Sunday, January 10, 2016

BAUAW NEWSLETTER, SUNDAY, JANUARY 10, 2016


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Bay Area United Against War Newsletter

Table of Contents:

A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS

B. ARTICLES IN FULL


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A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS



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 SUPPORTERS OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL,AND FREE QUALITY HEALTH CARE FOR ALL:
The Oasis Clinic in Oakland, CA, which treats patients with Hepatitis-C (HCV), is calling for a demonstration to protest the outrageous price-gouging of Big Pharma corporations, like Gilead Sciences, which hike-up the cost for essential, life-saving medications such as the cure for the deadly Hepatitis-C virus, in order to reap huge profits. The Oasis Clinic’s demand is:

PUBLIC HEALTH, NOT CORPORATE WEALTH!

MOBILIZE: 12 NOON, MONDAY,  JANUARY 11, 2016
JP MORGAN HEALTH CARE CONFERENCE
WESTIN ST. FRANCIS HOTEL
335 POWELL ST. 
UNION SQUARE, SAN FRANCISCO

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal urges you to support this demonstration! As many as 700,000 prisoners are among the nearly 5.2 million Americans infected with HCV, according to the Center for Disease Control, and political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal is among them.

This JP Morgan investor conference is an invitation-only event which entices corporate CEOs, CFOs, investors and other opportunist big-wigs to slurp up the profits that can be made from gouging the victims of life-threatening diseases such as Hepatitis-C. This includes Gilead Sciences, the “owner” of Harvoni, which is the effective new cure for HCV.

One pill a day for 12 weeks does the trick with a 95 percent cure rate, but Gilead charges $1,000 per pill, or nearly $100,000 for a full course of treatment!!

Prisoners are among the most likely to contract Hep-C, and among the least likely to receive the newly available cure for the disease, due to both the exaggerated price, and the refusal of prison administrations to provide proper health care to inmates!

Mumia Abu-Jamal was infected in 1981, after he was shot by police and treated as a prisoner for his wounds. Falsely convicted for killing a cop and sent to death row (he’s now serving life without the possibility of parole), Mumia’s infection began to show symptoms in 2015, which is typical for this slow-incubating but usually fatal (if untreated) disease. Mass mobilization by supporters is the only reason Mumia got any medical attention at all, and he is still denied the curative Harvoni treatment which alone can ensure his survival! The PA prison system is trying to kill Mumia by medical neglect!

In violation of National Institute of Health (NIH) regulations, Gilead canceled its program to supply a certain amount of the drug at low cost.   And the New York Times reported that in "a complicated deal to sell hepatitis drugs at a small fraction of their usual cost while imposing tight restrictions intended to protect lucrative markets in the West... for the past year, Gilead has sold the drug to the Egyptian government for about $10 a pill."

Mumia Abu-Jamal, though he suffered near death for lack of treatment last year, is the first one to point out that he is only one of many. He supports the demands for treatment of some 10,000 prisoners in Pennsylvania alone who suffer from HCV infection.

In a recent federal appeal, lawyers fighting for treatment of Mumia brought out evidence in court of a secret PA Department of Corrections (DOC) protocol which explicitly provides for observation, but not treatment, of HCV infected prisoners! 

WE DEMAND:

PUBLIC HEALTH, NOT CORPORATE WEALTH!

IMMEDIATE AND FREE TREATMENT FOR ALL HCV-INFECTED PRISONERS!

NO EXECUTION BY MEDICAL NEGLECT!

JAIL DRUG PROFITEERS, FREE MUMIA!

This message from:
Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
PO Box 16222 • Oakland CA 94610 • www.laboractionmumia.org
06 January 2016

Mumia Is Innocent!  Free Mumia!

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In America’s Prisons: Mumia and the Nightmarish Hepatitis C Epidemic

By Jack Heyman
 
A health crisis of epidemic proportions is raging in this country. Hepatitis C (HCV) has infected three million people, including over 700,000 in prison according to the Center for Disease Control. And 170 million people are infected worldwide. The rates of liver cancer because of HCV are growing faster than any other type of cancer.
Medical professionals call it “The Silent Epidemic” because symptoms in those infected by this blood borne disease may not appear for 20-plus years. America’s most prominent political prisoner, Mumia Abu-Jamal, near death in 1981, after being shot by police, contracted Hepatitis C from a tainted blood transfusion in the hospital. He was not diagnosed with the disease until 2012. If not treated with new life-saving drugs, patients will die from cirrhosis or liver cancer. Mumia is a victim of intentional medical mistreatment by prison authorities, consistent with the state’s attempt to execute him from the beginning.

Federal court hearing and labor support for Mumia

Mumia’s attorneys are now in federal court in Scranton, Pennsylvania, seeking an injunction for the judge to order the Department of Corrections to provide immediate medical relief. Rachel Wolkenstein who is not Mumia’s attorney on this case but has defended him and his wife, Wadiya, for nearly 30 years, has written an excellent report on the hearing proceedings and what’s at stake. To win life-saving medical treatment now and ultimately his freedom will require mass mobilizations in the streets.
In 1999, the Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal organized support through the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU). All West Coast ports were shutdown for two hours, while the San Francisco longshore workers led a march of 25,000 to demand freedom for Mumia. This is the kind of action needed to save Mumia now.
This week, the Japanese Railway Union, Doro Chiba, sent a letter calling for Hepatitis C treatment and protesting his frame-up, imprisonment and demanding he be freed. And last year, UNITE, the largest union in Britain with 1.4 million members sent a letter to Pennsylvania officials protesting the state mistreatment of Mumia and demanding his immediate release from prison to get competent medical care.  A strong San Francisco Labor Council resolution called for adding their “voices to the international call for the immediate release of Mumia Abu-Jamal” given his innocence and wrongful incarceration.

Gilead profits are soaring while Hepatitis C patients are dying

There is a new cure for this disease invented by Dr. Michael Sofia that’s over 90 percent effective. However, Dr. Sofia’s medication, Sovaldi, and the company Pharmasset were bought for $11 billion dollars by Gilead Sciences, Inc. of Foster City, California. Gilead, who didn’t do the hard research and development work, is now selling its highly effective cure, the Sovaldi and Harvoni pill, for a prohibitive price of $1,000 for a daily treatment of 2-3 months or up to $100,000. That’s unaffordable for most working people and is extremely costly for Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance companies. A Senate Finance Committee reported released last month blasts Gilead for pursuing “a calculated scheme for pricing and marketing its Hepatitis C drug based on one goal: maximizing revenue regardless of the human consequences.”
The U.S. is the only advanced industrialized country that does not have price controls on pharmaceuticals. These meds should be free for poor and imprisoned people. If we had socialized medicine, it would be. In a recording by Prison Radio, Mumia has sharply critiqued Gilead’s price-gouging.
Prison authorities who callously refuse treatment for prisoners are imposing a death sentence. Yet, case law holds that denial of treatment based on cost is deliberate indifference under the Eighth Amendment and therefore unconstitutional.
Gilead essentially eliminated its patient financial assistance program, which provided for a negotiated reasonable price based on the patient’s ability to pay. Egypt, which is experiencing a Hepatitis C epidemic with 15-20 percent of the population infected, negotiated to get Gilead’s pill for $10. And the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority (SEPTA). Philadelpia’s transit system is suing Gilead for its prohibitively high pricing, seeking reimbursement of “unjust” profits, plus penalties and interest.
S.F. Demo Called to Protest J.P. Morgan and Gilead Profiteering
Dr. Diana Sylvestre who runs the Oasis Clinic for Hepatitis C patients in Oakland, is angry about Gilead’s profiteering and simultaneously cutting their patient assistance program “leaving thousands of persons without access to medications and at risk for cirrhosis, liver cancer and death.” They’re calling for a protest at J. P.Morgan’s Big Pharma Profiteering Conference. It’s time to mobilize. Join their protest Monday calling for “Public Health Not Corporate Wealth” and “Gilead is ripping off the healthcare system and promoting patient suffering.”
Time: 12:00 Noon, Monday January 11, 2016
Place: Westin St. Francis Hotel
335 Powell St., Union Square, San Francisco 
Jack Heyman, a retired longshoreman, is a member of the Labor Action to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal. 
—Counter Punch, January 8, 2016
 http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/01/08/in-americas-prisons-mumia-and-the-nightmarish-hepatitis-c-epidemic/

 

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OccupyForum: The Militarization of Police -- Arming a Racist System and Killer Cops


 

Monday, January  11th from 6 - 9 pm at Global Exchange


2017 Mission Street near the 16th Street BART station


Information, discussion & community! Monday Night Forum!!


Occupy Forum is an opportunity for open and respectful dialogue

on all sides of these critically important issues!


OccupyForum presents…


The Militarization of Police:

Arming a Racist System and Killer Cops


OccupyForum will focus on the militarization of police with a panel from Stop Urban Shield Coalition, Open Circle, (representing families of murdered black children); and Susan Harman, (representing Oakland Privacy Working Group and CodePink).

Besides addressing the current national emergency of police murders of black people in our streets, these groups seek

creative alternatives to traditional notions of police practices and the role of police in communities and the state.



Stop Urban Shield is a broad coalition of grassroots community and social justice organizations primarily based in the Bay Area but with partnering community groups across the nation who have come together united against Urban Shield. Urban Shield, a SWAT team training and weapons expo that brings together local, regional, and international police-military units to collaborate on and profit from new forms of surveillance, state repression, and state violence. The Stop Urban Shield Coalition includes members from various race, faith, political and social backgrounds and successfully stopped the Urban Shield expo from being hosted in Oakland in 2014.  Their goal is to end Urban Shield and hold accountable our cities and counties from their corroboration in increased racialized repression and violence. John Lindsay-Poland is Wage Peace Coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) in San Francisco, and has researched, written and organized to address state violence for many years. AFSC is a member of the Stop Urban Shield Coalition,

which has organized to stop the militarized SWAT team competition and vendor show in Alameda County since 2013.



Code Pink: Women for Peace is a grassroots, women-initiated, peace and social justice movement working to end U.S.- funded wars and occupations, to challenge militarism globally, and to redirect our resources into health care, education, green jobs

and other life-affirming activities.



The Oakland Privacy Working Group is a coalition of Bay Area activists fighting construction of the proposed Oakland Police Department surveillance hub, the Domain Awareness Center (DAC). The DAC is a proposed, $10.9M Department of Homeland Security-funded, 24/7 surveillance center. The project has grown exponentially in scope since its inception and would now enable law enforcement to engage in widespread warrantless surveillance of Oakland residents, using large numbers of surveillance cameras, license plate readers, thermal imaging devices, gun-shot detection sensors, toll payment tracking for those using electronic passes, and social media monitoring, along with other tools. It has spawned a fierce groundswell of resistance, uniting a disparate coalition of impassioned residents who are unwaveringly saying “no” to government surveillance and the militarization of our community.



Open Circle, ground zero for families who have suffered a death at the hands of police,

addresses police terror and systemic oppression.



Time will be allotted for Q&A, discussion and announcements.

Donations to Occupy Forum to cover costs are encouraged; no one turned away!


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Sunday, March 20: National March 

 

to Support Palestine in D.C.!




On Sunday, March 20, 2016, there will be a major National March on Washington, D.C., to support Palestine and the Palestinian people. Stand with Palestine, say NO to the racist reign of terror and the Apartheid Wall, and say YES to the right of Palestinian refugees to return home.

Buses are being reserved and organized. Transportation centers are being set up in cities up and down the East Coast and in the Midwest. We expect people from every region to descend on Washington, D.C.

The National March and Rally is timed to coincide with the opening of the AIPAC Convention in downtown Washington, D.C. We will gather in front of the White House for a rally at 12 Noon. At 1:00 pm we will march to the D.C. Convention Center, the site of the AIPAC (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee) conference.

Al-Awda, The Palestinian Right to Return Coalition and the ANSWER Coalition are co-sponsoring the National March on March 20 (#‎SupportPalestineInDC2016). We are expecting hundreds of organizations and individual leaders to endorse this activity and join the effort!
What you can do:

1. Become an endorser of this important national action
http://www.answercoalition.org/endorse_the_national_march_to_support_palestine?utm_campaign=palestine_0108&utm_medium=email&utm_source=answercoalition


2. RSVP online to say you're coming
http://www.answercoalition.org/national_march_on_washington_d_c_to_support_palestine?utm_campaign=palestine_0108&utm_medium=email&utm_source=answercoalition#rsvp

3. Sign up if you can help bring other people from your area to Washington on March 20
http://www.answercoalition.org/organize_transportation_to_the_national_march_on_washington_to_support_palestine?utm_campaign=palestine_0108&utm_medium=email&utm_source=answercoalition

Palestine is calling and the world must answer. International solidarity can make the difference, as it did in bringing an end to apartheid in South Africa. This must be a united effort for justice. We must stand together to reject the efforts by the Israeli state and settlers to abuse, violate and evict the Palestinian people. We say NO to racism and YES to self-determination.

Please join and help bring thousands of people to Washington, D.C., on Sunday, March 20, 2016.

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Chelsea Manning Support Network

Defend Chelsea Manning

Here are two important ways you can support Chelsea:

1. Give the gift of a donation to the Chelsea Manning Defense Fund

Attorneys Nancy Hollander and Vincent Ward are well into the process of preparing for Chelsea's first legal appeal next year. The appeals process has the potential to take decades off Chelsea's 35 year prison sentence. Donate Today!

2. Send her a birthday message:

CHELSEA E. MANNING 89289
1300 N Warehouse Rd
Ft Leavenworth KS 66027-2304
Super secret insider info: Not only are Chelsea Manning shirts and stuff already 50% off in our online store, if you use discount code "chelsea" during check out, you'll get an additional 50% off. That is insane, so please don't tell anyone else, as we can't afford for this news to get out too broadly. Here's the link to the store, just for you Bonnie.

Chelsea honored in Advocate's 40 under 40!

