The Persistent Press

Drastic cuts to funding for the Disabled in Minnesota

2011-10-09T19:29:00.000-07:00

On July 1st, funding for disabled people's heath was slashed yet again by Statute 256B.0659 subdivision 11, signed into law by Governor Dayton. In the last year, after PCA hours had been limited, assessments by agencies like AXIS health care had been done, and hours had been cut, PCA services were again attacked, partly because the common assumption is that PCAs are petty and the field is full of fraud.
On September 1st, the state of Minnesota was set to save money by cutting pay rates for PCAs across the board by 1.5%. Some PCA agencies, like Custom Care and People Enhancing People, have not cut wages but have absorbed the loss of reimbursement from the state. All agencies have to deal with additional funding cuts, making it especially hard for nonprofits like PEP.
On October 1st, the reduced pay rate for PCAs related to their clients went into effect. An additional 20% pay cut, which some agencies have not been able to absorb into their budgets because they lack the reimbursement from the state & from matching Medicaid funds to stay afloat.

According to the Minnesota Disability Law Center,
"persons who live in rural areas, immigrant/refugee families whose first language
is not English, other minority communities will be particularly hurt by this harsh
cut. The 20% cut will reduce the modest earnings of many family members,
including many women in their 50’s and 60’s who care for their adult sons and
daughters with significant disabilities for many hours beyond those authorized to
be paid as PCA services. Families who have cared for a loved one with total and
permanent disabilities have all slid down the economic ladder, sacrificed
personally and economically, and provided reliable, loving care at a much lower
rate and higher quality than would otherwise be available. This cut saves the state
about $23 million and results in a PCA service cut of $46 million due to the loss
of federal Medicaid matching funds."
There has been no word as to WHY the people who likely work the most, beyond billable hours, and care the most about their clients are the hardest hit. The dollar amount is significant to the state, but what about families that will struggle to work other jobs, raise their income, and bring in new staff who might not care as much?
PEP's role in selecting and training PCAs becomes ever more important.
The 1.5% provider rate cut will change in 2 years, when the state expects to have the money to pay PCAs only
1% less than usual. It's still less than they deserve for hard work that is now more rushed than ever. Many disabled people were reassessed & found to have only one ADL that they need help with, alotted only half an hour per day to get help, and forced to ask their staff to work very, very part-time for low pay. That does not attract or motivate high-quality staff.
"Another cut of 1.67% is slated to begin July 1, 2012 if
DHS is not allowed to implement tightened criteria for nursing facility eligibility,"
states the Minnesota Disability Law Center.
The public comment period on these changes continues and it's not too late to call your state legislator and demand better funding! A bill regarding these same topics was introduced but not voted on this year, meaning that next year these issues will come up again for vote & consideration. The state must get its priorities straight, or more costs and poorer health overall will result.

Earthdance for Peace

2011-09-19T09:23:00.000-07:00

Come one, come all, to Earthdance in Powderhorn Park, (near 35th St & Bloomington Ave)

Minneapolis,

on Saturday Sept. 24, 2011! It's time to give peace a dance-- to sing & dance & pray with strangers for world peace, from 2- 7 pm!

Please see the short video about last year's event here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhcjfHt5U8o&feature=channel_video_title

It is all about unifying: internationally, interfaith, with our neighbors in the park, & with all others focusing on peace at the same time in the whole world! We'll see you there!

(Directly follows American Indian Day in Minneapolis,

an event for all on Saturday, Sept. 24, 10 am - 2pm,

at the Midtown Farmer's Market Parking lot right next to Anishinaabe Academy & the Lake St. Light Rail station)

Wherever you are, you can partake in this international event for world peace! Find a location near you through

earthdance.org

Community Speaks Out about Retail Cleaners' Struggle as hunger strike ends

2011-06-08T07:16:00.000-07:00

On June 1, 2011, the 12-day hunger strike ended and Cub Foods stores in Minneapolis, Minnesota knows the seriousness of the workers united. CTUL eagerly anticipates the management's reaction to the continuing letters and questions that have been coming in from the public. When will the stores have a meeting with the workers?

CTUL asks that the public call CEO Keith Wyche to tell him of continued support for the boycott of Cub Foods:

651-439-7200

Please see
www.ctul.net

for more updates.

Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxZSY2uj5Yc

People with Disabilities Volunteer!

2011-03-22T13:22:00.000-07:00

Have you ever offered, “I can help,” only to hear the dismissive reply “No, why don’t you just take it easy.” If this sounds familiar,
you have the heart of a willing volunteer -- you know you have a lot to contribute, but it’s hard to find a volunteer opportunity that’s for you. Campus Kitchens, Meals on Wheels, and Sisters Camelot travel around the Twin Cities feeding the hungry, but they want quick, able-bodied volunteers. Some nonprofits, like the Traces Museum of history in St Paul, are still not accessible to people in walkers, crutches or wheelchairs.
Fortunately, several charities and churches in the Twin Cities do value the contributions of disabled volunteers, reaching out and accommodating their skill sets. You can greet and direct guests at Abbot Northwestern Hospital, serve hot meals to the public at Open Arms, coordinate book drives or clothing drives for Goodwill sales, lead a small group or confirmation class at your place of worship, or tutor a child looking for mentoring.

