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Free Ehren Watada!
For more backfround on Lt. Ehren Watada, go to info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ehren_Watada ).
For updates on the Campaign to Free Ehren Watada, go to
www.SoldierSayNo.blogspot.com
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May Day Immigrant Rights Marches 2009 -- San Francisco
ILWU Local 10 and ILWU Local 34 along with AFSCME 444 and other union contingents will be joining this year's May Day March and Rally in San Francisco. The ILWU Drill Team will also participate. Bring your union banner and labor placards.
Dolores Park - 12 PM
Civic Center - 4 PM
http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/MayDay2009/
Resolution of San Francisco Labor Council
(Adopted April 27, 2009 by unanimous vote)
* Support May Day 2009 March and Rally in San Francisco for worker and immigrant rights.
* Support ILWU #10 decision to stop work in Bay Area ports on May 1, 2009 to protest repression of port workers and immigrants by the Department of Homeland Security.
Whereas, International Longshore & Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 10 has voted to stop work in Bay Area ports on Friday, May 1, 2009, International Workers Day; and
Whereas, the ILWU action is being called to protest two policies of ongoing repression by the Department of Homeland Security:
* First, the unfair implementation of Transport Workers Identification Credential (TWIC) cards in seaports, in violation of elementary civil rights and civil liberties, causing hundreds of longshore workers to be unfairly denied work in the ports. This also undermines the union hiring hall, a fundamental labor right won by Harry Bridges and the longshore union after the 1934 Maritime Strike and San Francisco General Strike.
* Second, the ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) raids in homes and workplaces, which have victimized many thousands of immigrant workers, often resulting in prolonged detention under harsh conditions, and the separation of families including the separation of children from their parents -- all in violation of elementary civil rights and civil liberties; and
Whereas, a united May Day march and rally for immigrant and worker rights will take place on Friday, May 1, 2009, gathering at Dolores Park at 12:00 noon, and marching after 2:00 p.m. to a late-afternoon rally at the San Francisco Civic Center, including a contingent from the ILWU; therefore be it
Resolved, that the San Francisco Labor Council support the May 1st march and rally for immigrant and worker rights and encourage participation by our members; and be it further
Resolved, that the Council support the decision of ILWU Local 10 to Stop Work in Bay Area ports on Friday May 1st to protest repression of port workers and immigrants by the Department of Homeland Security -- just as the Council supported the ILWU in stopping work in all West Coast ports on May Day 2008; and be it further
Resolved, that the Council support ILWU Local 10 in opposing the unfair implementation of TWIC cards in seaports, resulting in hundreds of longshore workers being denied work in the ports in violation of their civil rights and civil liberties -- and undermining the rights of unions and all workers; and be it finally
Resolved, that the Council oppose the ICE raids in homes and workplaces, which have victimized many thousands of immigrant workers, often resulting in prolonged detention under harsh conditions, and the separation of families including the separation of children from their parents -- all in violation of elementary civil rights and civil liberties.
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Bail Out Working People -- NOT the Banks!
Join us on May 9 in San Francisco for a
TEACH-IN & MASS MOBILIZATION PLANNING MEETING
Without joining together for our common interests, we don't have the strength to change our government's priorities. We must begin to build a massive movement that will have the power to impact government policy and give people genuine hope for a better future.
Help organize a mass mobilization and ongoing action campaign around the following demands:
- No layoffs. Massive job-creation program.
- Tax the rich -- don't bail out the banks.
- Pass the Employee Free Choice Act.
- Single-payer healthcare for all.
- Affordable housing for all. Tenants' rights. Moratorium on foreclosures & evictions.
- Funding for jobs and for social services & infrastructure, not for war.
- Stop the ICE raids and deportations. Legalization for all!
Speakers:
- Art Pulaski, Secretary-Treasurer, California Federation of Labor;
- N'tanya Lee, Executive Director, Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth;
- Mark Dudzic, National Organizer, Labor for Single Payer Healthcare Campaign (Washington, D.C.);
- Rosie Martinez, SEIU Local 721 (Los Angeles);
- Steve Williams, Executive Director, POWER (People Organized to Win Employment Rights);
- Conny Ford, Vice President, San Francisco Labor Council;
- Clarence Thomas, ILWU Local 10;
- Jack Rasmus, Professor of economics St. Mary's College and Santa Clara Univ.;
- Alan Benjamin, Executive Committee, San Francisco Labor Council and Workers Emergency Recovery Campaign;
- Student representative, City College of San Francisco, Mission Campus.
ALSO:
Extended remarks from Bay Area labor and community leaders -- and ample time for dialogue among teach-in participants.
AND:
Spoken Word performance by YOUNG PLAYAZ
SATURDAY, MAY 9, 2009 - 1 to 5 p.m.
(registration begins at 12:30 p.m.)
Plumbers Hall,
1621 Market St. @ Franklin St.
San Francisco
Initiated by the San Francisco Labor Council, South Bay Labor Council, and Workers Emergency Recovery Campaign
(list of dozens of teach-in endorsers in formation)
Donations will be requested at door to defray cost of renting the hall, printing leaflets and posters, and copying teach-in packets for all participants. No one will be turned away for lack of funds.
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Call for May 9 Teach-In:
Bail Out Working People, NOT the Banks!
The severity of the economic crisis we are currently facing is predicted to rival the magnitude of the Great Depression. Some say it could be even worse. Over 6 million jobs have already been eliminated since the current recession began. Millions of working people have lost their homes to foreclosures and evictions, and many more homes are in or near default, while housing remains unaffordable to millions of people. The ranks of those without health insurance continue to grow. But even these statistics fail to reflect the growing insecurity and stress of working people across the country as we wonder when we, too, might be next.
Meanwhile, the federal government has showered billions upon billions of taxpayer dollars on financial institutions in the form of bailouts. In other words, working people, who are bearing the brunt of the crisis, are being required to shoulder an additional burden. Our tax dollars are being funneled to the very financial institutions and wealthy investors whose reckless gambling in pursuit of unbridled profit was responsible for driving the economy over the cliff. They have refused to say what they've done with trillions. Worse still, to emphasize their contempt for public opinion, these priests of high finance have spent some of the bailout money on huge bonuses, office decorations and the purchase of more CEO jets.
In response to this unprecedented crisis, many organizations have emerged that are addressing specific issues. Some are fighting foreclosures. Others are fighting for a single-payer healthcare system that would guarantee health coverage for everyone. Still others are pressing for the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which, if passed, will greatly facilitate the ability to form unions.
Although our problems take many forms, most of them stem from a single source. During the past three decades, the inequality in wealth has surged to historic proportions not seen since the 1920s. The hourly wage of working people has actually declined, forcing many additional family members into the workforce just to make ends meet. Aggressive campaigns by employers have created additional barriers to unionizing, resulting in a sharp decline in the percentage of unionized workers. Without unions, workers have not had the means to struggle successfully for higher wages, healthcare coverage, pensions and other benefits.
Given these conditions, can there be any wonder that we have a housing crisis and a healthcare crisis? And during this same period, the taxes on corporations and on the rich in general have dramatically declined, thereby accelerating the accumulation of unprecedented wealth, on the one hand, and the decline of tax dollars for public infrastructure and services, on the other.
In order to have any chance of altering these trends, given the magnitude of the crisis we confront and the forces we're up against, we need to come together, unite all our separate organizations and mount a collective struggle around our common concerns. Without joining together for our common interests, we don't have the strength to change our government's priorities. Only in this way can we begin to build a massive movement that will have the power to impact government policy and give people genuine hope for a better future.
We working people constitute the vast majority of the population. We need to ensure that our society operates in the interests of the majority. But we can only succeed if we stand together in solidarity with each other's demands and struggles.
The goal of the May 9 teach-in is to inspire other teach-ins. It is aimed at organizing massive Solidarity DAYS OF ACTION in support of our common demands. By bringing huge numbers of people together in common actions, people will realize through their own experience that they do not stand alone, and they will gain the confidence that by uniting we can begin to exercise real power.
- Join us and help build a movement.
- Together we can prevail.
- An Injury to One Is an Injury to All!
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ATTEND THE JULY 10 NATIONAL ASSEMBLY CONFERENCE IN PITTSBURGH!