"In blogs, tweets, and handwritten letters from prison, the former Army intelligence specialist is still trying to change the world."
"I often hear and read that many people all over the world consider me a ‘whistleblower’ or a ‘heroine.’ This experience can be a little intimidating at times," she tells The Advocate. "That’s an idea that would be a lot to live up to! I don’t feel like I can live up to the expectations of being a ‘heroine.’ I don’t have any special powers or abilities like a comic book super hero. I actually feel a lot more vulnerable than that. In fact, I am very vulnerable. I just try to be myself, and that’s all I aspire to be.” Read more...

Help us continue to cover
100% of Chelsea's legal fees!

Please donate today!



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When Drone Whistleblowers are Under Attack,

What Do We Do?

STAND UP, FIGHT BACK!



 We honor Stephan, Michael, Brandon and Cian!

These four former ex-drone pilots have courageously spoken out publicly against the U.S. drone assassination program.  They have not been charged with any crime, yet the U.S. government is retaliating against these truth-tellers by freezing all of their bank and credit card accounts.  WE MUST BACK THEM UP!
Listen to them here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43z6EMy8T28

PLEASE HELP THEM:

1.  Sign up on this support network:
         www.facebook.com/events/1502272456740302/

2.  Sign this petition  NOW:
               https://www.change.org/p/barack-obama-congress-attorney-general-loretta-lynch-protect-the-drone-assassination-program-whistleblowers?recruiter=436431670&utm_source=share_for_starters&utm_medium=copyLink

3.  Call and email officials TODAY, listed below and on FB site.

4.  Ask your organization if they would join our network.


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Statement of Support for Drone Whistleblowers
(Code Pink Women for Peace: East Bay, Golden Gate, and S.F. Chapters 11.28.15)

Code Pink Women for Peace support the very courageous actions of four former US drone operators, Michael Haas, Brandon Bryant, Cian Westmoreland, and Stephan Lewis, who have come under increasing attack for disclosing information about “widespread corruption and institutionalized indifference to civilian casualties that characterize the drone program.” As truth tellers, they stated in a public letter to President Obama that the killing of innocent civilians has been one of the most “devastating driving forces for terrorism and destabilization around the world.”* These public disclosures come only after repeated attempts to work privately within official channels failed.

Despite the fact that none of the four has been charged with criminal activity, all had their bank accounts and credit cards frozen. This retaliatory response by our government is consistent with the extrajudicial nature of US drone strikes.

We must support these former drone operators who have taken great risks to stop the drone killing. Write or call your US Senators, your US Representatives, President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, and CIA Director John Brennan demanding that Michael Haas, Brandon Bryant, Cian Westmoreland, and Stephan Lewis be applauded, not punished, for revealing the criminal and extrajudicial nature of drone strikes that has led to so many civilian deaths.

Petition

URGENT: Sign and Share NOW! Drone Whistleblower Protection Petition
https://www.change.org/p/barack-obama-congress-attorney-general-loretta-lynch-protect-the-drone-assassination-program-whistleblowers?recruiter=436431670&utm_source=share_for_starters&utm_medium=copyLink

Contacting your Government
- White House comment line: 202-456-1111
 
- Email President Obama: president@whitehouse.gov and cc info@whitehouse.gov
 
- White House switchboard: 202-456-1414 for telephone numbers of your Senators and Representatives.

- Email your Senators and Representatives:
http://www.house.gov/representatives/
http://www.senate.gov/senators/contact/

-Contact Ashton Carter Secretary of Defense: Go to http://www.defense.gov/About-DoD/Biographies/BiographyView/Article/602689 and select appropriate icon.

- Contact John Brennan, CIA Director: Go to
https://www.cia.gov/about-cia/leadership/john-o-brennan.html and select appropriate icon.

For more information on the 4 Drone Whistleblowers:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1502272456740302/
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43z6EMy8T28
(Must see Democracy Now interview with the 4 drone operators)

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/18/life-as-a-drone-pilot-creech-air-force-base-nevada

*http://thefreethoughtproject.com/drone-pilots-bank-accounts-credit-cards-frozen-feds-exposing-murder/#fqt0crLvckG2OdbD.99

Code Pink Women for Peace: eastbaycodepink@gmail.com



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Save Ashraf Fayadh

Palestinian poet sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia.

Ashraf Fayadh, Palestinian refugee poet and artist living in Saudi Arabia, has been sentenced to death by a Saudi court, on charges of apostasy or abandoning his faith in Islam. The charges appear to be based on his poetry and writing and also maybe a form of retaliation for posting an online video showing Saudi religious police lashing a man in public.

Fayadh is a Palestinian refugee who was born in Saudi Arabia and has become a leading member of the young Saudi art scene. He was arrested in January 2014, his identity documents confiscated, and held for a lengthy period without charge. He was then sentenced to four years in prison and 800 lashes; after he appealed; he was re-tried last month and sentenced to death. He did not have legal representation.

Fayadh is being sentenced to death after having been jailed for more than 22 months in the Saudi city of Abha without clear legal charges beyond “insulting the Godly self” and having “ideas that do not suit the Saudi society.” These charges are based on the complaint of a reader’s interpretation of Fayadh's 2008 poetry collection titled, Instructions Within.

“According to Fayadh’s friends, when the police failed to prove that his poetry was atheist propaganda, they began berating him for smoking and having long hair,” reported the Guardian. Fayadh said his poetry book, Instructions Within, is “just about me being [a] Palestinian refugee…about cultural and philosophical issues. But the religious extremists explained it as destructive ideas against God.”

This is not the first time that Saudi authorities have arrested Ashraf Fayadh. The poet was detained before after a Saudi citizen filed a complaint with the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice accusing Fayadh of having “misguided and misguiding thoughts.” Fayadh was bailed out of jail at the time, only to get arrested again. According to sources close to Fayadh, the poet has been denied both visitation and legal representation rights.

Amnesty international stated, “We condemn these acts of intimidation targeting Ashraf Fayadh as part of a wider campaign inciting hate against writers and using Islam to justify oppression and to crush free speech. We express our solidarity with Fayadh, hoping to increase support for the poet as well as pressure to release him. Our efforts should come together to ensure the proliferation of free speech and personal freedoms. We specifically call on Saudi intellectuals to express solidarity with Fayadh against Takfiris’ intimidation practices meant to silence poets, writers, and artists like him. Let the flag of creativity fly free and remain innovative. Remaining silent towards Fayadh’s detention is an insult to knowledge, literature, culture, and thought as well as to freedom and human rights.”

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network joins the call for the immediate freedom of Ashraf Fayadh. His imprisonment, persecution and death sentence by the Saudi regime reflects the deeply reactionary and far-right role played by the Saudi regime in the region—alongside its close imperial partners in the United States, Canada and Europe—that threatens Palestinian and Arab culture, life, and movements and works to block and suppress any struggle for liberation.

One hundred Arab intellectuals have called for Fayadh’s release and so far over 10, 000 people have signed an AI petition to save his life. Please sign and share the petition. https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Amnesty_international_Save_the_palestinian_poet_and_artist_Ashraf_Fayadh/?tUPvwdb

To take further action:

1. Call the Saudi Embassy in your area and demand freedom for Ashraf Fayadh. In the United States, call 202-342-3800. In Canada, call 613-237-4100. Find the embassy in your country here: http://embassy.goabroad.com/embassies-of/saudi-arabia

2. Protest at the Saudi Embassy in your area for freedom for Ashraf Fayadh. Print signs and materials, and gather outside the Saudi embassy with Palestine rights activists, artists and others to demand his freedom. See the list of Saudi embassies here: http://embassy.goabroad.com/embassies-of/saudi-arabia

3. Contact your government officials. The Saudi regime is a close partner of the United States, Canadian and various European governments. Demand that your government pressure the Saudi regime to release Fayadh. In Canada, Call the office of the Foreign Minister, Stéphane Dion, at 613-996-5789 and demand Canada pressure Saudi Arabia to release Fayadh, or email: stephane.dion@parl.gc.ca. In the U.S., call the White House (202-456-1111) and the U.S. State Department (202-647-9572); demand the U.S. pressure Saudi Arabia to release Fayadh. In the EU, contact your Member of the European Parliament—you can find your MEP here:

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/map.html

Please also write letters, Facebook posts, emails or send Facebook messages to your local politicians, newspapers and friends to publicize this dire case and spread the information about the situation of Ashraf Fayadh.

—Steven Katsineris

Information from Amnesty International, Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network and AVAAZ.

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Commute Kevin Cooper's Death Sentence

Sign the Petition:
http://www.savekevincooper.org/pages/petition.php


Urge Gov. Jerry Brown to commute Kevin Cooper's death sentence. Cooper has always maintained his innocence of the 1983 quadruple murder of which he was convicted. In 2009, five federal judges signed a dissenting opinion warning that the State of California "may be about to execute an innocent man." Having exhausted his appeals in the US courts, Kevin Cooper's lawyers have turned to the Inter American Commission on Human Rights to seek remedy for what they maintain is his wrongful conviction, and the inadequate trial representation, prosecutorial misconduct and racial discrimination which have marked the case. Amnesty International opposes all executions, unconditionally.

"The State of California may be about to execute an innocent man." - Judge William A. Fletcher, 2009 dissenting opinion on Kevin Cooper's case

Kevin Cooper has been on death row in California for more than thirty years.

In 1985, Cooper was convicted of the murder of a family and their house guest in Chino Hills. Sentenced to death, Cooper's trial took place in an atmosphere of racial hatred — for example, an effigy of a monkey in a noose with a sign reading "Hang the N*****!" was hung outside the venue of his preliminary hearing.

Take action to see that Kevin Cooper's death sentence is commuted immediately.

Cooper has consistently maintained his innocence.

Following his trial, five federal judges said: "There is no way to say this politely. The district court failed to provide Cooper a fair hearing."

Since 2004, a dozen federal appellate judges have indicated their doubts about his guilt.

Tell California authorities: The death penalty carries the risk of irrevocable error. Kevin Cooper's sentence must be commuted.

In 2009, Cooper came just eight hours shy of being executed for a crime that he may not have committed. Stand with me today in reminding the state of California that the death penalty is irreversible — Kevin Cooper's sentence must be commuted immediately.

In solidarity,

James Clark
Senior Death Penalty Campaigner
Amnesty International USA

News Updates

  • Death Row Stories
    Kevin Cooper's case will be the subject of a new episode of CNN's "Death Row Stories" airing on Sunday, July 26 at 7 p.m. PDT. The program will be repeated at 10 p.m. PDT. The episode, created by executive producers Robert Redford and Alex Gibney, will explore how Kevin Cooper was framed by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department and District Attorney.Viewers on the east coast can see the program at 10 p.m. EDT and it will be rebroadcast at 1 a.m. EDT on July 27. Viewers in the Central Time zone can see it at 9 p.m. and midnight CDT. Viewers in the Mountain Time zone can see it at 8 p.m. and ll p.m MDT. It will be aired on CNN again during the following week and will also be able to be viewed on CNN's "Death Row Stories" website.
Kevin Cooper: An Innocent Victim of Racist Frame-Up - from the Fact Sheet at: www.freekevincooper.org
 
Kevin Cooper is an African-American man who was wrongly convicted and sentenced to death in 1985 for the gruesome murders of a white family in Chino Hills, California: Doug and Peggy Ryen and their daughter Jessica and their house- guest Christopher Hughes. The Ryens' 8 year old son Josh, also attacked, was left for dead but survived.

Convicted in an atmosphere of racial hatred in San Bernardino County CA, Kevin Cooper remains under a threat of imminent execution in San Quentin.  He has never received a fair hearing on his claim of innocence.  In a dissenting opinion in 2009, five federal judges of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals signed a 82 page dissenting opinion that begins: "The State of California may be about to execute an innocent man." 565 F.3d 581.

There is significant evidence that exonerates Mr. Cooper and points toward other suspects:

  The coroner who investigated the Ryen murders concluded that the murders took four minutes at most and that the murder weapons were a hatchet, a long knife, an ice pick and perhaps a second knife. How could a single person, in four or fewer minutes, wield three or four weapons, and inflict over 140 wounds on five people, two of whom were adults (including a 200 pound ex-marine) who had loaded weapons near their bedsides?

  The sole surviving victim of the murders, Josh Ryen, told police and hospital staff within hours of the murders that the culprits were "three white men." Josh Ryen repeated this statement in the days following the crimes. When he twice saw Mr. Cooper's picture on TV as the suspected attacker, Josh Ryen said "that's not the man who did it."

  Josh Ryen's description of the killers was corroborated by two witnesses who were driving near the Ryens' home the night of the murders. They reported seeing three white men in a station wagon matching the description of the Ryens' car speeding away from the direction of the Ryens' home.

  These descriptions were corroborated by testimony of several employees and patrons of a bar close to the Ryens' home, who saw three white men enter the bar around midnight the night of the murders, two of whom were covered in blood, and one of whom was wearing coveralls.

  The identity of the real killers was further corroborated by a woman who, shortly after the murders were discovered, alerted the sheriff's department that her boyfriend, a convicted murderer, left blood-spattered coveralls at her home the night of the murders. She also reported that her boyfriend had been wearing a tan t-shirt matching a tan t-shirt with Doug Ryen's blood on it recovered near the bar. She also reported that her boyfriend owned a hatchet matching the one recovered near the scene of the crime, which she noted was missing in the days following the murders; it never reappeared; further, her sister saw that boyfriend and two other white men in a vehicle that could have been the Ryens' car on the night of the murders.

Lacking a motive to ascribe to Mr. Cooper for the crimes, the prosecution claimed that Mr. Cooper, who had earlier walked away from custody at a minimum security prison, stole the Ryens' car to escape to Mexico. But the Ryens had left the keys in both their cars (which were parked in the driveway), so there was no need to kill them to steal their car. The prosecution also claimed that Mr. Cooper needed money, but money and credit cards were found untouched and in plain sight at the murder scene.

The jury in 1985 deliberated for seven days before finding Mr. Cooper guilty. One juror later said that if there had been one less piece of evidence, the jury would not have voted to convict.

