kerry lobel | living water

Ezra Nawi: An Activist in Need

This post by Naomi Klein, Noam Chomsky and Neve Gordon tells the story of Ezra Nawi.

Every so often someone comes along who is so brave and so inspiring that you just can't sit by and remain silent when you learn they need your help.

And Ezra Nawi is anything but quiet.

He is a Jewish Israeli of Iraqi descent who speaks fluent Arabic.

He is a gay man in his fifties and a plumber by trade.

He has dedicated his life to helping those who are trampled on. He has stood by Jewish single mothers who pitched tents in front of the Knesset while struggling for a living wage, and by Palestinians threatened with expulsion from their homes.

Read the article here.

Families on U.S.-Mexico Line Fighting Plan

A recent article in the Washington Post by writer N.C. Aizenman, tells the stories of a small group of landowners along the Rio Grande River, and the 240 years of history since the Spanish Crown granted their colonial ancestors title to their land. The lastest efforts by the US Government to create a border fence threaten to divide long held lands.

Aizenman writes:

Under the Secure Fence Act of 2006, the department was instructed to secure about one-third of the 2,000-mile Mexican border with 700 miles of double-layered fencing. However, department officials have since whittled that down to a plan for about 370 miles of pedestrian fencing and 300 miles of vehicle barriers to be finished by the end of 2008.

Last year, the department completed the first 123 miles of vehicle barriers and 165 miles of fencing, much of it on federally owned land in Arizona, California and New Mexico. This year, a substantial portion of the remaining miles of fencing probably will be installed in Texas, where much border land is held privately -- and where ties to Mexico remain strong.

In December, officials sent warning letters to 135 private landowners, municipalities, universities, public utility companies and conservation societies along the border that had turned away surveyors. Landowners were given 30 days to change their minds or face legal action. More than 100 of them -- 71 in Texas -- let the deadline pass.

Over the past several weeks, U.S. attorneys acting on behalf of the Homeland Security Department have been filing lawsuits against the holdouts. Already, federal district judges have ordered one landowner in California, 11 in Arizona and 11 in Texas -- including the small city of Eagle Pass -- to temporarily surrender their properties. The mayor of Eagle Pass, which is located about 100 miles southwest of San Antonio and stands to lose 233 acres of city-owned land, said the city is planning to appeal. Suits are also pending against 14 landowners in California and 44 in South Texas, including Tamez.

News of the lawsuits has sent a chill through the chain of tiny centuries-old South Texas settlements that dot the Rio Grande like beads on a necklace. Like Tamez, many residents of these hamlets are descendants of the Spanish settlers who colonized the region in the late 1700s. But significant numbers of them are now impoverished, and even those who have become middle-class professionals, lack deep pockets for a legal battle.

Much of their determination stems from practical concerns. According to preliminary maps, large stretches of the proposed fence would be located more than a mile inland from the river, cutting off substantial swaths of landIn addition to building up the levees, local officials have suggested a variety of alternatives to the fence, including deepening the Rio Grande with dams so that it is more difficult to cross and can be patrolled by boat.

Fred Garcia thinks it would be enough to maintain the beefed-up Border Patrol presence that he has noticed in the region since Sept. 11, 2001.

"Every time I come out here, they're on me in minutes," he said.

As if on a cue, a white sport-utility vehicle with the Border Patrol's distinctive green stripe loomed in the rearview mirror, lights flashing. In the distance, three more SUVs converged, and several men stepped out, wearing uniforms of the National Guard, which has supplemented the Border Patrol over the past year.

Nydia stopped the car and rolled down her window as an agent walked up.

"Hi there," he said, leaning into the window. "May I ask what you're doing here?"

"This is my property," she answered.

"Really? All of this?"

"Yup," she said, a slight edge creeping into her voice. "All of this is my property."

As the officer strolled away, Fred rolled his eyes.

"My God, what's next," he said. "Are we going to have to bring our passports every time we come back here?"

Fashion with a bite?

When my friend Kay sent me a link to a Taser video, my first thought was that it must be a parody of the growing marketing of tasers for use by individuals, law enforcement and the military. Sadly, the video, and others on the Taser International site are all too real. In the first taser video, high tech robotics are used to subdue an African-American man. In the second video, Maricopa County Sheriff, Joe Arpaio, promotes the use of personal tasers. He's the border sheriff that makes prisoners wear uniforms with black and white stripes, along with pink underwear.