Open Arms of Minnesota, on Bloomington Avenue in Minneapolis, prepares and delivers free meals tailored for those facing critical illness and their families. They are looking for enthusiastic greeters; you can call Lyla at 612-872-1152 to ask about volunteer orientation!

Anyone with a big heart can mentor a child, and the Kinship Project is seeking diverse adults of all abilities, from all backgrounds to either befriend and mentor a local kid, or help in the office once each week. Visit www.kinship.org to apply to be a mentor. Kinship also will provide training for a new volunteer office assistant! Call Penny Kallas at (612)588-4655

If you’ve ever been taken by the volume & diversity of STUFF at Goodwill, you know they need volunteers --behind the scenes and in the adult & youth tutoring programs, you can help Goodwill continue its thrift store sales that benefit the Easter Seals. Call Rebecca Bedner
at 651-379-5937, to ask when you can sort or appraise items, or get involved as a tutor! GoodWill has very accessible facilities at 553 Fairview Ave. N., St. Paul.

Voluntourism is a growing trend today, partly because volunteering is a no-cost vacation activity, a chance to understand and connect with, rather than just tour, a new location, and because it reduces your impact on a place and its culture overall. Contact these organizations to arrange to both travel and volunteer:

Camphill Association of North America
There is one Camphill Village in Sauk Centre, MN, where people of all ages and abilities can stay for a month or a season or a year, if they live with others in the community and volunteer.
Camphill is an international movement of intentional communities designed to meet the needs of children, youth and adults with developmental disabilities through a combination of community life, the arts and work on the land. The experience offered in Camphill is varied and includes: supporting individuals with disabilities in the home, at work on the farm, garden or in one of the various craft workshops, such as weaving, pottery, stained glass, woodworking, candle-making, bookbinding or bakery; cooking food for your household with a small group of people.
You can also call Camphill Village to ask about their sites in other states, if you want to travel & stay in a different Camphill. (320) 732-6365

Global Deaf Connection,
Based in South Minneapolis, they organize deaf education teachers and community members to go on short-term summer programs to volunteer at the schools for deaf children in Kenya, Jamaica, or the Democratic Republic of Congo. Sign language interpreters are always welcome. You can call
612- 724-8565 or see www.deafconnection.org

Wilderness Inquiry

They organize a wide variety of canoe, sea kayak, dogsled, rafting, horse pack, and hiking trips in Africa, North America, Oceania, and other regions of the world. All trips include people with and without disabilities working together to make the outdoor adventures open to everyone.
Their Minneapolis office is seeking ASL interpreters, office assistance, design and outreach volunteers. If you want to volunteer your skills, like helping others with disabilities, on one of their wilderness trips in Minnesota, the price will be discounted.
www.wildernessinquiry.org

Rally in Support of THE LARAMIE PROJECT scares away Westboro Baptist Church

2011-03-03T09:41:00.000-08:00

The Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas had planned to picket Hastings High School on Sunday, Feb. 13.

It's one stop on their unending tour of performances of The Laramie Project, Matthew Shephard memorials, and soldiers' funerals, where they proudly arrive with their "God Hates Fags" signs. The Hastings High School performance of The Laramie Project, a play about the reaction to the homophobic murder of student Matthew Shephard in Laramie, Wyoming, brings attention to hate crimes and the lack of hate crimes legislation that is often a lack of protection of the rights of minorities. This sobering, liberal play sold out; it was a first for the mildly conservative large town of Hastings, which rarely sees a public rally such as that which turned out to support the issue at the high school & counter the Westboro Baptist Church protest.

Organized through Facebook, the high school gay/straight alliance, and public concern, a rally of support for GLBT rights and hate crimes legislation lined the sidewalks outside Hastings High School.

See attached pictures or online album:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2042977&id=72700664&saved#!/album.php?aid=2042977&id=72700664

Seeing this large and loud peaceful gathering for Love, Not Hate, the WBC protesters cancelled their picket & are now taking their message of religious hate elsewhere.

Minnesotans to Defend Julian Assange

2011-02-05T12:02:00.000-08:00

Many thanks to Sonja Johnson & Tackling Torture at the Top, for getting this message to the Star Tribune & the UK Consulate in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Just one of many ways you too can help defend WikiLeaks' founder Julian Assange:
On Monday, February 7, we are taking a letter to the United Kingdom Consulate in Minneapolis. Our group, while doing some reading and research, found a very interesting story, and a friend, Will Shapira, suggested you may be interested in it.

The Honorary Consul of the United Kingdom Consulate is William McGrann. The McGrann law firm was established as a result of a political response to the killing of six priests, their housekeeper and her daughter by Salvadoran military officers. William McGrann and three of his current partners left the O'Connor & Hannan law firm shortly afterwards because the firm represented the government of El Salvador.

In 2009, a Spanish judge opened an investigation into those 1989 killings (http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45399).