The evidence the prosecution presented at trial tying Mr. Cooper to the crime scene has all been discredited…         (Continue reading this document at: http://www.savekevincooper.org/_new_freekevincooperdotorg/TEST/Scripts/DataLibraries/upload/KC_FactSheet_2014.pdf)

     This message from the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal. July 2015

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For Immediate Release – Thursday, October 29, 2015 
Solitary Prisoners' Lawyers Slam CDCR for Sleep Deprivation

Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition

SAN FRANCISCO – Yesterday, lawyers for prisoners in the class action case Ashker v. Brown submitted a letter condemning Pelican Bay prison guards' "wellness checks," which have widely been viewed as sleep deprivation. The letter was submitted to United States Magistrate Judge Nandor Vadas, and calls on the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to put an end to the checks.

Last month, prisoners achieved a historic victory in the settlement of Ashker v. Brown where the indefinite long term solitary confinement was effectively ended in California, with Magistrate Judge Vadas currently monitoring implementation of the settlement terms.

The guards at Pelican bay Security Housing Units have been conducting disruptive cell checks every 30 minutes around the clock for three months, causing prisoners widespread sleep disruption. The process is loud and according to prisoners, "the method and noise from the checks is torture."

Attorneys representing Pelican Bay SHU prisoners have just completed extensive interviews with prisoners who demand that "the every 30-minute checks have to be stopped or people are going to get sick or worse." In addition, they report that regular prison programs have been negatively impacted.

"To sleep is a fundamental human right," said Anne Weills, a member of the prisoners' legal team and one of the attorneys who conducted the interviews with prisoners in Pelican Bay. "To take away such a basic human right amounts to severe torture, adding to the already torturous conditions of being in solitary confinement."

Most prisoners report low energy, exhaustion and fatigue. Most state that they have trouble concentrating. They try to read, but they nod off and/or can't remember what they have read. Their writing is much slower ("I can't think to write"), and describe the constant welfare checks as having a negative impact on their mental state.

While this recent attorney survey was specifically focusing on sleep deprivation and its effects, prisoners volunteered information about the negative impact of these frequent checks: yard policy and practice has reduced access to recreation, access to showers has been reduced, programs and meals are being delayed, and property for those newly transferred to Pelican Bay is still being delayed and withheld.

Sleep deprivation constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Prisoners and their attorneys are demanding that these checks be halted.
--
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org


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UPDATE:

Albert Woodfox, Angola Inmate, Can Be Tried 3rd Time, Court Rules

By ASHLEY SOUTHALL  
NOV. 9, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/10/us/angola-inmate-can-be-tried-3rd-time.html?ref=us


Free Albert Woodfox!

On June 8, 2015 a federal judge granted Louisiana prisoner Albert Woodfox unconditional release. Albert's conviction had already been overturned three times - most recently in 2013 - yet every time the state has appealed.

Today, Albert is still behind bars after spending four decades in cruel, unjust solitary confinement. He believes that he and fellow prisoners, Herman Wallace and Robert King, were first placed in solitary confinement in retaliation for their activism. All three men were members of the Black Panther Party. Together, they came to be known as the Angola 3.

It is time for the State of Louisiana to stop standing in the way of justice. Call on Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal to ensure Albert's cruel and unjust confinement is not his legacy. Learn more

http://act.amnestyusa.org/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=1839&ea.campaign.id=35593&ea.tracking.id=Country_USA~MessagingCategory_PrisonersandPeopleatRisk&ac=W1506EAIAR2&ea.url.id=414689&forwarded=true

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Amnesty for all those arrested demanding justice for Freddie Gray!

 

Amnesty for ALL those arrested
demanding justice for Freddie Gray!

Sign and distribute the petition to drop the charges!
Spread this effort with #Amnesty4Baltimore

"A riot is the language of the unheard"
— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

An estimated 300 people have been arrested in Baltimore in the last two weeks. Many have been brutalized, beaten and pepper-sprayed by police in the streets, and held for days in inhumane conditions. Those arrested include journalists, medics and legal observers.

One individual arrested for property destruction of a police vehicle is now facing life in prison and is being held on $500,000 bail. That's $150,000 more than the officer charged with the murder of Freddie Gray.  

The legal system has made it clear that they care more about broken windows than broken necks; more about a CVS than the lives of Baltimore's Black residents.

They showed no hesitation in arresting Baltimore's protesters and rebels, and sending in the National Guard, but took 19 days to put a single one of the killer cops in handcuffs. This was the outrageous double standard that led to the Baltimore Uprising.

 Sign the petition to drop the charges on all who have been arrested.

Petition to Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake

Download PDF of Petition 

http://www.answercoalition.org/amnesty_for_all_those_arrested_demanding_justice_for_freddie_gray?utm_campaign=baltimore_amn1&utm_medium=email&utm_source=answercoalition

Mayor Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake
City Hall, Room 250,
100 North Holliday St.,
Baltimore, MD 21202

Dear Mayor Rawlings-Blake:

I stand in solidarity with those in Baltimore who are demanding that all charges be dropped against those who rose up against racism, police brutality, oppressive social conditions and delay of justice in the case of Freddie Gray. The whole world now recognizes that were it not for this powerful grassroots movement, in all its forms, there would be no indictment.

It is an outrage that peaceful protesters have been brutalized, beaten and pepper-sprayed by police in the streets, and held for days in inhumane conditions. Those arrested include journalists and legal observers.

Even the youth who are charged with property destruction and looting should be given an amnesty. There is no reason a teenager -- provoked by racists and justifiably angry -- should be facing life in prison for breaking the windows of a police car.

The City of Baltimore should work to rectify the conditions that led to this Uprising, rather than criminalizing those who took action in response to those conditions. Drop the charges now!

Sincerely,
[add your name below]

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CANCEL ALL STUDENT DEBT!

Sign the Petition:

http://cancelallstudentdebt.com/?code=kos


Dear President Obama, Senators, and Members of Congress:


Americans now owe $1.3 trillion in student debt. Eighty-six percent of that money is owed to the United States government. This is a crushing burden for more than 40 million Americans and their families.

I urge you to take immediate action to forgive all student debt, public and private.

American Federation of Teachers
Campaign for America's Future
Courage Campaign
Daily Kos
Democracy for America
LeftAction
Project Springboard
RH Reality Check
RootsAction
Student Debt Crisis
The Nation
Working Families


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Campaign to Free Lorenzo Johnson
 
Updates from the New "Team Free Lorenzo Johnson":
Thank you all for your relentless effort in the fight against wrongful convictions and your determination to stand behind Lorenzo.

To garner even more support for Lorenzo Johnson, we have been hard at work updating the website and developing an even more formidable and dedicated team. Please take a moment to visit the new site here.

During the month of July, Lorenzo wrote two new articles for The Huffington Post titled "When Prosecutors Deny Justice for the Innocent," and "Hurry Up and Wait for Justice: The Struggle of Innocent Prisoners." In these articles, Lorenzo discusses the flaws in the criminal justice system, which he deems is a "serious problem in this country."

Lastly, Lorenzo has a message to you all.

A Letter from Lorenzo:

July 23, 2015
Dauphin County Prison
Harrisburg, PA

Dear Supporters,

I hope all is well with everyone and your families. As for myself, I'm still on my journey in pursuit of my vindication. Sorry for my website being shut down for a couple of weeks. It was being transferred to a new provider and management. I'm back and will do my best to keep everything up to speed with what's taking place.

I would like to thank ALL of my loyal supporters in the U.S. and in the MANY different counties that have signed on to support my innocence. Thanks for all of the letters, emails, photos, etc. Like I always say, I get energy to carry on and inspiration hearing form you, please stay engaged in my struggle.

As of this moment, nothing has changed, but – the continued delay tactics are constantly being used by my prosecutor, Deputy Attorney General William Stoycos. With the mounting of evidence that supports my innocence and police and prosecution misconduct claims that is steadily piling up, you would think that I would be having a couple of evidentiary hearings on my actual innocence appeal that have been pending since August 5, 2013.

At the time of this writing, I've been moved from SCI-Mahanoy to Dauphin County Prison and locked down for 23 hours and 40 minutes a day. In the 20 minutes I get to come out, I get to take a shower and make a short call. Prosecutor Stoycos had me moved so I can be a witness in his attempt to have my codefendant Corey Walker's attorney removed from representing him. How dare he call into question an attorney who is seeking justice for her client, when prosecutor Stoycos himself violated multiple constitutional rights of mine and Mr. Walker, that led to us being in prison for 20 years and counting.

Prosecutor Stoycos is continuously abusing his power and his endless resources he has at his disposal. He is not tough on crime, he's tough on Innocent Prisoners. Prosecutor Stoycos is doing everything in his power to prevent justice from taking place. I encourage everyone to continue to speak out against my nightmare, invite others to get involved by going to my website and signing my Freedom Petition and whatever else they're willing to do.

On a positive note, I just enrolled in warehouse management trade and started on July 13th. Unfortunately, you're only allowed to miss a couple of days and Prosecutor Stoycos had me temporarily transferred on July 14th … It's extremely hard on Lifers to get into these trades due to the fact that Lifers are placed at the back of the list of ALL vocational classes. I try to further my education every chance I get, so when I do come home, I will be certified in different work.

The month of the hearing has come and left, without me being brought to the courthouse … I'm one of MANY innocent prisoners who endures this non-stop madness in our pursuit of Justice and Freedom. Now that my webpage is almost caught up to speed, I promise prompt updates and as everyone knows that contacted me directly, I personally reply to those in the states and out of the country. For those who can make a financial contribution, everything counts. Take care and let's continue to fight until we achieve Freedom, Justice, and Equality for all innocent prisoners.

"The Pain Within"

Free the Innocent
Lorenzo "Cat" Johnson

[Note: Lorenzo has since been transferred back to SCI Mahanoy and can be reached at his usual address.]

Thank you all for reading this message and please take the time to visit the new website and contribute to Lorenzo's campaign for freedom!

Write: Lorenzo Johnson
            DF 1036
            SCI Mahanoy
            301 Morea Rd.
            Frackville, PA 17932

 Email: Through JPay using the code:
              Lorenzo Johnson DF 1036 PA DOC
                                     or
              Directly at LorenzoJohnson17932@gmail.com

Have a wonderful day!
- The Team to Free Lorenzo Johnson


freelorenzojohnson.org

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Join the Fight to Free Rev. Pinkney!

Click HERE to view in browser

http://www.iacenter.org/prisoners/freepinkney-1-28-15/


On December 15, 2014 the Rev. Edward Pinkney of Benton Harbor, Michigan was thrown into prison for 2.5 to 10 years. This 66-year-old leading African American activist was tried and convicted in front of an all-white jury and racist white judge and prosecutor for supposedly altering 5 dates on a recall petition against the mayor of Benton Harbor.

The prosecutor, with the judge's approval, repeatedly told the jury "you don't need evidence to convict Mr. Pinkney." And ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE WAS EVER PRESENTED THAT TIED REV. PINKNEY TO THE 'ALTERED' PETITIONS. Rev. Pinkney was immediately led away in handcuffs and thrown into Jackson Prison.

This is an outrageous charge. It is an outrageous conviction. It is an even more outrageous sentence! It must be appealed.

With your help supporters need to raise $20,000 for Rev. Pinkney's appeal.

Checks can be made out to BANCO (Black Autonomy Network Community Organization). This is the organization founded by Rev. Pinkney.  Mail them to: Mrs. Dorothy Pinkney, 1940 Union Street, Benton Harbor, MI 49022.

Donations can be accepted on-line at bhbanco.org – press the donate button.

For information on the decade long campaign to destroy Rev. Pinkney go to bhbanco.org and workers.org(search "Pinkney").

We urge your support to the efforts to Free Rev. Pinkney!Ramsey Clark – Former U.S. attorney general,
Cynthia McKinney – Former member of U.S. Congress,
Lynne Stewart – Former political prisoner and human rights attorney
Ralph Poynter – New Abolitionist Movement,
Abayomi Azikiwe – Editor, Pan-African News Wire<
Larry Holmes – Peoples Power Assembly,
David Sole – Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice
Sara Flounders – International Action Center

MESSAGE FROM REV. PINKNEY

I am now in Marquette prison over 15 hours from wife and family, sitting in prison for a crime that was never committed. Judge Schrock and Mike Sepic both admitted there was no evidence against me but now I sit in prison facing 30 months. Schrock actually stated that he wanted to make an example out of me. (to scare Benton Harbor residents even more...) ONLY IN AMERICA. I now have an army to help fight Berrien County. When I arrived at Jackson state prison on Dec. 15, I met several hundred people from Detroit, Flint, Kalamazoo, and Grand Rapids. Some people recognized me. There was an outstanding amount of support given by the prison inmates. When I was transported to Marquette Prison it took 2 days. The prisoners knew who I was. One of the guards looked me up on the internet and said, "who would believe Berrien County is this racist."

Background to Campaign to free Rev. Pinkney

Michigan political prisoner the Rev. Edward Pinkney is a victim of racist injustice. He was sentenced to 30 months to 10 years for supposedly changing the dates on 5 signatures on a petition to recall Benton Harbor Mayor James Hightower.

No material or circumstantial evidence was presented at the trial that would implicate Pinkney in the purported5 felonies. Many believe that Pinkney, a Berrien County activist and leader of the Black Autonomy Network Community Organization (BANCO), is being punished by local authorities for opposing the corporate plans of Whirlpool Corp, headquartered in Benton Harbor, Michigan.

In 2012, Pinkney and BANCO led an "Occupy the PGA [Professional Golfers' Association of America]" demonstration against a world-renowned golf tournament held at the newly created Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course on the shoreline of Lake Michigan. The course was carved out of Jean Klock Park, which had been donated to the city of Benton Harbor decades ago.

Berrien County officials were determined to defeat the recall campaign against Mayor Hightower, who opposed a program that would have taxed local corporations in order to create jobs and improve conditions in Benton Harbor, a majority African-American municipality. Like other Michigan cities, it has been devastated by widespread poverty and unemployment.