REGISTER FOR THE CONFERENCE and DOWNLOAD PRINTABLE BROCHURE (8.5 X 14) at:
https://natassembly.org/Home_Page.html
In the aftermath of the March 21 and April 3-4 demonstrations, a number of critical questions must be addressed by the antiwar movement: What next for the movement? Where do we go from here? How can we broaden the movement and win new forces to our cause? How can we help ensure that our next demonstrations are larger than the ones organized in March and April and that the ones organized after those will be even larger?
We who are supporters of the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations believe these questions can best be answered by convening a national antiwar conference open to all peace activists who will have the opportunity to share their ideas and proposals, be part of a broad ranging discussion and debate, and help make decisions based on one person, one vote.
Such a conference will be held at La Roche College in Pittsburgh on July 10-12, 2009.
The National Assembly was established nearly a year ago at a national conference attended by over 400 people, including top leaders of the antiwar movement as well as activists from many states. One of the main decisions that conference made was to do everything possible to unite the movement in urgently needed visible street actions.
Now we look to the July conference, which will provide a forum for dealing with crucial issues as Washington escalates its wars, occupations, bombing attacks, sanctions, threats and illegal interventions in the Middle East and elsewhere. We need your ideas, your input and your presence to help make this conference a success. Please join us in Pittsburgh on July 10-12. Bring all the troops home now!
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Courage to Resist
Resister to be courts-martialed Tuesday
Cliff Cornell was denied sanctuary in Canada; will face general courts-martial Tuesday, April 28 at Ft. Stewart, Georgia. Donate to Cliff's legal defense here:
https://co.clickandpledge.com/sp/d1/default.aspx?wid=25410
--56 people have given $2,270 of Cliff's $3,000 legal expenses thusfar.
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EMERGENCY UPDATE: Bad news for Troy Davis
ANOTHER INNOCENT MAN ON DEATH ROW
Amnesty International USA
alerts@takeaction.amnestyusa.org
Dear Readers,
It's not the end of the road for Troy Davis, but the news is not good.
Yesterday, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Troy Davis' bid for a new trial. In a 2-1 vote, the court cited technical reasons to reject Davis' petition for a hearing.
But all hope is not lost. Troy has 30 days to file another petition with the US Supreme Court.
Troy and his lawyers are doing everything they can to fight this decision from the inside. It is up to us to turn up the pressure on the outside. Even if you've taken action before, keep flooding Governor Perdue's office with emails demanding justice for Troy. And pass the action on to everyone you know. There is power in numbers and when you stand behind Troy Davis, you make the fight for justice even stronger!
We can't thank you enough.
In solidarity,
Sue, Brian, Jessie, and the rest of the Death Penalty Campaign team
P.S. Save the date - National Day of Solidarity for Troy Davis coming in May. We'll be in touch soon to let you know how you can support Troy in your own community!
To send a message to Governor Perdue:
http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org/siteapps/advocacy/index.aspx?c=jhKPIXPCIoE&b=2590179&template=x.ascx&action=12168
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Please spread the message where ever you will be during the next weeks!
Thank you so much,
Annette in Heidelberg - Germany
German Network Against the Death Penalty and to Free Mumia
Dear co-strugglers for Mumia,
This is our call for action - sign the online-petition to the Justices of the US Supreme Court.
We launched it at the beginning of March in Germany and Austria - and it is growing fast now.
It was already signed by Noam Chomsky, Frances Goldin, Robert Meeropol, Harold Wilson, Colin Firth, Anthony Arnove, Marc Taylor, Julia Wright, Pam Africa, Veronica Jones and so many others.
The updated letter with the 3500th signature was sent to the Justices this Easter Monday, April 13.
http://www.PetitionOnline.com/supreme/petition.html
Support Mumia in this most dangerous state of his life.
Please spread it as far as you can! Post it, send it around, use all your powerful means of creating news and attention.
German Network Against the Death Penalty and to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
www.inprisonmywholelife.com
www.mumia-hoerbuch.de
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Sign Petition:
Reinstate Anti-War Opinion Editor
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/reinstate-anti-war-opinion-editor
To The Recorder Staff--
It has come to our attention that on Tuesday, March 10, 2009, Central Connecticut State University's newspaper The Recorder's Opinion Editor, student Marissa Blaszko, was fired from her position for an alleged conflict of interest. The Recorder's editor-in-chief called Marissa into a private meeting and presented her with an ultimatum to quit campus activism or resign her position with the student newspaper. Marissa refused to make a choice. She was later locked out of the office and fired.
The editor-in-chief told Marissa that she was being fired for her prominence in campus activism and her membership in the Youth for Socialist Action club, and not based on her job performance. It was explained to her that editors are forbidden to participate in campus protests against the Iraq war, or bring to campus the author of a new book on the frame-up of journalist and death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal.
We declare as invalid any internal code or policy of The Recorder which presumes to grant its editor-in-chief the authority to purge the staff of such political convictions and activities as he or she finds disagreeable. Such an absurd claim to power contradicts every official policy of the University, every civil liberties egal precedent of the past 40 years, not to mention the animating spirit of our state and federal constitutions.
We consider Marissa's firing and any internal policy which its perpetrators would produce in an attempt to justify it as a subversion of basic democratic rights. Under no circumstances does an employer ever have the right to fire an employee for legally exercising her constitutional rights.
We demand Marissa's immediate and unconditional reinstatement to her position at The Recorder, along with a reaffirmation from the newspaper editors that it will not tolerate discrimination against its staff on the basis of race, sex, religion, national origin, sexual preference, personal views or affiliations, or any other conditions established by the law.
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ARTICLES IN FULL:
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1) Group Sounds Alarm on European Bee Industry
By REUTERS
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/world/europe/28bees.html?ref=world
2) On Voting Rights, Test of History v. Progress
By ADAM LIPTAK
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/us/28voting.html?ref=us
3) Obama Is Nudging Views on Race, a Survey Finds
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and MARJORIE CONNELLY
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/us/politics/28poll.html?ref=us
4) People With Service Jobs Feel Economic Pain Early
By HILLARY CHURA
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/business/28worker.html?ref=business
5) Group Advises Stopping Flow of Gifts to Doctors
By GARDINER HARRIS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/health/policy/29drug.html?ref=health
6) Local Health Agencies, Hurt by Cuts, Brace for Flu Risk
By KEVIN SACK
April 30, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/health/30states.html?hp
7) Poppies a Target in Fight Against Taliban
By DEXTER FILKINS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/world/asia/29afghan.html?ref=world
8) Britain to Add 700 Troops to Afghan War
By ALAN COWELL
April 30, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/world/europe/30britain.html?ref=world
9) Costs Soar as Iraq Falls Behind on Training Plan, Audit Says
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/world/middleeast/29audit.html?ref=world
10) California: Report Cites Police Abuse
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
National Briefing | West
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/us/29brfs-REPORTCITESP_BRF.html?ref=us
11) M.T.A. Warns of New Cuts 'Beyond Doomsday'
By William Neuman
April 29, 2009, 2:23 pm
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/mta-warns-of-new-cuts-beyond-doomsday/
12) As More Apply for Welfare, Concern for Those Denied
By JULIE BOSMAN
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/nyregion/29welfare.html?ref=nyregion
13) 3 Brothers Sentenced to Life for Holy War Plot at Ft. Dix
By REUTERS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/nyregion/29fortdix.html?ref=nyregion
14) Smoke 'Em Out, Freedom Of Speech Be Damned
By Lenore Daniels
BlackPlanet.com, NewsOne
April 28, 2009
http://newsone.blackplanet.com/nation/opinion-smoke-em-out-freedom-of-speech-be-damned/#more-164111
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1) Group Sounds Alarm on European Bee Industry
By REUTERS
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/world/europe/28bees.html?ref=world
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Europe's beekeeping industry could be wiped out in less than a decade as bees fall victim to disease, insecticides and intensive farming, the international beekeeping body Apimondia said on Monday.
"With this level of mortality, European beekeepers can only survive another 8 to 10 years," Gilles Ratia, the president of Apimondia, told Reuters.
"We have had big problems in southwest France for many years," he said, but the problem had extended to Italy and Germany.