Just when you think it can't get any worse,  Taser introduced a new product at the  Consumer Electronics Show -- an MP3 player and taser combination unit, in your choice of colors. "It's fashion,  with a bite," said Taser International spokesman Stephen Tuttle.

If you don't believe me, watch the video.

Taser International, like other companies, are jumping on the fear bandwagon. After nearly eight years, George Bush has succeeded into converting our fears into cash for big business.

Police and Tasers: Hooked on Shock

Published Naomi Klein's post on Monday, February 11, 2008 by CommonDreams.org reports on a deal that would make tasers stand issue for police in Toronto, Canada. As she points out in her article, tasers are under investigation in several police-involved deaths in Canada and so the deal, made now, makes clear that the seduction of "no police touching" is overcoming reason and science. Let's be clear, the tasers are often being used on folks experiencing some mental distress. And studies show, that repeated tasering within a short period of time adds to the risk of death. Imagine this: the goal of Taser International is to get tasers in the hands of civilians. Combine this with the report earlier this week that the FBI and Homeland Security have in effect, deputized, scores of civilians to "shoot to kill" in states of emergency.

Klein writes:

The past couple of weeks have been rocky on the stock market, but one company that hasn’t been suffering too much is Taser International. At the end of January, its stock jumped by an impressive 8 per cent, and it’s even higher today.

Matthew McKay, a stock analyst at Jeffries & Co. in San Francisco, cites a simple cause: news that the Toronto Police Services Board plans to buy 3,000 new Taser electroshock weapons, at a cost of $8.6 million for gear and training. If the deal goes ahead, tasers would become standard issue weaponry for all of Toronto’s frontline officers, right next to their handcuffs and batons.

On Wednesday night, I participated in a public forum about the prospect of a fully taser-armed police force, organized by the Toronto Police Accountability Coalition. One speaker, who had a history of psychiatric illness, told the room: “We’re worried because we’re the people who are going to get shocked.”

It’s a concern grounded in experience. According to Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair’s own analysis, in 2006, city cops deployed the devices in 156 incidents. In all but nine, the subject appeared “to have a mental disorder” or was in some sort of “crisis.”

Several speakers at the forum pointed out that $8.6 million would be better spent keeping people out of crisis - by opening more beds and providing better mental health and addiction services. Instead, four homeless shelters were closed last year, at a loss of 258 beds.

But the most troubling remark of the evening was this: “Why is this happening now?” The timing is indeed baffling. It was only three months ago that video of the death of Robert Dziekanski at the Vancouver International Airport caused an international furor. The tragedy exposed the most prevalent misconception about tasers: that they are used primarily as an alternative to guns. As former Toronto mayor John Sewell told me, “the taser is not the thing that replaces the gun, it’s what replaces all the other things that police might do other than use a gun, like talk to you.”

That certainly appears to have been the case with Mr. Dziekanski. When the RCMP approached him, they made no attempt to calm the unarmed Polish man, or to discover the source of his extreme agitation. Within 25 seconds, he was getting zapped.

Mr. Dziekanski’s death also put a spotlight on the other post-taser deaths, the ones not caught on film. According to Amnesty International, 310 people in North America have died after being shocked with a taser since 2001.

Were these deaths caused by the device or by something else? Taser’s aggressive lawyers make it tough to know. The company has been hit with roughly a hundred wrongful death and injury lawsuits and claims it hasn’t lost one yet. But in August, Bloomberg News reported on “several mysterious dismissals” - instances where the plaintiffs asked for the cases to be thrown out. Though Taser denies paying off all its accusers, it admits to paying in some, “where the settlement economics … were significantly less than the cost of litigation.”

Taser has consistently claimed that something else is causing the deaths. The company points to a report saying that that death by electrocution happens within seconds. Yet in many cases, subjects have died minutes, even days, after being shocked.

A recent study may explain the discrepancy. Trauma researchers at Chicago’s Cook County Hospital conducted an experiment on 11 pigs, zapping each for 40 seconds; then zapping them again 10 or 15 seconds later. (This mimics how tasers are actually used, since Amnesty reports that those who have died after being Tasered were frequently “subjected to multiple or prolonged shocks.”) The study found that all the pigs exhibited heart problems after the shocks and two of them died of cardiac arrest, one three minutes later.

