Washington has good reason to brace for the worst. The country’s largest trade union, the AFL-CIO, has issued a nationwide “call to action.” The unions are planning a week of rallies capped off with a huge march and demonstration on the first day of the meetings. Last year tens of thousands of supporters turned out, bringing Washington to a standstill. Today the movement is larger, and the smell of blood is in the air.
Scores of other groups are also on the move. Jobs With Justice is coordinating hundreds of buses through local chapters to bring in demonstrators. The International Action Center plans a march on the White House. Even the anarchists are more organized. Groups like the Black Bloc are shunning the more mainstream umbrella group coordinating protest activities, Mobilization for Global Justice. Instead they’ve set up their own anarchist front, called the Anti-Capitalist Convergence. The goal, explains one activist, is to embrace a greater “diversity of tactics.” In other words, store owners might be wise to board up their windows–or at least cover up those Starbucks and McDonald’s signs.