Last year, about 30 percent of Europe's 13.6 million hives died, according to Apimondia figures. Losses reached 50 percent in Slovenia and as high as 80 percent in southwest Germany.
About 35 percent of European food crops rely on bees to pollinate them, Mr. Ratia said, and the deaths pose a big threat for farmers.
"It is a complete crisis," said Francesco Panella, who tends about 1,000 hives in the Piedmont region of Italy. "Last year, I lost about half my production. I can't survive more than two or three more years like this."
Mystery has surrounded the recent decline in the bee population. Most keepers blame modern farming methods and the pesticides used on crops like sunflower and rapeseed.
French honey output has suffered in intensive sunflower-farming areas, said Henri Clement, president of the French beekeeping union, but has remained steady in mountains and chestnut forests.
Apimondia's scientific coordinator, Gerard Arnold, cites two main factors responsible for weakening bee colonies: insecticides and the parasitic mite Varroa. Once weakened, Mr. Arnold said, the hives were then wiped out by other diseases.
The European Union voted this year to phase out the most toxic pesticides after years of wrangling, but beekeepers still say that they are ignored by politicians. "If cattle were producing 30 percent less milk each year, it would not be acceptable," said Josef Stich, who keeps 200 hives near Vienna.
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2) On Voting Rights, Test of History v. Progress
By ADAM LIPTAK
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/us/28voting.html?ref=us
WASHINGTON - Ellen D. Katz is a liberal law professor and a big fan of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which she calls the most effective civil rights legislation in American history. "It's sacred," she said. "It's holy."
But Professor Katz is torn about what the Supreme Court should do in a case asking it to strike down a central part of the law. She cannot shake the feeling that the election of the nation's first black president has changed everything.
"This election was momentous," said Professor Katz, who teaches voting rights and legal history at the University of Michigan, "and it arguably presents the moment when Congress should close out this regime."
That Barack Obama is now president is not directly relevant to any issue in the case, Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1 v. Holder, No. 08-322, which will be argued on Wednesday and is widely considered the most important of the term.
Yet as they consider whether to cut off one of the great legal legacies of the civil rights era, the justices may be asking themselves the inevitable question: Is a law rooted in the age of Jim Crow still needed in the Obama era?
The central question before the court, though, is this: Did Congress overstep its constitutional power in 2006 by reauthorizing Section 5 of the act, which requires states and localities with a history of discrimination to obtain federal permission before making changes to their voting procedures?
"Obama inexorably shapes how we understand Section 5 today," Professor Katz said, adding that the court should take the unusual step of finding a way to force Congress to take a fresh look at the law, which expires in 2031.
Theodore M. Shaw, a law professor at Columbia and a former president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc., said the court should not place too much weight on a single election. "We've had a profound moment, and we're in a different place," Professor Shaw said. "But race still plays powerfully in electoral politics in this country. If it weren't for the Voting Rights Act, there would be no President Obama."
The act was a triumph of the civil rights movement. It took on, as the Supreme Court said in upholding it in 1966, the "insidious and pervasive evil" of state officials defiantly committed to denying blacks the right to vote.
At the act's heart is Section 5, which requires state officials to get permission from the Justice Department or a federal court before they make even minor changes to voting procedures. Such federal intrusion into state affairs through "preclearance" rather than subsequent litigation was needed, the Supreme Court said in 1966, to address "unremitting and ingenious defiance of the Constitution" by state officials.
The court has repeatedly upheld the act. Just last month, even as it limited another part of the law, three relatively conservative justices in the majority acknowledged that more work was needed to ensure equal access at the polls.
Some state officials, mostly in the South, bristle at what they say is the stigma, burden and federal intrusion that come with being covered by Section 5.
Gov. Bob Riley of Alabama, a Republican, conceded in a friend-of-the-court brief that his state's racist policies had earned it a place on Section 5's original coverage list. "Through acts of violence and willful defiance of federal law," Mr. Riley told the court, "Alabama maintained an all-white legislature and 19 percent black voter registration in 1965."
Today, though, he said, black and white voter registration rates are virtually identical - 72.9 percent for blacks and 73.8 percent for whites. And a quarter of the state legislators are black, almost exactly reflecting the state's population.
In extending the Voting Rights Act in 2006, Mr. Riley said, "Congress wrongly equated Alabama's modern government, and its people, with their Jim Crow ancestors."
Besides Alabama, Section 5 applies to Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Texas; most of Virginia; counties and townships in California, Florida, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina and South Dakota; and three New York City boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. The act requires federal permission before making changes in voting procedures like how registration is conducted, where polling places are put, how elections are publicized and where the boundaries of voting precincts are drawn.
Most changes are minor, but redistricting or wholesale revisions of election laws can require complicated, expensive and time-consuming submissions.
A supporting brief urging the court to uphold the law filed by six states at least partly subject to the preclearance requirement said the minor burdens were offset by benefits including expert guidance in avoiding discrimination, less litigation and better race relations. The law also allows jurisdictions with clean records to ask a court to let them "bail out" of the preclearance requirements.
The jurisdictions subject to Section 5 were selected based on whether they had used devices to discourage voting, like literacy tests, and data from the 1964, 1968 and 1972 elections. Congress did not tinker with those decades-old criteria when it renewed in 2006.
The question before the Supreme Court is not whether the criteria were optimal but whether Congress acted beyond its constitutional authority in using them.
There are arguments on both sides. On the one hand, Congressional power is at its peak in the areas of race and voting. On the other hand, the federal intrusion under Section 5 is unique in American legal history.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the Voting Rights Act and its earlier extensions. But a 1997 decision in a religion case, City of Boerne v. Flores, may require the court to subject the latest extension to more exacting scrutiny than it has in the past, one that asks not only whether legislation was a rational response to constitutional violations but also whether it was "congruent and proportional" to them.
The case before the court was brought by a Texas utility district that was established on undeveloped land in the late 1980s. The district said it had never been accused of voting discrimination. Lawyers for the district told the court that the current Voting Rights Act "treats racism as an inheritance that runs with the land rather than a manifestation of attitudes and actions of living individuals."
The crucial vote on the court will probably be that of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. In another voting rights case decided last month, Bartlett v. Strickland, Justice Kennedy indicated that he might oppose eliminating Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.
"Racial discrimination and racially polarized voting are not ancient history," he wrote. "Much remains to be done to ensure that citizens of all races have equal opportunity to share and participate in our democratic processes and traditions."
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3) Obama Is Nudging Views on Race, a Survey Finds
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG and MARJORIE CONNELLY
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/us/politics/28poll.html?ref=us
Barack Obama's presidency seems to be altering the public perception of race relations in the United States. Two-thirds of Americans now say race relations are generally good, and the percentage of blacks who say so has doubled since last July, according to the latest New York Times/ CBS News poll.
Despite that, half of blacks still say whites have a better chance of getting ahead in American society, the poll found. Black Americans remain among the president's staunchest supporters; 70 percent of black respondents now say the country is headed in the right direction, compared with 34 percent of whites.
The poll found broad support for Mr. Obama's approach on a variety of issues, including one of the most contentious: whether Congress should investigate the harsh interrogation tactics authorized by George W. Bush. Sixty-two percent of Americans share Mr. Obama's view that hearings are unnecessary.
Americans seem to have high hopes for the president; 72 percent said they were optimistic about the next four years. By and large, Americans expect him to make significant progress in health care, energy and immigration policy, issues central to his ambitious domestic agenda.
But the optimism is tempered by a feeling of resignation about two of the most difficult challenges he faces: reviving the economy and ending United States military involvement in Iraq. Most Americans say Mr. Obama has begun to make progress on both fronts, but many do not expect either the recession or the war to be over by the end of his term.
It is not unusual for new presidents to enjoy substantial public support at this point in their tenure. But Mr. Obama's 68 percent job approval rating is higher than that of any recent president at the 100-day mark. Mr. Bush had the approval of 56 percent of the public at this juncture.
But while Americans clearly have faith in Mr. Obama, the poll revealed something of a disconnect between what the public thinks the president has already accomplished and what it expects him to achieve.
Fewer than half of those surveyed, 48 percent, said Mr. Obama had begun to make progress on one of his major campaign promises, changing the way business is conducted in Washington. And just 39 percent said he had begun to make progress on another major promise, cutting taxes for middle-class Americans, even though the stimulus bill he signed into law does include a middle class tax cut.