The Obama administration pressured Spanish officials to block a similar investigation of U.S. actions (http://www.democraticunderground.com/dicuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x550231).

WikiLeaks' release of diplomatic cables reveal this Obama administration pressure on Spanish officials.

Which leads to Mr. Julian Assange ............and Mr. McGrann.

Mr. Julian Assange has an extradition hearing on February 7-8 in London. His lawyer believes that if Assange is extradited to Sweden, Sweden will extradite him to the United States. We will be bringing a letter to Mr. McGrann on Monday, February 7, at 4:30, urging England not to extradite Assange to Sweden. WikiLeaks disclosed war crimes that the administration prefers not to be made public. The government is more interested in hiding secrets than exposing war crimes.

It is most appropriate that the Honorary Consul be Mr. William McGrann when such a letter is being given to him in support of a person who exposed war crimes. The Honorary Consul is indeed an honorable man.

Opposing Genocide in the Ogaden Region of Ethiopia

2011-01-24T20:55:00.000-08:00

MINNEAPOLIS, JANUARY 23 --

Outside the Radisson City Center hotel, hundreds of Somali people protested and drew attention to a visit by Abdi Mohamud Omar, president of the Ogaden region of Ethiopia. They demanded that human rights abuses under Omar's growing military end, while raising awareness of the US' unquestioning military aid to Ethiopia.

The Ogaden region is a place of decades-long conflict, home to nomadic Somali people and occupied by the Ethiopian military. Both the Ogaden National Liberation Front and the military are accused of human rights abuses against civilians in the region by Human Rights Watch(1) -- hangings, setting makeshift villages on fire, systemic rape as a tool of warfare, hording the food aid from the UN and NGO's in the middle of droughts, demanding that men become soldiers in order to access food and water.

The government shuts down basic aid operations as soon as they're suspected of providing material aid to the rebels.(2) Always the threat of invisible rebels lurks in the countryside patrolled by soldiers, who use any excuse to collectively punish civilians and refugees.

According to the Ogaden National Liberation Front, "In 1981 the Organisation of African Unity committee mediating between Somalia and Ethiopia regarding the conflict in the Ogaden declared that the Ogaden is part of Ethiopia. That decision was based on the 1964 resolution of the OAU promulgated in Cairo regarding the sanctity of the African borders left by colonialism. That unjust resolution in no way took into account the aspirations of the people of Ogaden and wrongly portrayed the Ogaden conflict as a border dispute between two States when it is infact a conflict borne from the desire of the Ogaden people for self-determination." (5)

The pattern of violence is very similar to that of the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. But if there is a genocidal crisis in Ogaden, why is it not the subject of US Presidential addresses, as Darfur was even in the Bush administration? Why is it not in the news? Where are the divestment campaigns for Ethiopia? Why does the Genocide Intervention Network not list Ogaden among its areas for concern?(3) Why do we learn of actions to take regarding Darfur, but not Ogaden, when we call the Genocide Intervention Network's youth-driven hotline, 1-800-GENOCIDE?

According to the 2007 Human Rights Watch testimony on Ethiopia and the state of democracy, "the crisis in Ogaden is linked to a US-supported military intervention by Ethiopia in Somalia that has been justified in terms of counter terrorism. Because the United States has until now supported Ethiopia so closely, there is a widespread and growing sentiment in the region that the United States also shares some of the blame for the Ethiopian military's abusive conduct."

Their testimony to the US' House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health called

Ethiopian security forces "among the most abusive on the continent." Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced. Is this not enough magnitude of violence to merit our action?

The US government has investigated and listened to some of the protesters, here among the highest concentration of Somali people outside Somalia, in Minnesota. But our representatives seem unsure of what to actually do. One of the organizers, Sadiq, said that they're grateful for Senators Klobuchar & Franken & their attempts to keep President Omar out of the country and away from Minnesota. Regardless, Omar arrived at the hotel and kept his purposes from the press.

But his presence, and his regime's guilt, were all too evident amid the chanting crowds downtown on Sunday.

Is it time to divest from Ethiopia? Is this the year to reduce their military aid, this year that began with the surprising announcement that the Obama administration would cut the defense budget for the first time since the Cold War? (4)

1) http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2007/10/01/ethiopia-and-state-democracy-effects-human-rights-and-humanitarian-conditions-ogaden

2) http://www.ogadennet.com/news.php?readmore=1556

3)http://www.genocideintervention.net/educate/crisis

4)http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/06/AR2011010603628.html

5) http://www.onlf.org/news.php

A new year of new knowledge

2011-01-01T09:31:00.001-08:00

Happy New Year! As we rest this winter and build up momentum for 2011, it's a great time to learn.

In January a new semester of free college-level classes begins here in the Twin Cities of Minnesota:

check out the ever-changing Experimental College's website:

www.excotc.org

for a long list of all the diverse community-based offerings coming up in spring. I'm planning further discussion groups in the Ex.Co. format, and an educational retreat to Wisconsin concerning sustainable design! More info. soon!