Taser CEO Rick Smith has brushed off the study, saying human research is more relevant. However, according to Bob Walker, one of the lead researchers, it shows “that the effect of the taser shot can last beyond the time when it’s being delivered.”

So back to that question: Why now? In addition to the troubling new scientific evidence and the disconcerting lawsuits, there are several public investigations in Canada that are still ongoing. In addition to those sparked by the Dziekanski death, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Nova Scotia are all conducting taser reviews.

Surely it would be wise for Toronto’s police chief to wait for those findings before ordering a seven-fold taser increase. But something more powerful than reason appears to be at play here, and I believe it has to do with the seductive promise of no-touch policing.

No other method of controlling unruly suspects offers police the same kind of all-encompassing, instant effect. Talking, calming, negotiating are all messier and take time. Other physical techniques put officers’ own bodies at risk.

Then there is the taser. The company boasts that its technology, which allows electrified darts to be fired from more than 10 meters away, “temporarily overrides the command and control systems of the body.” At the push of a button, even the strongest, angriest subject drops to the floor. In a way, firing a taser is the maximum power one person can exert over another. As an Ottawa Police officer reportedly said after tasering protesters at the ministry of immigration back in 2003: “Less mess, more fun.”

Few would argue with an officer’s right to use an electroshock weapon when lives are in danger and the only alternative is a gun. Many Toronto police officers, particularly those on the Emergency Task Force, clearly use them with restraint.

Yet there is also plenty of evidence that some officers get hooked on shock. In Edmonton, in 2001, reports of taserings averaged less than once a week. Three years later, they were coming in daily. In another part of the country, a mother in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia called police when she and her 17-year-old daughter were having an argument. Three officers showed up and tasered the teen in her own bed. In a recent court ruling, the judge called these actions “very disturbing and disconcerting.”

It may well be possible to prevent shock-happy policing with tighter controls. Yet, despite repeated calls for stricter regulations for police, Taser International is racing to get its devices in the hands of civilians, marketing the product as not just safe but fun. In the United States the company has been aggressively pushing its line of C2 “personal protectors” - available in pink, leopard print, and in holsters with built-in MP3 players. (The weapon is nicknamed the “iTaser.”) Tupperware-style taser parties are springing up in the suburbs of Arizona.

Taser International is a company whose executives present themselves as serious experts in public safety. Yet it has launched this foray into fashion at the very moment when the safety of its devices is being questioned on multiple fronts. Valentine’s Day is coming and Taser’s website is busily hawking the C2 in flaming red. “Love her? Protect her,” goes the slogan.

This is what corporations do: whatever they can get away with to sell more product. From Taser International, we should expect nothing less.

From our police we have a right to expect much more.

Naomi Klein is the author of The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. www.naomiklein.org

On this day, remember the Jena 6

My friend, Dena, sent this reminder to me today, as we mark the birthday of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Injustice continues throughout the United States (think Katrina, the Jena 6) and around the globe.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968)

"The ultimate test of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and moments of convenience, but where he stands in moments of challenge and moments of controversy."

--Martin Luther King, Jr., 27 January 1965

Prayer for peace

Last night I brought a Christmas tree to a simple trailer. The tree joined a smaller one and a wonderful scene of the Nativity, not unlike the one on the mantle of my home, made by local women.

I've befriended a family of five and together we've shared some simple pleasures. They've fallen on difficult times, not unusual for migrant families, but their situation was compounded by errors made by a nonprofit in a nearby town that assisted them with their various applications for US status. I can only imagine the sleepless nights spent by the family as they wait for resolution of their immigration status.

I've slept much less easily this past year myself as I've seen first hand the devastating toll that our government's immigration policies have taken on the lives of real people. As the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates continue to scapegoat immigrants, to ignore the plight of thousands in New Orleans, and to sidestep the war in Iraq, I can only see the result -- honest, hardworking people suffering day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year.

My prayer for the New Year is that our country comes to its senses and realizes that the borders that divide countries are man-made. Mexico, US, Palestine, Israel, Iraq, Turkey, Serbia, Kosovo, and countless other man-made borders continue to divide families. Borders and boundaries make profits for those that police them, and wreak havoc for millions of people around the world.

My prayer for the New Year is for peace. For justice. For quiet. For a new way.

