BAUAW Newsletter: 08/17/2008

Saturday, August 23, 2008

BAUAW NEWSLETTER - SATURDAY, AUGUST 23, 2008

Thursday, August 21, 2008

BAUAW NEWSLETTER - FRIDAY, AUGUST 22, 2008

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NO ON PROPOSITION V! NO ON JROTC! NO MILITARY RECRUITMENT IN OUR SCHOOLS!

NEXT MEETING:
TUESDAY, AUGUST 26, 7:15 P.M.
Friends Meeting House
65 9th St, San Francisco (between Mission and Market Sts)
To RSVP or for additional information, please contact Alan Lessik at AFSC at 565.0201, x11 or alessik@afsc.org.

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(Please circulate)

No Military in our Schools-No on Prop. V and Marx in Soho Benefit

Dear all,

Below is Bay Area United Against War's paid ballot argument for a NO
vote on Proposition V, the pro-JROTC initiative on the ballot in San
Francisco this November. But this is only the beginning of our
campaign efforts to defeat this initiative.

We invite you to come to our benefit performance of the wonderful
Howard Zinn play, Marx in Soho. It is only one of the ways we are
trying to raise money to carry out our campaign to end military
recruitment in our schools and to defeat Proposition V.

Howard Zinn's MARX IN SOHO

Two Performances:

OAKLAND:
Thursday, August 28, 7-9:00 P.M.
High Street Church
1945 High Street (Corner of Courtland, 1/2 block from Foothill Blvd.)

SAN FRANCISCO:
Saturday, August 30, 7-9:00 P.M.
Noe Valley Ministry
1021 Sanchez Street (Near 23rd Street)

You can get advance tickets to the play for $10.00 by emailing the
following address and leaving a name and how many tickets you would
like to reserve then simply pick up your tickets at the door the day
of the performance.

giobon@comcast.net

(Please indicate either Oakland or San Francisco, leave your name and how many tickets you want to reserve and simply pick your tickets up at the door the night of the performance.)

If you can't come to the play, please consider making a donation to
our campaign by sending a check to:

Bay Area United Against War
P.O. Box 318021
San Francisco, CA 94131-8021

We have no paid staff and rarely ask for donations but we feel this
campaign is of utmost importance not only for the children of the San
Francisco Unified School District, but what we do here will have
ramifications in school districts across the country.

In solidarity,

Bonnie Weinstein, for Bay Area United Against War

P.S., our ballot argument cost over $600.00 and we need to get out
posters and flyers, etc.

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Bay Area United Against War Paid Ballot Argument:

VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION V!

We don't want the schools used to recruit our children for the wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan.

1. JROTC doesn't teach students the realities of war:

a. They are likely to kill civilians.

b. They are more likely to die or return with devastating mental
and physical disabilities than earn college degrees.

2. Proposition V argues that students should have a "choice" to take
JROTC, but if they join the military they have no choice about killing
or dying.

3. JROTC is a military recruitment program. Keep the military out of
schools!

4. JROTC is NOT the way to keep kids away from gangs. There are
peaceful ways to keeps kids safe.

5. JROTC is NOT a leadership program. It teaches unquestioning
obedience in preparation for military service.

The School Board's decision to end JROTC has set a precedent for
communities nationwide. Don't allow it to be reversed.

Join parents everywhere trying to save their children from being sent
to fight these unjust and illegal wars!

We want funding for education, healthcare, the environment, and jobs,
not war! U.S. out of Iraq and Afghanistan now!

BAY AREA UNITED AGAINST WAR

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Bay Area United Against War Presents a Benefit Performance of:

Howard Zinn's MARX IN SOHO

Author of "A People's History of the United States," Howard Zinn,
humanizes the man behind the ideas in his one-man play. The premise of
the play is that Marx dies in 1883 but is able to see what happens on
Earth for the next 100 years and then comes back to talk about it.
Imagine what Karl Marx would have to say after 100 years of just being
able to watch...

Starring Veteran Actor: Jerry Levy

Charged with a mighty talent and a bottomless love of the play, Levy
has been teaching sociology at Marlboro College and has been acting
with the Actors' Theater of Brattleboro since he moved there from
Chicago in 1975.

Two Performances:

OAKLAND:
Thursday, August 28, 7-9:00 P.M.
High Street Church
1945 High Street (Corner of Courtland, 1/2 block from Foothill Blvd.)

SAN FRANCISCO:
Saturday, August 30, 7-9:00 P.M.
Noe Valley Ministry
1021 Sanchez Street (Near 23rd Street)

You can get advance tickets to the play for $10.00 by emailing the
following address and leaving your name and how many tickets you would
like to reserve, then simply pick up your tickets at the door the night
of the performance.

giobon@comcast.net

(Please indicate either Oakland or San Francisco, leave your name
and how many tickets you want to reserve and simply pick your
tickets up at the door the night of the performance.)

A special benefit for Bay Area United Against War's
Military counter-recruitment campaign.
P.O. Box 318021
S.F., CA 94131-8021
www.bauaw.org
LABOR DONATED

You can watch a short clip of the play with Jerry Levy at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdfRsmkIj4c

And for more fun you can watch "The Manifesto of the Communist
Party"--the cartoon at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1IME451NDY&feature=related

REVIEW:

Marx in Soho, Zinn at Brandeis
by Noah Klinger
March 11, 2005
http://thehoot.net/articles/454

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9th Annual "Power-to-the-Peaceful Festival"

Annual 9/11 Rally / March from the Panhandle through Golden Gate Park to
the "Power-to-the- Peaceful Festival"

Saturday, September 6, 2008

http://www.communitycurrency.org/events.html

Speedway Meadows
Golden Gate Park

Following the attacks of September 11th, the first "9/11 Truth Rally and March" took place in the Panhandle, marching up Haight Street and through Golden Gate Park to the "Power-to-the-Peaceful" Concert

Our rally begins at 10:00 am @ the Panhandle (between Oak and Fell at Ashbury)
11:00 am we begin our march up Ashbury to Haight, through Golden Gate Park to Speedway Meadows and to the Concert which lasts until 5:00 pm.

To endorse, speak, volunteer --- Contact Carol Brouillet @ 650-857-0927. We welcome all who are for 9/11 Truth, Impeachment, Peace, an End to War, Repeal of the Patriot Act, Military Commissions Act. Bring banners, signs, costumes, musical instruments, your humor, energy, messages. The Northern California 9/11 Truth Alliance will have a booth at the Concert and pass out literature to the thousands who come to the concert and support peace.

(Go to: http://www.communitycurrency.org/events.html
Here's our 9-11 Truth Rally / March webpage with photos and reports from years ago.)

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Labor Beat: National Assembly to End the War in Iraq and Afghanistan:
Highlights from the June 28-29, 2008 meeting in Cleveland, OH. In this 26-minute video, Labor Beat presents a sampling of the speeches and floor discussions from this important conference. Attended by over 400 people, the Assembly's main objective was to urge united and massive mobilizations in the spring to “Bring the Troops Home Now,” as well as supporting actions that build towards that date. To read the final action proposal and to learn other details, visit www.natassembly.org. Produced by Labor Beat. Labor Beat is a CAN TV Community Partner. Labor Beat is affiliated with IBEW 1220. Views expressed are those of the producer, not necessarily of IBEW. For info: mail@laborbeat.org,www.laborbeat.org. 312-226-3330. For other Labor Beat videos, visit Google Video or YouTube and search "Labor Beat".
http://blip.tv/file/1149437/

Open Letter to the U.S. Antiwar Movement

The following “Open letter to the U.S. Antiwar Movement” was adopted by the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations on July 13, 2008. We urge antiwar organizations around the country to endorse the letter. Please send notice of endorsements to natassembly@aol.com

Dear Sisters and Brothers:

In the coming months, there will be a number of major actions mobilizing opponents of U.S. wars and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan to demand “Bring the Troops Home Now!” These will include demonstrations at the Democratic and Republican Party conventions, pre-election mobilizations like those on October 11 in a number of cities and states, and the December 9-14 protest activities. All of these can and should be springboards for very large bi-coastal demonstrations in the spring.

Our movement faces this challenge: Will the spring actions be unified with all sections of the movement joining together to mobilize the largest possible outpouring on a given date? Or will different antiwar coalitions set different dates for actions that would be inherently competitive, the result being smaller and less powerful expressions of support for the movement’s “Out Now!” demand?

We appeal to all sections of the movement to speak up now and be heard on this critical question. We must not replicate the experience of recent years during which the divisions in the movement severely weakened it to the benefit of the warmakers and the detriment of the millions of victims of U.S. aggressions, interventions and occupations.

Send a message. Urge – the times demand it! – united action in the spring to ensure a turnout which will reflect the majority’s sentiments for peace. Ideally, all major forces in the antiwar movement would announce jointly, or at least on the same day, an agreed upon date for the spring demonstrations.

The National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations will be glad to participate in the process of selecting a date for spring actions that the entire movement can unite around. One way or another, let us make sure that comes spring we will march in the streets together, demanding that the occupations be ended, that all the troops and contractors be withdrawn immediately, and that all U.S. military bases be closed.

In solidarity and peace,

National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations

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OCTOBER 11, 2008 End the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan Now!
http://oct11.org/

Dear Readers,

The date of October 11, 2008 was designated as a day of localized national actions against the war at the National Assembly to End the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this past June. Demonstrations are already being planned. Here is the call from the Greater Boston area--hopefully we can pull something together for October ll here in San Francisco.

In solidarity,

Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War

Hi all,

Below is an outreach letter that will be going out to various organizational lists
and individuals all over the Greater Boston area. Please feel free to circulate
this letter as an example of what is happening in Boston as you seek support
for October 11 in your various localities.

Adelante (forward),
John Harris
Greater Boston Stop the Wars Coalition

Dear Friends,

March, 2008 ushered in the sixth year of war and occupation “without end” on Iraq . In an act of arrogance and impunity, Congress in a bipartisan vote approved another
$162 billion in funding for the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan . Stepped up threats against Iran and the increased likelihood of a U.S. troop “surge” into Afghanistan point to an imperative for action and an independent voice from the peace and justice movement.

In light of these developments, grass roots forces from around the country gathered together at the end of June for the National Assembly to End the Iraq War and Occupation in Cleveland, Ohio. At the conference an action plan for the months ahead was discussed and approved in a democratic vote. As part of this plan, over 95 percent voted in favor of supporting pre-election protests being organized in cities and localities around the country on October 11, 2008.

It was on October 11, 2002 that Congress approved the “ Iraq War Resolution” granting the Bush administration authorization to invade Iraq . The weeks ahead promise to be filled with debate as the election campaigns gear up. Instead of being spectators who watch the media pundits put their spin on the political pronouncements of the candidates, the October 11 protests present us with an opportunity to be engaged in injecting our agenda, the antiwar agenda, into the intensifying debate.

Please join us in an initial planning meeting as we prepare a Boston protest demanding the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all occupation forces from Iraq and the closing of all military bases. All are invited. Looking forward to seeing you there.

Saturday, August 9, 3:00 PM
Encuentro 5
33 Harrison Avenue, 5th Floor
Boston (in Chinatown )

In Peace and Solidarity,

Marilyn Levin
*Arlington/Lexington United for Justice with Peace, New England United

Liam Madden
*IVAW – Boston Chapter

Suren Moodliar
Mass Global Action

Ann Glick
Newton Dialogues for Peace

Nate Goldshlag
Smedley D. Butler Brigade, Chapter 9 Veterans for Peace

Paul Shannon
American Friends Service Committee

John Harris
Greater Boston Stop the Wars Coalition

* Organization for identification purposes only

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A.N.S.W.E.R.Calendar of Upcoming Anti-war Events
-- August 25-28 in Denver: Protest the Democratic National Convention
-- September 1-4 in St. Paul: Protest the Republican Convention
-- January 20, 2009: Bring the Anti-War Movement to Inauguration Day in D.C.