In summer, students of life and facilitators of free knowledge gathered for an Ex.Co. party in Powderhorn Park. It was a great time had by all, full of music and cross-cultural meetings, and now we finally have a video to show you what it was like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqKNcXQMW7s

Please see the above hip, fun video to get an overview of Ex.Co. enthusiasm and class summary presentations-- among them was my skit about requesting files from the FBI through the Freedom of Information Act, exemplifying the class content of last spring's IndyMedia classes which I co-taught.

For a more in-depth explanation of Ex.Co, take a listen to co-founder David Boehnke's talk here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLRZRfNfSZg&feature=related

Reminiscent of the TED Talks, this brief presentation shares the revolutionary dynamic tenet of Ex.Co. with the Solutions Conference Volume 3:

"Anyone can take or teach a class, & all classes are free."

Still more Ex.Co. class videos are online at www.excotc.blip.tv

Rainforest Action campaign Update

2010-12-13T19:37:00.000-08:00

My brief documentary, an update on the Rainforest Action Network's campaign against Sinar Mas palm oil, will soon air on Minneapolis cable: Channel	Day	Date	Time
16	WED	12/29	8:00AM
16	THUR	12/30	4:00PM
16	TUE	1/4	11:00PM
16	WED	1/12	7:30AM

World Bank President Zoellick and the Slippery Currency

2010-12-07T00:38:00.000-08:00

On the day that gold hit $1385.50/ oz, the Twin Cities community packed the Humphrey Center auditorium to hear of "Challenges Facing Global Economic Development."
On Wednesday December 1, the President of the World Bank Group, Robert Zoellick, faced the Twin Cities community and addressed global development issues in the format of a guided conversation with his friend, Vin Weber.
Weber, the senior fellow at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs for many years, had pulled some strings to make this conversation free, public, and catered, promoting both the University of Minnesota and the World Bank.
The public wanted to know-- among other things written on pre-screened question cards-- what effect the Wikileaks site would have on banking. He said that it would have no effect, but Zoellick criticized the new releases from Wikileaks, saying that they make it harder for the US to do business with other countries.
[TC Indymedia video: Zoellick on Wikileaks:
http://tc.indymedia.org/videos/2010/dec/world-bank-president-robert-zoellick-slams-wikileaks]
--

More: Upcoming Event: Striking Blows in Defense of the Earth @ U of M - Dec 11th - Ongoing: Indymedia live coverage of Cancun COP16 Climate Conference - LINK http://mobilebroadcastnews.com/MBN/story/Cancun-COP16

--

The World Bank's claim is to work towards a world free of poverty. But time and again, its policies have eased up on the destructive practices of multinational corporations.
President Zoellick will soon face this easing of standards, as Sinar Mas, a palm oil company, fights its sanctions. Recently, as the Rainforest Action Network and scores of its allies have pressured multinationals like Cargill to stop using palm oil from old rainforests & end deforestation of the rainforests of Indonesia, the World Bank proposed changes to its own palm oil policy.
According to Climate Action's blog of November 22,
"The World Bank’s proposed easing off on its palm oil strategy [of no funding to palm oil companies] has roused relief for corporations worldwide whilst attracting mixed reactions to its plan to finance only firms pursuing green standards....
Robert Zoellick was responsible for freezing World Bank Group funding worldwide in the palm oil sector, pending the social and environmental concerns. It is now his responsibility to ensure safeguards are in place to protect all stakeholders."
Will he go forward with the green standards, which will be contested in early 2011?
Questions abounded and a few pre-screened questions were brought from the audience to facilitator Vin Weber.

Weber brought up the pointed question of Zoellick's piece in the Financial Times
(http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/54a44c3e-ec7c-11df-ac70-00144feab49a.html#axzz17PNuQcFc)
that briefly mentioned a gold standard. It's the sort of thing that gets everyone worrying, and for good reason. "Gold is a signal of no confidence in the currency policies," Zoellick replied, betraying a hint of self-doubt. He advised a successor to the Bretton Woods II agreement, not an international gold standard but neither a rapidly shifting exchange rate like in China. He predicted that there will be flexible currencies with none predominant-- and no longer a dominant dollar -- but he had most faith in the Chinese Renminbi, "which needs to join the club and have an open capital account," he said, so that foreigners can finally invest in their currency.
The Bank President is surely picking up on the Gold Signal, and seeing its troubling signs not only for his job but for America.
"If you have a banking crisis, you'll have a sovereign debt crisis next," he warned. "Either debasing the currency, clipping coins, or inflation!" Both tactics are currently in use, of course, by America's money-maker, the Federal Reserve. His criticism of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke was subtle: "I should be very careful what I say about certain institutions, like the Federal Reserve."

The World Bank Group is diverse, but not a democracy, in that its members' votes don't have equal weight. Zoellick commented that nothing in the WBG's charter requires it to be a democracy or to work with democracies.
One audience member asked, Why does the World Bank Group provide capital to dictatorships, like that of Ethiopia? Doesn't that border on complicity?
Zoellick responded that the needs of humans can still be addressed by World Bank funding & shouldn't be neglected for the sake of politics. He expressed an interest in working with Ethiopia for its leadership in addressing climate change. Many WBG members are not democracies, he noted, but still worth working alongside-- but to what (greenwashed) end?