Blessings to you and yours.

Teeth, Toll of Poverty and Neglect

Last night, I attended the Posada for the organization where I work, Puente de la Costa Sur. One of the program participants told me that he was grateful for the meal of tamales, turkey mole, and desserts, because as he said, "with my teeth, I can only eat soft foods." He showed us his mouth, inflamed and obviously very painful. We're fortunate that there is a nonprofit dental clinic in a nearby town, but even their highly trained staff will be unable to fully address his dental needs.

This reminded me about an August, 2005, Malcolm Gladwell wrote an article in the New Yorker that I simply have been unable to forget. In it he writes about the staggering toll that poor dental care takes in this country. He writes:

Several years ago, two Harvard researchers, Susan Starr Sered and Rushika Fernandopulle, set out to interview people without health-care coverage for a book they were writing, "Uninsured in America." They talked to as many kinds of people as they could find, collecting stories of untreated depression and struggling single mothers and chronically injured laborers—and the most common complaint they heard was about teeth.  Gina, a hairdresser in Idaho, whose husband worked as a freight manager at a chain store, had "a peculiar mannerism of keeping her mouth closed even when speaking." It turned out that she hadn't been able to afford dental care for three years, and one of her front teeth was rotting.  Daniel, a construction worker, pulled out his bad teeth with pliers.  Then, there was Loretta, who worked nights at a university research center in Mississippi, and was missing most of her teeth.  "They'll break off after a while, and then you just grab a hold of them, and they work their way out," she explained to Sered and Fernandopulle.  "It hurts so bad, because the tooth aches.  Then it's a relief just to get it out of there.  The hole closes up itself anyway.  So it's so much better."

People without health insurance have bad teeth because, if you're paying for everything out of your own pocket, going to the dentist for a checkup seems like a luxury.  It isn't, of course.  The loss of teeth makes eating fresh fruits and vegetables difficult, and a diet heavy in soft, processed foods exacerbates more serious health problems, like diabetes.  The pain of tooth decay leads many people to use alcohol as a salve.  And those struggling to get ahead in the job market quickly find that the unsightliness of bad teeth, and the self-consciousness that results, can become a major barrier.  If your teeth are bad, you're not going to get a job as a receptionist, say, or a cashier.  You're going to be put in the back somewhere, far from the public eye.  What Loretta, Gina, and Daniel understand, the two authors tell us, is that bad teeth have come to be seen as a marker of "poor parenting, low educational achievement and slow or faulty intellectual development." They are an outward marker of caste.  "Almost every time we asked interviewees what their first priority would be if the president established universal health coverage tomorrow," Sered and Fernandopulle write, "the immediate answer was 'my teeth.' "

Happy Camp-er

If you really want to know about Mike Huckabee and his record on HIV/AIDS, ask Eric Camp. His blog, Happy Camp'er provides a powerful record of the Arkansas years -- the Clinton, Tucker and Huckabee legacies on HIV/AIDS.

Here's the latest post from his blog:

Bite Me, Huckabee

Candidate Huckabee admits he was so confused about how HIV was transmitted in 1992 that he believed people infected with HIV should be "isolated from the rest of society." To be clear, this was not 1982, but 1992. In 1992, it was obvious HIV could not be transmitted casually. As I recall, people with AIDS addressed both the Democratic & Republican National Conventions in 1992. Guess Huckabee missed the memo. You know, the one sent out in 1985 to every American household saying HIV was not spread by casual contact.

More fresh from the ministry then, Huckabee was more than willing to kick around the sick and dying in 1992. Just to twist the knife a bit, Mike also said queers are "aberrant, unnatural, and sinful."

Yes ladies and gentlemen, Mike Huckabee was an ignorant homophobic sombitch in 1992, and went a-courtin' the "God Hates Fags" vote with vigor. As effective treatment for HIV became available in America, it was a damn hard fight to make them available in Arkansas. "Waiting Lists" were the norm here for medications under Huckabee.

If Mike Huckabee really didn't know HIV couldn't be spread by casual contact in 1992, it was the same willful ignorance that infected Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. Willful ignorance (under the guise of national intelligence) also started the Iraq War. The same willful ignorance allows the words "compassionate" and "conservative" to be linked.

Like the Rev. Pat Robertson (R) before him, I hope Huckabee's political ambitions get quarantined in Iowa.

