In Greenfield 150 or so people attended a rally to protest Trump. The August 15 event was inspired by a pro-Trump rally that ended up drawing just five people. Katherine Golub was at the anti-Trump rally. “It was amazing,” she told the Valley Post. Trump supports cutting taxes on rich people and cutting programs that help poor people. He feels that climate change is not a problem.

On August 6 a judge ruled that a rape accusation against Trump by E. Jean Carroll can proceed. At least a dozen women are accusing Trump of sexual assault.

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On August 19 in Northampton, dozens of people attended a teachers' union rally. They were protesting plans by schools around the Valley to re-open despite the virus. The organizers have a web site at www.nea.org.

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In Springfield on August 24 the nurses union will hold a rally for justice and better health care. People in 42 nations live longer than in the USA. The USA is the richest country in the world. The nurses are asking the public to attend. The rally will be at 4 p.m. outside 271 Carew Street. Details are at www.MassNurses.org.

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To save the post office from Trump, people will rally August 22 at 11 a.m. in Northampton. The rally will be outside 37 Bridge Street. As of August 20, at www.SaveThePostOffice.net 23 people had RSVP'd to the Northampton rally.

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Dummerston, Vermont borders Brattleboro. In Dummerston and the neighboring towns of Newfane and Brookline 1,000 acres could be saved if activists win their fight. Details are at www.GreenMountainConservancy.org.

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The 900 or so workers at the mental hospital in Brattleboro are asking the public to sign a petition for justice. It's at www.ReformTheRetreat.org. The workers can be reached via their union's web site www.unap.org. One of the workers is union president Sy Creamer. On August 15 she told the Valley Post that Retreat executive “Meghan Baston upset hundreds of employees by changing their work schedules. This not only resulted in multiple resignations but also fractured teams of staff that had worked cohesively for years. Patient care was undoubtedly impacted in a negative way. To this day no one can identify a positive benefit to this calamity. We do know it triggered picketing and cost the hospital hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Creamer continued, “Before the picketing, union officials expressed legitimate concerns within the workplace setting. Along the way there would be more controversy, particularly around the way nursing staff were disciplined and often terminated. In one notable – but far from the only-- instance Meghan terminated a mental health worker for using an 'illegal restraint.' The problem was that by Retreat policy there hadn't been any restraint. This didn't stop Meghan from wasting tens of thousands of the hospital's dollars to defend her poor decision. The worker was reinstated with back pay.”

Creamer continued, “When Meghan disciplined and threatened to fire the union's unit one vice president it took another expensive arbitration hearing to get her to retract her written statements.... More recently there were two code of conduct complaints filed against Meghan. In the first instance (workers) witnessed the (Baston) screaming at a subordinate who happened to be the unit one union president. The internal investigation excluded key witnesses and implied that Meghan would not have yelled if the subordinate had not been so persistent. In the second complaint – about which the hospital does not contest the facts -- Meghan presided over and participated in a scheduled managers' meeting where she and others speculated and joked about a subordinate's genitals. The object of the demeaning talk happened to be the unit one union vice president. Though this complaint was handled professionally and in the workplace setting the outcome seemed surprising. The investigation, based on the contention that this was a 'private meeting,' concluded that there was no violation of the code of conduct policy. What made this even more remarkable is that direct care staff have been terminated for less.”

Creamer continued that the Retreat CEO's “declaration that Meghan has the support of 'the entire leadership team' does nothing other than increase concerns about the collective judgment of that group.”

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One hundred years ago, on August 18, 1920, following a mass movement that included non-violent civil disobedience, white women won the right to vote in the USA. Decades later, women of color won that right.