The US has the greatest voting power among the 187 members (each representing a country) of the International Bank for Reconstruction & Development, one institution in the World Bank Group. The WBG, though a resource for international investment & settlements, is based in Washington, and customarily headed by an American. The International Monetary Fund, which also is based in Washington DC & came out of the historic Bretton Woods conference, is customarily headed by an European. This industrial Western bias has led to controversy over its approach to the Global South, a top-down approach that gives a uniform answer to development and aid while burdening developing countries with top -priority debt.
One question from the audience urgently asked about Structural Adjustment Programs, referring to the process of lending to poor countries with strict conditions for streamlined national economies, insisting on "free markets" that allow foreign companies access to resources.
Zoellick answered that there are no more Structural Adjustment Loans, and that the World Bank Group rather emphasizes Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers. Such plans are intended to be led by the governments of the recipient countries, but they tend to look quite similar to the terms of the Structural Adjustment Loans because the World Bank still advises heavily.
Zoellick spoke of a hip, green, transparent new trend in investing, but however hip it may seem, it will still be top-heavy.

He spoke of an upcoming Post-Conflict Development Group to emerge from WBG's work in Rwanda and Afghanistan, which would join the other complicated institutions in this alphabet soup: ICSID, the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes, IFC, the International Finance Corporation, the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency for insurance, the prerequisite IBRD, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the group for the poorest countries, IDA, the International Development Association.
It all seems very humanitarian at first glance.
"How can we help Africa?" Zoellick asked. He sees the emerging powers of the world as developing countries, some of them ahead of the curve of renewable energy, and wants to bring them in as stakeholders in a typically condescending institution.
"The basic lesson of development, no matter how well-intentioned, is --if the local guy doesn't own it, it's not going to work." He went on to say that "there are not just solutions from the West," but a "common interest" to be heeded.
That common interest, according to Zoellick, is localization and transparency. He said he wants to start a Corruption Hunters group in Washington, with investigators from 132 countries looking into political and financial corruption. "There are not just people who take bribes, but also people who give bribes..."

This won't be the first time Zoellick's long career in finance helpes him dip into politics. With the World Bank, he claims to be uninvolved in politics.
But they say, the business of America is business.
His biography, as distributed at the event, reveals friendly jaunts through the "revolving door":
"From 1985 to 1988, Zoellick served in various positions at the Department of Treasury, including Counselor to Secretary James Baker, Executive Secretary of the Department, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Policy. In August 1992, Zoellick was appointed White House Deputy Chief of Staff and Assistant to President G.H.W. Bush. Mr. Zoellick was also appointed Bush's personal representative for the G7 Economic Summits in 1991 and 1992.

From 1993 to 1997, Zoellick served as an Executive Vice President of Fannie Mae. Zoellick was appointed as the John M. Olin Professor of National Security at the U.S. Naval Academy (1997–98), Research Scholar at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and Senior International Advisor to Goldman Sachs. From 2001 to 2005, Mr. Zoellick served as U.S. Trade Representative and from 2005-2006, he served as Deputy Secretary of State. He then took office as President of the World Bank on July 1, 2007", succeeding a very different President, Paul Wolfowitz.
What's next for the Development Aid Crusade?

The World Bank has proposed to collect climate taxes in the Copenhagen 2009 proposal:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/copenhagen-climate-summit-disarray-danish-text

Meanwhile, as the COP16 met to hash out the details, hundreds of protesters in Cancun demonstrated, upset about the World Bank controlling the global climate fund:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tina-gerhardt/street-heat-actions-in-ca_b_792905.html

World Bank President to address the Global Economy

2010-11-26T11:39:00.000-08:00

Next week, the President of the World Bank will visit Minneapolis to address challenges in the global economy before a large public audience-- free admission.
The World Bank's claim is to work towards a world free of poverty. But time and again, its policies have eased up on the destructive practices of multinational corporations.
Recently, as the Rainforest Action Network and scores of its allies have pressured multinationals like Cargill to stop using palm oil from old rainforests & end deforestation of the rainforests of Indonesia, the World Bank proposed changes to its own palm oil policy.
According to Climate Action's blog of November 22,
"The World Bank’s proposed easing off on its palm oil strategy [of no funding to palm oil companies] has roused relief for corporations worldwide whilst attracting mixed reactions to its plan to finance only firms pursuing green standards....
Robert Zoellick was responsible for freezing World Bank Group funding worldwide in the palm oil sector, pending the social and environmental concerns. It is now his responsibility to ensure safeguards are in place to protect all stakeholders."
Will he go forward with the green standards, & make the right decisions? Come listen & pose your questions this Wednesday:

Challenges Facing Global Economic Development with the President of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick

Wednesday, December 1st, 2010
3:30-5:00 p.m.
Cowles Auditorium, Humphrey Institute
301 19th Avenue South, Minneapolis

From tensions over trade balances and currency valuations to the sharp economic disparities between rich and poor countries, global economic development continues to face enormous challenges. One of the country's most important figures in the global economy, Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, will discuss the current policy response to these challenges. Former Congressman Vin Weber will moderate the discussion.

