Thom Hartmann is a prominent left-wing radio broadcaster from the USA. I first came across him when he interviewed me at a conference in Washington and was promptly told by everyone just how prominent he is. He describes himself as a “democratic socialist” and his nationally-syndicated radio show has an estimated 2.75 million listeners. George Galloway needs no introduction to a left-wing audience in the UK.

In Solidarity recently we have discussed how political Islam can be both a “sigh of the oppressed” and a reactionary, right-wing movement.

The Christian right in the USA shows the same paradox more extravagantly. Thomas Frank, in his study of the rise of the right in Kansas, found that in Olathe, a poor Kansas City suburb which is a bastion of the right, “each of the conservatives I spent time with was either a blue-collar worker or married to one”

Outsourced cleaning, catering, and security workers at the University of London have been fighting for sick pay, holiday, and pension equality with directly-employed staff through the “Tres Cosas” (“Three Things”) campaign since they won the London Living Wage in 2012. On 27 and 28 November, they struck to win those demands, as well as to stop job cuts at the Garden Halls, and to win recognition of their union, the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB).

Strikes and protests were held at 1,500 Walmart stores across America on “Black Friday” (the Friday after Thanksgiving), 29 November.

Workers employed in the warehouses of online retail giant Amazon are paid poverty wages, work 50-hour weeks, and walk up to 11 miles during the course of a shift in which they are expected collect one order every 33 seconds.

A number of undercover reports have exposed hyper-exploitative conditions in the warehouses, which employ an extra 15,000 staff to deal with the Christmas rush. One worker told the BBC that conditions in the warehouses were comparable to “a slave camp”.

Research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, a human resources consultancy firm, attempts to put a positive spin on the proliferation of zero-hours contacts.

The report concludes that employers mainly use zero-hours contracts for flexibility, and claims that most workers are satisfied with this arrangement as it provides flexibility for them as well. It suggests that, on the whole, if there is an issue surrounding zero-hours contracts, it is to do with the way they are managed, rather than the type of contract itself.

In the discussion arising from Sean Matgamna’s introduction to Workers’ Liberty 3/1: Marxism and Religion, there are perhaps two issues that need a little more debate.

Six weeks before Romanian and Bulgarian workers will get unrestricted access to European labour markets, David Cameron has announced new benefit restrictions on all EU migrants.

The initiative is, to borrow the word used by European Commissioner Laszlo Andor, “nasty”. It is also, to judge it in terms of bourgeois policy-making efficacy, nonsensical.

Left Unity, launched in late 2012 by ex-Respect members Kate Hudson and Andrew Burgin, held its founding conference on 30 November.

The one day conference was to debate and decide the safer spaces policy, aims, constitution, electoral strategy and campaigning priorities of the organisation.

How did it do? The conference voted through a constitution and founding platform statement, but political debate was thin.