Mr. Obama will mark his 100th day in office on Wednesday with a trip to St. Louis and a prime time news conference, where aides say he will make the case that he has made "a down payment" on fixing the nation's biggest problems. The poll found that Americans seem to share that view, suggesting the White House has been effective at casting Mr. Obama as an agent of change, while persuading the public that change will take time.
"With all Obama wants to do and all he's got going, it's going to take more than four years," said Larry Gibbons, 58, a retired restaurant manager and a Republican in Phoenix who voted for Mr. Obama's opponent, John McCain. Speaking in a follow-up interview to the poll, he said, "Obama is attacking everything at once and I do approve of that."
Throughout Mr. Obama's candidacy and his young presidency, race has been a subtle thread woven through his message of change. Yet the president shies away from talking about it. In response to a question at his last news conference, Mr. Obama conceded that his election had created ''justifiable pride on the part of the country," then quickly shifted gears, adding, "That lasted about a day."
But Americans do feel differently about race and race relations with Mr. Obama in the White House, according to poll respondents who spoke in follow-up interviews. Some, like Jacqueline Luster, 60, a retired bank employee in Macedonia, Ohio, say that the times are changing, and that Mr. Obama seems to be speeding that change.
"With him as president, people seem to be working together toward the same goals, and that has helped race relations," said Ms. Luster, who is black and a Democrat. "Before there was more of a separation, blacks working for black goals and whites for white goals. Obama has helped change the perception of blacks in a positive way, but it's also the times."
Another Democrat, Lisa Fleming, 49, who is white, said that even in the small Illinois town, Potomac, where she lived, she noticed "people of different races being kinder to each other" since Mr. Obama's election. In Kansas City, a white Republican homemaker, Mary Robertson, 78, said Mr. Obama's ''openness and acceptance have helped others be more open and accepting."
The nationwide telephone survey was conducted Wednesday through Sunday with 973 adults. For purposes of analysis, blacks were oversampled in this poll, for a total of 212, and then weighted back to their proper proportion in the poll, based on the census. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points for all people, and plus or minus seven points for blacks.
After nearly 100 days of watching Mr. Obama conduct the affairs of state, more than two-thirds of Americans say he is not a typical politician, though most say he is set apart more by his style and his personal qualities than his policies.
For instance, the poll found that the public appears divided over whether the Obama administration has broken with the Bush administration in its overall foreign policy. Forty-three percent of respondents said there had been some change in foreign policy since Mr. Obama took office, the poll found, while 44 percent said there had been no change. Thirteen percent did not have an opinion.
Yet the public does give Mr. Obama credit for improving the image of the United States with the rest of the world. And it found support for Mr. Obama's overtures to Iran and Cuba; a majority, 53 percent, said they favored establishing diplomatic relations with Iran, while two-thirds favored Mr. Obama's plans to thaw relations with Cuba.
Megan Thee-Brenan, Marina Stefan and Dalia Sussman contributed reporting.
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4) People With Service Jobs Feel Economic Pain Early
By HILLARY CHURA
April 28, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/business/28worker.html?ref=business
Hotel jobs have long offered a first step on the economic ladder to immigrants and people without a college education or work experience. But the steep drop in travel that started last fall has hit hotels hard and, in turn, buffeted already vulnerable workers.
Many housekeepers, bus boys, dishwashers, doormen, valets and customer service agents have either lost their jobs or are working significantly fewer hours.
In some cases, hotels have laid off workers and hired them back as independent contractors, without health insurance and other benefits. The fortunate have picked up other odd jobs at their current hotels, while some have scrambled to cobble together equally low-paying second and third positions elsewhere.
Carrie Tucker, a hotel housekeeper in Detroit, said she earned $9.17 an hour. Pushing a 150-pound stocked cart, she cleans 16 to 22 rooms a day when the hotel has guests and she is not called off from work. She said that her hours were whittled to fewer than 36 a week from 40 late last year and that she was behind on her rent and her gas and electricity bills.
"I'm stressed out every day I go to work," Ms. Tucker said.
Daniel Tjhin Chin said he was demoted in November to hotel telephone operator, from night manager at the Sacramento Marriott Rancho Cordova, and his weekly hours were cut to 32 from 40. Four weeks later, he was laid off.
"I understand the recession, the crisis and the impact on the industry," he said "I feel bad for whoever owns that hotel, but I hope I get a job as soon as possible because I'm running out of money."
The hotel layoffs, said Lalia Rach, dean of the Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism and Sports Management at New York University, have had an inordinate impact on workers who were already living paycheck to paycheck - large percentages of women, minorities, immigrants, single parents and welfare-to-work participants.
"They are the vulnerable, but they are also what we built our country on," Ms. Rach said. "As paychecks decline or go away, there is going to be a ripple effect on families who are living on the edge. It's going to cascade into taking away the American dream in its entirety."
Hotel workers generally have less education than the American work force as a whole - 19.1 percent have no high school diploma, versus 8.8 percent of the total work force. Their wages last year were lower as well - their median hourly rate was $9.78, while the national rate for all workers in all industries was $15.10, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
And while 8.8 percent of workers in the United States were unemployed in the first quarter of this year, the jobless rate for hotel employees was 11.7 percent, according to the bureau. The figures do not count those still employed but working fewer hours.
Nor has there been much hiring. From July 2007 through February 2009, hotel industry job listings were down 28 percent, according to Simply Hired, a national online job search engine. Demand for valets was down 33 percent, housekeepers almost 50 percent and waiters 86 percent.
Hospitality employment may not bounce back until the beginning to middle of 2010, according to Adam Weissenberg, who leads the tourism, hospitality and leisure practice in the United States at Deloitte, the accounting firm. Other experts are even more pessimistic, predicting no rebound until the middle to end of next year, at the earliest.
Catherene Parker, who has a customer service job at the Marriott in San Jose, Calif., was able to cover her expenses with her pay of $15 an hour and consistent overtime. But she could save nothing. Late last year, when her overtime dried up, she said she found a job as a customer service representative at a shopping mall. Now, she works 40 hours a week at the hotel and 20 at the mall.
Van Valiant has managed to hold onto his job by participating in retraining programs and making himself as indispensable as possible. He started waiting tables at the Wyndham Garden Hotel in Austin, Tex., in May 2008. By fall, his hours were cut to 32 a week. He asked to be trained in other areas. Now the hotel's food and beverage supervisor, he can tend bar, cook, work at the hotel's front desk and do night auditing. He is back up to 40 hours a week, with frequent overtime.
"It's very easy to find another server," Mr. Valiant said. "It makes sense to make yourself more valuable so that they don't want to get rid of you."
At the South Point Hotel, Casino and Spa in Las Vegas, Amy DeVincentis, a parking attendant, says colleagues take turns leaving early when it is slow so that pooled tips go further.
"We understand that there are certain people that can't leave early because they need the extra money, because they do have a mortgage," Ms. DeVincentis said. "No one gets upset if they really need to work their hours. We're all in this together."
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5) Group Advises Stopping Flow of Gifts to Doctors
By GARDINER HARRIS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/health/policy/29drug.html?ref=health
WASHINGTON - In a scolding report, the nation's most influential medical advisory group said that doctors should stop taking much of the money, gifts and free drug samples that they routinely accept from drug and device companies.
The report by the Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, is a stinging indictment of many of the most common means by which drug and device makers endear themselves to doctors, medical schools and hospitals.
"It is time for medical schools to end a number of long-accepted relationships and practices that create conflicts of interest, threaten the integrity of their missions and their reputations, and put public trust in jeopardy," the report concluded.
The institute's report is even more damning than a similar one released last year by the Association of American Medical Colleges, which proposed tough new rules governing interactions between companies and medical schools.
In the wake of the association's report, many schools and medical societies toughened their policies. The institute's imprimatur is certain to accelerate this process.
"With the I.O.M.'s endorsement, issues that were once controversial now are indisputable," said Dr. David Rothman, president of the Institute on Medicine as a Profession at Columbia University. "Conflicts of interest in medicine are no longer acceptable."