January 20, 2009: Join thousands to demand "Bring the troops home now!"

The ANSWER Coalition will be in the streets on Saturday August 16 in Los Angeles to demand an immediate withdrawal of all occupation forces from Irag and Afghanistan and end to all threats and sanctions against Iran.

On January 20, 2009, when the next president proceeds up Pennsylvania Avenue he will see thousands of people carrying signs that say US Out of Iraq Now!, US Out of Afghanistan Now!, and Stop the Threats Against Iran! As in Vietnam it will be the people in the streets and not the politicians who can make the difference.

On March 20, 2008, in response to a civil rights lawsuit brought against the National Park Service by the Partnership for Civil Justice on behalf of the ANSWER Coalition, a Federal Court ruled for ANSWER and determined that the government had discriminated against those who brought an anti-war message to the 2005 Inauguration. The court barred the government from continuing its illegal practices on Inauguration Day.

The Democratic and Republican Parties have made it clear that they intend to maintain the occupation of Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, and threaten a new war against Iran.

Both Parties are completely committed to fund Israel’s on-going war against the Palestinian people. Both are committed to spending $600 billion each year so that the Pentagon can maintain 700 military bases in 130 countries.

On this the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we are helping to build a nationwide movement to support working-class communities that are being devastated while the country’s resources are devoted to war and empire for for the sake of transnational banks and corporations.

Join us in Denver on Aug. 25-28 at the Democratic Convention, in St. Paul at the Republican Convention between Sept. 1 and Sept. 4. And help organize bus and car caravans for January 20, 2009, Inauguration Day, so that whoever is elected president will see on Pennsylvania Avenue that the people want an immediate end to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and to halt the threats against Iran.

From Iraq to New Orleans, Fund Peoples Needs Not the War Machine!

Calendar of Events:

-- August 25-28 in Denver: Protest the Democratic National Convention
-- September 1-4 in St. Paul: Protest the Republican Convention
-- January 20, 2009: Bring the Anti-War Movement to Inauguration Day in D.C.

We cannot carry out these actions withour your help. Please take a moment right now to make an urgently needed donation by clicking this link:

https://secure2.convio.net/pep/site/Donation?ACTION=SHOW_DONATION_OPTIONS&CAMPAIGN_ID=1121&JServSessionIdr011=23sri803b1.app2a

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
http://www.answercoalition.org/
info@internationalanswer.org
National Office in Washington DC: 202-544-3389
New York City: 212-694-8720
Los Angeles: 213-251-1025
San Francisco: 415-821-6545
Chicago: 773-463-0311

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ARTICLES IN FULL:

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1) Living Costs Rising Fast, and Wages Are Trailing
"But inflation is causing pain for businesses, too, as many companies are forced to pay more for fuel and transportation costs for goods. To keep making money, firms may try to pass those costs on to their customers."
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
August 15, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/15/business/economy/15econ.html?ref=business

2) "Award-Winning Sand Creek Massacre Film To Smithsonian "
http://sandcreekmassacre.net/press/award-winning-sand-creek-massacre-film-to-smithsonian/

3) How About the Home Front?
By BOB HERBERT
Op-Ed Columnist
August 16, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/16/opinion/16herbert.html?hp

4) British Kill 4 Civilians in Afghanistan
By REUTERS
August 18, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/18/world/asia/18afghan.html?ref=world

5) The Corporate Free Ride
Editorial
August 18, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/18/opinion/18mon2.html?scp=1&sq=the%20corporate%20free%20ride&st=cse

6) Lakotah Plan Civil Disobedience Fishing Event
This historic event is planned for Monday, August 25th, at 1:00 p.m.
For more information: www.republicoflakota.com

7) Infected Galápagos Penguins Could Get Avian Malaria
By ERICA GIES
August 19, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/19/science/19peng.html?ref=worldn

8) No End in Sight
Editorial
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/opinion/20wed1.html?hp

9) JROTC is not a choice
San Francisco Bay Guardian
August 20, 2008
http://www.sfbg.com/printable_entry.php?entry_id=6942

10) Cellmate Describes Pain of Detainee Who Died
By NINA BERNSTEIN
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20detain.html?ref=us

11) One Protest, 52 Arrests and a $2 Million Payout
By JIM DWYER
About New York
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20about.html?ref=nyregion

12) Brooklyn Boy, 5, Falls 10 Stories to His Death After Public Housing Elevator Stalls
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20fall.html?ref=nyregion

13) Afghanistan on Fire
Editorial
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/opinion/21thu1.html?hp

14) Exiting Iraq, Petraeus Says Gains Are Fragile
By DEXTER FILKINS
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/world/middleeast/21general.html?ref=world

15) New Guidelines Would Give F.B.I. Broader Powers
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/washington/21fbi.html?ref=us

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1) Living Costs Rising Fast, and Wages Are Trailing
"But inflation is causing pain for businesses, too, as many companies are forced to pay more for fuel and transportation costs for goods. To keep making money, firms may try to pass those costs on to their customers."
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
August 15, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/15/business/economy/15econ.html?ref=business

The cost of living, led by the soaring cost of gasoline and food, is rising at the fastest rate since the recession of the early 1990s, the government said on Thursday, handing a de facto pay cut to the American worker.

The report, from the Labor Department, offered quantitative proof of what Americans have been feeling for months: almost everything costs more, even as they have less money to pay for it.

Prices of a wide range of common products in the Consumer Price Index were 5.6 percent higher last month than they were in July 2007, the sharpest annual increase since January 1991.

Much of the increase has been driven by the immense run-up in gasoline prices. But food, beverage and transportation costs are also significantly higher than they were a year ago.

The higher prices have made many workers’ wages effectively worth less.

In July, rank-and-file workers — those in production or nonsupervisory roles — earned 3.1 percent less than they did a year ago, after adjusting for the rising cost of living.

“Any way you slice it, incomes aren’t keeping up with the inflation rate,” said Michael T. Darda, chief economist at the trading and research firm MKM Partners.

It was the 10th consecutive month that the weekly average salary had failed to keep pace with inflation, according to statistics from the Labor Department.

Employers are doling out modest wage increases, but not nearly enough to compensate for more expensive food and fuel.

“People see it and they feel it on a daily basis,” Mr. Darda said. “If it’s gasoline or food, that’s visible inflation, and the stuff that households need the most and depend on.”

Prices have not risen at the speed they did during the oil crises of the 1970s, and financial policy makers have said they do not expect a repeat of the so-called wage-price spiral that led to double-digit inflation rates during that decade.

But with home values falling and the stock market in a slump, Americans are finding it more and more difficult to pay for basic purchases. Credit card debt has spiraled upward, home foreclosures are rising, and banks have become more guarded in giving out loans and mortgages.

Social Security recipients are now on track to receive the highest cost-of-living increase since 1982.

The Federal Reserve can try to choke off inflation by raising its benchmark interest rate. But such a move would also make it harder for businesses, banks and households to obtain loans, which could cause a further slowdown in the economy. Investors now expect the Fed to hold rates steady until at least the end of the year.

Some economists have argued that as Americans cut back their spending, demand for products and services will drop, forcing businesses to lower their prices.

But inflation is causing pain for businesses, too, as many companies are forced to pay more for fuel and transportation costs for goods. To keep making money, firms may try to pass those costs on to their customers.

Recent weeks have shown a few indications of relief in fuel prices, as oil prices declined steeply. On Thursday, crude oil futures dropped about a dollar to just over $115 a barrel, down 11 percent from a month ago.

Gasoline prices rose 4 percent in July, but that was less than half the 10 percent increase in May. Transportation costs also decelerated. And the dollar has waged a comeback against foreign currencies; on Thursday, it reached a six-month high against the euro.

But while some economists predicted that inflation would start to ease, they said that process could take several months. Many reserved the right to modify their forecasts if the price of oil rebounded.

Over all, the Consumer Price Index, considered the benchmark gauge of domestic inflation, rose 0.8 percent in July. Economists had predicted an increase of half that rate. In June, prices rose 1.1 percent, the second highest monthly pace in 26 years.

The C.P.I. surveys the prices of a basket of common goods and services, from toothpaste and prescription drugs to airline fares and restaurant menus.

Because food and energy prices can be highly volatile from month to month, the Labor Department also calculates a so-called core price index, which strips out those costs. In July, core C.P.I. rose 0.3 percent, reaching a 2.5 percent annual rate.

That is higher than the Fed and other economic policy makers would prefer. Central bankers use core C.P.I. to see whether price increases are becoming entrenched in the broader economy; Fed officials are said to prefer to keep the annual inflation rate at or below 2 percent.

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2) "Award-Winning Sand Creek Massacre Film To Smithsonian "
http://sandcreekmassacre.net/press/award-winning-sand-creek-massacre-film-to-smithsonian/

August 15, 2008 -- CENTENNIAL, CO -- The Film and Video Center of the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian has requested that the award- winning "The Sand Creek Massacre" documentary film be entered in its 14th Native American Film + Video Festival to be held in New York City, March 26— 29, 2009. The Festival features films and video productions of all genres from North, Central and South America, and Hawai’i. It showcases productions by Native media makers, as well as community projects, broadcast productions, and other works reflecting Native perspectives, and brings together participants from the four directions for screenings, workshops and special events. All programs are free to the public.

Award-winning writer/filmmaker, Donald L. Vasicek, who wrote, directed, and produced "The Sand Creek Massacre" said, "Since "The Sand Creek Massacre" documentary film project was made to inform, educate and create awareness of American native people and the genocide of them, this invitation enhances the exposure of the Cheyenne and Arapaho cultures to all people, and, in turn, helps insure that they will never leave this earth."

Vasicek is presently working on "Ghosts of Sand Creek", a feature film he also plans on making into a two-hour, six episode mini-series/documentary film.

Vasicek's SandCreekMassacre.net provides detailed information about the Sand Creek Massacre including witness accounts, still images, "The Sand Creek Massacre" award-winning trailer and documentary short, etc.

###

Contact:

Donald L. Vasicek Olympus Films+, LLC Writing/Filmmaking/Consulting http://www.donvasicek.com sandcreekmassacre.net dvasicek@earthlink.net 303-903-2103

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3) How About the Home Front?
By BOB HERBERT
Op-Ed Columnist
August 16, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/16/opinion/16herbert.html?hp

It’s fair to say that America’s mayors are not thrilled with the way the presidential campaign has unfolded so far.

Domestic issues? An urban agenda? Rebuilding the nation’s aging infrastructure?

They haven’t drawn nearly as much attention as the two favorite topics in this campaign: foolishness and foreign affairs. We’ve had dueling ads over which candidate is the bigger celebrity; an obsession with a New Yorker magazine cover; in-depth analyses of the Obamas’ fist-bumping moment; the requisite introduction of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton into a conversation that should be geared toward adults, and so on.

We’ve also had a more or less serious focus on the war in Iraq and a handful of other international matters.

What we haven’t had is a deep exploration of problems here at home that are threatening the very vibrancy of the nation, including: the dismal employment picture (there are many more Americans out of work than the official statistics show); the terrible toll that the housing and mortgage crisis is taking on families from one coast to the other; the tens of millions of Americans who are without health insurance coverage; the stunning high school dropout numbers; and a demoralizing problem with violent crime in several parts of the country.

(City officials in Hartford have become so frustrated with the violence plaguing their city that they’ve imposed a 30-day 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew for everyone 18 and under. Curfews are constitutionally dubious and unlikely to work, but when nothing seems to stop the gunfire, and you end up with a 17-month-old girl and a 7-year-old boy among the wounded, a sense of desperation sets in.)

This was the campaign that was supposed to chart a dramatic new direction for the U.S., away from the disastrous policies of the past several years — at home as well as abroad.

We’re still waiting.

