General Baker – September 6, 1941 – May 18, 2014

In 2010, then-governor Rick Snyder of Michigan signed a new, more authoritarian version of that state’s Emergency Manager law, dispatching appointees to selected cities and school districts throughout the state, where local government and school boards would be replaced.

Immigration, asylees, and the border wall are front and center in the national spotlight. With cries of an “invasion by criminals, murderers and rapists” from “sh*t hole countries,” former president Trump is using immigration as a political football to score points with his political base and as a battering ram to drive his Democratic opponents further to the right.

Some of the cruelest and most painful attacks on the working class are happening on the housing front. As Will Suphon of Tucson, Arizona explained, “The housing market, the job market, the price of food ... it’s all become rather insane and so many people are being thrown to the wayside. You can do everything right and still end up living in your car.”

On July 25, California governor Gavin Newsom declared war on unhoused people statewide. First, he ordered encampments removed from state land, with no regard for whether displaced people have somewhere else to go. Then on August 9, he doubled down and threatened to cut housing funding to any city or county that failed to sweep away its unhoused people.

Last June 13, residents from Puerto Rico’s coastal town Salinas staged a righteously angry and spirited protest in the courtyard of the most luxurious apartment complex in San Juan’s main urban center. Its principal owner is Nicholas Prouty, a key figure in the damning roster of real estate and finance investors currently feeding off Puerto Rico’s energy and economic crisis, which they caused.