The report calls on Congress to pass legislation that would require drug and device makers to publicly disclose all payments made to doctors. Senator Charles E. Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, and Senator Herb Kohl, a Democrat from Wisconsin, have co-sponsored legislation that would do just that.
Both senators said they welcomed the institute's endorsement.
"It's a shot in the arm to the reform movement to have the prestige and policy heft of the Institute of Medicine on the side of transparency," Mr. Grassley said. "The more disclosure, the better, for holding the system accountable and building public confidence in medical research and practice."
Drug companies spend billions of dollars wooing doctors - more than they spend on research or consumer advertising. Much of this money is spent on giving doctors free drug samples, free food, free medical refresher courses and payments for marketing lectures. The institute's report recommends that nearly all of these efforts end.
The largest drug makers agreed last year to stop giving doctors pens, pads and other gifts of small value, but company executives have defended other marketing tactics as valuable to both doctors and patients. Medical device and biotechnology companies have yet to swear off even pens and free trips.
A 2007 survey found that more than three-quarters of doctors accept free drug samples and free food, more than a third get financial help for medical refresher courses and more than a quarter get paid for giving marketing lectures and enrolling patients in clinical trials
Among the most controversial of the institute's recommendations is a plan to end industry influence over medical refresher courses. Presently, drug and device makers provide about half of the funding for such courses so that doctors can often take them for free. Even as they have acknowledged the need for other limits, many medical societies and schools have defended subsidies for education as necessary.
"As science progresses, it's going to get harder and harder to get doctors to keep pace," said Dr. Jack Lewin, chief executive of the American College of Cardiology. "I think industry has some responsibility toward education."
By contrast, the American Psychiatric Association recently announced that it would phase out industry funding for medical refresher courses at its conventions.
The institute acknowledged that many doctors depend on industry funding for refresher medical courses but said that "the current system of funding is unacceptable and should not continue." The report recommended that a different funding system be created within two years.
Senator Kohl said that he has been investigating refresher medical courses, and he said the industry's funding has biased some courses.
Dr. Bernard Lo, the director of the Program in Medical Ethics at University of California San Francisco who served on the institute's committee that wrote the report, said in an interview that doctors "need to do a better job in addressing conflicts of interest that would lead to bias or threaten public trust."
Dr. P. Roy Vagelos, a former Merck chief executive, said that he has worried for years that drug and device companies wielded too much influence over doctors.
"I think medical centers and companies will start to listen to these recommendations and to take them very seriously," Dr. Vagelos said.
The institute recommended that doctors stop giving free drug samples to patients unless the patient is poor and the doctor can continue to provide the medicine to the patient for little or no cost. By contrast, many free drug samples go to patients with insurance coverage or to doctors and their families, the report stated.
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6) Local Health Agencies, Hurt by Cuts, Brace for Flu Risk
By KEVIN SACK
April 30, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/health/30states.html?hp
The recession has drained hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of workers from the state and local health departments that are now the front line in the country's defense against a possible swine flu pandemic.
Health officials in affected states said they had thus far been able to manage the testing and treatment of infected residents and mount vigorous public education campaigns. But many said they had been able to do so only by shifting workers from other public health priorities, and some questioned how their depleted departments might handle a full-fledged pandemic.
"I'm very concerned," said Robert M. Pestronk, executive director of the National Association of County and City Health Officials. "Local health departments are barely staffed to do the work they do on a day-to-day basis. A large increase in workload will mean that much of the other work that is being done now won't be done. And depending on the scale of an epidemic, capacity may be exceeded."
At a news conference on Monday, Dr. Richard E. Besser, the acting director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the public health system was in "a tough situation."
"We hear about tens of thousands of state public health workers who are going to be losing their jobs because of state budgets," he said. "It is very important that we look at that resource because this outbreak was identified because of a lot of work going on around preparedness."
Mr. Pestronk's group estimates that local health departments lost about $300 million in financing and 7,000 workers in 2008, a year when more than half of all agencies shed employees. There were about 160,000 health department workers in 2005, according to the group. Mr. Pestronk said he expected to lose at least another 7,000 jobs this year.
State public health agencies lost an additional 1,500 workers through layoffs and attrition from July 2008 to January 2009, according to the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials. The group anticipates 2,600 job losses in the coming fiscal year.
South Carolina's Department of Health and Environmental Control, which also staffs local health departments, has lost $30 million in state money and a third of its 6,000 employees over the last decade, said Thom W. Berry, a spokesman. The department is currently investigating several "probable" cases of swine flu.
In New York City, which has the highest concentration of confirmed flu cases, federal grants for emergency preparedness have fallen to $23 million, from $28 million a year ago, said Andrew S. Rein, the city health department's executive deputy commissioner.
In California, which has 14 confirmed cases, the Department of Public Health recently absorbed a 10 percent budget cut ordered by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to help close a massive budget gap. It did so without laying off workers, instead slashing grants to local health departments, said Dr. Bonnie Sorensen, the chief deputy director of policy and programs. During the flu scare, about 100 state health workers have been diverted from other duties, she said.
On Tuesday, Mr. Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency that calls for all California agencies to assist the health department. It gave the department special powers to enter into contracts, suspend competitive bidding and waive certification requirements for laboratories. The federal disease control agency has shipped equipment and chemicals used to test for swine flu to California so the state can hasten its laboratory work without sending samples elsewhere.
"The bottom line is, we are prepared," Mr. Schwarzenegger said this week.
The White House asked Congress on Tuesday to provide $1.5 billion in emergency financing to battle the swine flu outbreak, but it is not clear how that money might flow downstream.
Public health officials said Congress had missed an opportunity by excising nearly $900 million in proposed financing for pandemic flu preparation from this year's stimulus bill. It was to be the final installment of President George W. Bush's request for $7 billion in federal spending on vaccines, medical equipment and planning. Congress last allocated money for pandemic planning by state and local governments in 2006 - about $600 million over two years, said Dr. Paul E. Jarris, executive director of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials.
"The entire system is lining up to decrease resources at the time we need them most," Dr. Jarris said. "We have to realize that we're at the starting line. The stress will come if this escalates."
Jeffrey Levi, executive director of the Trust for America's Health, said the financial strain made "it more important that we luck out" with a mild outbreak.
Dr. Alvin D. Jackson, the state health director in Ohio, which has one confirmed case of swine flu, said his agency's state appropriation had declined by about $10 million over the last two years. He said his budget to prepare communities and hospitals for an influenza pandemic had dropped to $34 million, from $55 million in 2004.
"Right now we're O.K.," he said. "We feel that we can do an excellent job protecting our citizens. But looking forward, we do understand that some additional resources would be appreciated."
But in Cleveland, Dr. Terry Allan, the Cuyahoga County health commissioner, said the decline in state and federal money had prompted a 25 percent cut in spending on pandemic preparedness over the last two years. That had cost the department at least 10 workers, he said, and further cuts are anticipated.
"Those are people we would have had available to expand and build on our plans for social distancing, for mobilizing antivirals," he said. "Our plan is not adequate. It's barely started."
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7) Poppies a Target in Fight Against Taliban
By DEXTER FILKINS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/world/asia/29afghan.html?ref=world
ZANGABAD, Afghanistan - American commanders are planning to cut off the Taliban's main source of money, the country's multimillion-dollar opium crop, by pouring thousands of troops into the three provinces that bankroll much of the group's operations.
The plan to send 20,000 Marines and soldiers into Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul Provinces this summer promises weeks and perhaps months of heavy fighting, since American officers expect the Taliban to vigorously defend what makes up the economic engine for the insurgency. The additional troops, the centerpiece of President Obama's effort to reverse the course of the seven-year war, will roughly double the number already in southern Afghanistan. The troops already fighting there are universally seen as overwhelmed. In many cases, the Americans will be pushing into areas where few or no troops have been before.
Through extortion and taxation, the Taliban are believed to reap as much as $300 million a year from Afghanistan's opium trade, which now makes up 90 percent of the world's total. That is enough, the Americans say, to sustain all of the Taliban's military operations in southern Afghanistan for an entire year.
"Opium is their financial engine," said Brig. Gen. John Nicholson, the deputy commander of NATO forces in southern Afghanistan. "That is why we think he will fight for these areas."
The Americans say that their main goal this summer will be to provide security for the Afghan population, and thereby isolate the insurgents.