Manny Diaz, the mayor of Miami and president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, has been harshly critical of the federal government’s failure to address the most serious needs of the nation’s cities and metropolitan areas. In a talk at the National Press Club early this month, he said that Washington had “lost its values, lost its principles,” and given up on investing in the cities and their people.

“Washington,” he said, “has abandoned us.”

I sat in on a meeting Thursday as Mr. Diaz and several other mayors, including Michael Bloomberg of New York, met in Manhattan to discuss ways of getting the federal government involved in large-scale infrastructure and transportation initiatives. The mayors are trying to spread the message that investing in a sound infrastructure is essential for continued economic development.

This may seem obvious, but infrastructure proponents are having a terrible time getting traction on this issue. Infrastructure initiatives are expensive, and not sexy. But there are powerful returns on these investments. They tend to pay for themselves many times over (can you imagine New York City without the subways?) and the projects are job creators.

With President Bush on the way out, the burden of leading an effort to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure would fall on either Barack Obama or John McCain. Representatives of each candidate attended Thursday’s meeting but did not participate.

The mayors talked about clogged highways, the high price of gasoline and an air transportation system that seems to get more pitiful by the day. Mayor John Robert Smith of Meridian, Miss., called on the presidential candidates to take a bold, creative approach to the nation’s transportation needs, including substantial investments in railroad infrastructure.

Mr. Smith believes the nation should devote the same level of commitment to developing a first-rate passenger rail system as was marshaled for the interstate highway system in the Eisenhower era.

What struck me as I listened to the mayors’ earnest conversations was how infrequently the public gets to hear the nitty gritty of serious public policy issues. Most voters go into the booth woefully uninformed. Presidential campaigns are largely a compilation of 30-second television ads, endlessly speculating talking heads and nationally televised debates featuring gotcha questions and rigidly enforced time limits that preclude truly thoughtful answers.

At a press conference after the meeting, Mayor Bloomberg said, “We’ve got to make infrastructure investment a national priority,” and he took the federal government to task for “walking away from its responsibility in this area.”

But just like the continuing slaughter of young people in tough neighborhoods across the country, very little attention is being given to the nation’s neglected infrastructure needs.

The mayors met in Philadelphia recently to talk about crime, and they will be meeting in Los Angeles soon to talk about poverty.

Who knows if anyone is listening.

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4) British Kill 4 Civilians in Afghanistan
By REUTERS
August 18, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/18/world/asia/18afghan.html?ref=world

LONDON (Reuters) — British troops accidentally killed four civilians and wounded three others with rockets during an operation against Taliban insurgents in southern Afghanistan, NATO and British officials said Sunday.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force said women and children were among the casualties, but it did not detail whether they were dead or wounded.

The British Ministry of Defense said British paratroopers were involved in the episode in the Sangin district of Helmand Province on Saturday. It said the alliance and British forces would investigate.

The alliance force said a patrol had spotted insurgents with weapons preparing to attack from the roof of a compound. “In order to protect themselves,” it said in a statement, the British soldiers “launched three rockets, all of which hit the target. Unbeknown to the patrol, the civilians were inside the compound.”

The force “deeply regrets the tragedy,” the statement added.

About 115 British troops have been killed in Afghanistan since late 2001. Most of Britain’s force of 8,000 in Afghanistan is based in Helmand, which has been the focus of intense fighting.

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5) The Corporate Free Ride
Editorial
August 18, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/18/opinion/18mon2.html?scp=1&sq=the%20corporate%20free%20ride&st=cse

Here is a crazy idea to address the United States’ gaping fiscal deficit: persuade corporate America to start paying taxes.

An investigation by the Government Accountability Office found that almost two-thirds of companies in the United States usually pay no corporate income taxes. Big companies, those with more than $50 million in sales or $250 million in assets, are less likely to avoid Uncle Sam altogether. Still, about a quarter of them report no tax liability either.

The G.A.O., which looked at tax returns from 1998 through 2005, does not tell us exactly how so many corporations managed to avoid the taxman. It simply notes that they were able to record sufficient expenses — salaries, interest and “other deductions” — to cancel out their taxable income.

We find it hard to believe that some two-thirds of American companies fail to turn a profit. What we find easier to believe is that corporations have become increasingly skilled at tax-avoidance strategies, including transfer pricing — overcharging their American units for products and services provided by subsidiaries abroad to artificially reduce their profits here.

The first place to look for money to close the budget deficit should be among the high-income individuals who have been treated so generously by the Bush administration. But corporate America has been getting a free pass for far too long. And the seeming ease with which corporations escape the taxman altogether compounds a fundamental unfairness in the American economy.

Even as corporate profits have soared — reaching a record of 14.1 percent of the nation’s total income in 2006 — the percentage of these profits paid out in taxes is near its lowest level since the 1930s.

It is a uniquely American paradox. This country’s corporate tax rates are among the highest in the industrial world, yet the taxes that corporations pay are among the lowest. With an enormous budget deficit and pressing demands for better health care and other social programs, America can no longer afford free riders.

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6) Lakotah Plan Civil Disobedience Fishing Event
This historic event is planned for Monday, August 25th, at 1:00 p.m.
For more information: www.republicoflakota.com

AIMsters and Friends,

Our brother, Russell Means, has sent out the following call. All supporters of treaty rights, and freedom for indigenous peoples, are encouraged to attend and show their solidarity.

In the tradition of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Russell Means, the Chief Facilitator of the Republic of Lakotah, is organizing a group of Lakotah Indians to enter Sheridan Lake Recreation Area near Rapid City, South Dakota, refuse to pay the admission fee, and fish without paying the license fee. Means claims that Lakotah retained the right to fish and pass in the 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty territory and that those rights continue today and backed by Article VI of the Constitution of the united states of America.

The event, which is being billed as the Lakotah Freedom Fishing Day, is about much more than the admission fee or the fishing license fee; it is about getting the South Dakota and United States governments to follow their own laws. Means said, "After having been an occupied nation for over 150 years, we have asked the United States government to leave our country. Meanwhile, until the United States Government leaves Lakotah territory we will take every opportunity to insist it follow its own laws and that its states do the same."

Lakotah have given notice to Larry Long, the Attorney General of South Dakota, of its plans for this event. Means said he has not heard from Long yet and does not know if the state plans on allowing the Indians to fish and pass or if the park rangers will issue citations or arrest any of the Lakotah fishermen. Means plans to call in federal marshalls to enforce the treaty rights. Means said, "According to the Civil Right Act, federal marshalls should arrest any state official who tries to stop Lakotah from entering the park and fishing. However, if the United States ignores its own laws to deny Lakotah rights, it will certainly not be the first time."

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7) Infected Galápagos Penguins Could Get Avian Malaria
By ERICA GIES
August 19, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/19/science/19peng.html?ref=world

A parasite has been found in Galápagos penguins, raising fears among researchers that it could lead to avian malaria, a disease that contributed significantly to the 50 percent extinction rate of endemic birds in Hawaii.

The discovery resulted from a long-term study to monitor diseases in Galápagos birds, conducted by researchers from the University of Missouri, St. Louis, the St. Louis Zoo, Galápagos National Park and the Charles Darwin Foundation.

Unlike Hawaii and other remote island archipelagos, the Galápagos, 600 miles off Ecuador, retains 95 percent of its original species and all of its birds. “It’s about the best record that exists on Earth,” said Patty Parker, a professor of zoological studies at the University of Missouri, St. Louis, who discovered the parasite in the penguins. Ninety-seven percent of the land is protected, and the surrounding waters are one of the world’s largest marine reserves.

Dr. Parker said the parasite was in the genus Plasmodium, which includes several malaria-causing species. The recently discovered parasite appears to be a new species and is so far unnamed.

The parasite was probably introduced by human activity, she said. Tourism has increased to 140,000 visitors in 2006 from 40,000 in 1990.

That has drawn immigrants from mainland Ecuador who work in the tourist industry, driving the population to an estimated 30,000 from about 8,000 in 1990.

In 2007, the archipelago, a Unesco natural heritage site, was labeled “in danger” by the international body.

The number of invasive insects arriving on the islands, presumably with the influx of people, has increased “exponentially,” Dr. Parker said.

This incursion is likely to continue, at least in the near future. Tourism accounts for 51 percent of the economy, according to a Darwin Foundation report.

Recently introduced quarantines, which fumigate incoming passenger planes and the supplies of researchers headed for uninhabited islands, are encouraging to experts but not comprehensive. For example, there are no controls on private boats, and cargo ships are not treated the same as commercial tour ships.

Researchers do not yet know if the Plasmodium species in the penguins is a threat. The birds seem healthy. That could be because that particular Plasmodium species does not cause malaria. Or the parasite could be biding its time, waiting to proliferate in the penguins during periods of stress, like a food shortage, other disease or the rainy El Niño, which causes insect populations to explode.

Researchers are trying to determine what sort of mosquito is transmitting the parasite to penguins. In Hawaii, the culprit was Culex quinquefasciatus, a species of mosquito that arrived in the Galápagos in the mid-1980s.

The other possibility is Ochlerotatus taeniorhynchus, a mosquito that may be native to the archipelago. This species can also carry the parasite that causes malaria.

Park managers would like to eradicate the guilty mosquito, and that may be possible with Culex because it needs fresh water to breed, a limited resource during the dry season. Ochlerotatus breeds in brackish water, however, which is found all over the islands, so eradication would be difficult.

Additionally, if the mosquito is native, it would be protected, said Dr. Virna Cedeño, director of the Fabricio Valverde Laboratory in the Galápagos. “It may not be as nice as a penguin,” Dr. Cedeño said. “But it would be a species to protect nevertheless.”

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8) No End in Sight
Editorial
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/opinion/20wed1.html?hp

A year into the financial crisis, the news is grim and there are signs of even worse troubles ahead. The mortgage bust continues and has begun to spread to loans for construction and commercial property, as well as credit cards and auto loans.

There may soon be more bank failures and a spate of corporate bankruptcies. That means that unemployment will almost certainly rise — employers have shed nearly half a million jobs this year — and those who keep their jobs will have to cope with fewer hours, measlier raises and evaporating bonuses.

In an election year, sound policy making is almost always trumped by political posturing, making the situation even bleaker. A case in point is the new foreclosure-prevention law. President Bush threatened for months to veto it, before signing it in July. The law’s main feature — allowing the government to guarantee hundreds of billions of dollars in new mortgages to troubled borrowers — won’t take effect until Oct. 1.

The law’s other important feature — a contingency plan for a government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the nation’s biggest mortgage companies — was a last-minute, crisis-driven addition, the opposite of the ahead-of-the-curve action that is now needed.

The country cannot afford more delay and more posturing. Before the crisis gets any worse, Congress must take several steps.

Lawmakers need to start crafting the next stimulus bill — without repeating the mistakes of the last one. Composed mainly of tax rebates, as the White House wanted, the first stimulus was too broad to deliver a powerful punch. The next package has to focus on actions that are known to yield big economic benefits: bolstered food stamps, which rapidly boost consumption; and aid to states and cities so they can continue to provide essential services. Lawmakers should also invest in infrastructure projects, like repairing bridges and roads. If not, projects that are already under way may have to be canceled, creating more unemployment.

Congress also needs to ensure that a $4 billion grant to states and cities to buy up vacant properties is quickly and efficiently distributed. The Department of Housing and Urban Development is developing the formula for allocating the money, and early indications suggest it is on top of the process. But the White House is contemptuous of the grant, calling it a gift to speculators when it is actually a lifeline for ailing communities. That means Congress will have to be especially vigilant.

Congress also cannot wait to see if its anti-foreclosure measures work. It must begin to vet other ideas and be ready to move quickly if the crisis worsens. Most important, lawmakers should be ready to reform the bankruptcy law so that homeowners can have their mortgages modified under court protection. That is arguably the best way to prevent foreclosures, but it is also the policy most reviled by the mortgage industry. Lawmakers should let the industry know that if lenders are not willing to back the foreclosure prevention effort wholeheartedly — before the government can step in, the law requires that the balances be reduced — they will be seeing the homeowners in bankruptcy court.