Blackwater splits California Town

This post in the New York Times highlights the growing influence and scope of Blackwater, the private security firm. Their core business is now shifting from providing private security in countries like Iraq to an increasing menu of services provided through contracts with the US, state and county governments. For those of us that fear the increasing militarization in the US and the increasing privatization of community services, Blackwater provides a text book example of the wave of the future. We should be afraid, very afraid.

New York Times, December 11, 2007

by Solomon Moore

POTRERO, Calif. — The scandal in Iraq involving Blackwater, the private security firm, is a world away from this tiny town near the Mexican border. But five members of the community’s planning group are expected to lose their posts on Tuesday for approving a Blackwater training camp on an old chicken farm here.

Results of a mail-in-ballot recall election against the members are scheduled to be announced on Tuesday. Three of the group’s nine members have already been removed because Blackwater opponents revealed they had been improperly appointed.

Like many Potrero residents, Carl Meyer, 51, a local farmer and environmental activist, never gave much thought to Iraq or private security firms until Blackwater came to town last year. Ever since, he has been opposed to the company’s proposal for 800 acres of rifle ranges, dormitories, classrooms and an armory.

“Having them here wouldn’t be in keeping with our rural character,” said Mr. Meyer, who has helped organize the recall effort. “But it’s more than that for me. They’re not good for our country.”

A federal grand jury is investigating Blackwater for various events in Iraq including the shooting deaths in September of 17 Iraqi civilians by the company’s security guards while driving through Baghdad.

An unincorporated community of 850 on the southeastern edge of San Diego County, Potrero is a scrubby nexus of military veterans, border guards, ranchers and recluses who live so close to the nightclubs in Tecate, Mexico, that on quiet nights they can hear Nortec music pulsing over the voices of coyotes.

The controversy about Blackwater has riven the community’s social fabric, leading to arguments among longtime neighbors and acquaintances, and at least two anti-Blackwater rallies.

Gordon Hammers, a retired businessman who is chairman of the Potrero Community Planning Group, is among those facing the recall, which both sides expect to be successful. Mr. Hammers steered Blackwater’s proposal into the county’s standard environmental review process, with the backing of seven of the board’s eight other members.

When Blackwater first approached the planning group in September 2006, Mr. Hammers said, he had never heard of the company.

“Once I found out more about them, I thought: ‘I need this like I need a hole in my head,’” Mr. Hammers said. “But I also thought they would bring jobs.”

Jan Hedlun, the sole member of the planning group to oppose Blackwater and to avoid a recall threat, said she never expected to be taking on such weighty issues when she volunteered.

“I came into this planning group because I wanted to know about a separate proposal to build a few houses near my home,” Ms. Hedlun said. “And all of a sudden I’m here tussling with this powerful company. It’s just overwhelming.”

Diane Jacob, who represents Potrero on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, which will ultimately decide whether the Blackwater campus will be built, declined to comment about the proposal or the recall drive. The planning group’s vote sent the proposal to the supervisors, who will act after reviewing an environmental impact report.

For the better part of the last year, Blackwater has maintained a conspicuous presence in Potrero. Company officials have attended planning group meetings, established a shelter and relief center after wildfires burned down 17 Potrero homes in October — and have attracted some supporters.

Sitting at the 94 Cafe, the town’s only diner, Andrew Lindsay, 82, and his wife Inez, 74, counted themselves among those supporters. Mr. Lindsay wore a pin with the firm’s bear paw logo on his cap.

“We need a good little bit of industry and employment out here, it’ll be good for the economy,” said Mr. Lindsay, praising the company’s ability to deliver food and propane to residents in the aftermath of wildfires. “Blackwater is very community-minded.”

But Mr. Meyer, the farmer, was among the residents who picked up supplies at the fire station after the wildfires. Once he learned that Blackwater had provided the gas tanks, Mr. Meyer said, he tried to return the items or at least pay for them, but a neighbor at the first station who supported Blackwater’s relief effort turned him away.

“‘Get out of my face, Carl,’” Mr. Meyer recalled the neighbor saying. “‘Nobody likes you around here.’”

Company officials said the proposed training camp — in a secluded, mountain-protected site — is part of an unfolding business strategy to diversify beyond the kind of dangerous, controversial operations that have attracted so much unwelcome attention in Iraq.