But because the opium is tilled in heavily populated areas, and because the Taliban are spread among the people, the Americans say they will have to break the group's hold on poppy cultivation to be successful.
No one here thinks that is going to be easy.
Only 10 minutes inside the tiny village of Zangabad, 20 miles southwest of Kandahar, a platoon of American soldiers stepped into a poppy field in full bloom on Monday. Taliban fighters opened fire from three sides.
"From the north!" one of the soldiers yelled, spinning and firing.
"West!" another screamed, turning and firing, too.
An hour passed and a thousand bullets whipped through the air. Ammunition was running low. The Taliban were circling.
Then the gunships arrived, swooping in, their bullet casings showering the ground beneath them, their rockets streaking and destroying. Behind a barrage of artillery, the soldiers shot their way out of Zangabad and moved into the cover of the vineyards.
"When are you going to drop the bomb?" Capt. Chris Brawley said into his radio over the clatter of machine-gun fire. "I'm in a grape field."
The bomb came, and after a time the shooting stopped.
The firefight offered a preview of the Americans' summer in southern Afghanistan. By all accounts, it is going to be bloody.
Like the guerrillas they are, Taliban fighters often fade away when confronted by a conventional army. But in Afghanistan, as they did in Zangabad, the Taliban will probably stand and fight.
Among the ways the Taliban are believed to make money from the opium trade is by charging farmers for protection; if the Americans and British attack, the Taliban will be expected to make good on their side of that bargain.
Indeed, Taliban fighters have begun to fight any efforts by the Americans or the British to move into areas where poppy grows and opium is produced. Last month, a force of British marines moved into a district called Nad Ali in Helmand Province, the center of the country's poppy cultivation. The Taliban were waiting. In a five-day battle, the British killed 120 Taliban fighters and wounded 150. Only one British soldier was wounded.
Many of the new American soldiers will fan out along southern Afghanistan's largely unguarded 550-mile-long border with Pakistan. Among them will be soldiers deployed in the Stryker, a relatively quick, nimble armored vehicle that can roam across the vast areas that span the frontier.
All of the new troops are supposed to be in place by Aug. 20, in order to provide security for Afghanistan's presidential election.
The presence of poppy and opium here has injected a huge measure of uncertainly into the war. Under NATO rules of engagement, American or other forces are prohibited from attacking targets or people related only to narcotics production. Those people are not considered combatants.
But American and other forces are allowed to attack drug smugglers or facilities that are assisting the Taliban. In an interview, General Nicholson said that opium production and the Taliban are so often intertwined that the rules do not usually inhibit American operations.
"We often come across a compound that has opium and I.E.D. materials side by side, and opium and explosive materials and weapons," General Nicholson said, referring to improvised explosive devices. "It's very common - more common than not."
But the prospect of heavy fighting in populated areas could further alienate the Afghan population. In the firefight in Zangabad, the Americans covered their exit with a barrage of 20 155 millimeter high-explosive artillery shells - necessary to shield them from the Taliban, but also enough to inflict serious damage on people and property. A local Afghan interviewed by telephone after the firefight said that four homes had been damaged by the artillery strikes.
Then there is the problem of weaning poppy farmers from poppy farming - a task that has proved intractable in many countries, like Colombia, where the American government has tried to curtail poppy production. It is by far the most lucrative crop an Afghan can farm. The opium trade now makes up nearly 60 percent of Afghanistan's gross domestic product, American officials say. The country's opium traffickers typically offer incentives that no Afghan government official can: they can guarantee a farmer a minimum price for the crop as well as taking it to market, despite the horrendous condition of most of Afghanistan's roads.
"The people don't like to cultivate poppy, but they are desperate," Mohammed Ashraf Naseri, the governor of Zabul Province, told a group of visitors this month.
To offer an alternative to poppy farming, the American military is setting aside $250 million for agriculture projects like irrigation improvements and wheat cultivation. General Nicholson said that a $200 million plan for infrastructure improvements, much of it for roads to help get crops to market, was also being prepared. The vision, General Nicholson said, is to try to restore the agricultural economy that flourished in Afghanistan in the 1970s. That, more than military force, will defeat the Taliban, he said.
"There is a significant portion of the enemy that we believe we can peel off with incentives," the general said. "We can hire away many of these young men."
Even if the Americans are able to cut production, shortages could drive up prices and not make a significant dent in the Taliban's profits.
The foray into Zangabad suggested the difficulties that lie ahead. The terrain is a guerrilla's dream. In addition to acres of shoulder-high poppy plants, rows and rows of hard-packed mud walls, used to stand up grape vines, offer ideal places for ambushes and defense.
But the trickiest thing will be winning over the Afghans themselves. The Taliban are entrenched in the villages and river valleys of southern Afghanistan. The locals, caught between the foes, seem, at best, to be waiting to see who prevails.
On their way to Zangabad, the soldiers stopped in a wheat field to talk to a local farmer. His name was Ahmetullah. The Americans spoke through a Pashto interpreter.
"I'm very happy to see you," the farmer told the Americans.
"Really?" one of the soldiers asked.
"Yes," the farmer said.
The interpreter sighed, and spoke in English.
"He's a liar."
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8) Britain to Add 700 Troops to Afghan War
By ALAN COWELL
April 30, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/world/europe/30britain.html?ref=world
LONDON - Calling the border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan "the crucible for global terrorism," Prime Minister Gordon Brown confirmed Wednesday that Britain would send an additional 700 troops to Afghanistan to fight alongside American and NATO forces battling the Taliban.
But he made clear that the deployment - which had been expected and will raise Britain's commitment to 9,000 from 8,300 - would be intended primarily to build security around the coming elections in Afghanistan and that the extra forces would be withdrawn by early 2010.
"For Afghanistan, our strategy is to ensure the country is strong enough as a democracy to withstand and overcome the terrorist threat," he said, unveiling what British officials called a new strategy that resembled the Obama administration's approach, particularly in treating security issues in Afghanistan and Pakistan as intertwined.
"The greatest international priority is the border areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan," Mr. Brown told Parliament. "They are the crucible of global terrorism. They are the breeding ground for international terrorists. They are the source of a chain of terror which links the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan to the streets of Britain."
The British leader visited both countries in recent days.
Britain has close historical and other ties with the region, from military debacles in the 19th century "Great Game" for influence in Afghanistan to the links British counterterrorism officials have traced between militants in Britain and Pakistan.
Mr. Brown said two-thirds of the terrorism plots uncovered in recent years involved clandestine ties to Pakistan.
"Tackling terrorism in and from the borders of Afghanistan and Pakistan drives forward our new set of proposals today," he said. "Our aim is to divide, isolate and then remove the insurgents, offering to those prepared to renounce violence and accept the Afghan Constitution the prospect of work and security."
He said Britain wanted to help train the Afghan Army to fight the Taliban and to support development projects in Pakistan to prevent young people from "falling under the sway of violent and extremist ideologies."
Last month, President Obama announced plans to send extra combat forces and military trainers to Afghanistan as part of a plan that would bring the overall American deployment there to about 60,000. Compared to those numbers, the British deployment is modest, particularly since Britain is set to complete a pullback from southern Iraq within months.
Still, Britain is the second largest contributor to the 42-nation, 58,000-member international force in Afghanistan, according to its Web site While Washington has been pressing for greater contributions from European countries, Britain argues that its forces are already playing a significant role in the dangerous Helmand Province of southern Afghanistan. According to Britain's Ministry of Defense more than 150 military personnel have died in Afghanistan since the American-led invasion that toppled the Taliban in 2001.
Mr. Brown's newest proposals, coupling military action and training with a boost in development spending, drew some criticism in Parliament.
Comparing the British plan to President Obama's resolve to defeat Al Qaeda and the Taliban, David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative opposition, told Parliament on Wednesday: "Isn't it essential that our strategy is as tightly defined, as hard-headed and as realistic as that?
"We are not in the business of trying to create a new Switzerland in the Hindu Kush - we want to help provide security and deny Al Qaeda those training bases."
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9) Costs Soar as Iraq Falls Behind on Training Plan, Audit Says
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/world/middleeast/29audit.html?ref=world
BAGHDAD (AP) - Iraq is falling far behind schedule to create a system to maintain its own military equipment, costing American taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars to fill in the gaps, according to a new United States audit.