Robert Zoellick is the current president of the World Bank, a position he has held since July of 2007. Mr. Zoellick has served in various positions throughout his career, including Managing Director of Goldman Sachs, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, and U.S. Trade Representative. From 1985 to 1988, Zoellick served in various positions at the Department of Treasury, including Counselor to Secretary James Baker, Executive Secretary of the Department, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Policy. In August 1992, Zoellick was appointed White House Deputy Chief of Staff and Assistant to the President. Mr. Zoellick was also appointed Bush's personal representative for the G7 Economic Summits in 1991 and 1992.

>From 1993 to 1997, Zoellick served as an Executive Vice President of Fannie Mae. Afterwards, Zoellick was appointed as the John M. Olin Professor of National Security at the U.S. Naval Academy (1997–98), Research Scholar at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and Senior International Advisor to Goldman Sachs. From 2001 to 2005, Mr. Zoellick served as U.S. Trade Representative and from 2005-2006, he served as Deputy Secretary of State. He then took office as President of the World Bank on July 1, 2007. Mr. Zoellick graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Swarthmore College in 1975. He earned a J.D. magna cum laude from the Harvard Law School and a MPP (focusing on public management and international issues, especially economics) from the Kennedy School of Government in 1981. He lived in Hong Kong on a fellowship in 1980.

Vin Weber is a senior fellow at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs. He is also actively involved in the Humphrey Institute Policy Fellows program. He served in Congress from 1981 to 1993, representing Minnesota’s Second Congressional District. He is a partner at Clark & Weinstock, a consulting firm that provides strategic advice to institutions with matters before the legislative and executive branches of the federal government. Prior to opening Clark & Weinstock’s Washington office in 1994, Weber was president – and co-director with Jack Kemp, Jeane Kirkpatrick and Bill Bennett – of Empower America, a public policy advocacy group. From 2001-2010, he served as chairman of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a private, nonprofit organization designed to strengthen democratic institutions around the world through nongovernmental efforts. Weber is a regular commentator on National Public Radio and is often sought as a political analyst for network programs such as CNN’s Capital Gang.

This event is free and open to the public, however, registration is required. Please RSVP at http://robertzoellick.eventbrite.com/.

For parking and directions please go to http://www.hhh.umn.edu/contact/parking.html. To request disability accommodations, please call 612-625-2530 or e-mail cspg@umn.edu.

Stolen Lives Ceremony, One Month Later

2010-11-23T10:54:00.000-08:00

Every October 22, concerned citizens across America march against police brutality & remember the many lives stolen by police shootings, tasers, & chemical weaponry over the years.
Nationally, there have been well over 2000 Stolen Lives in the last 10 years.
This year, Communities United Against Police Brutality led a large group down to the Fifth Precinct Police station in Minneapolis, Minnesota, gaining the support of everyone who drove by and honked, & who stopped and listened as all the names of the Minnesota dead were read aloud.
Victims of fatal police brutality were honored by having their names & life dates placed on the police station steps, like rows of tombstones. Regrettably, several of them were nameless, unidentified homeless people who police killed without documenting them or giving much thought.
The officers inside watched & did nothing; the officers outside watched from their cars and cautiously followed the march of Minneapolitans along blocks parallel to their route.
Since the march last month, the nights have gotten longer, colder and lonelier in Minnesota. Minneapolis police have not responded in any way to the demands of the people-- probably they have their hands full now that the False Reporting on Police Brutality statute has been overturned, & lawsuits are being brought against them by black cops over racism and abuse, as well as by citizens demanding that Police Chief Dolan follow the law and punish abusive officers.
To see the list of those we remember, the victims we speak out for:
See this List & Memorial.

Martial Law Blueprint - Leaked!

2010-11-19T21:50:00.000-08:00

National Level Exercise 2011 docs found on Army Corps fileserver prove upgrade for Secret 'Civil Disturbance Operations CONPLAN 3502' the Master Pentagon Blueprint for RNC/G20 Lockdowns, Policing Disasters & More

By Twin Cities Indymedia — Digital presentations posted on an Army Corps of Engineers server, about military operations in a giant FEMA-simulated earthquake drill called National Level Exercise 2011, inadvertently reveal crucial new info about another 'Secret' Pentagon plan, Northcom CONPLAN 3502, including the “trigger” for domestic military 'Civil Disturbance Operations.' CONPLAN 3502 and CONPLAN 3501, 'Defense Support of Civil Authorities,' are the two main military plans used to design the Pentagon's 'footprint' at National Special Security Events like the 2008 Republican National Convention.

Exactly as the Pennsylvania National Guard took over the G20 protester jail operation, other docs show 'Secret' CONPLAN 3502 specifically plans for military-operated detention and search operations within our country. In context, the new material is the most troubling I have ever discovered, and proves anew that underneath Constitutional limited government, a more brutal martial framework is secretly, constantly, extending its reach. DHS/FEMA doesn't like it at all when NLEs get publicized so check it out right away. Full URLs below.