The Benton Harbor corporate power structure has used similar fraudulent charges to stop past efforts to recall or vote out of office the racist white officials, from mayor, judges, prosecutors in a majority Black city. Rev Pinkney who always quotes scripture, as many Christian ministers do, was even convicted for quoting scripture in a newspaper column. This outrageous conviction was overturned on appeal. We must do this again!

To sign the petition in support of the Rev. Edward Pinkney, log on to: tinyurl.com/ps4lwyn.

Contributions for Rev. Pinkney's defense can be sent to BANCO at Mrs Dorothy Pinkney, 1940 Union St., Benton Harbor, MI 49022

Or you can donate on-line at bhbanco.org.

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COURAGE TO RESIST

 http://couragetoresist.org/

New Action--write letters to DoD officials requesting clemency for Chelsea!

Secretary of the Army John McHugh

President Obama has delegated review of Chelsea Manning's clemency appeal to individuals within the Department of Defense.

Please write them to express your support for heroic WikiLeaks' whistle-blower former US Army intelligence analyst PFC Chelsea Manning's release from military prison.

It is important that each of these authorities realize the wide support that Chelsea (formerly Bradley) Manning enjoys worldwide. They need to be reminded that millions understand that Manning is a political prisoner, imprisoned for following her conscience. While it is highly unlikely that any of these individuals would independently move to release Manning, a reduction in Manning's outrageous 35-year prison sentence is a possibility at this stage.

Take action TODAY – Write letters supporting Chelsea's clemency petition to the following DoD authorities:

Secretary of the Army John McHugh

101 Army Pentagon

Washington, DC 20310-0101

The Judge Advocate General

2200 Army Pentagon

Washington, DC 20310-2200

Army Clemency and Parole Board

251 18th St, Suite 385

Arlington, VA 22202-3532

Directorate of Inmate Administration

Attn: Boards Branch

U.S. Disciplinary Barracks

1301 N. Warehouse Road

Fort Leavenworth, KS 66027-2304

Suggestions for letters send to DoD officials:

The letter should focus on your support for Chelsea Manning, and especially why you believe justice will be served if Chelsea Manning's sentence is reduced.  The letter should NOT be anti-military as this will be unlikely to help.

A suggested message: "Chelsea Manning has been punished enough for violating military regulations in the course of being true to her conscience.  I urge you to use your authorityto reduce Pvt. Manning's sentence to time served."  Beyond that general message, feel free to personalize the details as to why you believe Chelsea deserves clemency.

Consider composing your letter on personalized letterhead -you can create this yourself (here are templates and some tips for doing that).

A comment on this post will NOT be seen by DoD authorities–please send your letters to the addresses above

This clemency petition is separate from Chelsea Manning's upcoming appeal before the US Army Court of Criminal Appeals next year, where Manning's new attorney Nancy Hollander will have an opportunity to highlight the prosecution's—and the trial judge's—misconduct during last year's trial at Ft. Meade, Maryland.

Help us continue to cover 100% of Chelsea's legal fees at this critical stage!


Courage to Resist
484 Lake Park Ave. #41
Oakland, CA 94610
510-488-3559
couragetoresist.org


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B. ARTICLES IN FULL


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1) Militiamen Occupy Oregon Wildlife Office in Protest of Ranchers’ Prison Terms
By LIAM STACK

A group of activists and militiamen protesting the federal prosecution of two ranchers occupied a remote federal building in the rural southeastern corner of Oregon, the authorities said.

The building seized by the group houses the offices of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, and is operated by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, about 30 miles southeast of Burns, in Harney County.

The occupation began after a demonstration in support of Dwight Hammond, 73, and his son Steven Hammond, 46, who were to report to California prison after a federal judge ruled that the sentences they had served for arson were not long enough under federal law.

Among the occupiers were Ammon and Ryan Bundy, two sons of Cliven Bundy, a Nevada rancher who became a symbol of anti-government sentiment in 2014, according to The Oregonian.

A lawyer for the Hammonds said, however, they did not welcome the Bundys’ help, according to The Associated Press.“Neither Ammon Bundy nor anyone within his group/organization speak for the Hammond family,” the lawyer, W. Alan Schroeder, wrote to David Ward, the Harney County sheriff.

An email to the sheriff seeking comment was not immediately returned.

In a video posted to Facebook on Thursday, Ammon Bundy called on the members of “different militia groups” to participate in the protest on Saturday.

“This is not a time to stand down,” he said. “It is a time to stand up and come to Harney County. We need your help and we are asking for it.”

The Hammonds admitted they lit fires in 2001 and 2006, but said it had been to protect their property from wildfires and invasive plant species, The A.P. said. They were convicted three years ago, and the father served three months in prison, while the son served one year.

The Harney County Sheriff’s Department said the Oregon State Police was handling the incident. Beth Anne Steele, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I. in Portland, said the agency was “aware” of the situation, but declined to comment further.

The Bundys have been organizing opposition to the government case against the Hammonds on social media in recent weeks, which they described as a tyrannical use of federal authority.

“We’re out here because the people have been abused long enough,” Ammon Bundy said in a separate video posted to Facebook on Saturday.

He called the prosecution of the Hammonds “a symptom of a very huge, egregious problem” that he described as a battle over land and resources between the federal government and “the American people.”

“The people cannot survive without their land and resources,” he said. “We cannot have the government restricting the use of that to the point that it puts us in poverty.”

Mr. Bundy described the federal building as “the people’s facility, owned by the people” and said his group was occupying it to take “a hard stand against this overreach, this taking of the people’s land and resources.”

He said the group would remain there indefinitely and told an interviewer that he hoped more supporters would join them. “We have a facility that we can house them in,” he said, referring to the occupied building.

“We pose no threat to anybody,” Mr. Bundy said. “There is no person that is physically harmed by what we are doing.” He added that if law enforcement officials “bring physical harm to us, they will be doing it only for a facility or a building.”

However, in an interview with The Oregonian earlier on Saturday evening, Mr. Bundy and his brother said they would not rule out violence if law enforcement officers attempted to remove them from the building.

“The facility has been the tool to do all the tyranny that has been placed upon the Hammonds,” Ammon Bundy told the newspaper. He said he planned to remain in the building for “years.”

Cliven Bundy previously galvanized conservative critics of the federal government after a standoff with agents from the Bureau of Land Management, who attempted to confiscate cattle he had illegally grazed on federal land since 1993.


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2)  Michael Pollan: What You Should Eat to Be Healthy
A new documentary helps consumers navigate a food system complicated by globalization and industrialization.
By Cole Mellino / Eco Watch
January 1, 2016
http://www.alternet.org/food/michael-pollan-what-you-should-eat-be-healthy?akid=13845.229473.kBHxLN&rd=1&src=newsletter1048309&t=7

A new documentary from Kikim Media based on Michael Pollan’s bestselling book, In Defense of Food, helps consumers navigate a food system complicated by globalization and industrialization.

“I’ve been writing about the food system for a very long time,” Pollan said in the trailer for the new film. “But what I kept hearing from readers was ‘yeah yeah yeah, you told me where the food comes from and how the animals live and everything, but what I want to know is what should I eat.'”

In the film, Pollan attempts to answer that very question: What should I eat to be healthy? He addresses what he has called the “American paradox: the more we worry about nutrition, the less healthy we seem to become.”

We’re consuming “edible food-like substances” rather than actual food, Pollan said. By actual food, he means the food people ate for thousands of years before we became dependent on processed foods.

“You don’t have to be a scientist to know how to eat,” said Marion Nestle, professor of nutrition at New York University. “Just go around the outside of the supermarket and pick up fruits, vegetables and meat, and stay out of the processed foods, because they’re fun to eat once in a while, but they shouldn’t be daily fare.”

From Tanzania to Peru to U.S. grocery stores, Pollan helps eaters find their way through the barrage of faulty nutritional science and misleading marketing claims. He advocates for a more simplified approach to eating, one based on common sense and old-fashioned wisdom. Using a more holistic approach to medicine, Pollan focuses on the macro level (eating whole foods) rather than the micro level (seeking out particular nutrients).

The film covers everything from the latest science on omega-3s and -6s, to sugar’s effect on the body and why we crave it so badly. Pollan unpacks nutritional guidelines and investigates the benefits of a plant-based diet, and the crucial role your gut plays in your overall health.

Pollan is well known for his simple food rules—he’s even got an entire book devoted to the topic. In this film, Pollan says the solution to America’s health crisis is undeniably simple: Eat Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants.

For years, Pollan has advocated for a climate-friendly diet built on regenerative organic agriculture—also known as carbon farming—in which soils are a carbon sink rather than a source of carbon pollution. He argues that this diet is not only essential for a healthy planet, but also essential for human health. “Four of the top 10 things that will kill you are chronic diseases linked to diet,” Pollan explains in the trailer.

So if you’re planning to set weight loss resolutions this New Year’s or are seeking a low-impact diet (which, by the way, makes you a climatarian), then be sure to watch Pollan’s new documentary. It will air on PBS at 9 p.m. ET Wednesday and premier at the Mill Valley Film Festival in October 2016.
Cole Mellino is a writer based in Cleveland, Ohio, where he covers news for EcoWatch.
 

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3) Supreme Court, in Recusal Case, May Find Itself Looking Inward
By  
JAN. 4, 2016
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/05/us/politics/supreme-court-in-recusal-case-may-find-itself-looking-inward.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fus&action=click&contentCollection=us&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=sectionfront&_r=0

WASHINGTON — Not long after he took office as Philadelphia’s district attorney in 1986, Ronald D. Castille made a handwritten note on a subordinate’s memorandum. “Approved to proceed on the death penalty,” Mr. Castille wrote, in neat cursive script, authorizing prosecutors to seek the execution of a young murderer named Terrance Williams.

Later, when Mr. Castille was running for a seat on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, he said he was reluctant to take a firm public position on the death penalty, fearing it would require his recusal from all capital cases.

“I can certainly say I sent 45 people to death row as district attorney of Philadelphia,” he told a legal newspaper in 1993, adding that voters “sort of get the hint.” Mr. Williams was the first of those 45.Mr. Castille won the election and served on the State Supreme Court for 21 years, the last seven as chief justice. One of his final acts, about two weeks before he retired at the end of 2014, was to join a unanimous decision reinstating Mr. Williams’s death sentence.

Next month, the United States Supreme Court will hear arguments about whether Mr. Castille should have disqualified himself from hearing Mr. Williams’s appeal, given his involvement in the prosecution.

The case, Williams v. Pennsylvania, No. 15-5040, puts the justices in a ticklish spot, as the best arguments against recusal are grounded in their own practices. Individual justices decide for themselves whether their recusal is warranted, just as Mr. Castille had.

That is the right approach, Mr. Castille said last week. “The individual involved should make the decision,” he said. “We leave it up to the individual conscience of the justice.”

In declining to recuse himself from other capital cases over the years, Mr. Castille pointed to the examples of two members of the United States Supreme Court, Justices William H. Rehnquist and Antonin Scalia.

In 1972, Justice Rehnquist, a former Justice Department official, issued a statement justifying his participation in a decision about Army surveillance of domestic political groups even though he had defended the spying program in congressional testimony and had criticized the lawsuit when he was a government lawyer.

In 2004, Justice Scalia explained that he could vote on a case involving the official conduct of Vice President Dick Cheney despite the fact that the two had gone duck hunting together.

Similarly, Mr. Castille said last week, there was no reason for him to recuse himself. “I didn’t try the case,” he said. “I wasn’t really involved in the case except as the leader of the office.”

Moreover, the decision to seek death was straightforward, he said. “This guy had a previous homicide,” Mr. Castille said. “That’s the easiest one, where they have a history of violent crime.”

Mr. Williams committed his first murder when he was 17. A jury spared his life after hearing evidence that he had been sexually abused by the man he killed.

In the second case, by contrast, Mr. Williams testified that he had not known the victim, a 56-year-old man named Amos Norwood, and had not been involved in the murder. In fact, Mr. Williams and a friend, both 18, had robbed Mr. Norwood and beat him to death with a tire iron.

The trial prosecutor said that Mr. Williams had killed Mr. Norwood “for no other reason but that a kind man offered him a ride home.”

In 2012, reviewing one of Mr. Williams’s many challenges to his death sentence, a state trial judge said there was another reason: As in the first case, there was evidence that Mr. Williams’s victim had abused him and other juveniles.

The judge, M. Teresa Sarmina of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, said prosecutors in Mr. Castille’s office had failed to turn over evidence of the abuse to Mr. Williams’s lawyer, and she vacated the death sentence. That is the ruling Mr. Castille voted to reverse in 2014. In a concurrence, he called Judge Sarmina’s conduct “lawless.”

Last week, Mr. Castille said that Mr. Williams had known the truth but had chosen to lie on the witness stand.

“He was actually a male prostitute,” Mr. Castille said of Mr. Williams. “He was prostituting himself for money. This guy he killed was not the most upstanding individual, but he still took the guy’s life.”

“It’s nothing that was kept from the defense,” Mr. Castille said. “If anything, he kept it from his attorney.”

That is one way to look at it. Here is another, set out in a supporting brief from the American Civil Liberties Union: “Amos Norwood was a middle-aged sexual predator who preyed on teenage boys like Terry Williams,” starting when he was 13. “In exchange for sex, he would give the boys money, food, housing and other gifts.”

“While Williams of course knew of his own past dealings with Norwood and other men,” the brief also said, “it is no surprise that he would not have disclosed such deeply intimate and traumatic events to an attorney he barely knew.”

The vote in the Williams case in 2014 was unanimous, which suggests that the dispute over whether Mr. Castille should have recused himself is academic.

But Mr. Williams’s supporters say he was entitled to an entirely unbiased tribunal, and they point to social science literature demonstrating that group decision making can be powerfully affected by one participant’s strongly held views.

Mr. Castille rejected that line of thinking. “I’ve read the argument that one judge can sway all the other judges,” he said. “That’s not really accurate. The people on our court are all very independent-minded. They might have swayed me. Who knows?”
 