The United States military sees Iraq's ability to take on such duties as essential for the country to maintain a self-sufficient force after American forces leave at the end of 2011.
But the audit, by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction and released Sunday, found a pattern of negligence and shortcomings by the Iraqi military in planning for its basic needs: repairing and maintaining equipment, and supplying troops. The problems include not allocating enough money for logistics operations and failing to provide enough soldiers for training, the audit said.
In one case, Iraqi soldiers abandoned a 90-day maintenance training class in March 2008 because they had not been paid in weeks by their units. The report said the Iraqi Army had not yet assigned other soldiers to take a class.
The study also faulted the United States military for setting unrealistic training timetables.
Initially, the contract costs were put around $208 million to train Iraqis in routine but critical roles. The audit said the contract had ballooned to more than $628 million in part because there was no clear blueprint for the programs, which led to frequent extensions and cost overruns.
"The U.S. objective is to achieve greater capacity within the Iraqi security forces as quickly as possible," said David Warren, assistant inspector general for Iraq reconstruction in Washington. "The fact that these things have occurred on this contract have delayed that. We would have liked to see a greater return on the investment."
Col. Mike Sage, the assistant chief of staff for logistics for Multi-National Security Transition Command, said developers of a Humvee maintenance training program thought that Iraqi commanders would jump at the chance to have their soldiers learn how to care for the vehicles.
As part of the contracts, the United States gave Iraq more than 8,000 armored Humvees.
"We did not read the commanders as well as we thought," he said. "They would not commit soldiers to train" because they did not want to give up the troops for the lengthy classes.
The report recommended the United States military negotiate a firm agreement with the Iraqi government on a timetable to take over maintenance responsibilities.
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10) California: Report Cites Police Abuse
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
National Briefing | West
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/us/29brfs-REPORTCITESP_BRF.html?ref=us
A small police force that patrols two gritty cities near Los Angeles routinely beat up suspects and arrested innocent people, the state attorney general said in a scathing report. The report calls the 45-officer Maywood Police Department sexist, racist and discourteous and cites what it says are abuses. Several officers have been placed on administrative leave, Attorney General Jerry Brown said, and one officer was charged with 17 felony counts stemming from the sexual assaults of three women. Maywood is a city of about 30,000 residents approximately seven miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles. Its police department also provides law enforcement for nearby Cudahy.
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11) M.T.A. Warns of New Cuts 'Beyond Doomsday'
By William Neuman
April 29, 2009, 2:23 pm
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/mta-warns-of-new-cuts-beyond-doomsday/
The executive director of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said on Wednesday that a possible second round of service cuts and fare hikes would go "beyond doomsday" and he said that even extreme measures, like stopping nighttime subway service, could not be ruled out.
The director, Elliot G. Sander, said that the slumping economy had squeezed the authority's revenues so tightly that it would have to rip up its budget for this year and start over with a new, leaner spending plan.
The authority revealed on Monday that it faced an additional $621 million budget shortfall this year, even after deep service cuts and steep fare increases of as much as 30 percent go into effect. The new deficit is caused by the slumping economy, which has choked revenues from taxes and fare and toll collections.
A deficit of more than $1 billion is forecast for next year.
The authority has been hoping for a rescue plan to come out of the State Legislature in Albany, but political leaders have been unable to agree on the contents of a plan.
The subway and bus fare is scheduled to go up on May 31. Service cuts, including the elimination of 35 bus routes and the W and Z subway lines, will be phased in over the rest of the year.
Officials have described those measures as being part of a "doomsday" budget and on Wednesday, Mr. Sander was asked how he would characterize a new round of cuts and fare increases.
"I'm not sure the English language captures what goes beyond doomsday but to me, as a transit professional, as a citizen and a user of the system, they are just unbelievably difficult and I think some would view them as horrific," Mr. Sander said.
Asked if he would consider shutting down the subway at night to save money, he said, "One can't say that anything is off the table."
But he said that he had not discussed an overnight shutdown with the New York City Transit president, Howard H. Roberts Jr., and that there were strong arguments for maintaining all-night service.
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12) As More Apply for Welfare, Concern for Those Denied
By JULIE BOSMAN
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/nyregion/29welfare.html?ref=nyregion
Even as the welfare rolls in New York State dropped steadily over the last decade, the number of applications in the state increased by 35 percent from 1999 to 2007, according to a report released on Tuesday by the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies.
That trend left advocates wondering if more people were withdrawing their applications or were being turned down for welfare benefits because of overly stringent or confusing requirements - a fear that will only deepen as a growing number of unemployed and low-income people turn to cash assistance.
"Our social safety net system in the state and in the city has been weakened since the welfare restructuring," said Bich Ha Pham, the director of policy, advocacy and research for the federation and an author of the report. "A lot of the unemployed New Yorkers who have lost their jobs in this recession are going to encounter barriers to social services that are meant for them."
In the state, cash-assistance applications rose to 554,307 in 2007 from 410,518 in 1999. In New York City, applications rose to 341,635 in 2007 from 221,895 in 1999, a 54 percent increase, the report said.
Last month, the number of welfare recipients in New York City inched up slightly for the second month in a row, after a long decline. There were 343,384 recipients of cash assistance in New York City in March, up 0.4 percent from February, according to data from the Human Resources Administration, which administers welfare in New York City.
In February, the city's unemployment rate jumped to 8.1 percent from 6.9 percent in January, the largest jump in a single month on record.
The national welfare reforms of 1996 ushered in a new program with work rules, time limits and greater latitude for states to discourage people from receiving welfare.
The report released Tuesday blamed those reforms for "roadblocks" to receiving welfare: a cumbersome application process, excessive documentation requirements and a strict sanctions process, which contributed to an increase in application denials. (The tally includes applications that were voluntarily withdrawn.) The findings echoed a survey released in November by Betsy Gotbaum, the city's public advocate, which said welfare help centers imposed unnecessary barriers for people seeking cash assistance, including long waits and confusing instructions from employees.
Michael Hayes, a spokesman for the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, said he had "some concern" with the report's analysis. David A. Hansell, commissioner of temporary and disability assistance, said that in response to the economy, state officials had financed new job training programs and increased the basic welfare grant for the first time in 19 years.
"Today's difficult economic climate has forced us to redouble our efforts to help welfare recipients move into the work force and stay employed," Mr. Hansell said in an e-mail message. "That has been, and remains, the core focus of welfare reform, and the basis of its success."
Robert Doar, the city's commissioner of human resources, said the report "badly mischaracterizes welfare reform in New York City."
"Most notably, it fails to acknowledge that welfare policies that require work have significantly increased employment for welfare recipients, reduced child poverty and lowered welfare caseloads to their lowest level in 40 years," he said.
Some advocates praised the expansion of safety nets beyond welfare - like food stamps, unemployment benefits and Medicaid, entitlement programs that low-income New Yorkers have turned to in greater numbers - but said cash assistance should be made just as accessible.
"The welfare program could be helping a lot of the same population," said Don Friedman, a managing lawyer for the Empire Justice Center, a legal advocacy group. "Yet it continues to be run in a way that makes it difficult for people to receive benefits. If you miss any appointment, or if you do something that they consider a failure to comply, it begins the sanction process, where there is a reduction or termination of benefits. This is a punishment-driven system."
Wendy A. Bach, a clinical professor in the Economic Justice Project at the CUNY School of Law, said the economic crisis called for a renewed focus on welfare.
"We're very focused on getting certain benefits to households," she said of food stamps and Medicaid. "But with welfare, the system is designed to be extraordinarily cumbersome and difficult. Welfare policy is, in very large part, designed to divert people from receiving welfare."
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13) 3 Brothers Sentenced to Life for Holy War Plot at Ft. Dix
By REUTERS
April 29, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/nyregion/29fortdix.html?ref=nyregion
CAMDEN, N.J. (Reuters) - Three Muslim brothers from Albania were sentenced to life in prison on Tuesday for a plot to kill American soldiers at the Fort Dix military base, which prosecutors said was inspired by the idea of holy war against the United States.