The work doesn’t end there. The Bush administration and federal regulators need to develop a framework for resolving future financial failures before they occur. That is essential for rebuilding confidence in the system.

Millions of Americans are already suffering. And we fear millions more will be hurt before this crisis ends. They cannot wait until after the election for help.

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9) JROTC is not a choice
San Francisco Bay Guardian
August 20, 2008
http://www.sfbg.com/printable_entry.php?entry_id=6942

It seems the military will do whatever it takes
to get in front of our youngsters in our public schools.

By San Francisco School Board President Mark Sanchez
and Tommi Avicolli Mecca

To hear proponents of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) talk, it's a matter of personal choice for 14 and 15-year-olds to sign up for the Pentagon's military recruitment program, which is being phased out of San Francisco's public schools June 2009. The San Francisco Board of Education also recently voted to remove physical education credit from the program this school year. It had to: the retired military officers who teach the course don't meet the educational standards of state law, and the course doesn't meet state physical education standards.

Supporters of JROTC are taking the issue to the November ballot. Their initiative, albeit non-binding, would put San Franciscans on record as in support of the military program.

As Democratic clubs and other political organizations begin their endorsement process, progressives need to understand the importance of defeating this initiative. It's not a harmless measure. If it passes, the new school board can use it to reinstate JROTC. If it loses, it's less likely the board will change its course. Thankfully, last week the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC) voted overwhelmingly not to endorse the measure.

JROTC is not summer camp or a harmless after-school activity. It is one more way the military finds bodies for its illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Denisha Williams can tell you that. The African American high school senior in Philadelphia told the City Paper that she left JROTC and opted out of the military having her contact info. It hasn't made any difference: "I have received phone calls, e-mail, three letters and a 15-minute videotape. I even received a phone call from a female recruiter asking if I was still interested in the Navy. I told her I wasn't and hung up. A week later I received another letter and the tape."

Capt. Daniel R. Gager, commander of the US Army recruiting station in south Philadelphia, said he and other recruiters were ordered by the US Recruiting Command to put more time and energy into recruiting high school upperclassmen such as Williams.

In San Francisco, at least 15 percent of the cadets have been placed in the program without their consent. It seems the military will do whatever it takes to get in front of our youngsters in our public schools.

Pressuring kids to join the military is wrong. International law says kids under 18 should not be recruited at all, and the ACLU agrees (see www.aclu.org/intlhumanrights/gen ). Recruiters in every high school and at every mall in this country break that law every day.

Nationally about 40 percent of JROTC kids end up in the military. In San Francisco, proponents claim only 2 percent go on to military careers. They are wrong. According to the school district, no tracking of JROTC students is done.

Please work to defeat Proposition V, the pro-JROTC initiative.

Mark Sanchez is President of the San Francisco Board of Education and an eighth grade science teacher. Tommi Avicolli Mecca is a radical queer activist and writer whose regular columns appear at www.beyondchron.org .

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10) Cellmate Describes Pain of Detainee Who Died
By NINA BERNSTEIN
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20detain.html?ref=us

A lawsuit filed in federal court a year ago by a Dominican detainee makes complaints about health care at a detention center in Rhode Island that are similar to accounts of how the center treated a Chinese New Yorker who died Aug. 6 in immigration custody. That inmate was suffering from a fractured spine and extensive cancer that had gone undiagnosed until five days before his death.

The lawsuit, filed in Providence, asserts that employees at the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Center, in Central Falls, R.I., denied a wheelchair to Marino De Los Santos, who said that he suffered serious injuries to his neck, back, chest and spine in two falls at the center in 2006. According to the suit, employees accused Mr. De Los Santos of faking his injuries and refused to take him to scheduled examinations by a spine specialist.

Cornell Corrections of Rhode Island, one of the defendants, which ran the center at the time covered by the suit, denied any wrongdoing in its answer.

In the case of Hiu Lui Ng, who was the subject of an article last week in The New York Times, lawyers and relatives said that when he was racked with pain and too weak to walk, detention officials refused him a wheelchair, failed to take him to scheduled appointments for an M.R.I. exam or a CT scan, and instead took him in shackles to Hartford — where he was pressured to withdraw his appeals and accept deportation.

The lawsuit by Mr. De Los Santos and details of earlier medical evaluations that fell short of diagnosing Mr. Ng’s terminal illness and debilitating injury, emerged this week as members of Congress demanded a full accounting by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security.

In a telephone interview on Tuesday, Mr. De Los Santos, 37, said that Mr. Ng was briefly his cellmate early last month and that his extreme back pain and weakness were apparent.

“He was crying all night,” Mr. De Los Santos said from his home in Bridgeport, Conn., where he returned after he was released on bond on Friday. He faces deportation as a convicted drug dealer. “I got bottom bunk, he got the upper bunk, and when he’s going to bed, it’s terrible. And I got problems, too, in my back, but him, when I see him, I can’t sleep.”

Mr. Ng was eventually assigned to a lower bunk in another cell, but by late last month he could barely walk, Mr. De Los Santos said. “When you line up to take medicine, he would grab a chair, because he couldn’t stand. And they would tell him he had to let the chair go, he had to stand, but he couldn’t.”

He said that when Mr. Ng was bedridden, he saw a nurse go to check him in his cell. “She came out laughing and saying he was faking,” Mr. De Los Santos said.

Mr. Ng, a computer engineer with no criminal record, overstayed a visa years ago and had been applying for a green card through his wife, a United States citizen, when he was swept into the detention system in July 2007.

Kelly A. Nantel, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said in an e-mail message that the agency “continues to investigate allegations that Mr. Ng was mistreated in any way while in detention.”

But she added: “Based on a review of the medical records, it appears that Mr. Ng was examined by medical staff at the facility where he was detained and at the local hospital in Rhode Island both as a normal course of admission to the facility and for individual complaints he had. Tragically, but not unlike similar situations involving citizens of this country, Mr. Ng was diagnosed with advanced-stage cancer and sadly succumbed to the illness within days of the diagnosis.”

Officials at Wyatt would not answer questions last week, but asserted in a written statement that Mr. Ng had received proper care.

In a letter to Michael Chertoff, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, on Monday, Representatives John C. Conyers Jr., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and Zoe Lofgren, chairwoman of its subcommittee on immigration, said that based on the article, “ the treatment provided to Mr. Ng is simply unforgivable.”

It is “particularly distressing,” the letter added, “considering that much of it took place when ICE was facing intense scrutiny over the quality of its medical care system and when agency personnel had assured Congress that problems had been addressed.”

According to Mr. Ng’s relatives and lawyers, he began complaining of severe back pain and an itchy rash in April, when he was being held at the Greenfield County Sheriff’s lockup in St. Albans, Vt., where little or no health care was available.

When he was transferred to Wyatt on July 3, a health screening form listed a rash, but no back pain. Later, he was seen by detention center doctors for back pain, and after his relatives urged further tests, given an X-ray of his back and hip on July 20, medical records show.

The radiologist’s report came back with a diagnosis of mild scoliosis, without complications. Since Mr. Ng’s spine fracture was diagnosed 12 days later, when an M.R.I. also found terminal cancer in his bones, lungs and liver, it is unclear whether the radiologist missed evidence of his broken back or if that injury occurred sometime between the X-ray and his Aug. 2 admission to Rhode Island Hospital, in Providence.

A doctor at the detention center noted in the record that a CT scan should be performed if Mr. Ng’s pain did not respond to painkillers and muscle relaxants. Instead, on the evening of July 26, a Saturday, Mr. Ng was taken to the emergency room at a hospital in Pawtucket, R.I., which does not perform CT scans on weekends. Doctors there scheduled a CT scan for the following Monday, but according to affidavits from Mr. Ng’s lawyers, the detention center’s staff made no effort to take him back there.

Another scan was scheduled for Tuesday, the affidavits said, but Mr. Ng missed that one, too, because, his lawyers assert, he was unable to walk to the car and detention center officials refused to give him a wheelchair, then reported that he had refused to go.

According to affidavits, concern over Mr. De Los Santos’s lawsuit may have played a role in Mr. Ng’s treatment. Mr. Ng’s lawyers said that he told them that a detention captain had ordered him to stop talking to a detainee who had filed a civil suit over a back injury suffered at Wyatt. After his painful trip to Hartford on July 30, Mr. Ng expressed fears that he, too, had been labeled “a troublemaker” by detention officials, and that they had determined to get rid of him or to prove that he was faking illness.

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11) One Protest, 52 Arrests and a $2 Million Payout
By JIM DWYER
About New York
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20about.html?ref=nyregion

The city has agreed to pay $2,007,000 to end a lawsuit brought by 52 people who were swept up in a mass arrest along a Midtown sidewalk during a protest against the invasion of Iraq.

They were charged with blocking pedestrians, but videotapes show that at their most annoying, they might have slowed a few people carrying coffee into work. Public order did not seem to be in unusual danger that morning — certainly nothing that called for rounding up 52 people, or spending millions of dollars.

Only two people were tried; they were acquitted, and charges against the other 50 were dismissed.

The arrests were made on April 7, 2003, during the opening days of the invasion of Iraq and right after the city persuaded the Republican Party to hold its 2004 convention in New York. The people arrested said their rights to free speech had been abused, and sued the city and the police.

Now, five years later, the $2 million settlement is only part of the bonfire of legal expenses. And only some of the costs from this episode involve money.

Of the $2 million paid to the people who were arrested, $1,057,000 is for legal fees and expenses owed to their lawyers. The Law Department could not provide an estimate on Tuesday of how much it spent on the defense, said Laura Postiglione, a spokesman for Michael A. Cardozo, the city’s chief lawyer.

Just about every Tuesday and Thursday for over a year, witnesses were deposed under oath, part of the pretrial process in civil cases, according to Sarah Netburn, a lawyer with the firm Emery Celli Brinkerhoff Abady, which, along with the Center for Constitutional Rights, represented many of the people arrested that morning. The deposition transcripts cost over $100,000, said Matthew Brinkerhoff, another lawyer for the plaintiffs.

Among those deposed were 55 police officers and their supervisors. Between preparation and testimony, many would have lost two days of regular police work.

The city had five lawyers handling the case over the last four years, along with a special appellate team. A conservative estimate is that the city spent $1 million on the defense, including the salaries and benefits of police officers and lawyers, before running up the white flag.

“Although defendants believe that they would ultimately have prevailed at a trial, the costs of going forward weighed in favor of a settlement at this time,” said Susan Halatyn, a city lawyer.

But why were the arrests made in the first place?

That morning, two groups gathered on West 56th Street, outside the offices of an affiliate of the Carlyle Group, a private equity firm that has holdings in defense industries and employs many world figures, including the first President Bush.

One group of about 10 people planned to commit civil disobedience by sitting in front of the building, on the south side of 56th Street. The other group, of about 100 people, stood on the north side of the street, chanting.

Sarah Kunstler, 31, a lawyer, a filmmaker and the daughter of the renowned lawyer, said she had gone to see if there were possibilities of making a film about war protests. “I found out I could get arrested for absolutely no reason,” Ms. Kunstler said.

A film editor, Ahmad Shirazi, 70, said he was in the group on the north side of the street and had just finished speaking with reporters for the BBC when he saw officers beginning to mass.

“All of a sudden, from the Fifth Avenue side, a huge number of police officers entered 56th Street,” Mr. Shirazi said. “The protest was on the south side of the street. We were standing on the north side of the street. They came directly to us, they were in riot gear, and they surrounded us. They made a semicircle around us, shoulder to shoulder, with their batons.”

“Then they started arresting us, one by one. At that point, I got emotional — I could not believe in my country, in my city, I could get arrested for doing absolutely nothing and standing on the sidewalk,” Mr. Shirazi added.

