Kickstarter employees successfully vote to form union

By

Daniel Uria

#KickstarterUnited has now been certified by the NLRB: We Are A Union!!! pic.twitter.com/l6W91lILKU— Kickstarter United (@ksr_united) February 18, 2020

 

Feb. 18 (UPI) -- Kickstarter employees successfully formed a union Tuesday, becoming one of the first groups of tech employees to unionize.

The Kickstarter employee union effort, Kickstarter United, announced it voted to form a union with the Office and Professional Employees International Union certified by the National Labor Relations Board."It's been a long journey, but now the real work is ahead of us!" Kickstarter United wrote. "And to all tech and creative workers looking to fight for your rights, this is only just the beginning."

After forming an initial organizing committee, the 85 engineers, directors, analysts, designers, coordinators, customer support specialists and other Kickstarter employees chose to partner with the New York-based OPEIU Local 153.

"We believe unionizing provides a path toward furthering all of our goals," KSRU representative Oriana Leckert said. "It was truly an honor to get to have deep conversations with so many of my colleagues around these issues. Utilizing our collective power to improve our workplace and our professional lives will increase Kickstarter's ability to have a radical, positive impact on society by allowing us all to advocate for workers' rights, which is a core pillar of the fight against inequality."

Last year, Kickstarter wrote that unionization was not "the right tool" to fix the company's issues and two employees who spearheaded organizational efforts were fired, although the company said it was unrelated to the union.

Kickstarter CEO Aziz Hasan issued a statement to Mashable saying he and company leadership "support and respect" the decision to unionize.

"We've worked hard over the last decade to build a different kind of company, one that measures its success by how well it achieves its mission: helping to bring creative projects to life," said Hasan. "Our mission has been common ground for everyone here during this process and it will continue to guide us as we enter this new phase together."

Kickstarter United

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The workers of Kickstarter. Organizing with OPEIU Local 153. contact@kickstarterunited.org

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So, what does this mean? 1) Our media blackout is now over (did you miss us?

) 2) We’ll begin discussing our priorities and forming an inclusive and representative bargaining committee for everyone at Kickstarter so that we can... 3) Bargain our first contract! #1u

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We are so truly grateful to everyone who has supported us along the way, especially

@OPEIU

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@153Local

. It's been a long journey, but now the real work is ahead of us! And to all tech and creative workers looking to fight for your rights, this is only just the beginning!

https://twitter.com/DocPop/status/1229803243158429696

Audit: U.S. failed to account for nearly $715M in arms to fight ISIS

(THATS ALMOST A BILLION BUCKS)By Christen McCurdy UPI


Syrian army units advance to the Aleppo Ghazi Aintab International Highway and the northern countryside of Aleppo, Syria, Monday. A DoD audit released Tuesday said the U.S has failed to account for nearly $715 million in weapons sold to Syria to fight ISIS. Photo by Hajj Ahmad/EPA-EFE

Feb. 18 (UPI) -- The U.S. military did not properly account for nearly $715 million in weapons and equipment intended for Syrian partners fighting ISIS, according to a Department of Defense report released Tuesday.

According to the DoD Inspector General's report, Special Operations Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve did not maintain a list of all equipment purchased and received, and instead allowed "multiple entities" involved with Syrian forces to store records in numerous locations


In addition, military equipment was not always properly secured or stored.

For example, according to the report, equipment stored at a Kuwait warehouse was stored outside in metal shipping containers, exposing the equipment to heat and humidity -- in part because outdated equipment had not been disposed of, which led to overcrowding at the facility.

RELATED Over 830,000 forced to flee northwest Syria since December

The IG's office closed the report with recommendations that SOJT-OIR develop a central repository for all documentation required to support equipment for the Syria effort, and that SOJTF-OIR's commander develop guidance for the proper disposal of unserviceable equipment stored in Kuwait.

The IG also recommended that the commander of 1st Theater Sustainment Command regularly perform physical security inspections of the facility and "ensure corrective action is taken to fix new and existing security issues identified."

The report does not address the possibility that arms intended to fight terrorists in Syria have fallen into the wrong hands.

But that has happened in the recent past: A 2017 report showed that 90 percent of 40,000 ISIS firearms and ammo caches, documented by the arms control group Conflict Armament Research, were originally supplied to Syrian Democratic Forces by the U.S. and allies.

And a 2016 investigation into arms sales to Afghanistan and Iraq found that officials only had records for 700,000 firearms -- just under half -- of guns sold in 14 years to fight the War on Terror.

DHS waives federal statutes to build 177 miles of border wall

UPI Staff


The Trump administration said it agreed to waive 10 federal regulations to facilitate construction of the wall. 

File Photo by Ariana Drehsler/UPI

Feb. 18 (UPI) -- The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has issued waivers to bypass multiple federal statutes in order to build a long section of border wall between the United States and Mexico.