The men, Dritan Duka, 30, Shain Duka, 28, and Eljvir Duka, 25, all illegal immigrants, were each sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
The three, who operated a roofing business in Cherry Hill, N.J., were among five foreign-born Muslims convicted in December of planning an attack at the base, about 40 miles east of Philadelphia. The attack was never carried out.
The other two men who were convicted, Mohamad Shnewer, a Jordanian-born taxi driver from Philadelphia, and Serdar Tatar, a convenience-store clerk from Turkey, are to be sentenced on Wednesday.
Judge Robert B. Kugler of Federal District Court here said in sentencing Dritan Duka, "The evidence was overwhelming as to the guilt of this defendant." He was sentenced to life plus 30 years in prison.
"He showed not even the slightest bit of remorse for what he has done nor what he has put his beautiful children through," the judge said. "There is no question in my mind that were he free, he would continue on this route."
Dritan Duka read a statement saying he was innocent and a victim of a conspiracy by the United States government.
He said he and his brothers had been manipulated by one of their co-defendants, Mr. Shnewer, and by Mahmoud Omar, an F.B.I. informant who had infiltrated the group.
Defense lawyers argued during the eight-week trial that their clients were entrapped into making statements about holy war by Mr. Omar and another F.B.I. informant who obtained hundreds of hours of audio and video recordings.
During the trial, prosecutors called the men "radical Islamists" and said they discussed killing as many soldiers as possible in their planned attack.
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14) Smoke 'Em Out, Freedom Of Speech Be Damned
By Lenore Daniels
BlackPlanet.com, NewsOne
April 28, 2009
http://newsone.blackplanet.com/nation/opinion-smoke-em-out-freedom-of-speech-be-damned/#more-164111
"This is not justice. The only reason they put five kids in jail is because they are Muslim."-Faten Shnewer, mother of Mohammed Shnewer
"Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech." -Rev. Martin L. King, Jr.
"...When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me." -Pastor Martin Niemoller
I saw a beautiful young boy in three studio photos. In another photo, I saw four brothers, typical young men, smiling at the camera. They could have been photos of my past students.
Then I am told that the brother with the little daughter can not see her. The brother with five children can't see his children.
Why?
Well, the U.S. government has declared them "terrorists."
The young men are suspicious looking here in America: They are Muslim!
The young men were caught on a video saying "Allah, akbar!" rather than "God is greatest" in English!
Suspicious looks and very suspect language!
The corporate media has labeled this the case of the "Fort Dix 5-Terrorists."
And, let's face it, in America, that label announced to the American public, makes them guilty!
I recently had the opportunity to meet the Lata Duka, the mother of three of the charged young men and the sister of Mohammed Shnewer, Inas Shnewer.
One day, the young men entered a Circuit City store with a video. They wanted a DVD copy of the video. The tape shows a family on vacation, swimming, playing paint ball, and pillow fighting. The clerk, however, views a fragment of the tape where the young men were shouting at a firing range at Pocono Mountains, a vacation and recreation site in Pennsylvania. He hears those "strange" words: "Allah, akbar!" He sees young Muslim men standing before him. It's America! COINTELPRO America! Patriot Act America! Homeland Security and Violent Radicalization laws America! "We'll smoke 'em out" America!!
So the clerk contacts the FBI.
At Poconos the young men asked for semi-automatics (not automatic weapons as the informants and corporate media have repeated) to use on the firing range. And because they are Muslims, they said "Allah, Akbar" and not "God is greatest" in English as while they had fun at the firing range.
But, you see, this is America.
White children, as soon as they come into the world, have a fishing rod placed in one little hand and a rifle placed in the other. They are taught to fish and hunt-to kill.
I remember college classrooms of white students from rural areas "teaching" me about video games in which they were able to kill and rape-virtually, of course. We remember Charleston Heston's words, "over my dead body," when he thought the government would take away his guns.
We live in a country obsessed with violence and the right to own their guns but they remain silent, as the First Amendment is-one citizen at a time-slowly disappearing.
Since the "alert" clerk at Circuit City contacted the FBI in 2005, the young men were under surveillance for 14 months. And more-
Mohmoud Omar and Besnik Bakali went to high school with the young men.
They ate lunch and dinner at the young men's home and came by the store owned by the family. But what they were not members of the community.
Omar, Egyptian, was on probation for entering the U.S. illegally, according to Joseph Piette, "The Fort Dix 5 Convictions: Provocation and Frameup?" in Workers World. Bakali is wanted for "a shooting in Albania." The FBI approached them and they were grateful!
The informants worked hard over the 14 months to encourage the young men to say the word "jihad." Finally, one of the young men says "jihad." Jihad means struggle both personal and political just as we speak of the Black struggle and our daily struggle in America.
Wired to record the Duka brothers, Shnewer, and Serdar Tatar, the informants insisted that it would be a good idea to own a weapon-an automatic-for the next visit to Poconos, said the informants. No, said the young men who were not interested. They work. They have families. Yes, you can bring your own weapons to the firing range, but they work. The Duka brothers are roofers. Mohammed Shnewer is a taxi driver. They have the responsibility of providing for their families. Dritan Duka, 30, has five children. Elijvir Duka, 26, has a daughter. Shain Duka, 26, has a younger brother who needs his guidance. No, said the young men-a semi-automatic!
But isn't that how it works? It's the "friend" brings law enforcement to you and kisses your cheeks. It's the one who arranges a meeting to settle disagreements on your "turf."
What were these young men planning to do, according to the informants? They were set to attack a U.S. base at Fort Dix. Sounds like a movie, doesn't it? The prosecutor's star witnesses, Omar and Bakali were well paid too. Omar received $240,000 while Bakali took home $150,000 ("The Fort Dix 5 Convictions). Nice "work," uh?
And this starts with a video of swimming and of pillow fights! But, these are images of distraction to cover up the secret training of "terrorists" at Poconos! These activities concealed plotting young Muslim men planning to destroy the lifestyle of "hard working" Americans! Be fearful of your neighbors with racial and religious differences while, for Islamic Muslims living in America, daily activities are subject to misinterpretation.
What happened to this evidence of terrorism, this incriminating evidence, this videotape?
"Broken!"
"Broken!"
I looked at the two women, the mother of the Duka brothers and the sister of Mohammad as they gesture...
Broken!
Yes, the videotape is damaged-as in-end of the incriminating evidence!
Gone!
Am I surprised?
According to one corporate media report, the five young men were found guilty on December 28, 2008, of "conspiring to massacre U.S. soldiers at Fort Dix [New Jersey]."1 The "investigation" stopped "terrorists" at "the planning stage." Oh, yes, "an attack was imminent" and the case "underscored the dangers of terrorist plots hatched on U.S. soil."
Americans are safer because five young Muslim men shouting "Allah, akbar" at a public firing range, are now facing life in prison!
They went to Poconos to have fun and they ran into terror!
"My sons didn't do anything," their mother, Lata Duka, told me. "Now, everyone is crying all the time."
Everyone?
The children who can't see their fathers and wives, uncles, sisters, and mothers, shouldn't be alone in crying.
As we have witnessed in the persecution of Rev. Edward Pinkney in Benton Harbor, Michigan and his fight to end the takeover of the Black community with Whirlpool, Inc.'s development scheme, this case represents the government's violation of the First Amendment-Freedom of Speech and Expression. Rev. Pinkney was given a 3-10 years sentence for "threatening" a judge with a passage from the Bible! (bhbanco.blogspot.com). Now, apparently, if you say "God is greatest" in Arabic and not in English-that's a threat to U.S. national security!
Your outrage is needed! Your right to justice is at stake! It is YOUR First Amendment right that is being violated if these five men are sentenced to life in prison! And the Dukas, Shnewer, and Tartar families are your family members too!
They need you! Court officials have used fear to silence the Duka's friends and neighbors. Let the government know that its effort to control by fear is on trial! "If I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges, because they hadn't committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech."
Dr. Daniels is a cultural theorist and activist based in Philadelphia, and a Board Member on Black Commentator. After teaching a year in Ethiopia, she was inspired to name her blog after her colleague, Netsanet, which means Freedom in Amrahic.
-BlackPlanet.com, NewsOne, April 28, 2009
http://newsone.blackplanet.com/nation/opinion-smoke-em-out-freedom-of-speech-be-damned/#more-164111
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