Are there any lessons from the day? The Law Department said the $2 million payout did not mean the police had done anything wrong. “This settlement was reached without any admission of liability on behalf of the city and the individual defendants,” said Ms. Halatyn, the city lawyer.

The Police Department did not respond to a request for comment on the settlement.

Mr. Shirazi said that as he was being handcuffed for the first time in his life, he told the officer that the plastic cuffs were squeezing him. “He said, ‘You should have thought about that before you came out this morning.’ It was like a dagger in my heart, that a police officer of my city would come up with anything like that.”

E-mail: dwyer@nytimes.com

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12) Brooklyn Boy, 5, Falls 10 Stories to His Death After Public Housing Elevator Stalls
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
August 20, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/nyregion/20fall.html?ref=nyregion

A 5-year-old Brooklyn boy fell 10 stories down an elevator shaft to his death on Tuesday in a public housing complex where residents had complained of recurring problems with the elevators and renovations had been delayed because of federal cutbacks.

The police said the boy, Jacob Neuman, 5, was in an elevator with his 8-year-old brother at 70 Clymer Street in South Williamsburg just before 9:00 a.m. when the elevator became lodged between the 10th and 11th floors. Jacob, a student at a Talmudic academy, was on his way to classes when he tried to escape through the opened elevator door by jumping to the 10th floor, the police said, but lost his footing and fell to the bottom of the shaft.

The boy was taken to Brooklyn Hospital Center, where he was pronounced dead at 9:30 a.m., said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office.

Jacob was the youngest of five children, three girls and two boys. The family lives on the 11th floor of the building, which is part of the Taylor-Wythe apartment complex, owned and overseen by the New York City Housing Authority.

The funeral, held nearby at the Yereim Orthodox Chapel at 93 Broadway soon afterward, was attended by several hundred men, dressed in the traditional black garb of the Hasidic community, and by women with head coverings. Jacob’s father, Chaim, delivered a eulogy, saying in Yiddish, “We are parting, but we will never forget you.”

Jacob’s mother and sisters clutched their faces in grief and had to be helped into chairs on the sidewalk near the end of the service.

In interviews at the complex, residents of the 12-story building said there had been repeated problems with the elevators.

“A lot of times they have become stuck,” said Doris Acosta, who lives on the second floor. “Sometimes they don’t close or don’t open,” she said. “Like when we try to close the door it stays open, and sometimes when we are trying to press the elevator button it doesn’t move. It has happened a lot of times.”

Akive Mendelowitz, 56, who has lived on the 11th floor of the building for 21 years, said he had often called 311 for help.

“This morning — it was like I would say 5:30 — I wanted to go down, and the elevator did not stop,” he said in a telephone interview. Instead, he had to walk down a few floors to catch the elevator. “I needed to go to the 10th floor and then 9th floor,” he said.

“And then this happens,” he said.

The building’s elevators were rated “unsatisfactory” in 17 of 21 inspections the housing authority conducted from 2004 through 2007, city records show, but authority officials said most of those involved minor matters like broken light bulbs or oil leaking from the elevator motor. The authority did not find any problems it considered hazardous, said Howard Marder, an authority spokesman.

The building’s two elevators were to have been modernized in 2004, but those projects were twice delayed because of cuts in federal aid, housing authority officials said.

According to City Department of Buildings records, someone complained on Jan. 21 this year that one of the building’s elevators became stuck for about an hour.

A housing authority official said five operational failures were reported in the last six months in the elevator where Jacob fell. According to the buildings department Web site, the last recorded inspection of the elevators at that address was on Oct. 3, 2007.

A housing authority statement said that the circumstances were under review by city agencies.

David Yassky, the city councilman who represents the neighborhood, said in a statement that the housing authority assured him that it was “working to get to the bottom” of Jacob’s death. The Police Department was also investigating.

Mr. Yassky said in a telephone interview that he had not been aware of elevator problems at the building but he was aware of general complaints at the complex, which was completed in 1974. “Public housing and the city housing authority has been chronically underfunded for years, and the result of that neglect is just becoming more and more evident,” he said. “There are elevators that don’t work and doors that are chronically broken. This is what happens when you let buildings fall apart through neglect.”

“This is a tragedy and a very personal thing that happened today,” he said.

Israel Rosenberg, 30, the president of the tenants’ association at the complex, said he had received complaints from residents two weeks ago about the elevator from which Jacob fell. “They’re a danger,” he said. “They’ve been a danger. We complain but nothing is ever done.”

So common is the sound of the emergency alarm at 70 Clymer Street that when Tanya Johnson, a resident, heard it on Tuesday, she assumed that it was just another person stuck. It was not until later while watching the news that she knew it concerned a graver emergency.

“I heard the cries, I heard the hollers,” she said. “I heard him calling his brother’s name. I heard the little boy. He was hysterical. I heard them pushing the button.”

Pessie Gelb, 37, a neighbor, said she saw Jacob’s brother after the accident. “He was saying, ‘I couldn’t grab my brother. I couldn’t grab my brother,’ ” she recalled.

Jacob was a student at the Central United Talmudic Academy. The president of the United Jewish Organization, Rabbi David Niederman, said some of Jacob’s siblings came home from summer camp upstate when they learned of his death.

At the funeral, Rabbi Mendel Teitelbaum wept as he spoke. “This is not the nature of the world,” the rabbi said, “that young children should die before their parents and grandparents.”

The tiny coffin, draped in a black cloth with white trim, was carried down Broadway and placed in a minivan to be taken to a cemetery in New Brunswick, N.J.

Reporting was contributed by Al Baker, David Giambusso, Daryl Khan and Ray Rivera.

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13) Afghanistan on Fire
Editorial
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/opinion/21thu1.html?hp

The news out of Afghanistan is truly alarming. This week, Taliban forces staged two of their most complex and audacious attacks of the war. Nearly 100 insurgents killed 10 French paratroopers in an attack near Kabul. At least 10 suicide bombers mounted a coordinated assault on one of America’s largest military bases, wounding three American and six Afghan soldiers. An earlier attack at the base killed 12 Afghan workers.

The number of United States and NATO casualties is mounting so quickly, that unless something happens soon this could be the deadliest year of the Afghan war. Kabul, the seat of Afghanistan’s pro-Western government, is increasingly besieged. And Taliban and foreign Qaeda fighters are consolidating control over an expanding swath of territory sprawling across both sides of the porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

Let us be clear about why this is so dangerous. The more territory the Taliban controls, the more money it can raise from narcotics and black-market activities to mount an even fiercer challenge against the foundering civilian governments in Kabul and Islamabad. And the more territory the Taliban controls, the more freedom Al Qaeda will have to mount new terrorist operations against this country and others.

There is no more time to waste. Unless the United States, NATO and its central Asian allies move quickly, they could lose this war. The following steps need to be taken in the coming weeks.

Washington must finally make clear to Pakistan’s leaders the mortal threat they face. The Army must turn its attention from India to the fight against the Taliban. Civilian leaders must realize that there can be no separate peace with the extremists. Sending American troops or warplanes into Pakistani territory will only feed anti-American furies. That should be the job of Pakistan’s army, with intelligence help and carefully monitored financial support from the United States.

More American ground troops will have to be sent to Afghanistan. The Pentagon’s over-reliance on airstrikes — which have led to high levels of civilian casualties — has dangerously antagonized the Afghan population. This may require an accelerated timetable for shifting American forces from Iraq, where the security situation has grown somewhat less desperate.

NATO also needs to step up its military effort. With Russia threatening to redraw the post-Soviet map of Europe, this is not time for NATO to forfeit its military credibility by losing a war. Europe does not have a lot of available ground troops either. But it needs to send its best ones to Afghanistan and let them fight.

Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, must rein in his government’s rampant corruption that has all but driven his people into the hands of the Taliban and criminal warlords. The international community needs to provide more — and more carefully monitored — resources to build up Afghanistan’s security forces and administrative capacity and accelerate rural development.

These investments will take time to pay off. But seven years have already been wasted, and unless such efforts begin now there will be no safe exit from Afghanistan for the foreseeable future.

Afghanistan’s war is not a sideshow. It is the principal military confrontation between America and NATO and the forces responsible for 9/11 and later deadly terrorist attacks on European soil. Washington, NATO and the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan must stop fighting it like a holding action and develop a strategy to win. Otherwise, we will all lose.

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14) Exiting Iraq, Petraeus Says Gains Are Fragile
By DEXTER FILKINS
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/world/middleeast/21general.html?ref=world

BAGHDAD — In the final days of his campaign to bring Iraq under control, Gen. David H. Petraeus sat in his office at the American Embassy here looking drawn, exhausted, and more than a few years older than when he took command 18 months ago.

More than once as he spoke of his tenure, the general stopped to cough. An intensely energetic man who prides himself on besting young recruits in tests of strength and endurance, General Petraeus, 55, said Monday that he had been forced to scale back his punishing daily workouts to three a week.

“There is not much in the tank at the end of the day,” he said.

Yet for all the signs of fatigue, General Petraeus is preparing to leave Iraq a remarkably safer place than it was when he arrived. Violence has plummeted from its apocalyptic peaks, Iraqi leaders are asserting themselves, and streets that once seemed dead are flourishing with life. The worst, for now, has been averted.

And so in the general’s exhaustion comes the glimmer of hope, and also a caveat: Iraq has indeed stepped back from self-destruction, General Petraeus said, but the gains are tenuous and unlikely to survive without an American effort that outlasts his tenure. By the time he leaves for the United States next month to assume overall command of American forces in the Middle East and Afghanistan, he will have spent a total of 48 months in Iraq since the war began.

“I don’t know that it was a death spiral, but I mean it was a pretty dire situation,” General Petraeus said, referring to the situation upon his arrival here as the senior commander in Iraq in February 2007. “There have been very substantial gains at this point. Don’t take any of this to imply that we think we’re anywhere near finished.”

“It’s not durable yet. It’s not self-sustaining,” he added. “You know — touch wood — there is still a lot of work to be done.”

His run as commander coincided with the “surge” of American combat forces into Baghdad, in what amounted to a last, desperate gamble to bring the country under control.

The arrival of the 30,000 extra soldiers, deployed to Baghdad’s neighborhoods around the clock, allowed the Americans to exploit a series of momentous events that had begun to unfold at roughly the same time: the splintering of Moktada al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army; the growing competence of the Iraqi Army; and most important, the about-face by leaders of the country’s Sunni minority, who suddenly stopped opposing the Americans and joined with them against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and other local extremist groups.

The surge, clearly, has worked, at least for now: violence, measured in the number of attacks against Americans and Iraqis each week, has dropped by 80 percent in the country since early 2007, according to figures the general provided. Civilian deaths, which peaked at more than 100 a day in late 2006, have also plunged. Car and suicide bombings, which stoked sectarian violence, have fallen from a total of 130 in March 2007 to fewer than 40 last month. In July, fewer Americans were killed in Iraq — 13 — than in any month since the war began.

The result, now visible in the streets, is a calm unlike any the country has seen since the American invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in April 2003. The signs — Iraqi families flooding into parks at sundown, merchants throwing open long-shuttered shops — are stunning to anyone who witnessed the country’s implosion in 2005 and 2006.

General Petraeus declined to discuss the kind of American troop levels he thinks would be needed to ensure that the positive trends become permanent. Indeed, the way ahead in Iraq seems anything but clear, with many arrangements that are keeping the peace — like 100,000 Sunni gunmen, many of them former insurgents, on the government payroll at $25 million a month — extremely fragile. A collapse of the peace is not difficult to imagine.

The question of America’s continued commitment is likely to be taken up immediately by the new president, whoever he is, when he moves into the White House in January. General Petraeus suggested he had some details in mind, but did not think them appropriate to discuss publicly. “I can,” he said, “but I won’t.”

“The only statement I think somebody in a position like this can responsibly make is that it obviously depends on the conditions and how much risk one is willing to take,” General Petraeus said, referring to the next president.

