Union Perspectives

We, here in the U.S., have our very own Greece. There is the destruction of the city of Detroit, which has been raped and pillaged by hedge fund vultures who are major donors to both political parties, which means the politicians then pass laws to protect hedge funders’ money, that is usually invested in bonds. On a bigger scale there is Puerto Rico, which has labored under colonial rule since Christopher Columbus landed on its shores in 1493 and claimed it for Spain. After the Spanish American War in 1898 the U.S. acquired Puerto Rico in the treaty of Paris and ruled it as a territory since. Puerto Ricans are considered natural born citizens, but like all stepchildren they must abide by U.S. laws without a voting member in Congress. For decades the island was a jewel of the Caribbean with the highest per capita income in Latin America, but in 1996 when a Republican Congress and the Clinton administration agreed to a 10-year phase out of section 936, a tax exemption for U.S. manufa...