The Big Break: FEMA NLE Regional Readiness Workshop files (indexed on Google)

The NLE2011 presentations & material show a domestic military command system that's accelerated quite a bit since the 1960s. The new documents are in these directories & URLS - all from a planning meeting in March called the Regional Readiness Workshop (RRW).

Google "USARNORTH CONPLAN 3501" and it should take you directly to http://www.google.com/search?rls=en&q=usarnorth+conplan+3501

...This is the key presentation! https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/RSC/NewMadrid/Document%20Library/1/11.%20FINAL%20ARNORTH_Dovey_NMSZ%20RRW.ppt

You have to 'accept security certificate' i.e. bad encryption, for your browser to connect to it. [I think this is one reason no one has noticed!] The rest of the files can be located at URLS like

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/RSC/NewMadrid/Document%20Library - The whole filestash for the New Madrid Seismic Zone National Level Exercise 2011 Regional Readiness Workshop. This has the index for the other RRW presentations. (All interesting)

The notes in here portray a FEMA & emergency management system in confusion, overall an alarming state of earthquake preparation for a New Madrid Seismic Zone event. The 11th presentation, from US Army North, was apparently never given due to time constraint (See 'After Action Report'). Don't miss the presentation which maps out which fiber optic cables that would snap in a New Madrid epic heartland earthquake!

Presentation #11 is about CONPLAN 3501, the sunny-faced all-sized military program working between FEMA and NORTHCOM to set up joint commands. It's the same plan as the Gulfwater Horizon Joint Command (more below). They put out a happy 400-page DSCA handbook recently to lay out the nice Joint Task Force / Northcom disaster civil support logistics stuff. No riot control gear suggested in 3501. No checkpoints, etc.

But seemingly accidentally, an entirely different intro notes annotation or text was left in the Army's title slide.

Chilling stuff / details below: the notes show incremental updates to the ultimate “bad cop” Northcom mega-plan, CONPLAN 3502, with the apparent approval of US 5th Army Chief of Staff Richard Francey. CONPLAN3502 is the replacement for the post 1960s Army lockdown plan, GARDEN PLOT. So this note gives us a new totally concrete view of the Army's recent 'Changelog' of the same damn plan that's been there all along – yeah, it includes military detention centers for US citizens, other official material proves.

The rest of the URLS worth checking out, besides the RRW folder:

Reference materials here:

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/EmergencyManagement/default.aspx
https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/EmergencyManagement/Shared%20Documents/Forms/DOD%20and%20Army%20Regulations%20and%20Directives.aspx

1994 version of domestic ops (dod 3025.1) manual here, not seen elsewhere?

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/EmergencyManagement/Shared%20Documents/DoD%203025.1M.pdf

Calendar has training events etc :

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/RSC/Lists/Calendar/DispForm.aspx?ID=479&Source=https%3A%2F%2Feportal%2Eusace%2Earmy%2Emil%2Fsites%2FRSC%2FLists%2FCalendar%2FCalendar%20RSC%2Easpx%3FCalendarDate%3D12%252F18%252F2010
https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/RSC/trainingexer/Civil/level1/default.aspx
https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/RSC/trainingexer/Civil/level1/Pages/ConOps.aspx

Some files are like this - in segments, you can get them together with a ZIP app

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/SLS2010/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx?RootFolder=%2Fsites%2FENGLink%2FSLS2010%2FShared%20Documents%2FNYC%20Pres&View=

Check into these folders - they have FEMA reportbacks - the Senior Leadership Seminar 2010:

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/SLS2010/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx?

Local emergency managers freakin out over giga-planfail. For Public Safety concerns this is just grim :

https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/SLS2010/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx?RootFolder=%2fsites%2fENGLink%2fSLS2010%2fShared%20Documents%2fBO1&FolderCTID=
https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/SLS2010/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx?RootFolder=%2fsites%2fENGLink%2fSLS2010%2fShared%20Documents%2fBO3&FolderCTID=
https://eportal.usace.army.mil/sites/ENGLink/SLS2010/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx?RootFolder=%2fsites%2fENGLink%2fSLS2010%2fShared%20Documents%2fBO2&FolderCTID=

I think that covers all the interesting folders.

To understand where CONPLAN 3502 & the new info fits, we have to briefly go back to its roots, back to Kent State and the riots of the 1960s - now these plans are core to the domestic military system's new generation.

Quick History - From GARDEN PLOT & Kent State to (S)ecret 3502, NORTHCOM & More

The US Northern Command, NORTHCOM, near Colorado Springs & the post-Cold War NORAD command center, was set up in 2002 as a Department of Defense counterpart to the Department of Homeland Security. NORTHCOM is a global 'combatant command' with responsibility for all of North America, like CENTCOM handles the Middle East, EUCOM Europe, AFRICOM Africa, etc. (By the way, PACOM, the Pacific Command, has 'CONPLAN 7502' setup for Asian Civil Disturbance Operations - i.e. almost certainly ready-to-go on US bases during the Seoul G20).