Instead, General Petraeus looked mostly back. Dressed in his combat green-and-tan fatigues and boots, and swigging on a plastic bottle full of instant tea, he gave an account that did not lack for drama.

When he arrived 18 months ago, the American project in Iraq, then led by General George W. Casey Jr. and Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, was in serious trouble, with sectarian violence spiraling across the country. The day when Iraqi forces could take over and allow the Americans to leave seemed more distant than ever. A sectarian and ethnic division of the country loomed.

“The fact is that General Casey and Zal Khalilzad signed an assessment in December, early December of 2006, that said the strategy is failing,” General Petraeus said.

Violence, indeed, had reached anarchic levels: By February 2007, Sunni and Shiite insurgents were carrying out close to 1,500 attacks against Iraqis and Americans each week, and each month were killing as many as 2,500 civilians, who were often the victims of hideous, sectarian-driven slayings. In Baghdad alone, 40 to 50 people were being kidnapped each day. The Iraqi security forces, charged with keeping order, were carrying out some of the most egregious acts of crime and sectarian killings.

The crisis gave an opening to a handful of senior officers and military policy analysts in Washington to push for an American-heavy strategy of putting troops in Iraqi neighborhoods around the clock — which had not been done on a large scale — while isolating and attacking the main catalysts of the sectarian violence.

General Petraeus, with other commanders, like then-Col. H. R. McMaster, had for years been pushing the Army to change its focus from killing the enemy to helping ordinary Iraqis cope with insurgents — the essence of modern counterinsurgency strategy.

The “surge,” ordered by President Bush in early 2007, sparked a vociferous debate in the United States. While General Petraeus and his deputy, Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, were confident about their chances of success, they realized that with Iraq disintegrating and the American public turning against a longer commitment, the surge would probably be the military’s last chance to get things right.

As fresh troops arrived, the generals began deploying them across Baghdad, mostly in small outposts called joint security stations. The stations were seen as the key to securing the capital; for the first time, Americans could credibly promise that they would protect Iraqi civilians from the insurgents. The extra troops also allowed American commanders to initiate a series of offensives last year against the strongholds of Al Qaeda of Mesopotamia and other Sunni extremist groups in and outside of Baghdad and then, in 2008, against the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia.

“We started putting joint security stations right in the heart of Al Qaeda’s areas,” General Petraeus said.

At first, the surge was accompanied by a rise in American deaths. The three deadliest months for American soldiers in five and a half years of war came from April through June last year, as the added soldiers took to the streets. In those three months, 331 Americans soldiers and marines died. “We said it was going to get harder before it got easier,” General Petraeus said. “And it did. We took very tough casualties.”

For years, he said, the Americans and the Iraqi government had been locked in what he described as a “downward spiral”; as the violence raged, ordinary Iraqis were often too frightened to cooperate with either the Iraqi security officers or American troops. Good intelligence was thus hard to come by, which meant that military operations often missed their marks. The insurgents were free to intimidate, threaten and kill civilians, government officials or anyone who refused to do their bidding.

It was the spectacular bombings, like the destruction of the Askariya shrine in Samarra in 2006, which prompted ordinary Iraqi Shiites to accept the protection of militias like the Mahdi Army. Those militias, in turn, began carrying out massacres of their own, against Sunni civilians in their own neighborhood.

Dismantling Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, General Petraeus said, took away the rationale for the Mahdi Army. “As the Al Qaeda threat is gradually degraded, the reason for the militia is no longer there,” he said. That, in turn, helped civilians in both communities who wanted to join the government or cooperate with the security forces. And that allowed the Shiite-dominated government of Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to purge the ranks of the state security services of sectarian killers, and finally take on Mr. Sadr’s militia.

All good, General Petraeus suggested, as long as it lasts.

“You’re either spiraling downward,” he said, “or you’re spiraling upward.”

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15) New Guidelines Would Give F.B.I. Broader Powers
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/washington/21fbi.html?ref=us

WASHINGTON — A Justice Department plan would loosen restrictions on the Federal Bureau of Investigation to allow agents to open a national security or criminal investigation against someone without any clear basis for suspicion, Democratic lawmakers briefed on the details said Wednesday.

The plan, which could be made public next month, has already generated intense interest and speculation. Little is known about its precise language, but civil liberties advocates say they fear it could give the government even broader license to open terrorism investigations.

Congressional staff members got a glimpse of some of the details in closed briefings this month, and four Democratic senators told Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey in a letter on Wednesday that they were troubled by what they heard.

The senators said the new guidelines would allow the F.B.I. to open an investigation of an American, conduct surveillance, pry into private records and take other investigative steps “without any basis for suspicion.” The plan “might permit an innocent American to be subjected to such intrusive surveillance based in part on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, or on protected First Amendment activities,” the letter said. It was signed by Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.

As the end of the Bush administration nears, the White House has been seeking to formalize in law and regulation some of the aggressive counterterrorism steps it has already taken in practice since the Sept. 11 attacks.

Congress overhauled the federal wiretapping law in July, for instance, and President Bush issued an executive order this month ratifying new roles for intelligence agencies. Other pending changes would also authorize greater sharing of intelligence information with the local police, a major push in the last seven years.

The Justice Department is already expecting criticism over the F.B.I. guidelines. In an effort to pre-empt critics, Mr. Mukasey gave a speech last week in Portland, Ore., describing the unfinished plan as an effort to “integrate more completely and harmonize the standards that apply to the F.B.I.’s activities.” Differing standards, he said, have caused confusion for field agents.

Mr. Mukasey emphasized that the F.B.I. would still need a “valid purpose” for an investigation, and that it could not be “simply based on somebody’s race, religion, or exercise of First Amendment rights.”

Rather than expanding government power, he said, “this document clarifies the rules by which the F.B.I. conducts its intelligence mission.”

In 2002, John Ashcroft, then the attorney general, allowed F.B.I. agents to visit public sites like mosques or monitor Web sites in the course of national security investigations. The next year, Mr. Bush issued guidelines allowing officials to use ethnicity or race in “narrow” circumstances to detect a terrorist threat.

The Democratic senators said the draft plan appeared to allow the F.B.I. to go even further in collecting information on Americans connected to “foreign intelligence” without any factual predicate. They also said there appeared to be few constraints on how the information would be shared with other agencies.

Michael German, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union and a former F.B.I. agent, said the plan appeared to open the door still further to the use of data-mining profiles in tracking terrorism.

“This seems to be based on the idea that the government can take a bunch of data and create a profile that can be used to identify future bad guys,” he said. “But that has not been demonstrated to be true anywhere else.”

The Justice Department said Wednesday that in light of requests from members of Congress for more information, Mr. Mukasey would agree not to sign the new guidelines before a Sept. 17 Congressional hearing.

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LINKS AND VERY SHORT STORIES

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Texas: Militant Ordered to Stand Trial
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A federal appeals court ordered a Cuban militant, Luis Posada Carriles, to stand trial in El Paso on immigration fraud charges. A three-judge panel of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans, ruled that Mr. Posada, 80, an anti-Castro militant, should stand trial on charges that he lied to federal authorities in his 2005 bid to become an American citizen. The criminal case had been dismissed last year when a federal district judge in El Paso, Kathleen Cardone, ruled that the government engaged in trickery and deceit by using a naturalization interview to build its case against Mr. Posada. Felipe Millan, one of Mr. Posada’s lawyers in El Paso, said Mr. Posada’s legal team was reviewing the decision and would decide on a course of action afterward.
August 15, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/15/us/15brfs-MILITANTORDE_BRF.html?ref=us

Canada: Rioting in Montreal
By IAN AUSTEN
World Briefing | The Americas
Three police officers were injured, one shot in the leg, during rioting in Montreal that erupted late Sunday in response to the killing of an 18-year-old by the police the day before. A fire station, fire trucks, cars and about 20 shops were vandalized or set ablaze. An ambulance worker was also injured. About 500 riot police officers quelled the violence.
August 12, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/world/americas/12briefs-RIOTINGINMON_BRF.html?ref=world

Arizona: Court Allows Fake Snow Opposed by Tribes
By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
National Briefing | Southwest
A federal appeals court has ruled that a ski resort’s plan to use recycled wastewater for making snow would not violate the religious freedom of Indian groups who had claimed that the practice would be blasphemous to a mountain they hold sacred. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, ruling in a lawsuit against the Arizona Snowbowl near Flagstaff that was filed by 13 tribes and the Sierra Club, overturned a ruling by a smaller panel of the court that said the plan would violate the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The 1993 act is intended to ensure that government actions do not infringe on religious freedom. Lawyers for the tribes and the Sierra Club said they expected to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.
August 9, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/us/09brfs-COURTALLOWSF_BRF.html?ref=us

Bolivia: Tin Miners Die in Clashes
By REUTERS
World Briefing | The Americas
At least two miners were killed and many more were injured Tuesday in clashes between the police and workers at the country’s largest tin mine, Huanuni, local radio reported. The violence erupted when police officers clashed with groups of striking miners who had blocked a road, Interior Minister Alfredo Rada said. The strike is in support of a drive by a labor federation for higher pensions and a lowering of the retirement age to 55.
August 6, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/world/americas/06briefs-TINMINERSDIE_BRF.html?ref=world

Proposed Kosher Certification Rules
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Conservative Jewish leaders are seeking to protect workers and the environment at kosher food plants like the one raided this spring in Iowa. They issued draft guidelines for a kosher certification program meant as a supplement to the traditional certification process that measures compliance with Jewish dietary law. The proposed “hekhsher tzedek,” or “certificate of righteousness,” would be awarded to companies that pay fair wages, ensure workplace safety, follow government environmental regulations and treat animals humanely, among other proposed criteria. Support for the idea has been fueled by controversies at Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville, Iowa, the nation’s largest kosher meatpacking plant. In May, immigration officials raided the plant, arresting nearly 400 workers.
August 1, 2008
National Briefing | Immigration
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/01/us/01brfs-PROPOSEDKOSH_BRF.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENTS AND INFORMATION

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12 year old Ossetian girl tells the truth about Georgia.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5idQm8YyJs4

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SAN FRANCISCO IS A SANCTUARY CITY! STOP THE MIGRA-ICE RAIDS!

Despite calling itself a "sanctuary city", S.F. politicians are permitting the harrassment of undocumented immigrants and allowing the MIGRA-ICE police to enter the jail facilities.

We will picket any store that cooperates with the MIGRA or reports undocumented brothers and sisters. We demand AMNESTY without conditions!

BRIGADES AGAINST THE RAIDS
project of BARRIO UNIDO
(415)431-9925

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Canada: American Deserter Must Leave
By IAN AUSTEN
August 14, 2008
World Briefing | Americas
Jeremy Hinzman, a deserter from the United States Army, was ordered Wednesday to leave Canada by Sept. 23. Mr. Hinzman, a member of the 82nd Airborne Division, left the Army for Canada in January 2004 and later became the first deserter to formally seek refuge there from the war in Iraq. He has been unable to obtain permanent immigrant status, and in November, the Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear an appeal of his case. Vanessa Barrasa, a spokeswoman for the Canada Border Services Agency, said Mr. Hinzman, above, had been ordered to leave voluntarily. In July, another American deserter was removed from Canada by border officials after being arrested. Although the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper has not backed the Iraq war, it has shown little sympathy for American deserters, a significant change from the Vietnam War era.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/14/world/americas/14briefs-canada.html?ref=world

Iraq War resister Robin Long jailed, facing three years in Army stockade

Free Robin Long now!
Support GI resistance!

* Donate to Robin's defense
* Write to Robin in jail

By Courage to Resist
August 7, 2008

Last month 25-year-old U.S. Army PFC Robin Long became the first war resister since the Vietnam War to be forcefully deported from Canadian soil and handed over to military authorities. Robin is currently being held in the El Paso County Jail, near Colorado Springs, Colorado, awaiting a military court martial for resisting the unjust and illegal war against and occupation of Iraq. Robin will be court martialed for desertion “with intent to remain away permanently”—Article 85 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice—in early September. The maximum allowable penalty for a guilty verdict on this charge is three years confinement, forfeiture of pay, and a dishonorable discharge from the Army.