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4) Economists Take Aim at Wealth Inequality
By

SAN FRANCISCO — When pundits and presidential candidates talk about inequality and the tiny sliver of the population whose fortunes have soared, they often drop names like Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Sheldon Adelson and Mark Zuckerberg.

But those are just the most visible members of a larger but less-talked-about cadre of the big winners in today’s economy. This group consists of roughly 250,000 Americans who mainly populate the executive offices and managerial suites of major companies and financial institutions, along with a smattering of top law firms, hedge funds and other elite aeries.

These people — the top one-quarter of 1 percent of the country’s employed population — have enjoyed explosive gains in income and wealth in recent decades, even as salaries and wages stagnated for the typical American worker.“You hear about C.E.O.s, entertainers, athletes and hedge funders, but that’s the tip of the iceberg,” said Nicholas A. Bloom, a professor of economics at Stanford who is finishing a paper examining the underlying dynamics of income inequality. “It’s a much, much bigger group and they are outpacing everyone else.”

Like those of many of his peers who are presenting new research at the annual meeting of the American Economic Association, which began here on Sunday and ends on Tuesday, Mr. Bloom’s findings are bringing to light fresh perspectives on why income inequality is growing and how it is reshaping the national and global economy.

While the much-talked-about 1 percent is doing just fine, the supersize gains are taking place even further up the income ladder, according to what Mr. Bloom and four colleagues found by examining 35 years of data from the Social Security Administration.

The phenomenon is not limited to Wall Street or the big banks — manufacturers rewarded their top executives every bit as generously as did firms in the finance, insurance and real estate sectors. And this pattern is being repeated in countries where the political landscape is quite different from that of the United States, like Sweden, Germany and Britain.

“This is a truly global phenomenon, and I don’t know any serious economist who would deny inequality has gone up,” said Mr. Bloom, a native of Britain whose politics veer toward a laissez-faire approach and the Conservative Party there. “The debate is over the magnitude, not the direction.”

The economic association’s meeting is something of a barometer of what concerns economists most, drawing more than 13,000 attendees from the ranks of academia, as well as research groups and the private sector. And in panels, research presentations and speeches, what was once mainly a preoccupation of ivory tower Marxists and other players on the margins of the profession is taking center stage.

“In the last few years, there’s been a huge change in the mainstream of the profession,” said Steven Fazzari, an economics professor at Washington University in St. Louis who first came to the conference as a job-hunting graduate student in 1982. “The issue of income inequality was a backwater in the economics field, and it was largely ignored.”

At the same time, there’s a growing consensus among economists of all ideological stripes that inequality is growing — in the United States and abroad — even if the usual political fault lines appear when the discussion turns to the consequences of the trend and whether new public policies are needed to address it.

“It’s pretty much indisputable that the percentage of income being earned by the top 1 percent, or the top quarter of 1 percent, is going up,” said Richard H. Thaler, the association’s president.

“It was true five years ago, but it was not as widely recognized,” said Mr. Thaler, a behavioral economist who teaches at the University of Chicago. “As with climate change, scientific consensus takes a while to build.”

And, to borrow language from an economic seminar, there’s also a striking correlation between the emergence of income inequality as an issue here and the near-rock-star status accorded a handful of once-obscure experts on the subject inside and outside academia.

The best known of these is Thomas Piketty, whose 700-page tome, “Capital in the Twenty-First Century,” became an improbable best-seller in 2014 and made the French academic a media superstar.

Emmanuel Saez, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, who has collaborated with Mr. Piketty, won a MacArthur “genius” grant in 2010. Raj Chetty of Stanford, who has looked closely at economic mobility, also received a MacArthur grant and has presented findings to Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush and Obama administration officials.

“There are definitely fashions in the field,” said Dean Baker, co-director of the left-leaning Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington. “As much as most economists might hate to acknowledge it, there’s no way you can’t respond to Piketty’s success.”

Anticipated presentations at the economic association meeting include new findings from David Autor, an influential M.I.T. economist, on the links between college performance and increased financial aid as well as research by Enrico Moretti of Berkeley into how state tax increases prompt the highest earners to move to lower-tax locations.

For all the intense focus on the roots and extent of income inequality today, most academics are leery of any easy solution. At the same time, they acknowledge that their traditional tools are inadequate for the task.

“There’s no reason the free market will solve this,” Mr. Bloom said.

He believes inequality is being magnified by technological change and what’s known as skills bias, where workers with a particular expertise reap the biggest reward. Neither is amenable to quick fixes.

In Professor Bloom’s new paper, which he wrote with David J. Price, a Stanford graduate student, and three other economists — Jae Song, Fatih Guvenen and Till von Wachter — the top quarter of 1 percent of Americans appears to be pulling away from the rest.

For workers at this threshold, who earn at least $640,000 annually, their salaries rose 96 percent from 1981 to 2013, after taking account of inflation.

The trend was especially pronounced among the most successful enterprises in the American economy, creating a divergence between the highest-paid people at companies that employ more than 10,000 people and the rest of the work force. In this rarefied circle, overall pay jumped 140 percent versus a 5 percent drop for the typical employee at these corporate behemoths.

The split in compensation between executives and everyone else was much less pronounced at smaller companies, according to the research by Mr. Bloom and his colleagues. At these firms, between 1981 and 2013, top salaries rose 49 percent, while median pay rose 30 percent.

In addition, Mr. Bloom and his team also found a sharp divergence between pay at the most successful companies and also-rans in the same field — think Apple versus BlackBerry. The highest-paid workers cluster at the winners, heightening income disparities in the overall work force.

Mr. Bloom traces the outsize gains to large grants of stock and options to top workers at big companies, with their fortunes rising in line with the performance of the stock market.

“There used to be a premium for working at a big company, even in a lower-level job,” he said. “That’s not true anymore. The people who have really suffered are lower-level employees at big companies.”


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5) Takata Emails Show Brash Exchanges About Data Tampering
By DANIELLE IVORY and


When Honda Motor Company said two months ago that it would no longer use Takata as supplier for its airbags, the automaker said that testing data on the airbags had been “misrepresented and manipulated.”

Now, newly obtained internal emails suggest the manipulation was both bold and broad, involving open exchanges among Takata employees in Japan and the United States.

“Happy Manipulating!!!” an airbag engineer, Bob Schubert, wrote in one email dated July 6, 2006, in a reference to results of airbag tests. In another, he wrote of changing the colors or lines in a graphic “to divert attention” from the test results and “to try to dress it up.”

The emails were among documents unsealed recently as part of a personal injury lawsuit against Takata and obtained by The New York Times. Takata said in a statement that the exchanges concerned only the formatting of data and were unrelated to defective airbags that are under recall.Takata’s airbags, which can explode when they deploy, have been linked to eight deaths in the United States and more than 100 serious injuries and have prompted the recalls of almost 20 million vehicles. Regulators have said that millions more airbag inflaters may need to be recalled unless the company can prove that the propellant they use — ammonium nitrate — is safe.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration imposed a $70 million penalty on the Japanese supplier, also citing data manipulation, in November, on the day that Honda dropped Takata as a supplier of its driver and passenger airbags.

The emails referred to the testing of airbag inflaters, which contain the propellant. Some Takata airbag inflaters can shatter, sending shrapnel flying into the car’s cabin.

Honda would not comment on whether the emails were examples of Takata’s misrepresentations. The automaker said that it had reached its conclusions after reviewing millions of internal Takata documents. But four airbag experts asked by The New York Times to review the emails said that the emails suggested an effort to misrepresent testing data.

“To have these kinds of offhand remarks shows that this is a systemic issue at Takata,” said Mark Lillie, a former Takata engineer and whistle-blower.

Takata’s practice of manipulating airbag test results dates to at least 2000, just as the company began to introduce a new type inflater.

At first, the American engineers appeared to raise concerns about data manipulation.

An internal report prepared by American employees in November 2000, for example, details discrepancies in airbag test results sent to Honda earlier in the year. In several instances, “pressure vessel failures,” or airbag ruptures, were reported to Honda as normal airbag deployments, the report said.

Then in January 2005, Mr. Schubert alerted a colleague in a memo that he had been “repeatedly exposed to the Japanese practice of altering data presented to the customer,” adding that such conduct was described at Takata as “the way we do business in Japan.”

In the memo, Mr. Schubert warned that while the fudging of the data had initially not changed the fundamental conclusions of the data, the practice had “gone beyond all reasonable bounds and now most likely constitutes fraud.”

“I cannot, in good conscience, fail to report these issues to you,” Mr. Schubert said, according to the memo.

But a year later, Mr. Schubert was urging his colleagues to manipulate the test data, the newly obtained emails suggest.

Specifically, the emails point to concern about tests conducted at an elevated temperature, the experts consulted by The Times said. Together with moisture, high temperatures are known to make ammonium nitrate more volatile.

In response to Mr. Schubert’s invitation — “Happy Manipulating!!!” — a colleague appeared to be more cautious. “If you think I’m going to manipulate, you really should try and get to know me better,” he insisted. Yet he offered: “I would be willing to deviate for running slightly high” in tests at higher temperatures.

“Hey, I manipulated,” Mr. Schubert responded. The objective, he said, was to help disguise that some of the inflaters performed differently from the rest — a dynamic referred to as “bimodal distribution.”

“I showed all the data together, which helped disguise the bimodal distribution,” Mr. Schubert wrote. “Nothing wrong with that. All the data is there. Every piece,” he added. But then he suggested using “thick and thin lines to try and dress it up, or changing colors to divert attention.”

In a statement, Takata said that the emails were not examples of manipulation.

“Mr. Schubert is referring to the formatting of a presentation, not to changing data, and the emails in question are completely unrelated to the current airbag inflater recalls,” the statement said. “In fact, as has previously been reported, Mr. Schubert played a significant role in raising concerns about the past testing data issues referenced in the settlement with N.H.T.S.A. in early November — issues that will not be tolerated or repeated.”

Takata previously said that it did not dispute assertions that it had manipulated test data but that any manipulation had been unrelated to the recalls. Mr. Schubert did not respond to a request for comment; in the past, he has referred all questions to Takata.

A spokesman for Honda, Chris Martin, reiterated that the automaker was “aware of evidence that suggests that Takata misrepresented and manipulated test data.” But he declined to comment specifically on the documents and said that Honda, which has been Takata’s biggest customer, would be in a better position to comment, once a third-party audit of Takata’s test data, requested by the carmaker in November, was complete. Takata is also the subject of a criminal investigation by the Justice Department.

Chris Caruso, an engineer for General Motors and its parts supplier Delphi from 1979 to 2006, said that a bimodal distribution showed the parts being tested were not consistent — generally a requirement for meeting quality standards for automotive safety products.

Mr. Caruso, who now works as a safety consultant in litigation involving airbag issues, including lawsuits against Takata, said that bimodal distribution should result in the rejection of parts by the purchaser.

“Clearly they are saying the data is not good, but if they can manipulate it, they can make it at least appear to be good data,” he said. “This is really bad.”

Linda Rink, a former senior staff scientist for Autoliv, another airbag manufacturer, and a longtime consultant for airbag manufacturers including Takata, cautioned that a bimodal distribution did not necessarily mean that the part in question was unsafe. And it was unclear from the emails whether the data in this instance was directly related to propellant problems or inflater fragmentation, she said.

Still, she said that any obfuscation of test results was a serious concern.

“If they would disguise inflater data sent to the customer, there is a serious problem with ethics within that company,” Ms. Rink said. “Having a bimodal distribution requires an explanation and a root-cause analysis, not a cover-up.”

The documents were unsealed as part of a lawsuit brought by a Florida woman who was paralyzed after her Takata airbag deployed aggressively during an accident in her 2001 Honda Civic in June 2014.

“Takata engineers knew of the dangers of manipulating test data,” said Ted Leopold, the lead plaintiff lawyer in the case. “The only thing they did not know was the names of the individuals who were going to be injured or killed, and the date it was going to happen.”


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6) What if the Oregon Protesters Were Black or Muslim? Debate Ensues
By KATIE ROGERS



The Oregon protest at a federal wildlife refuge has reignited an already intense debate on social media about policing, race and terrorism.

On Saturday, an armed group of antigovernment protesters occupied a remote federal wildlife refuge in Oregon and warned that they would not leave without a fight. The authorities have held back from attempting to stop the protest.

On social media, that led quickly to questions about a double standard, particularly from liberals and the left, who asked: What if the armed men were Muslim or black? They predicted the authorities would have been more forceful.

Many or all of the protesters appear to be white. It was unclear what religion they are, but at least one has made reference to a prominent Mormon figure. For its part, the Mormon church on Monday condemned the armed building seizure and said it could “in no way be justified on a scriptural basis.”

Some wondered why the news media and the authorities were not calling the takeover a form of terrorism. People used the hashtags #YallQaeda, #YeeHawd, and #VanillaISIS to challenge a widely held perception that terrorism applies only to crimes carried about by minorities and non-Christians.

The leader of the armed group in Oregon is Ammon Bundy, the son of Cliven Bundy, a rancher in Nevada who in 2014 engaged in an armed standoff with federal officials, gaining the support of leaders in the conservative movement, then losing it after declaring that black Americans would be better off as slaves.

Still, many conservatives on Twitter criticized the debate, and said it was a step too far to call the men terrorists, and pushed back against memes that perpetuated stereotypes about white people.

Others objected to the criticism of the lack of force used by the authorities by drawing comparisons to past deadly standoffs between the federal authorities and armed groups that harbor antigovernment sentiments.

“Worth recalling lessons of Waco and Ruby Ridge before suggesting FBI should simply go to war with Oregon militiamen,” an observer wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

In February 1993, a gun battle erupted in Waco, Tex., between federal authorities and members of a religious sect called the Branch Davidians. The fighting resulted in the deaths of four federal agents and half a dozen members of the sect. That was followed by a 51-day standoff and another confrontation that left dozens more people dead. All told, at least 82 Branch Davidians died. A third of those killed were children.