The department said Tuesday it granted the waivers as a measure to fast-track construction of 177 miles of wall along the Southwest border that will be built in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

"Working closely with the Army Corps of Engineers and Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security is exercising its congressionally-granted authority to waive procurement regulations in six high-traffic border sectors, which will allow us to use already vetted and experienced contractors to build an additional 177 miles of new border wall system," DHS spokeswoman Heather Swift told UPI Tuesday.

Swift said more than 36,000 undocumented migrants and 54,000 pounds of illicit drugs were captured at the U.S.-Mexico border in January alone.

"President Trump is fulfilling his promise to the American people to secure the border and build a high-tech border wall system," Swift added. "Under the president's leadership, we are building more wall, faster than ever before."

The Defense Department last week asked to divert nearly $4 billion from its weapons programs to help build the wall, which Trump has promised since he was a candidate for president.

The Pentagon's request would shift $2 billion in defense appropriations and $1.6 billion in overseas contingency operations the fund the wall.

The battle for Aleppo ends with liberation for some, Armageddon for others

Government supporters celebrate defeat of rebels in Aleppo, while humanitarian disaster unfolds on other side of battle lines, writes Richard Hall

Left: In the west of Syria's northern province of Aleppo on 16 February, people flee advancing Syrian government forces. Right: Meanwhile, crowds gather to celebrate at the Saadallah al-Jabiri square in Aleppo ( AFP )

It was the kind of split-screen moment that has come to define the Syrian war.

Over the past week, thousands of desperate families have been fleeing airstrikes and shelling in western Aleppo, many of them leaving their homes for the third or fourth time in a seemingly futile search for safety.

At the same time, inside the city itself, crowds of government supporters took to the streets to celebrate the rout of rebel forces on its outskirts, and the Syrian army claimed a symbolic and strategic victory in the long-running battle for Aleppo.

Backed by intensive airstrikes from Russian and Syrian jets, government troops captured more than 30 villages in the western countryside of Aleppo over the weekend. In doing so, they put the country’s second city out of reach of rebel fire for the first time in years and cemented control of the former commercial hub’s link to the capital, Damascus.

In a televised address on Monday, President Bashar al-Assad promised to push on further with the offensive.

“This liberation does not mean the end of the war, and does not mean the end of the schemes nor the end of terrorism or the surrender of enemies,” he said.

“But it means that we rubbed their noses in the dirt as a prelude for complete victory and ahead of their defeat, sooner or later.”

Syrian regime bombards Idlib
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Syrian state news reported that the city had been rescued “from terrorism and shells of hatred and spite from which the city has been suffering for many years.”

But what was a liberation for some was little short of Armageddon for others.

Some 900,000 people have been displaced since early December by the offensive in western Aleppo and neighbouring Idlib province – the largest single displacement of the entire war.

The vast majority of those fleeing are women and children. With no shelter available for the new arrivals, many are being forced to sleep in the open air in freezing temperatures. As many as seven children – including one baby only seven months old – have died from the cold and horrific living conditions in camps, according to Save the Children.
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Masses of civilians flee regime bombs in Syria’s Idlib

Many of those who fled from western Aleppo in recent weeks were uprooted from the city itself in 2016, when rebel forces surrendered in east Aleppo after years of bloody fighting.

Ahmed Aziz, a 29-year-old charity worker, was one of them. After living in the western suburbs of Aleppo since then, he left a few weeks ago with his family for the city of Azaz, near the Turkish border, when the fighting came too close.

“I didn’t go away from my city. I lived in the countryside and it was so close, I could see the western parts of the city. I dreamed of returning,” he tells The Independent by phone.

That dream has now faded, he says.

“For those Assad supporters in my city, I find it brutal that they dance on our bodies. Those who have been killed by the government are human beings. They are people who wanted to live in a free country,” he says. 

 
Civilians flee from Idlib to find safety inside Syria near the border with Turkey, 11 February 2020 (AP)

The battle for the ancient city of Aleppo was one of the most consequential of the entire war.

The capture of the eastern parts of the city by rebels in 2012, after the government violently cracked down on peaceful protests against Mr Assad’s rule, marked one of the opposition’s biggest early successes, even as it failed to breach the west of the city.

Despite a devastating and indiscriminate air campaign by government jets, rebel forces held out in east Aleppo for years. That changed in 2015, when Russia entered the war on the government’s side.

By 2016, with Moscow’s help, Syrian government forces besieged east Aleppo. While rebel forces were also responsible for indiscriminate shelling of the city’s western half, intensive Russian and Syrian government airstrikes targetted hospitals and civilian infrastructure in the east on a much larger scale, squeezing rebels and civilians alike until they surrendered in December 2016. 

The biggest humanitarian horror story of the 21st Century will only be avoided if Security Council members, and those with influence, overcome individual interests and put a collective stake in humanity first. The only option is a ceasefire.Mark Lowcock, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs

An array of rebel groups, jihadist militias among them, left the city for western Aleppo and Idlib province, as did thousands of civilians. The loss of Aleppo was a crushing blow for rebel forces, from which they never fully recovered.