In order to expedite Robin’s trial, it appears that his unit command, the Fourth Brigade Combat Team, Fourth Infantry Division is opting to not charge Robin with speech-related violations of military discipline; opting to try and convict Robin as fast as possible.

Jennifer Johnson, Ryan Johnson, and Dale Landry rally for Robin Long in Toronto, Canada

Robin went absent without leave (AWOL) from the Army in 2005, realizing that he had significant moral opposition to the war and the lies he had been told regarding the reason for invasion and occupation of Iraq. After being transferred to an Iraq bound combat unit, Robin went to Boise, Id. (his home town) where he stayed for several months, before traveling to Canada.

Robin recently talked to Courage to Resist about why he enlisted. “When the U.S. first attacked Iraq, I was told by my president that it was because of direct ties to Al-Qaida and weapons of mass destruction.” Robin explained that while he was uneasy about his personal role in fighting, the Iraq War seemed justified. So when his recruiter promised him a non-combat position within the U.S., he took it. Regarding his decision to resist later, Robin explained, “I made the best decision. Regardless of what hardships I go through, I could have put Iraqi families through more hardships. I have no regrets.” When asked by the Boise Weekly, in May of 2006, if he was prepared to go to jail, Robin replied, “Yeah if it came down to that, I'd be willing to go to prison because I know I did the right thing and I can sleep at night and my conscience is still good.”

Garrett Reppenhagen of IVAW speaks to a reporter about Robin Long, Pioneer Park, Colorado Springs 7/27/08

On July 27th, 2008 Garrett Reppenhagen of Iraq Veterans Against the War, Lee Zaslofsky of the War Resisters Support Campaign (Canada), members of the Springs Action Alliance and more joined James Branum, Robin Long’s civilian lawyer in Pioneer Park to demand Robin Long’s freedom. Garrett praised Robin, declaring “I support Robin Long because he is a Soldier of Conscience. There is a huge propaganda campaign in this country to get young men to join the military. He bought the hype. He signed up for a promised [non-combat] job, but it turned out not to be so. He decided to go to Canada and follow his conscience instead.”

As Robin awaits trial by military tribunal, a general court martial, he sits in the El Paso County Jail – surrounded by other military inmates, as well as civilians serving time on convictions or awaiting criminal prosecution. In the past Robin would have been held in pretrial confinement in an Army stockade, but with rising troop level needs, the Army has chosen to shut down many stockades and outsource confinement of soldiers to civilian authorities. With the exception of Robin’s Lawyer, James Branum, all of Robin’s visitors must communicate with him via a camera and real time video screen. Robin is allowed out of doors for only one hour a day, and even then cannot see anything but a thin strip of sky, directly overhead.

Robin's lawyer James Branum (right) rallies for his client., Pioneer Park, Colorado Springs. 7/27/08

Despite the deprivations of the El Paso county jail, Mr. Branum reports that Robin is “…in considerably good spirits, especially considering all that he is going through.” In a recent phone interview with Courage to Resist Robin reported that he was very happy with Mr. Branum calling him “awesome” as well as his military assigned defense lawyer “a smart cookie” in Robin’s words. He has received many visitors – pastors and members of local congregations, members of the IVAW among them. He wants everyone to know that the cards and the letters of support he receives are most welcome and give him of true sense of the support that is swelling for him, outside the confines of his cell. Lee Zaslofsky, of the Canadian WRSC reports that Robin is “..aware of what he might have to face, and is prepared to face it with courage and without bitterness.”

The fact remains, however, that the Iraq War is unjust and illegal. The U.N. Charter, the Geneva Convention and the Nuremberg principles all bar wars of aggression. The U.S. Constitution makes such treaties part of American law as well. Robin Long is a hero for not only recognizing these truths, but putting his future on the line to courageously resist participating in an immoral occupation. The least we can do is support Robin, and demand his immediate freedom.

What you can do now to support Robin

1. Donate to Robin's legal defense

Online: http://couragetoresist.org/robinlong

By mail: Make checks out to “Courage to Resist / IHC” and note “Robin Long” in the memo field. Mail to:

Courage to Resist
484 Lake Park Ave #41
Oakland CA 94610

Courage to Resist is committed to covering Robin’s legal and related defense expenses. Thank you for helping make that possible.

Also: You are also welcome to contribute directly to Robin’s legal expenses via his civilian lawyer James Branum. Visit girightslawyer.com, select "Pay Online via PayPal" (lower left), and in the comments field note “Robin Long”. Note that this type of donation is not tax-deductible.

2. Send letters of support to Robin

Robin Long, CJC
2739 East Las Vegas
Colorado Springs CO 80906

Robin’s pre-trial confinement has been outsourced by Fort Carson military authorities to the local county jail.

Robin is allowed to receive hand-written or typed letters only. Do NOT include postage stamps, drawings, stickers, copied photos or print articles. Robin cannot receive packages of any type (with the book exception as described below).

3. Send Robin a money order for commissary items

Anything Robin gets (postage stamps, toothbrush, shirts, paper, snacks, supplements, etc.) must be ordered through the commissary. Each inmate has an account to which friends may make deposits. To do so, a money order in U.S. funds must be sent to the address above made out to "Robin Long, EPSO". The sender’s name must be written on the money order.

4. Send Robin a book

Robin is allowed to receive books which are ordered online and sent directly to him at the county jail from Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble. These two companies know the procedure to follow for delivering books for inmates.

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Yet Another Insult: Mumia Abu-Jamal Denied Full-Court Hearing by 3rd Circuit
& Other News on Mumia

This mailing sent by the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal

PLEASE FORWARD AND DISTRIBUTE WIDELY

1. Mumia Abu-Jamal Denied Full-Court Hearing by 3rd Circuit
2. Upcoming Events for Mumia
3. New Book on the framing of Mumia

1. MUMIA DENIED AGAIN -- Adding to its already rigged, discriminatory record with yet another insult to the world's most famous political prisoner, the federal court for the 3rd Circuit in Philadelphia has refused to give Mumia Abu-Jamal an en banc, or full court, hearing. This follows the rejection last March by a 3-judge panel of the court, of what is likely Mumia's last federal appeal.

The denial of an en banc hearing by the 3rd Circuit, upholding it's denial of the appeal, is just the latest episode in an incredible year of shoving the overwhelming evidence of Mumia's innocence under a rock. Earlier in the year, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court also rejected Jamal's most recent state appeal. Taken together, state and federal courts in 2008 have rejected or refused to hear all the following points raised by Mumia's defense:

1. The state's key witness, Cynthia White, was pressured by police to lie on the stand in order to convict Mumia, according to her own admission to a confidant (other witnesses agreed she wasn't on the scene at all)

2. A hospital "confession" supposedly made by Mumia was manufactured by police. The false confession was another key part of the state's wholly-manufactured "case."

3. The 1995 appeals court judge, Albert Sabo--the same racist who presided at Mumia's original trial in 1982, where he said, "I'm gonna help 'em fry the n....r"--was prejudiced against him. This fact was affirmed even by Philadelphia's conservative newspapers at the time.

4. The prosecutor prejudiced the jury against inn ocence until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, by using a slimy tactic already rejected by the courts. But the prosecutor was upheld in Mumia's case!

5. The jury was racially skewed when the prosecution excluded most blacks from the jury, a practice banned by law, but, again, upheld against Mumia!

All of these defense claims were proven and true. But for the courts, these denials were just this year’s trampling on the evidence! Other evidence dismissed or ignored over the years include: hit-man Arnold Beverly said back in the 1990s that he, not Mumia, killed the slain police officer (Faulkner). Beverly passed a lie detector test and was willing to testify, but he got no hearing in US courts! Also, Veronica Jones, who saw two men run from the scene just after the shooting, was coerced by police to lie at the 1982 trial, helping to convict Mumia. But when she admitted this lie and told the truth on appeal in 1996, she was dismissed by prosecutor-in-robes Albert Sabo in 1996 as "not credible!" (She continues to support Mumia, and is writing a book on her experiences.) And William Singletary, the one witness who saw the whole thing and had no reason to lie, and who affirmed that someone else did the shooting, said that Mumia only arriv ed on the scene AFTER the officer was shot. His testimony has been rejected by the courts on flimsy grounds. And the list goes on.

FOR THE COURTS, INNOCENCE IS NO DEFENSE! And if you're a black revolutionary like Mumia the fix is in big-time. Illusions in Mumia getting a "new trial" out of this racist, rigged, kangaroo-court system have been dealt a harsh blow by the 3rd Circuit. We need to build a mass movement, and labor action, to free Mumia now!

2. UPCOMING EVENTS FOR MUMIA --

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA -- Speaking Tour by J Patrick O'Connor, the author of THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL, in the first week of October 2008, sponsored by the Mobilization To Free Mumia. Contributing to this tour, the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia will hold a public meeting with O'Connor on Friday October 3rd, place to be announced. San Francisco, South Bay and other East Bay venues to be announced. Contact the Mobilization at 510 268-9429, or the LAC at 510 763-2347, for more information.

3. NEW BOOK ON MUMIA

Efficiently and Methodically Framed--Mumia is innocent! That is the conclusion of THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL, by J Patrick O'Connor (Lawrence Hill Books), published earlier this year. The author is a former UPI reporter who took an interest in Mumia's case. He is now the editor of Crime Magazine (www.crimemagazine.com).

O'Connor offers a fresh perspective, and delivers a clear and convincing breakdown on perhaps the most notorious frame-up since Sacco and Vanzetti. THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL is based on a thorough analysis of the 1982 trial and the 1995-97 appeals hearings, as well as previous writings on this case, and research on the MOVE organization (with which Mumia identifies), and the history of racist police brutality in Philadelphia.

While leaving some of the evidence of Mumia's innocence unconsidered or disregarded, this book nevertheless makes clear that there is a veritable mountain of evidence--most of it deliberately squashed by the courts--that shows that Mumia was blatantly and deliberately framed by corrupt cops and courts, who "fixed" this case against him from the beginning. This is a case not just of police corruption, or a racist lynching, though it is both. The courts are in this just as deep as the cops, and it reaches to the top of the equally corrupt political system.

"This book is the first to convincingly show how the Philadelphia Police Department and District Attorney's Office efficiently and methodically framed [Mumia Abu-Jamal]." (from the book jacket)

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal has a limited number of THE FRAMING ordered from the publisher at a discount. We sold our first order of this book, and are now able to offer it at a lower price. $12 covers shipping. Send payment to us at our address below:

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
PO Box 16222 • Oakland CA 94610 • 510.763.2347
www.laboractionmumia.org • LACFreeMumia@aol.com

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Sami Al-Arian Subjected to Worst Prison Conditions since Florida
Despite grant of bail, government continues to hold him
Dr. Al-Arian handcuffed

Hanover, VA - July 27, 2008 -

More than two weeks after being granted bond by a federal judge, Sami Al-Arian is still being held in prison. In fact, Dr. Al-Arian is now being subjected to the worst treatment by prison officials since his stay in Coleman Federal Penitentiary in Florida three years ago.

On July 12th, Judge Leonie Brinkema pronounced that Dr. Al-Arian was not a danger to the community nor a flight risk, and accordingly granted him bail before his scheduled August 13th trial. Nevertheless, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) invoked the jurisdiction it has held over Dr. Al-Arian since his official sentence ended last April to keep him from leaving prison. The ICE is ostensibly holding Dr. Al-Arian to complete deportation procedures but, given that Dr. Al-Arian's trial will take place in less than three weeks, it would seem somewhat unlikely that the ICE will follow through with such procedures in the near future.