A year earlier, a confrontation in northern Idaho between the authorities and Randall Weaver, a white separatist, led to the fatal shooting of his wife and son. A federal marshal was also killed during the conflict, which came after an 11-day standoff. In 1995, the government awarded $3.1 million to Mr. Weaver.


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7) Jeremy Corbyn, British Labour Leader, Finishes Shadow Cabinet Reorganization
By

LONDON — The leader of Britain’s opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, completed the first reshuffling of his shadow cabinet early Wednesday morning, producing only minor changes after two days of internal argument.

Mr. Corbyn, a man of the far left who in September became Labour leader in a major surprise, has been facing severe criticism of his policies and party management from Labour members of Parliament, few of whom support him.

Elected with the votes of grass-roots party members and supporters, Mr. Corbyn held off on a major purge of internal dissenters, producing what one unnamed and disappointed Corbyn ally told The Financial Times was “the night of the blunt knives.”

The long process, featuring threats to resign from moderates in the shadow cabinet, formed only four months ago, displayed both the rifts in the party and the staying power of Mr. Corbyn.

Mr. Corbyn is trying to move the party further to the left, to bring it into opposition to nuclear weapons and military interventions, while taking an anti-elitist line in domestic policy, focusing on inequality and more spending on social welfare.

Although many political commentators believe Mr. Corbyn is leading Labour into permanent opposition, he intends to offer voters a clear choice against the Conservatives, rather than present what some considered a muddled policy under the previous Labour leader, Ed Miliband, who badly lost the May elections.

Mr. Corbyn also appears to want to make it easier for Labour to join a political coalition with the Scottish National Party, which shares his antinuclear views and whose policies are more left-wing than recent Labour ones.

In the end, Mr. Corbyn changed only two of the 31 positions in the shadow cabinet. He kept on Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary who openly opposed Mr. Corbyn in backing a British air campaign against the Islamic State in Syria.

To keep his position, Mr. Benn had to promise not to challenge Mr. Corbyn’s foreign policy positions so openly again in parliamentary debates, even though he had done so in the first place with Mr. Corbyn’s permission.

Mr. Corbyn did move his shadow defense secretary, Maria Eagle, who favors the renewal of Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent.

The reason he selected her for the position in the first place is not clear, but with a vote coming this spring on renewing the deterrent, he moved her to the role of shadow culture minister.

She replaces Michael Dugher, who said he was removed for criticizing Corbyn aides who had “trashed” the reputations of moderates in the shadow cabinet. At least nine members of the shadow cabinet then expressed disappointment that Mr. Dugher was removed.

Mr. Corbyn sought to keep Ms. Eagle’s twin sister, Angela, the shadow business secretary, in the cabinet, because he has been regularly criticized for giving women lesser jobs than men.

The new shadow defense secretary is Emily Thornberry, who also wants to eliminate the nuclear deterrent. She ran into trouble and had to resign from Mr. Miliband’s shadow cabinet in November 2014, when she was considered to have mocked working-class tastes in a Twitter post.

Mr. Corbyn fired the Europe minister Pat McFadden for being disloyal, Mr. McFadden said, when in the aftermath of the November terrorist attacks in Paris he said those who insisted that Western societies, not the terrorists themselves, were to blame.

Mr. McFadden was criticizing the response of the Stop the War Coalition, which Mr. Corbyn used to lead. He told the BBC on Wednesday morning that Mr. Corbyn had told him he thought his comments were “an attack on him and that he had come to the conclusion because of that and one or two other things that I shouldn’t continue.”

In response, three junior shadow ministers said they would quit their posts and go back to being ordinary members of Parliament.

Jonathan Reynolds, who handled railways, and Stephen Doughty, who dealt with foreign policy, quit over Mr. McFadden’s removal. Kevan Jones, a junior shadow minister for defense, quit over Ms. Thornberry’s appointment because of her views on the nuclear deterrent.

The struggle between Mr. Corbyn and Labour’s members of Parliament is bound to continue, with the leader appealing over their heads to his mandate from party members and supporters, some of whom had to pay only 3 pounds, about $4.40, to vote in the Labour leadership election.

Although there has been talk of the moderates leaving the party to start another, many are known to feel that it is Mr. Corbyn who is the exception, and that Labour will eventually come back to the center-left.


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8) Gun Control and White Terror
By Charles M. Blow
January 7, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/07/opinion/gun-control-and-white-terror.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region

On Tuesday, in an emotionally charged speech, President Obama announced a series of relatively modest executive orders to aid in preventing guns from getting into the wrong hands.

The proposal would expand background checks through a clarification of existing regulations, increase funding for mental health care, and promote the development of smart guns.

The speech itself accomplished more than the executive actions are likely to accomplish. Viewed in political terms, the president injected this issue more firmly into the national debate as only a president can. Because a sitting president, even an exiting one, is always in the next presidential race: Other candidates are either running, at least in part, against his legacy or to extend it.But there is one point that I was aching to hear articulated that wasn’t covered in the president’s speech, and is rarely mentioned in discussions about gun regulations: How our response to gun regulations is not now, nor has ever been, wholly ideological but is also ethnocentric and class-based.

I firmly believe that part of the current intransigence is because those gun homicides disproportionately affect poor minorities. (Gun suicides disproportionately affect white people.) Indeed, the only time that national figures seem to get fully engaged is in the wake of mass shootings that involve white people, either as shooters or victims.

Indeed, you have to explore the history of gun regulations to fully appreciate its racial dimensions.

In 2011, Adam Winkler spoke about his book “Gun Fight,” and the origins of gun control, saying, according to The Wall Street Journal:

“It was a constant pressure among white racists to keep guns out of the hands of African-Americans, because they would rise up and revolt.”He continued:

“The KKK began as a gun-control organization. Before the Civil War, blacks were never allowed to own guns. During the Civil War, blacks kept guns for the first time — either they served in the Union army and they were allowed to keep their guns, or they buy guns on the open market where for the first time there’s hundreds of thousands of guns flooding the marketplace after the war ends. So they arm up because they know who they’re dealing with in the South. White racists do things like pass laws to disarm them, but that’s not really going to work. So they form these racist posses all over the South to go out at night in large groups to terrorize blacks and take those guns away. If blacks were disarmed, they couldn’t fight back.”

It was about white terror.

After Prohibition and the Depression gave rise to gangsters and outlaws who posed a threat to white America’s sense of safety, the Firearms Act of 1934 was passed. As the gun law expert Robert Spitzer, of the State University of New York at Cortland, told NPR in 2013, the law required machine gun owners to pay a hefty tax, be fingerprinted and be listed on a national registry; as a result, sales of machine guns plummeted.

Again, white terror, but this time from other white people.

America was again stirred to action on gun control when, in 1967, armed members of the Black Panthers entered a largely white place of power — the California State Legislature. As The Times’s film critic A. O. Scott noted in his review of Stanley Nelson’s fascinating documentary “The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution”:

“When a group of Panthers demonstrated at the Statehouse in Sacramento carrying loaded rifles and shotguns, the organization drew national news attention and (at least temporarily) rallied many political conservatives, including Gov. Ronald Reagan, to the cause of gun control.”

Reagan said of the Panthers’ action at the time:

“I don’t think that loaded guns is the way to solve a problem that should be solved between people of good will. And anyone who would approve of this kind of demonstration must be out of their mind.”

(This episode stands in stark contrast to the armed white men now occupying the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon.)

In response to the Panthers, the California legislature passed and Reagan signed the Mulford Act, which banned the open carry of firearms in the state. The N.R.A. supported the measure. The bill’s author, Don Mulford, said at the time, “We’ve got to protect society from nuts with guns.”

Edward Wyckoff Williams even claimed in The Root in 2013 that “the NRA actually helped craft similar legislation in states across the country.”

The year after the Mulford Act, the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 was passed.

Once again, white terror.In recent decades, as the N.R.A.’s political power has grown, it has also taken on more of an absolutist position against any new regulations and politicians largely have bowed to the group’s stance.

Two notable exceptions were the 1993 Brady Bill requiring background checks for gun purchase and the assault weapons ban of 1994 — which has since expired — both of which were signed by Bill Clinton.

But in addition to the N.R.A.’s influence, the face of homicides is becoming increasingly black and poor — two groups we have traditionally marginalized and ignored.

As Richard V. Reeves and Sarah Holmes of the Brookings Institution pointed out last month, 77 percent of white gun deaths are suicides while 82 percent of black gun deaths are homicides.

But even then, it’s not the whole of the black population at risk of these homicides.

As William J. Wilson, also of Brookings, wrote last month:

“Segregation by income amplifies segregation by race, leaving low-income blacks clustered in neighborhoods that feature disadvantages along several dimensions, including exposure to violent crime. As a result, the divide within the black community has widened sharply. In 1978, poor blacks aged twelve and over were only marginally more likely than affluent blacks to be violent crime victims — around forty-five and thirty-eight per 1000 individuals respectively. However, by 2008, poor blacks were far more likely to be violent crime victims — about seventy-five per 1000 — while affluent blacks were far less likely to be victims of violent crime — about twenty-three per 1000, according to Hochschild and Weaver.”

There is now precious little political will to further inhibit the largely white gun-buying population — according to the Pew Research Center, whites are twice as likely as blacks or Hispanics to have a gun in the home — in order to help reduce the scourge of homicides among poor black people, particularly when the shooters are often black themselves. These killings are simply attributed to racial culture rather than to the complicated interplay between poverty, crime and gun culture.

And, since the federal government wouldn’t do enough to deal with this problem, local municipalities have employed other methods to get guns — many of them illegal — out of the hands of criminals. But those efforts, such as New York City’s morally indefensible racial dragnet program called stop-and-frisk, did as much damage as good in the black communities.

Lawmakers refused to act, and local politicians and police departments overreacted. Poor black people were caught in the middle.

That, alas, is less about a response to white terror, than a nonresponse to black pain.


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9) Dear Gov. Snyder: You Have to Go to Jail
"I'm asking everyone who agrees with me to sign on to this petition and call for your arrest."
By Michael Moore
January 7, 2016
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/01/07/dear-gov-snyder-you-have-go-jail
Dear Governor Snyder:

Thanks to you, sir, and the premeditated actions of your administrators, you have effectively poisoned, not just some, but apparently ALL of the children in my hometown of Flint, Michigan.

And for that, you have to go to jail.

To poison all the children in an historic American city is no small feat. Even international terrorist organizations haven't figured out yet how to do something on a magnitude like this.

But you did. Your staff and others knew that the water in the Flint River was poison -- but you decided that taking over the city and "cutting costs" to "balance the budget" was more important than the people's health (not to mention their democratic rights to elect their own leaders.) So you cut off the clean, fresh glacial lake water of Lake Huron that the citizens of Flint (including myself) had been drinking for decades and, instead, made them drink water from the industrial cesspool we call the Flint River -- a body of "water" where toxins from a dozen General Motors and DuPont factories have been dumped for over a hundred years. And then you decided to put a chemical in this water to "clean" it -- which only ended up stripping the lead off of Flint's aging water pipes, placing that lead in the water and sending it straight into people's taps. Your callous -- and reckless (btw, "reckless" doesn't get you a pass; a reckless driver who kills a child, still goes to jail) -- decision to do this has now, as revealed by the city's top medical facility, caused "irreversible brain damage" in Flint's children, not to mention other bodily damage to all of Flint's adults. Here's how bad it is: Even GM won't let the auto parts they use in building cars touch the Flint water because that water "corrodes" them. This is a company that won't even fix an ignition switch after they've discovered it's already killed dozens of people. THAT's how bad the situation is. Even GM thinks you're the devil.

Maybe you don't understand the science behind this. Lead, in water -- now, bear with me, this involves a science lesson and you belong to the anti-science party, the one that believes there's not a climate problem and that Adam and Eve rode on dinosaurs 6,000 years ago. Lead is toxic to the human body. There's no way to fully eliminate it once it's in your system, and children are the most damaged by it.

By taking away the city's clean drinking water in order to "cut costs," and then switching the city's water supply to Flint River water, you have allowed massively unsafe levels of pollutants and lead into the water that travels in to everyone's home. Every Flint resident is trapped by this environmental nightmare which you, Governor, have created.

Like any real criminal, when you were confronted with the truth (by the EPA and other leading water experts across America), you denied what you did. Even worse, you decided to mock your accusers and their findings. As I said, I know you don't like to believe in a lot of science (after all, you used to run Gateway Computers, and that, really, is all anyone needs to know about you), but this time the science has caught up with you -- and this time, I hope, it's going to convict you.

The facts are all there, Mr. Snyder. Every agency involved in this scheme reported directly to you. The children of Flint didn't have a choice as to whether or not they were going to get to drink clean water. But soon it will be your turn to not have that choice about which water you'll be drinking. Because by this time next year, if there is an ounce of justice left in this land, the water you'll be drinking will be served to you from a tap inside Jackson Prison.

I am calling upon my fellow Michiganders -- and seekers of justice everywhere -- to petition U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, asking her to arrest you for corruption and assault (i.e., the physical assault you committed against the children of Flint when you knowingly poisoned them).

Yesterday, the federal prosecutor in Flint, after many of us had called for months for this action, finally opened up an investigation into the matter. Now we need your arrest, prosecution and conviction.

And who will be cheering on that day when you are fitted with a bright orange jumpsuit? The poor and minority communities of Michigan who've endured your dictatorial firing of their mayors and school boards so you could place your business friends in charge of their mostly-black cities. They know you never would have done this to a wealthy white suburb.

I welcome all to look at the appalling facts of this case, which have been reported brilliantly here, here, and especially here by the great Rachel Maddow. Thank you, Rachel, for caring so deeply when the rest of the national television media didn't.

I'm asking everyone who agrees with me to sign on to this petition and call for your arrest, Governor Snyder. You are not allowed to run amok in my hometown like you have done. The children whom you have poisoned have to endure a life of pain and lower IQs from your actions. You have destroyed a generation of children -- and for that, you must pay.