Each year, according to company figures, more than 25,000 law enforcement officers and military personnel take courses at Blackwater’s campus in Moyock, N.C., which is about 30 miles south of Norfolk, Va. Blackwater West, as the facility here would be called, would train law enforcement officials from Western states, said Marty Strong, Blackwater’s vice president for communications. The firm recently opened an 80-acre regional training facility in Illinois to serve Midwestern customers.

The proximity of so many military installations in Southern California, borders, ports, and several of the nation’s largest local law enforcement agencies make the area an ideal market for Blackwater, Mr. Strong said.

“It seemed like a real logical place to go and build a facility,” he said.

Blackwater’s new training camps are only one aspect of the company’s shifting business strategy.

In August, Blackwater and four other contractors landed what could be its biggest job ever, a series of projects that could total $15 billion for the Counter-Narcoterrorism Technology Program Office at the Pentagon. The contract calls for unspecified technologies, training, logistics, and procurement services to fight narcotics trafficking and terrorism.

“The fact is we use Blackwater to do a lot of our training of counternarcotics police in Afghanistan,” said Richard J. Douglas, a deputy assistant secretary of defense. “I have to say that Blackwater has done a very good job.”

Blackwater is testing an unmanned aerial vehicle, the Polar 400, a remote-controlled dirigible that can be outfitted with various sensors. Unlike traditional drones, the Polar 400 is designed to remain aloft for several days at a time.

Mr. Strong said that the high-altitude blimp would be ideal for border surveillance operations or drug interdiction. He said the company wanted to win more Homeland Security contracts focused on border security training, and in choosing the location here, just eight miles from the border, Blackwater was banking on an increase in the number of border guards.

New York Times calls on Pelosi to explain hate crimes bill strategy

Congress just can't seem to get it right. It is unable to stop the war in Iraq, pass comprehensive legislation to ban employment discrimination, or pass hate crimes legislation. For those following the "let the transgenders wait" story with ENDA, it should be noted that women were asked to wait their turn when the original hate crimes legislation was passed by Congress in 1999. We're still waiting.

I found this New York Times editorial interesting, perhaps you will as well.

The New York Times: EDITORIAL: Caving In on Hate Crimes
Monday 12.10.07

Congressional leaders, who have disappointed frequently this year, have done it again. This time, the House leadership has failed to find a way to get a bipartisan law against hate crimes passed and signed into law. Racial, religious, sexual and other minorities have waited long enough. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has to do more than just express her support for the bill; she must find a way to make it the law.

The Matthew Shepard Act would expand the definition of hate crimes and make important improvements in the federal response. To categories already covered by federal law, which include race and religion, it would add crimes committed because of the victim’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender or disability. It would also broaden the federal government’s authority to investigate these hateful acts.

The bill has been a top priority of civil rights groups since Mr. Shepard, who was gay, was beaten to death in Laramie, Wyo., in 1998. It also has strong support from law enforcement, including the National Sheriffs’ Association and the National District Attorneys Association. The House passed it 237-180, with significant Republican support, and the Senate passed a similar bill by voice vote, after a 60-39 cloture vote.

President Bush has suggested he would veto the bill. It’s an unfortunate threat, but one he is certainly capable of carrying out. House and Senate leaders planned to get around that threat by attaching it to a Department of Defense Authorization bill, which Mr. Bush would have had trouble vetoing. But House leaders decided last week that since some liberals did not want to vote for the defense bill and some conservatives did not want to vote for the hate crimes bill, they could not piece together a majority to get it through.

Ms. Pelosi says she is still committed to getting the Matthew Shepard Act passed, perhaps early next year. That’s nice, but it is time for her to explain how she intends to do it — and then to make it happen.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/10/opinion/10mon3.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

We remember

Today we observe World AIDS Day. But every day around the world is World AIDS Day.

Today and every day I remember my beloveds and my comrades, lost to me, lost to us, forever.

I remember standing at the Capitol, when the AIDS Memorial Quilt was unveiled for the first time. Suzanne Pharr and I stood there with Eric Rofes (now also lost us unexpectedly). Name after name was read, and I was so struck by Eric saying, "I knew him, I knew him, I knew him." Suzanne and I lived in Arkansas then, and the HIV epidemic was just starting to hit us full force.