Today, again backed by Russian airstrikes, Mr Assad’s forces are pushing further into the last rebel-held bastion of Idlib and western Aleppo, which is controlled by both nationalist and jihadist groups who have united to fight off the attack, among them the extremist Hayyat Tahrir al-Sham.

Russian and Syrian bombing has killed close to 300 civilians since 1 January, the United Nations said on Tuesday, 93 per cent of which were caused by the Syrian government and its allies. Civilians are fleeing for the Turkish border and overwhelming relief agencies. Drone footage of a displacement camp in Northern Idlib, Syria.

“Civilians fleeing the fighting are being squeezed into areas without safe shelter that are shrinking in size by the hour. And still they are bombed. They simply have nowhere to go,” UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said in a statement.

On Monday, the UN’s under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, Mark Lowcock, warned of “the biggest humanitarian horror story of the 21st century” if a ceasefire is not reached.

The UN has called on Russia and Turkey, which backs a number of rebel groups and has its own forces stationed in Idlib, to agree to broker another ceasefire to allow humanitarian groups to assist those in need.

On Tuesday, a Turkish delegation ended two days of talks with Russian officials in Moscow with no statements made.

Turkey has kept its border closed to Syrians fleeing the fighting, fearing another wave of refugees to add to the 3.5 million already in the country.

That has left those displaced from the recent fighting, like Mr Aziz, with nowhere to go.

QANTAS UNION BUSTING

QANTAS WARNS PILOTS IT MAY HIRE NEW CREW TO FLY LONDON-SYDNEY NONSTOP

‘If we can’t reach agreement with the union soon, we’ll be putting the offer directly to our pilots’ – Qantas International CEO, Tino La Spina

The union representing Qantas pilots has warned the airline that a plan to hire new flight crew for the London-Sydney nonstop could "damage the airline for many years to come".

The Australian airline’s “Project Sunrise” is aimed at launching the world’s longest flight. The plan is to use Airbus A350 jets, which Qantas does not currently fly, to link Heathrow with Kingsford-Smith airport in Sydney. The distance is 10,573 miles, more than 1,000 miles longer than the current longest flight, between Singapore and New York.

The project is not covered by existing agreements with the Australian & International Pilots Association (AIPA), the union representing flight crew working for Qantas Group. 

The Australian airline has warned existing pilots that unless they make concessions to cut costs on future ultra-long-haul flights, it will set up a separate operation and recruit new flight crew on less favourable terms. 

The union said the plan was “not acceptable to a majority of our members” and warned there is currently “no legal basis” for the planned flights to operate.

The airline and AIPA have been in talks on the issue for six months. The biggest stumbling block is the airline’s proposed pay rates for future second officers. These are more junior pilots deployed on flights too long to be operated by a captain and first officer alone.

Qantas claims paying the second officers less than at present is “a major contributor to making the Sunrise business case stack up”.

Tino La Spina, chief executive of Qantas International, said: “We’ve had extensive discussions with AIPA for months and months and while they have told us they don’t like what’s on offer, they haven’t put forward a proposal of their own."

He warned the pilots’ union that, if no deal is reached, the airline will operate “Project Sunrise” flights through a new lower-pay unit to make the service financially viable.

Mr La Spina said: “We have a good deal on the table for our long-haul pilots, with pay increases and promotional opportunities. We’ve structured it so their take home pay is not negatively impacted.

“The reality is we are running out of time to keep our aircraft delivery slots with Airbus. If we can’t reach agreement with the union soon, we’ll be putting the offer directly to our pilots so they can have their say.”

Flight crew will be asked to vote in March, before the airline is expected to announce its decision.

If pilots vote against the agreement, the airline says it “will be left with no viable option than to employ pilots to operate Airbus A350s for Project Sunrise through a new entity”.

Airline to fly nearly empty plane from London to Sydney

But Mark Sedgwick, president of AIPA, said: “The announcement by Qantas that it was prepared to use an external workforce to engage in ultra-long range flying if it could not reach agreement with AIPA is not acceptable to a majority of our members.”

He warned the plan “risks damaging pilot engagement and would potentially damage the airline for many years to come”.

Mr Sedgwick said: “Qantas claims that it has been flexible in its approach to these negotiations but the productivity targets that it is asking pilots to agree to has remained absolutely fixed.

“Current restrictions on pilot duty hours means there is no legal basis for Qantas’ Project Sunrise proposal to operate.”

In 2019 Qantas conducted a series of what it called “research flights” nonstop from New York and London to Sydney.

The airline has operated nonstop flights between Heathrow and Perth since 2018. Routes from London to Brisbane and Melbourne are also being considered as part of Project Sunrise.

Frankfurt and Paris may also be connected nonstop with Sydney.