It is time for you to go to prison. Out of mercy, I'll ask that you have in your cell your own personal Gateway computer.

Sincerely,

Michael Moore

Flint native

Michigan resident and voter
For everyone wanting to sign on to this petition calling for the IMMEDIATE resignation of Governor Snyder AND for the FBI to arrest him, please sign the petition here.


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10) VW Refuses to Give U.S. States Documents in Emissions Inquiries
By and

Citing German privacy laws, Volkswagen has refused to provide emails or other communications among its executives to attorneys general in the United States, impeding American investigations into the company’s emissions-cheating scandal, according to officials in several states.

The revelation signals a turning point in the now openly fractious relations between Volkswagen and American investigators, after claims by the Justice Department, in its own inquiry this week, that the company had recently “impeded and obstructed” regulators and provided “misleading information.”

Significantly, investigators say, Volkswagen’s actions limit their ability to identify which employees knew about or sanctioned the deceptions. Finding the people responsible for the cheating is important to the lawsuits: Penalties would be greater if the states and others pursuing Volkswagen in court could prove that top executives were aware of or directed the activity.

“Our patience with Volkswagen is wearing thin,” New York’s attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, said. “Volkswagen’s cooperation with the states’ investigation has been spotty — and frankly, more of the kind one expects from a company in denial than one seeking to leave behind a culture of admitted deception.”

He was one of several attorneys general to express dissatisfaction in response to inquiries from The New York Times.

“I find it frustrating that, despite public statements professing cooperation and an expressed desire to resolve the various investigations that it faces following its calculated deception, Volkswagen is, in fact, resisting cooperation by citing German law,” said Connecticut’s attorney general, George Jepsen. “We will seek to use any means available to us to conduct a thorough investigation.”

Volkswagen in September admitted that it had installed software created to cheat on emissions tests in 11 million of its diesel vehicles worldwide. A 48-state civil investigation is being led by a half-dozen states, including New York and Connecticut. Attorneys general in California and Texas are conducting their own inquiries of the company, which includes the Audi and Porsche brands.

When he was named chief executive shortly after the scandal broke, Matthias Müller said “My most urgent task is to win back trust” and promised “maximum transparency.” But opening up a company known for its particularly insular culture has been a tall order.

German investigators are not making similar complaints about Volkswagen. Klaus Ziehe, a spokesman for prosecutors in Braunschweig, a city close to Volkswagen’s headquarters in Wolfsburg, said that under German law, prosecutors were allowed to carry out raids of Volkswagen’s Wolfsburg offices to gather possible evidence that could include email exchanges. He did not elaborate on what they had found.

“We are not and do not want to be dependent on that which Volkswagen gives us,” Mr. Ziehe said in a written response to questions. At the same time, he said, the company had been working with German investigators.

“We can’t complain about our cooperation with the company,” Mr. Ziehe said. “We have the impression that we have received everything that we have specifically requested.”

Volkswagen, in a statement, said it could not comment on continuing proceedings.

Germany, a close ally of America, is known for strict privacy laws like its Federal Data Protection Act, which limits access to data, particularly outside the European Union. And it is not the only European country with privacy laws; similar issues with Swiss laws have also hampered American investigators in their pursuit of FIFA, soccer’s world governing body. Strains over data-sharing between the United States and Europe also emerged after the spying revelations linked to Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor.

Germany also has a history of refusing to extradite its citizens to the United States. Still, American investigators have dealt with German corporations for many years and often reach amicable settlements.

The United States, where the scandal originated, is seen as potentially conducting tougher investigations of Volkswagen than Germany, where the carmaker is one of the nation’s largest employers. Prosecutors in Braunschweig initially said they would conduct a formal investigation of Martin Winterkorn, V.W.’s former chief executive, but quickly backtracked.

The Justice Department, which filed a civil suit against Volkswagen this week, has not ruled out filing a criminal charge or targeting specific executives. A Justice Department spokesman declined to say whether it was facing obstacles in its own inquiry.

Lacking access to officials at Volkswagen headquarters makes it more difficult to determine who was responsible for the wrongdoing, William H. Sorrell, the Vermont attorney general, said in a recent interview in Burlington. “One of the things that’s important to the state and others in terms of looking at the egregiousness or seriousness of the conduct is who at Volkswagen knew what and when,” Mr. Sorrell said.

“It doesn’t make this attorney general feel all warm and fuzzy,” he said, that information “has been coming out as gradually as it has been.”

Mr. Schneiderman’s office declined to comment on whether American investigators were collaborating with German prosecutors. In declining to turn over evidence to American investigators, Volkswagen has principally cited the German Federal Data Protection Act, an aide said in an email, as well as the German Constitution, the European Convention on Human Rights, decisions of the German Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights, “and (for good measure) provisions of the German Criminal Code.”

Volkswagen has maintained that a relatively small number of engineers and managers were responsible for the cheating. None of the nine Volkswagen executives who have been suspended in connection with the scandal were members of the management board. But several, like Wolfgang Hatz, who headed engine and transmission development, reported directly to members of the board.

The revelations may raise questions about the commitment of Mr. Müller to cleaning house. He was a protégé of Mr. Winterkorn and has close ties to a number of the central figures in the investigation. He was V.W.’s head of product planning when the cheating took place.In a tacit admission by Volkswagen that it needs to smooth tense relations with American officials, Mr. Müller will meet with Gina McCarthy, the E.P.A. administrator, on Wednesday at the company’s request, a spokeswoman for the agency said.




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11) A Rush of Central Americans Compounds Obama’s Immigration Task
By

DILLEY, Tex. — When mothers and children streamed across the Texas border in 2014, the Obama administration devised a strategy to manage the influx, putting them in detention centers to convince others that illegal crossers would be caught and sent back.

But that strategy is now under intense legal and political attack, leaving the administration with limited options as it tries to stem a new rush of families fleeing and seeking asylum amid escalating violence in Central America.

This recent influx is compounding President Obama’s troubles with immigration in his final year in office, as his efforts to achieve broad protections for immigrants already living in the country illegally have stalled in the federal courts and his fallback actions to try to quell a new border surge have alienated many political allies.A federal court has ordered Department of Homeland Security officials to release children and their parents swiftly from detention, to pursue asylum claims in courts across the country. Those rapid releases have begun, with most mothers from a center here in Dilley and another nearby in Karnes City, Tex., being discharged in less than three weeks — although they wore ankle bracelets so officials can monitor their movements.

In recent days, Homeland Security agents have made arrests to deport families who arrived in 2014, and whose asylum cases failed in the courts, saying it is an alternative way to send a discouraging message to potential migrants in Central America.

The raids provoked a nationwide outcry from Latino and immigrant groups whose support the White House has long courted. The groups say women and children should be welcomed as refugees and not expelled to face the brutal street gangs they fled. And immigrant advocates — and all three Democratic presidential contenders — have said the administration should close the family detention centers entirely.

The Republican presidential candidates have pointed to the latest illegal flow as proof that Mr. Obama’s border enforcement has been hopelessly lax.

The new rush of Central American families began in late July, and on several recent days reached the heights of the 2014 influx. By Dec. 1, more than 17,000 migrants in families were caught along the border, more than double the number in the same period in 2014.

Homeland Security officials had started in June to reconfigure the two Texas centers, after mothers and children had spent long months in confinement.

Then in August, Judge Dolly M. Gee of Federal District Court for the Central District of California ordered that migrant children could not be held in a locked detention center and had to be released, with their parents, “without unnecessary delay.” But the judge made an exception for an emergency due to an “influx,” for which she permitted children to be held for up to 20 days. Homeland Security officials seized on that exception, arguing that an influx existed even before the recent spike.

By doubling asylum officers and speeding legal procedures since late October, officials have been completing most initial asylum screenings in the two detention centers here in South Texas and releasing families within the 20-day limit.

Rather than shuttering the two centers, officials are adding 500 beds at the center in Karnes City, doubling its capacity. And they won their request for a federal appeals court to swiftly review Judge Gee’s order to release migrants quickly. The order, the Homeland Security secretary, Jeh Johnson, said this week, “significantly constrains our ability to respond to an increasing flow of illegal immigration to the United States.”

On Monday, officials sent many of the more than 120 mothers and children who were arrested over the weekend to be deported back to the center in Dilley — set up to screen asylum seekers entering the United States — for final steps before they are sent out of the country.

But in a new legal setback for the administration, officials on Thursday had to halt the deportations of three Salvadoran mothers and their children arrested in the raids, removing them from an airplane at the last minute, after lawyers at the Dilley center won stays from the immigration appeals court. One woman had presented a doctor’s statement saying she had epilepsy and had three seizures since her arrest.

The new flow from Central America has several causes. Mothers here said gang violence had spread across El Salvador and Honduras in the past year, even reaching rural villages, with attacks increasingly against women.

Several women also said they had heard from the local radio and family members in the United States that women crossing the border were allowed to stay.

“I heard this country gives protection to single mothers with children,” said Karla Rodríguez, 30, who came from El Salvador with her 4-year-old daughter.Ms. Rodríguez said she had been a manager at a busy upscale hotel in San Salvador. Gunmen seeking targets for kidnapping came to her home demanding the names of guests. They followed her to work, saying they would take her daughter if she did not give up guests. She fled.


Apprehended at the border, Ms. Rodríguez and her daughter passed a first screening interview with an asylum officer in the Dilley center and were released in 10 days. They planned to join her father, who lives in Delaware, and to fight for asylum there. Resting at a shelter in San Antonio before continuing her journey, she was elated, despite the heavy band on her ankle. “I trust in God, who brought us this far,” she said.

Inside the centers, officials have set a frenetic pace. Women and children have medical screenings at in-house clinics within 24 hours after arrival and dental checkups within two weeks, members of the medical staff said. Everyone gets vaccinations.

Most women have interviews with an asylum officer within six days — warp speed in the immigration system. The interviews are for officers to determine if a migrant’s fears of returning home are credible.

Most women are persuading officers that their fears are real. Of 7,892 migrants admitted to the two centers in the three months ending Nov. 1, only 41 were rejected and deported, official figures show.

But many women are not connecting with lawyers to help them with their cases. The tempo is faster than lawyers here, mostly volunteers, can handle. Court statistics show that asylum seekers with lawyers are far more likely to go to court and win their claims. Yet at the Karnes City center one day, two frantic lawyers scrambled just to make last-ditch contact with bewildered women who had lost several legal rounds.

“We’ve been running around trying to prevent women from being deported before they even had a real opportunity to express their fears,” said Stephanie Cordero, a volunteer from the Legal Aid Society of New York.

One of those women was Rosa Elida Castro, 26, a Salvadoran who said she was preyed upon by a gang because they assumed she had inherited money after her mother died. An ex-husband had sexually abused her, hounding her out of her home.

“If we weren’t in danger,” she said, crying, “why would we have come?”



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12) Angry Birders: Standoff at Oregon Refuge Has Riled a Passionate Group
In Transit
By DAVE SEMINARA  
JAN. 8, 2016
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/08/travel/angry-birders-standoff-at-oregon-refuge-has-riled-a-passionate-group.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fus&action=click&contentCollection=us&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=4&pgtype=sectionfront


Noah Strycker was in a hotel room in Ethiopia when he saw news that Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge had been occupied by an armed group protesting the federal government’s imprisonment of two local ranchers. He had just completed a record-breaking “Big Year” of birding, in which he spent 18 hours a day for 365 consecutive days observing some 6,042 species of birds in 41 countries on seven continents. Mr. Strycker’s obsessive pursuit had taken him to the ends of the earth, but news of the occupation brought Malheur to mind as the place where he first fell in love with birding.

Fifteen years ago, when he was 14, he saw a barred owl get into a fight with a great horned owl over a snake that one of them had caught, just steps away from the Malheur buildings now being occupied.

“I’ve been addicted to watching birds ever since,” said Mr. Strycker, who lived and worked at the refuge in 2003 as an intern. “Malheur is a life-changing place.”With no resolution to the standoff in sight, Mr. Strycker and other birders are concerned that one of the nation’s premier observation spots for birds and other wildlife will be off limits until the occupiers leave or are removed from the refuge. Thirty miles south of Burns, in Oregon’s High Desert, the refuge is a 187,000-acre oasis, where more than 320 species of birds and 58 mammal species have been observed.

Malheur (pronounced Mal-hear) opened as a national wildlife refuge on Aug. 18, 1908. At the turn of the 20th century, feathers were in fashion, and plume hunters had decimated the local white heron population. Theodore Roosevelt, who established 51 such wildlife refuges around the country, sought to address the problem by setting aside what was then unclaimed land as a preserve and breeding ground for birds.

Thanks to its location on the Pacific Flyway, a major north-south bird migration route, Malheur is a bucket-list destination for birders. They come in search of watch-listed species like the Western snowy plover, long-billed curlew, Franklin’s gull and Brewer’s sparrow, along with hundreds of other more common species like the white-faced ibis.

Tim Hunt, an Oregon birder who has been visiting Malheur for more than 35 years, said he adored the place, but said few people visit the refuge in the dead of winter, when birds are more scarce. If the occupation drags into spring, he said, when binocular- and scope-toting birders dot the landscape, many more birders will be affected. Mr. Hunt said he didn’t believe that the wildlife would be affected by the standoff or the influx of news media covering it.

“The birds will come back,” he said. “They always do. They’re not following this in the newspapers and on TV.”

Others like Bob Sallinger, the conservation director of the Audubon Society of Portland, are more concerned about the impact of the occupation. Mr. Sallinger penned a scathing condemnation of the occupation, on behalf of the Oregon and Washington chapters of the National Audubon Society.

“Birders are angry,” he said in a telephone interview, “and they should be, because we don’t know what these guys are doing there. Going in with guns and trying to take over public lands to pursue their own agenda is a crime, and it ought to be prosecuted.”

The refuge, he said, is already understaffed, and the occupation will further delay important conservation work. The situation is particularly concerning for the Audubon Society, Mr. Sallinger said, because it fought to have the area protected more than 100 years ago. Images of slaughtered Malheur bird populations taken a century ago by the group’s Oregon founder, William Finley, inspired Roosevelt to protect the place.