My friend Eric Kamp reminded me of the losses of our Arkansas friends just recently, by sending along a videotape with the  photos and stories of our lost ones. The tape was also an important reminder of all the ways we fought for our friends and loved ones -- for respect, for medication, for care, for housing, and for dignity.

My friends like Eric, living with HIV all these years later, are still fighting. We're still dogging Presidential candidates to make a firm commitment to end the HIV epidemic. We're still fighting to get no and low-cost medications to those that need them. We're still fighting battles around employment, housing and hospital care. We're still fighting, all around the world.

As the toll of HIV infection and HIV-related deaths continues to rise, as homophobia, sexism, and racism, continue to rise, we must remain vigilant. Not just today, but everyday.

End of America

In her new book, “The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot”, Naomi Wolf says the United States is on the road to becoming a fascist society, right under our very noses. Wolf outlines what she sees as the ten steps to shut down a democratic society and argues that the Bush administration has already implemented many of these steps. Wolf was interview today on Democracy Now by Amy Goodman.

Wolf, a feminist social critic,  outlines what she sees as the ten steps to shut down a democratic society and argues that the Bush administration has already implemented many of these steps. In an interview in the Guardian Unlimited, Wolf argues that "From Hitler to Pinochet and beyond, history shows there are certain steps that any would-be dictator must take to destroy constitutional freedoms." And, George Bush and his administration seem to be taking them all.

The radio interview and the article make for compelling thinking in an election season where it seems to be that the most popular candidates refuse to take a serious look at what is happening to our country.

Thirty years later: No Nukes

Nearly 30 years ago, Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne and Graham Nash, helped organize "No Nukes" concerts that stirred public opposition to nuclear power. They're still at it. The nuclear industry has slipped language into the pending Energy Bill for 2007 that could foot taxpayers with the bill for building new nuclear power plants in the U.S.

Watch a video featuring Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Keb' Mo' and Ben Harper and sign a petition to Congress asking them to remove nukes from the table and instead advance safe, economically viable solutions to global warming

The Smear This Time

Back in 1993, the Women's Project in Little Rock, Arkansas honored Dr. Anita Hill with a tile on its Women's Wall of Honor. The Women's Project is selling its building and one of my former colleagues honored me by sending along the thank you letter that Dr. Hill sent to me with her thanks in 1994. Just a few days later, the news was filled with tales from Clarence Thomas' autobiography. I confess that I won't read it. That said, the coverage of his book suggests to me that it is pure fiction. All these years later, Thomas still insists on that he did no harm. My view: he protests too much, he continues to do harm -- not only to Dr. Hill but to those millions of us that feel the impact of his now "legal opinions" which undermine and overthrow our hard-fought legal victories. Nearly sixteen years after her testimony, Anita Hill once again stands up, not only for herself, but for all those harassed in the workplace.

First posted in the New York Times on October 2, 2007 by Anita Hill

On Oct. 11, 1991, I testified about my experience as an employee of Clarence Thomas' at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. 

I stand by my testimony.

Justice Thomas has every right to present himself as he wishes in his new memoir, “My Grandfather’s Son.” He may even be entitled to feel abused by the confirmation process that led to his appointment to the Supreme Court.

But I will not stand by silently and allow him, in his anger, to reinvent me.

In the portion of his book that addresses my role in the Senate hearings into his nomination, Justice Thomas offers a litany of unsubstantiated representations and outright smears that Republican senators made about me when I testified before the Judiciary Committee — that I was a “combative left-winger” who was “touchy” and prone to overreacting to “slights.” A number of independent authors have shown those attacks to be baseless. What’s more, their reports draw on the experiences of others who were familiar with Mr. Thomas’s behavior, and who came forward after the hearings. It’s no longer my word against his.

Justice Thomas’s characterization of me is also hobbled by blatant inconsistencies. He claims, for instance, that I was a mediocre employee who had a job in the federal government only because he had “given it” to me. He ignores the reality: I was fully qualified to work in the government, having graduated from Yale Law School (his alma mater, which he calls one of the finest in the country), and passed the District of Columbia Bar exam, one of the toughest in the nation.

In 1981, when Mr. Thomas approached me about working for him, I was an associate in good standing at a Washington law firm. In 1991, the partner in charge of associate development informed Mr. Thomas’s mentor, Senator John Danforth of Missouri, that any assertions to the contrary were untrue. Yet, Mr. Thomas insists that I was “asked to leave” the firm.