Not content to merely keep Dr. Al-Arian from enjoying even a very limited stint of freedom, the government is using all available means to try to psychologically break him. Instead of keeping him in a prison close to the Washington DC area where his two oldest children live, the ICE has moved him to Pamunkey Regional Jail in Hanover, VA, more than one hundred miles from the capital. Regardless, even when Dr. Al-Arian was relatively close to his children, they were repeatedly denied visitation requests.

More critically, this distance makes it extremely difficult for Dr. Al-Arian to meet with his attorneys in the final weeks before his upcoming trial. This is the same tactic employed by the government in 2005 to try to prevent Dr. Al-Arian from being able to prepare a full defense.

Pamunkey Regional Jail has imposed a 23-hour lock-down on Dr. Al-Arian and has placed him in complete isolation, despite promises from the ICE that he would be kept with the general inmate population. Furthermore, the guards who transported him were abusive, shackling and handcuffing him behind his back for the 2.5-hour drive, callously disregarding the fact that his wrist had been badly injured only a few days ago. Although he was in great pain throughout the trip, guards refused to loosen the handcuffs.

At the very moment when Dr. Al-Arian should be enjoying a brief interlude of freedom after five grueling years of imprisonment, the government has once again brazenly manipulated the justice system to deliver this cruel slap in the face of not only Dr. Al-Arian, but of all people of conscience.

Make a Difference! Call Today!

Call Now!

Last April, your calls to the Hampton Roads Regional Jail pressured prison officials to stop their abuse of Dr. Al-Arian after only a few days.
Friends, we are asking you to make a difference again by calling:

Pamunkey Regional Jail: (804) 365-6400 (press 0 then ask to speak to the Superintendent's office). Ask why Dr. Al-Arian has been put under a 23-hour lockdown, despite the fact that a federal judge has clearly and unambiguously pronounced that he is not a danger to anyone and that, on the contrary, he should be allowed bail before his trial.

- If you do not reach the superintendent personally, leave a message on the answering machine. Call back every day until you do speak to the superintendent directly.
- Be polite but firm.

- After calling, click here to let us know you called.

Don't forget: your calls DO make a difference.

FORWARD TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS!

Write to Dr. Al-Arian

For those of you interested in sending personal letters of support to Dr. Al-Arian:

If you would like to write to Dr. Al-Arian, his new
address is:

Dr. Sami Al-Arian
Pamunkey Regional Jail
P.O. Box 485
Hanover, VA 23069

Email Tampa Bay Coalition for Justice and Peace: tampabayjustice@yahoo.com

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Video: The Carbon Connection -- The human impact of carbon trading

[This is an eye-opening and important video for all who are interested in our environment...bw]

Two communities affected by one new global market – the trade in carbon
dioxide. In Scotland, a town has been polluted by oil and chemical
companies since the 1940s. In Brazil, local people's water and land is
being swallowed up by destructive monoculture eucalyptus tree
plantations. Both communities now share a new threat.

As part of the deal to reduce greenhouse gases that cause dangerous
climate change, major polluters can now buy carbon credits that allow
them to pay someone else to reduce emissions instead of cutting their
own pollution. What this means for those living next to the oil industry
in Scotland is the continuation of pollution caused by their toxic
neighbours. Meanwhile in Brazil, the schemes that generate carbon
credits give an injection of cash for more planting of the damaging
eucalyptus plantations.

40 minutes | PAL/NTSC | English/Spanish/Portuguese subtitles.The Carbon Connection is a Fenceline Films presentation in partnership with the Transnational Institute Environmental Justice Project and Carbon Trade Watch, the Alert Against the Green Desert Movement, FASE-ES, and the Community Training and Development Unit.

Watch at http://links.org.au/node/575

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Torture
On the Waterboard
How does it feel to be “aggressively interrogated”? Christopher Hitchens found out for himself, submitting to a brutal waterboarding session in an effort to understand the human cost of America’s use of harsh tactics at Guantánamo and elsewhere. VF.com has the footage. Related: “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” from the August 2008 issue.
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/video/2008/hitchens_video200808

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Alison Bodine defense Committee
Lift the Two-year Ban
http://alisonbodine.blogspot.com/

Watch the Sept 28 Video on Alison's Case!
http://alisonbodine.blogspot.com/2007/10/blog-post.html

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The Girl Who Silenced the World at the UN!
Born and raised in Vancouver, Severn Suzuki has been working on environmental and social justice issues since kindergarten. At age 9, she and some friends started the Environmental Children's Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues. They traveled to 1992's UN Earth Summit, where 12 year-old Severn gave this powerful speech that deeply affected (and silenced) some of the most prominent world leaders. The speech had such an impact that she has become a frequent invitee to many U.N. conferences.
[Note: the text of her speech is also available at this site...bw]
http://www.karmatube.org/videos.php?id=433

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MINIATURE EARTH
http://www.miniature-earth.com/me_english.htm

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"Dear Canada: Let U.S. war resisters stay!"
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/499/89/

Russell Means Speaking at the Transform Columbus Day Rally
"If voting could do anything it would be illegal!"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8Lri1-6aoY

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Stop the Termination or the Cherokee Nation
http://groups.msn.com/BayAreaIndianCalendar/activismissues.msnw?action=get_message&mview=1&ID_Message=5580

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We Didn't Start the Fire
http://yeli.us/Flash/Fire.html

I Can't Take it No More
http://lefti.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html#9214483115237950361

The Art of Mental Warfare
http://artofmentalwarfare.com/pog/artofmentalwarfarecom-the-warning/

MONEY AS DEBT
http://video. google.com/ videoplay? docid=-905047436 2583451279
http://www.moneyasd ebt.net/

UNCONSTITUTIONAL
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6582099850410121223&pr=goog-sl

IRAQ FOR SALE
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6621486727392146155

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Port of Olympia Anti-Militarization Action Nov. 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOkn2Fg7R8w

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"They have a new gimmick every year. They're going to take one of their boys, black boys, and put him in the cabinet so he can walk around Washington with a cigar. Fire on one end and fool on the other end. And because his immediate personal problem will have been solved he will be the one to tell our people: 'Look how much progress we're making. I'm in Washington, D.C., I can have tea in the White House. I'm your spokesman, I'm your leader.' While our people are still living in Harlem in the slums. Still receiving the worst form of education.

"But how many sitting here right now feel that they could [laughs] truly identify with a struggle that was designed to eliminate the basic causes that create the conditions that exist? Not very many. They can jive, but when it comes to identifying yourself with a struggle that is not endorsed by the power structure, that is not acceptable, that the ground rules are not laid down by the society in which you live, in which you are struggling against, you can't identify with that, you step back.

"It's easy to become a satellite today without even realizing it. This country can seduce God. Yes, it has that seductive power of economic dollarism. You can cut out colonialism, imperialism and all other kind of ism, but it's hard for you to cut that dollarism. When they drop those dollars on you, you'll fold though."

—MALCOLM X, 1965
http://www.accuracy.org/newsrelease.php?articleId=987

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A little gem:
Michael Moore Faces Off With Stephen Colbert [VIDEO]
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/57492/

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LAPD vs. Immigrants (Video)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/qws/ff/qr?term=lapd&Submit=S&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Search&st=s

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Dr. Julia Hare at the SOBA 2007
http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeo9ewi/proudtobeblack2/

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"We are far from that stage today in our era of the absolute
lie; the complete and totalitarian lie, spread by the
monopolies of press and radio to imprison social
consciousness." December 1936, "In 'Socialist' Norway,"
by Leon Trotsky: “Leon Trotsky in Norway” was transcribed
for the Internet by Per I. Matheson [References from
original translation removed]
http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/12/nor.htm

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Wealth Inequality Charts
http://www.faireconomy.org/research/wealth_charts.html

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MALCOLM X: Oxford University Debate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dmzaaf-9aHQ

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"There comes a times when silence is betrayal."
--Martin Luther King

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YouTube clip of Che before the UN in 1964
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtATT8GXkWg&mode=related&search

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The Wealthiest Americans Ever
NYT Interactive chart
JULY 15, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/business/20070715_GILDED_GRAPHIC.html

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New Orleans After the Flood -- A Photo Gallery
http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=795
This email was sent to you as a service, by Roland Sheppard.
Visit my website at: http://web.mac.com/rolandgarret

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[For some levity...Hans Groiner plays Monk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51bsCRv6kI0
...bw]

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Which country should we invade next?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3g_zqz3VjY

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My Favorite Mutiny, The Coup
http://www.myspace.com/thecoupmusic

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Michael Moore- The Awful Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeOaTpYl8mE

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Morse v. Frederick Supreme Court arguments
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_LsGoDWC0o

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Free Speech 4 Students Rally - Media Montage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfCjfod8yuw

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'My son lived a worthwhile life'
In April 2003, 21-year old Tom Hurndall was shot in the head
in Gaza by an Israeli soldier as he tried to save the lives of three
small children. Nine months later, he died, having never
recovered consciousness. Emine Saner talks to his mother
Jocelyn about her grief, her fight to make the Israeli army
accountable for his death and the book she has written
in his memory.
Monday March 26, 2007
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2042968,00.html

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Introducing...................the Apple iRack
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-KWYYIY4jQ

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"A War Budget Leaves Every Child Behind."
[A T-shirt worn by some teachers at Roosevelt High School
in L.A. as part of their campaign to rid the school of military
recruiters and JROTC--see Article in Full item number 4, below...bw]

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"200 million children in the world sleep in the streets today.
Not one of them is Cuban."
(A sign in Havana)
Venceremos
View sign at bottom of page at:
http://www.cubasolidarity.net/index.html
[Thanks to Norma Harrison for sending this...bw]

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FIGHTBACK! A Collection of Socialist Essays
By Sylvia Weinstein
http://www.walterlippmann.com/sylvia-weinstein-fightback-intro.html

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[The Scab
"After God had finished the rattlesnake, the toad,
and the vampire, he had some awful substance left with
which he made a scab."
"A scab is a two-legged animal with a corkscrew soul,
a water brain, a combination backbone of jelly and glue.
Where others have hearts, he carries a tumor of rotten
principles." "When a scab comes down the street,
men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and
the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out."
"No man (or woman) has a right to scab so long as there
is a pool of water to drown his carcass in,
or a rope long enough to hang his body with.
Judas was a gentleman compared with a scab.
For betraying his master, he had character enough
to hang himself." A scab has not.
"Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage.
Judas sold his Savior for thirty pieces of silver.
Benedict Arnold sold his country for a promise of
a commision in the british army."
The scab sells his birthright, country, his wife,
his children and his fellowmen for an unfulfilled
promise from his employer.
Esau was a traitor to himself; Judas was a traitor
to his God; Benedict Arnold was a traitor to his country;
a scab is a traitor to his God, his country,
his family and his class."
Author --- Jack London (1876-1916)...Roland Sheppard
http://web.mac.com/rolandgarret]

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

"Award-Winning Writer/Filmmaker Donald L. Vasicek Launches New Sand
Creek Massacre Website"

May 21, 2008 -- CENTENNIAL, CO -- Award-winning filmmaker, Donald L.
Vasicek, has launched a new Sand Creek Massacre website. Titled,
"The Sand Creek Massacre", the site contains in depth witness
accounts of the massacre, the award-winning Sand Creek Massacre
trailer for viewing, the award-winning Sand Creek Massacre
documentary short for viewing, the story of the Sand Creek Massacre,
and a Shop to purchase Sand Creek Massacre DVD's and lesson
plans including the award-winning documentary film/educational DVD.

Vasicek, a board member of The American Indian Genocide Museum
(www.aigenom.com)in Houston, Texas, said, "The website was launched
to inform, to educate, and to provide educators, historians, students
and all others the accessibility to the Sand Creek Massacre story."

The link/URL to the website is sandcreekmassacre.net.
###

Contact:
Donald L. Vasicek
Olympus Films+, LLC
http://www.donvasicek.com
dvasicek@earthlink.net