“Now it appears as though the goal of these occupiers is to eliminate this protection and undo that heritage,” he said.

His passion for Malheur is also personal. It’s the place where his two oldest children, Peter and Annie, became birders, after spotting 50 species there in a single day several years ago. But he also acknowledged that there may be a silver lining to the Malheur situation: All the media attention may motivate people to visit the refuge and inspire them to help preserve it.

For birders who want to experience Malheur, the Harney County Migratory Bird Festival, scheduled for April 8 to 10, is a great introduction, as is the Audubon Society’s Gonzo Trip, set for May 13 to 15. But these and other Malheur birding excursions are contingent on a timely resolution to the standoff.

Mr. Strycker decided to delay a winter trip to Malheur, he said, adding that most birders will avoid the place until the occupation is over but will come back with a vengeance when it’s safe to do so.

“There are birders who will go into war zones to see birds,” he said, “so at least a few will go regardless. They’re angry about the situation, and the closer we get to spring, that anger will build.” 


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13) Campbell Labels Will Disclose G.M.O. Ingredients
By


Breaking from its industry rivals, Campbell Soup will become the first major food company to begin disclosing the presence of genetically engineered ingredients like corn, soy and sugar beets in its products.

The company, the maker of brands like Pepperidge Farm, Prego, Plum Organics and V8 in addition to its namesake soups, is taking the unusual step — and possibly risking sales by alienating consumers averse to genetically modified organisms — as big food corporations face increasing pressure to be more open about their use of such ingredients.

Food companies have begun printing labels to comply with a new labeling law in Vermont, which has become a battleground over labeling that other states have been watching closely. Beginning in July, Vermont will require disclosure of genetically engineered ingredients, a measure opposed by most major food companies, which are seeking to supersede any state’s legislation with a voluntary federal solution.Campbell is also breaking with its peers by calling for federal action to make mandatory a uniform labeling system of foods that contain such ingredients, commonly known as G. M.O. labeling, said Denise Morrison, chief executive of Campbell.

“We’re optimistic that a federal solution can be reached in a reasonable amount of time, but if that’s not the case, we’re preparing to label all our products across the portfolio,” Ms. Morrison said in an interview.

She said about three-quarters of the company’s products contained ingredients derived from corn, canola, soybeans or sugar beets, the four largest genetically engineered crops. The change in labeling is expected to take 12 to 18 months.

The first example provided by the company, for a SpaghettiO’s label prepared for Vermont, is sparsely worded and does not specify which individual ingredients are genetically altered. It simply states at the bottom of the label: “Partially produced with genetic engineering. For more information about G.M.O. ingredients, visit WhatsinMyFood.com.”

Other companies have reformulated a handful of products to replace such ingredients. General Mills now produces non-G.M.O. Cheerios, and others have put labels on some products verifying that they contain no genetically engineered components, like Tropicana juices.

But none have gone as far as Campbell, whose move is reminiscent of that by Whole Foods Markets, which almost three years ago created an uproar when it announced that, as of 2018, it would require all products sold in its stores to have labels disclosing the presence of ingredients from genetically altered crops.

More mainstream grocers like Kroger and Safeway have moved to highlight their selection of organic products, which by law cannot contain any genetically modified ingredients, and have quietly urged big food manufacturers not to oppose demands for G.M.O. labeling.

The number of products verified by the Non-GMO Project, a nonprofit group that certifies foods that are free of ingredients from genetically engineered sources, is now in the tens of thousands.

But many companies have long argued that a patchwork of state laws with different requirements for G.M.O. labeling will be cumbersome and expensive, and the quirks in the Vermont law are making their case.

Ms. Morrison noted, for example, that in Vermont, the cans of SpaghettiOs will have to be wrapped in one label stating that the product contains ingredients from genetically engineered sources because they fall under the jurisdiction of the Food and Drug Administration. But Campbell does not have to disclose that SpaghettiOs with Meatballs contains such ingredients because that product is governed by the Department of Agriculture — and the Vermont law applies only to products overseen by the F.D.A.

“A state-by-state patchwork of laws could be incredibly costly not only for our company but for the entire industry,” Ms. Morrison said. “That’s why we want the federal government to come up with a national standard that is mandatory.”

Campbell will seek advice from the Department of Agriculture and the F.D.A. about what language it might use on its packaging. In an interview with The Des Moines Register in December, Tom Vilsack, the agriculture secretary, said he planned to hold a meeting with food companies and others in the hope of reaching a compromise before the Vermont law goes into effect.

“I’m going to challenge them to get this thing fixed,” Mr. Vilsack told The Register, adding that he was worried about “chaos in the market” if other states follow suit. “That will cost the industry a substantial amount of money, hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more, and it will ultimately end up costing the consumer,” he said.

A spokeswoman for the Agriculture Department said no date had been set for the meeting, nor had any decisions been made about who would attend.

Ms. Morrison said that complying with Vermont’s law was expensive but that establishment of a national mandatory labeling standard to take effect over a period of time would allow companies to work the changes into their business operations with little cost. She noted that adoption of the 1990 Nutrition Labeling and Education Act, which required companies to add nutritional information to their labels, did not significantly raise costs.

Ms. Morrison said she could not speculate on how the move to label all of Campbell’s products might affect the company’s sales. In 2011, food manufacturers themselves introduced a program called Facts Up Front to make information about the amount of sugar, salt, fat and calories in their products even more obvious by putting it out front in an easy-to-read format, which had no notable impact on sales.

Last year, Campbell created the website that offers information about the ingredients in its products and how they are used, including those items that come from genetically engineered crops.

It discloses, for instance, that among the ingredients in Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom soup, the vegetable oil, monosodium glutamate and modified food starch may come from genetically engineered sources. The website has had no apparent impact on sales, according to a company spokeswoman.

“We’ve always believed consumers have a right to know what’s in their food,” Ms. Morrison said. “We know that 92 percent of Americans support G.M.O. labeling, and transparency is a critical part of our purpose.”

Phil Lempert, a food industry expert and founder of Supermarketguru.com, said it could be risky for a company to disclose genetically altered ingredients. “I think it would get a lot of credit for transparency and that its stock would get a pop, if it were publicly traded,” Mr. Lempert said. “But I think a consumer could be confused by it and put the product back on the shelf and grab something else.”

Mr. Lempert and other marketing experts recommended that the company use clear language to inform its consumers.

“We’re in uncharted territory here,” said Carl Jorgensen, director of global consumer strategy and wellness at Daymon Worldwide, a consulting firm. While studies have shown that consumers favor such labeling, he said he did not know of data collected on the impact of labels on sales.

Campbell joined other major food companies in fighting efforts to impose mandatory labeling in California and Washington State, spending more than $1 million, according to the Environmental Working Group. It is also a member of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, a trade group that has spent millions trying to get a bill passed in Congress that would make labeling voluntary and pre-empt state labeling efforts.

“We will withdraw from any coalition that doesn’t support mandatory labeling,” Ms. Morrison said. “We were involved in fighting the state ballots in California and Washington out of concern over a state-by-state patchwork, yet we didn’t participate in the fights in any other state beyond those. Any money we did spend after that was in support of seeking a federal solution.”


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14) Flint Wants Safe Water, and Someone to Answer for Its Crisis
By

FLINT, Mich. — A caravan of Genesee County sheriff’s office cruisers snaked its way through the streets here on Thursday, doling out water filters and jugs of water to frustrated and terrified residents who have been trying to cope for more than a year with the public health crisis that has been flowing out of their taps.

Shortly after officials switched the source of their drinking water to the Flint River from Lake Huron in April 2014 to save money, residents started complaining that their tap water looked strange, tasted bad and caused rashes. But not until the fall of 2015, when the water was found to have elevated levels of lead that were reflected in children’s blood, did state officials swing into action.

Now they are scrambling to address a situation that has endangered the health of Flint’s children and generated untold costs and anxiety.“It’s ridiculous we have to live in such a way,” said Colette Brown, a Flint native who months ago stopped drinking tap water. She said the filter at her home needed a replacement cartridge.

“Put yourself in our shoes,” she said. “It’s hurting kids, the elderly. It’s hurting all of us.”

And there was plenty of blame to go around, she added. “It’s almost like a stepladder — you start from the top and you go all the way down to the bottom,” she said.

Switching the source of drinking water was meant to relieve some of the financial pressures on this struggling city. Flint has high rates of gun violence and crumbling infrastructure. And as manufacturing jobs have moved overseas, the population has steadily dropped to fewer than 100,000 — more than 40 percent of whom live below the poverty line.

But it was not long before some in Flint were pointing out the nasty color and odor of what was coming out of their taps, and digging into their wallets to buy bottled water for drinking and cooking, and baby wipes for bathing.

State and city leaders had largely dismissed residents’ complaints for months, assuring them that the water was safe and being tested regularly. With the emergence of the blood level data, officials began advising residents not to drink unfiltered tap water — a recommendation that remains in effect.

In October, Gov. Rick Snyder helped orchestrate a switch back to Lake Huron water. Though Mayor Karen Weaver called that a positive step, she said the change did not undo corrosion damage from the river water that caused pipes to leach lead.

As of last month, the state had identified 43 people with elevated lead levels in their blood. Lead is toxic, and can cause stunted development in children.

Last month, the governor apologized to residents. On Tuesday he declared the city to be in a state of emergency — the same day that federal officials said they had opened an investigation into the water contamination. And in October, Mr. Snyder announced a state plan to distribute free water filters and provide water testing to residents. But many residents remain unsatisfied.

“Their one job was to make sure our water was safe,” Melissa Mays, a Flint resident, said of Michigan environmental officials. Ms. Mays, who has helped organize protests and been among the most outspoken critics of the water situation, said she worried about how the water might be affecting her young sons’ health.

“They cut every corner,” she said. “They did more to cover up than actually fix it. That’s criminal.”

In a scathing initial report last month, a task force appointed by Mr. Snyder found that the State Department of Environmental Quality’s response to health concerns “was often one of aggressive dismissal, belittlement and attempts to discredit these efforts and the individuals involved.” That approach, the report added, was “completely unacceptable.”

After the letter was released, Mr. Snyder, a Republican and former businessman who took office in 2011, apologized and announced the resignation of the director of the Department of Environmental Quality.

On Thursday, after he met with Ms. Weaver, Mr. Snyder told reporters that he would work to provide “a broad-based suite of services” to address the water issues and other problems in Flint. Among the services could be more water testing, more filters, and health care and education support for those affected. Many residents have called for state money to replace the city’s old pipe infrastructure — which the mayor has said could cost up to $1.5 billion — and a fund to address any developmental impact on children.

“You have to earn trust,” Mr. Snyder said. “This will be a process by showing the steps we’re taking to be proactive.”

Many residents are reserving judgment. Researchers at Virginia Tech who detected the lead contamination last year released state employee emails obtained through a public records request. In a message in July, the governor’s chief of staff at the time, Dennis Muchmore, wrote that he was “frustrated by the water issue in Flint” and that “folks are scared and worried about the health impacts and they are basically getting blown off by us.”

In response, a state health official assured Mr. Muchmore that there was no evidence of increased lead poisoning, a finding later called into question.

A spokesman for Mr. Snyder said the message indicated that the governor’s staff members were engaged and seeking answers on behalf of worried community members.

Some residents are quick to point out that it was an emergency manager appointed by the governor who approved the 2014 switch away from Lake Huron water to save money.

Wantwaz Davis, a member of Flint’s City Council, said the emergency manager “created this problem.”

“What the governor should do is become fully accountable to this problem and give us the finances that we need to rectify the problem,” Mr. Davis said.

Some efforts already underway have added to residents’ frustrations. At City Hall on Thursday, where signs advertise free water filters, Quintina Swanson stopped by to pick up a replacement cartridge. But Ms. Swanson, 25, was told that the model she needed was out of stock, and that she would need to return later or go to a different distribution site.

Sheriff Robert J. Pickell of Genesee County, who organized the door-to-door water filter distribution, said traveling to another site was not always possible in a place like Flint. “People over in Lansing, they forget how the poor folks live,” Sheriff Pickell said, referring to the state capital. “They say they’re going to have a distribution center. They forget that not everybody has a car.”

Still, residents said they were grateful that state officials and federal investigators were now engaged. Ms. Weaver, a clinical psychologist elected last year largely on a promise to improve the water, praised Mr. Snyder for his emergency declaration, even as she cautioned that major commitments of time and money would be needed.

“It does let us know that our voice is being heard,” Ms. Weaver said. “And for such a long time, the residents of the city said, ‘We do not have a voice.’ ”



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15) Talks on Phoenix Bus Strike Hit an Impasse
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

PHOENIX — Negotiations have hit an impasse in an attempt to end a bus drivers’ strike that has idled public transportation in the nation’s sixth-largest city, officials say.

Transdev, a city-contracted transit company, said the drivers’ union had simply reintroduced the same demands from earlier in the week. A federal mediator, as a result, called for a break in the negotiations on Friday afternoon. Talks began in April and resumed last month after a six-week hiatus.

“Transdev will continue to negotiate in good faith by keeping our very generous offer on the table, which is a 3 percent increase per year for five years, totaling almost 16 percent, with excellent benefits, on average wages of $56,000,” the company said.

A spokesman for Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1433 did not reply to messages seeking comment from the union.

The union rejected the company’s last and best offer for a contract, according to the Public Transit Department. An additional 20 routes operated by another company are not affected by the strike, and neither is light rail service. The walkout, which began Friday, affects nearly 80,000 daily riders.

Union officials said sticking points in the negotiations included bereavement time and uniform allowances for the bus drivers, plus a tiered payment system and vacation time.

Thousands of college football fans will pack the city leading up to Monday night’s national championship game between Clemson and Alabama in suburban Glendale. But relatively few fans are expected to rely on buses to get to the game, said Lars Jacoby, a spokesman for the Public Transit Department.


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Posted by: bonnieweinstein@yahoo.com
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