity
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4:30 – 5:30 pm – Visibility Brigade at California St. I-80 Overcrossing, Rodeo
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As Trump tries to drag us into another endless war that a majority of Americans don’t approve of and Congress did not authorize, we must once again show who has the power in this country.
On Saturday, March 28, millions of us will come together to reaffirm that in this country we have No Kings. RSVP now!
Last June, 3 million of us came together for the first No Kings. Then, 7 million in October. And now, March 28 is on track to be the largest No Kings mobilization yet and the largest nonviolent demonstration in U.S. history.
Trump wants to control us—a key feature of authoritarian rule. This administration wants to consolidate the media, surveil our social media, and twist the truth so we don’t rise up. But if he believes we will roll over and allow him to take our freedoms, he is mistaken. Instead, we will come together en masse and show that we will fight to protect one another and our country.
Dictatorship is not our inevitable fate—we know we can overcome this repression when we unite.
Our momentum is growing as everyday people are fed up with this president and administration, who are raking in riches for themselves while too many of us struggle to afford basics like health care, food, and housing.
Will you RSVP now to join a rally in your community?
More and more of us are seeing past their lies—that as a nation we can’t afford quality health care for every American but then go on to dish out tax breaks to the richest people, send ICE agents to terrorize our communities, and fund wars that fuel their interests. And collectively, we are saying enough is enough.
They’re counting on you staying home. But we’re coming together again on March 28 to make it clear to Trump that his fear and intimidation aren’t working.
There are over 2,500 events already taking place across the country. Check out the map here to find an event near you. Be a part of history and RSVP to join now. And then, forward this email to a friend and invite them to join you!
A core principle behind all No Kings events is a commitment to nonviolent action. We expect all participants to seek to de-escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values and to act lawfully at these events. Weapons of any kind, including those legally permitted, should not be brought to events.
P.S. Don’t see an event near you? Sign up to host one!
Build Community Power Through MH First Training
Join us in strengthening our collective ability to keep each other safe and make a lasting impact in our communities.
The next Mental Health First Community Crisis Response Training will take place on Saturday, March 28 and Sunday, March 29 from 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM via Zoom.
Register here: bit.ly/mhfirst-training0328
This virtual training is designed to equip community members with the skills needed to respond to mental health crises, support those in distress, and connect people to healing justice resources within our neighborhoods.
MH First is grounded in the belief that our communities can care for one another without relying on law enforcement. Through peer support, de escalation, and non punitive, life affirming interventions, we work to interrupt and eliminate the role of police in mental health crisis response.
We are committed to decriminalizing emotional and psychological crises, reducing stigma around mental health, substance use, and domestic violence, and addressing their root causes including white supremacy, capitalism, and colonialism.
We take care of us.
We have the power and are claiming it together. No Thrones. No Crowns. No Kings.
ALWAYS CHECK HERE for the most up-to-date info: https://tinyurl.com/NK3-Oakland-Event-Info
What began in 2025 as a single day of defiance has become a sustained national resistance to tyranny, spreading from small towns to city centers and across every community determined to defend democracy. Our peaceful movement is bigger than ever. As gatherings continue to grow, maintaining safety remains essential, and working with a Fire Watch Company in New Orleans is a smart way to help keep events secure and well-monitored.
When our families are under attack and costs are pushing people to the brink, silence is not an option. We will defend ourselves and our communities against this administration’s unjust and cruel acts of violence.
On March 28th, rise up, take to the streets, and say it loud: no thrones, no crowns, no kings. We’re not watching history happen—we’re making it. Join us.
A core principle behind all No Kings events is a commitment to nonviolent action. We expect all participants to seek to de-escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values and to act lawfully at these events. Weapons of any kind, including those legally permitted, should not be brought to events.
We’ll set up our blue canopy at that corner with an Occupella sign hanging from it.
We will have QR codes with lyrics to songs we can sing, but if you want to print it out ahead of time, go to https://docs.google.com/
Marcie will have a QR code on site and lead us to sing along with the Mighty Marching Chorus when they pass by.
See you Saturday! Invite your friends! Share our location so folks don’t go to the original location. – Thanks, Love and Peace, Hali
Build Community Power Through MH First Training
Join us in strengthening our collective ability to keep each other safe and make a lasting impact in our communities.
The next Mental Health First Community Crisis Response Training will take place on Saturday, March 28 and Sunday, March 29 from 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM via Zoom.
Register here: bit.ly/mhfirst-training0328
This virtual training is designed to equip community members with the skills needed to respond to mental health crises, support those in distress, and connect people to healing justice resources within our neighborhoods.
MH First is grounded in the belief that our communities can care for one another without relying on law enforcement. Through peer support, de escalation, and non punitive, life affirming interventions, we work to interrupt and eliminate the role of police in mental health crisis response.
We are committed to decriminalizing emotional and psychological crises, reducing stigma around mental health, substance use, and domestic violence, and addressing their root causes including white supremacy, capitalism, and colonialism.
We take care of us.
Refreshments at 2:45PM
Join the Oakland People’s Arms Embargo on Sunday, March 29th, for an afternoon panel, discussion, and musical performance to celebrate Oakland’s long history of international solidarity! Learn from Oakland’s own movement leaders about local resistance against the South African apartheid regime, and how we’re carrying on this legacy today through the fight for an Arms Embargo. History shows us that when Oakland fights, we WIN.
Please take 10 seconds to register at this link, and share this invitation far and wide!
Featured panelists include:
• David Canham, Executive Director of SEIU 1021 & Former anti-apartheid organizer in South Africa
• Nesbit Crutchfield, Organizer & former Chairperson of the Bay Area Free South Africa Movement
• Andrea Prichett, Educator & former leader of UC Berkeley Campaign Against Apartheid
• Clarence Thomas, Former Executive Board of ILWU 10 & Black Panther Party member
• Pastor Michael McBride, Founder & Lead Pastor at The Way Christian Center in West Berkeley
+ With musical performance by the Vukani Mawethu Choir
+ Refreshments from Shawarmaji served at 2:45pm
As a proud endorser of the Oakland People’s Arms Embargo, we can’t wait to see you there!
Agenda Packet:
Selected Relevant Agenda Items:
ANNUAL SURVEILLANCE REPORTS For each Annual Report, the Privacy Advisory Commission will consider a vote to provide one of the following recommendations to the City Council: (1) that the benefits to the community of the surveillance technology outweigh the costs and that civil liberties and civil rights are safeguarded; or (2) that use of the surveillance technology cease; or (3) propose modifications to the corresponding surveillance use policy that will resolve concerns.
a. Pen Register 2025 OPD Annual Report on the use of pen register technology to track dialing, routing, and signaling information for investigations.
b. Cellebrite 2025 OPD Annual Report on the use of Cellebrite technology to extract and analyze data from mobile devices for investigative purposes.
c. Crime Tracer 2025 OPD Annual Report on the use of CrimeTracer to access records, locate individuals, and support criminal investigations.
d. ShotSpotter 2025 OPD Annual Report on the use of ShotSpotter to identify and locate gunfire for rapid police response
SURVEILLANCE USE POLICY AND SURVEILLANCE IMPACT REPORT FOR CONSIDERATION The Privacy Advisory Commission will consider a vote to recommend that the City Council either adopt, modify, or reject a proposed surveillance use policy or changes to an surveillance use policy that has already been approved by City Council. a. Proposed changes for DGO I-24: Law Enforcement Records Search Platform, Previously Referred to as DGO I-24: Forensic Logic CopLink