The Grand Conjunction, US Dept of Labor responds on H2A labor contractor abuses, and some red anniversaries

A response from the US Department of Labor to the Farm Labor Organizing Committee's letterwriting campaign regarding abuses of workers' rights by agricultural guestworker labor contractors (see durhamspark.blogspot.com/2020/11/floc-songs-for-justice-concert-124-and.html ) is below.

The FLOC fundraising concert advertised in that post was delayed a day, but is online at: youtu.be/a87gbLcYfTU (1 hour 12 minutes).

FLOC December benefit concert program, from Facebook.

December 21^st is the winter solstice, when night is longest and the Sun rises and sets far south on the horizon and is relatively low in the sky all day. Many or maybe all cultures have winter solstice traditions or festivals, such as Iran's Yalda Night or Chelleh Night ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yald%C4%81_Night and highlighted yesterday on NPR's Weekend Edition Sunday www.npr.org/2020/12/20/948315562/yalda-night ).

Adding to the significance of the day, there will also be an unusually close conjuction of Jupiter and Saturn shortly after sunset. A conjuction of Jupiter and Saturn occurs every 20 years, but this is the closest such conjuction visible at night in centuries (the last close Jupiter-Saturn conjunction that was easily seen might have been one in 1226, according to this month's Sky and Telescope magazine, skyandtelescope.org/ ), and I think the next one will be on a morning in March 2080, the month of the Northern Hemisphere's spring equinox, when day an night are about equally long and the Sun rises due east and sets due west. These two bright planets have been visible in the southern sky for months, but now appear very close together, peaking early this evening in the faint zodiacal constellation Capricornus, in the southwest. I looked for Jupiter and Saturn a few days ago, but they must have been very low behind trees or had already set by then. These gas giants are among the brightest objects in the sky (visible even through urban light pollution, the subject of a future post), and unlike stars, planets don't really twinkle. With a telescope or maybe with binoculars some of their moons and rings are visible, and from the continental USA Ganymede can be seen passing across Jupiter tonight. It was misty and overcast here this morning, but is now completely clear, and the planets will probably remain close together in the sky for a while after the 21^st.

Later tonight (about 4am) the Ursid meteor shower peaks (Ursids can be seen from about the 17^th to 26^th every December), though it is a weak shower, with 5 to 10 or 15 meteors an hour. There are meteor showers with varying numbers of meteors per hour and other characteristics throughout the year, as well as random meteors not associated with a known shower. Earlier in December the Geminid shower peaked with up to 50 to 150 meteors an hour, and is predicted to reach 200 by 2080, according to an article in this month's issue of Sky and Telescope.

Other conjuctions happen periodically during a year, and can involve more than two objects. It might not have been a conjunction, but several planets were lined up in the sky, I think in the southwest after sunset, at one point in the 90's. Brilliant Venus is currently a “Morning Star,” while reddish Mars (orange-colored to me) is in the southeast in the evening (it was brighter months ago); Neptune, Uranus, and the asteriod Ceres are also currently in view (see Astronomy magazine, astronomy.com ), but probably only with binoculars or a telescope. Mercury was faintly visible in the morning in November and maybe into December, but will be up in the evening later in the winter.

Some useful stargazing websites:

spacewatchtower.blogspot.com/2020/12/mon-winter-begins-great-conjunction.html

heavens-above.com/main.aspx

www.spaceweather.com/

International Meteor Organization: www.imo.net/

December 21^st is also the birth anniversary of Georgian Bolshevik Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Djugashvili) and Thomas Sankara of Burkina Faso, known as Africa's Che Guevara. Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong (or Tse-tung) was born December 26^th in China's Hunan province.

There is a post today about Stalin's continuing significance, denied by revisionists, “democratic socialists,” etc. at michaelharrison.org.uk/

FLOC Facebook post about workers' rights violations by H2A labor contractors.

The US DOL's December 15^th letter (by email):

The U.S. Department of Labor (Department) received your letter expressing concerns regarding the Department's H-2A visa program and request for a moratorium on the approval of H-2A applications filed by H-2A labor contractors (H-2ALCs). Your correspondence was forwarded to the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) for response.

You allege certain H-2ALCs are violators of federal law. The Department takes very seriously employer compliance with the Department's H-2A program regulations, which include provisions for worker protections and impose employer requirements concerning wages and working conditions [footnote: See 20 CFR Part 655, subpart B; and 29 CFR Psart 501.]. However, these regulations do not allow the Department to impose a moratorium or cessation on the review of properly filed applications that meet H-2A regulatory requirements.

The Department's regulations at 20 CFR Part 655, subpart B, permit H-2ALCs to file H-2A applications with the Department and to receive a certification where the application meets the requirements of 20 CFR 655.161. The Department's regulations define H-2ALCs in 20 CFR 655.103 as “any person who meets the definition of employer under [subpart B] and is not a fixed-site employer, an agricltural association, or an employee of a fixed-site employer or agricultural association...who recruits, solicits, hires, employs, furnishes, houses, or transports any worker....” H-2ALCs must meet the same program requirements as other H-2A employers, including assurances and guarantees, and are subject to additional requirements for participation in the H-2A prigram. For example, to receive H-2A certification, an H-2ALC must also provide the Department with the following: an original surety bond demonstrating the H-2ALC's ability to meet payroll and financial obligations to workers; pertinent details related to each fixed-site employer they will service, with expected start and end dates of work and descriptions of the crops and activities for each location; copies of fully executed work contracts with each fixed-site employer; a copy of a valid Farm Labor Contractor certificate of registration and Farm Labor Contractor Employee certificates of registration, if applicable; and proof that housing and transportation for workers meets all applicable standards and regulations, if provided by the fized-site employer. See 20 CFR Part 655.132. The Department will continue to receive and evaluate each application on its merits for compliance with H-2A program regulations and determine whether each application meets the requirements for certification.

While your letter alleges violations of a general nature, you may report a specific suspected violation of H-2A's provisions by contacting the Department's Wage and Hour Division for direct assistance at (866) 487-9243 or https://www.dol.org/agencies/whd/. Please know the Department remains in frequent contact with our federal and state partners and the stakeholder community to ensure employer compliance with H-2A program requirements. If you have any additional questions, please contact ETA's Office of Foreign Labor Certification at (202) 513-7350.

Sincerely,

[Signed by an administrator at the Office of Foreign Labor Certification]