It’s worth noting, too, that Mr. Thomas hired me not once, but twice while he was in the Reagan administration — first at the Department of Education and then at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. After two years of working directly for him, I left Washington and returned home to Oklahoma to begin my teaching career.

In a particularly nasty blow, Justice Thomas attacked my religious conviction, telling “60 Minutes” this weekend, “She was not the demure, religious, conservative person that they portrayed.” Perhaps he conveniently forgot that he wrote a letter of recommendation for me to work at the law school at Oral Roberts University, in Tulsa. I remained at that evangelical Christian university for three years, until the law school was sold to CBN University (later Regent University) in Virginia Beach, Va., another Christian college. Along with other faculty members, I was asked to consider a position there, but I decided to remain near my family in Oklahoma.

Regrettably, since 1991, I have repeatedly seen this kind of character attack on women and men who complain of harassment and discrimination in the workplace. In efforts to assail their accusers’ credibility, detractors routinely diminish people’s professional contributions. Often the accused is a supervisor, in a position to describe the complaining employee’s work as “mediocre” or the employee as incompetent. Those accused of inappropriate behavior also often portray the individuals who complain as bizarre caricatures of themselves — oversensitive, even fanatical, and often immoral — even though they enjoy good and productive working relationships with their colleagues.

Finally, when attacks on the accusers’ credibility fail, those accused of workplace improprieties downgrade the level of harm that may have occurred. When sensing that others will believe their accusers’ versions of events, individuals confronted with their own bad behavior try to reduce legitimate concerns to the level of mere words or “slights” that should be dismissed without discussion.

Fortunately, we have made progress since 1991. Today, when employees complain of abuse in the workplace, investigators and judges are more likely to examine all the evidence and less likely to simply accept as true the word of those in power. But that could change. Our legal system will suffer if a sitting justice’s vitriolic pursuit of personal vindication discourages others from standing up for their rights.

The question of whether Clarence Thomas belongs on the Supreme Court is no longer on the table — it was settled by the Senate back in 1991. But questions remain about how we will resolve the kinds of issues my testimony exposed. My belief is that in the past 16 years we have come closer to making the resolution of these issues an honest search for the truth, which, after all, is at the core of all legal inquiry. My hope is that Justice Thomas’s latest fusillade will not divert us from that path.

Anita Hill, a professor of social policy, law and women’s studies at Brandeis University, is a visiting scholar at the Newhouse Center for the Humanities at Wellesley College.

 

No to intolerance and Islamophobia

On October 22-26 the so-called Terrorism Awareness Project, will send extremist speakers to campuses across the country to spread a message of intolerance and Islamophobia, in a campaign billed as "the biggest conservative campus protest ever."

The list of speakers includes:

• Ann Coulter, who recently made quite a splash with her unabashed Jew-hatred;
• Robert Spencer, who calls Islam, "the world's most intolerant religion;"
• Rick Santorum, who compared homosexuality to incest and bestiality;
• And of course, David Horowitz whose long history of racism has included attacks on affirmative action and the statement that 'guns don't kill black people, other blacks do.'

These and other hate-mongers will be demonizing Islam and portraying a one-sided and bigoted view of a faith held by billions of people around the world. Sign the JVP statement denouncing the so-called "Islamo-Fascism Week" and let them know that while our campuses must remain a place for the free exchange of all ideas, such promotion of hatred will not go unchallenged.

 

Join Jewish Voice for Peace in their condemnation of this campaign of racism and bigotry! Click here to sign their statement.

Protests continue at California sanctuary church

Since a United Church of Christ in California's Simi Valley made real its commitment to become a sanctuary church, it has been the focus of Sunday protests by Minute Men and other immigration opponents. Protesters carried signs with red letters that said "Stop Illegal Immigration!" or "Viva Minutemen." They used the bullhorn to demand a conversation with Simi Valley's mayor, to scold church members as they drove away after the worship service and to call for an investigation of the church's tax-exempt status. The Rev. Dr. June Christine Goudey, Pastor of the Church, and the congregation remain resolute in their commitment to provide a safe haven for Liliana Sanctuaria and her family.

Visit the Church website to learn more about the sanctuary movement

Click here to read coverage of the Church in the Ventura County Star