CONPLANs are Concept of Operations Plans, basically abstract templates, around 200 to 300 pages long in some cases, which can be turned into OPLANs, specific local operations plans. Other operations like exercises (exercise orders or EXORDs) can be generated from CONPLANs as well. CONPLANs are numbered in sets for each combatant command - NORTHCOM got the 2500s and 3500s, PACOM the 7500s etc.

Before NORTHCOM, the US military labeled its plans differently. The urban riots of the 1960s prompted the blue-ribbon Kerner Commission to recommend a more coherent approach for the military to intervene in domestic emergencies. So the Pentagon secretly drafted and deployed 'GARDEN PLOT,' also known as Plan 55-2.

Four versions of GARDEN PLOT have been released recently via FOIA. (More @ globalsecurity.org) At the US Social Forum this summer, an activist attorney who's been dealing with west coast military ops said to me that they thought GARDEN PLOT was 'just a conspiracy theory' all those years, but of course it turned out to be very real.

GARDEN PLOT laid out the National Guard plan at the Watts Riots, the 1968 Democratic National Convention, the LA Riots and Kent State. Just like 3502, it kept getting revised after every 'lab test' on Americans. It's really the main foundation, and in the 1980s infamous Oliver North-related tests like REX84 and in California, Louis Guifrida's CABLE SPLICER were essentially GARDEN PLOT type exercises, with Pentagon & FEMA-based communications & control.

An early-1990s domestic operations manual was also on USACE server, so it shows the pre-NORTHCOM/DHS way the Pentagon & FEMA were connected.

Once tiny authorities & connections have grown into bureaucracies with thousands of operatives & staff. GARDEN PLOT was last modified in 1996, and in 2002 it was replaced with CONPLAN3502. That's the main idea-what's new here is the latest revision info & the “trigger”.

CONPLAN 3502 = GARDEN PLOT For 21st Century Military Control Ops in America

NORTHCOM has now set a whole series of CONPLANs. One particularly creepy one, CONPLAN 3591, the master plan for Influenza Pandemic operations, (PDF) has already been published but heavily redacted. Skimming 3591 illustrates the deeply spooky and exhaustive nature of CONPLANS – not to mention the bulk, more than 250 pages with many annexes!

CONPLAN 3502 is, at a minimum, the classified (S)ecret NORTHCOM replacement for GARDEN PLOT – this means it replaces the major secret Army domestic crackdown plan of the 20th Century. Careful comparison of all official CONPLAN 3502 references with the GARDEN PLOT editions – dating from the 1960s to 1996 – proves that certain features like “Civil Disturbance Conditions” or CIDCONs are in both. CIDCONs are a stages of readiness for an Army units with Civil Disturbance gear to fly out to US cities. (Like this set of Army gear eerily advertised right now on the Metrodome - a pic from the 2008RNC!)

GARDEN PLOT lists Army staging areas or 'bases' for domestic military operations such as the military fields by the Minneapolis/St Paul International Airport, which is exactly where they staged to crush the Highway 55 Coldwater resistance protest camp in 2002. The 'bases' are key to understanding what turned up.

There they were, already indexed on Google for “NLE 2011” and “USARNORTH CONPLAN 3501” etc - files on the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) server. Inside the NLE2011 Powerpoint slides from US Army North, the 5th Army under NORTHCOM, supposed to just be about CONPLAN 3501, 'Defense Support of Civil Authorities' which includes all big disasters, hurricanes, earthquakes etc.

Instead the title slide's 'notes' or annotation field has a whole bunch of explanation about CONPLAN 3502 including Army revisions and 'base' changes! This must have been accidentally left within the PowerPoint - as almost nothing else references 3502. It proves the 5th Army Chief of Staff is approving refinements to 3502, apparently (by the date) after they deployed it in Pittsburgh.

This proves beyond the shadow of a doubt a Colonel Francey, i.e. Chief of Staff (CofS) Richard Francey of the US 5th Army, influenced the revisions to CONPLAN 3502 - it proves where this thing is getting tweaked.

Why is this here? The military is choked by transmitting all its material in PowerPoints, and soldiers are constantly throwing presentations together from existing slides, so it's no surprise the presentation about approving revisions to CONPLAN 3502 leached into the CONPLAN 3501/NLE2011 Earthquake presentation. According to meeting notes this presentation was never actually given as they ran out of time – the actual National Level Exercise 2011 planning conference process seemed quite messy in execution.

Another major CONPLAN 3502 fact was included to be presented, no less than the “TRIGGER” condition itself. A slide with very pixellated layout (via MS Paint?) shows the “3502 TRIGGER = CDO EXCEDES T32 CAPIBILITIES” [sic]. Civil Disturbance Operations exceed Title 32 Capabilities, it seems likely, a reference to the different sections of US Code delineating domestic military operations authorities.

There it is, one heck of a droid many have been looking for. But let's look for further reference hooks to codes of martial law-like behavior. Turns out there are plenty.

Cross Reference: CONPLAN 3502 Outlining Domestic Searches, Crowd Control & Detention Facilities Match Pittsburgh G20 Terrors

The frightening dimension of what must be contained in the full version of CONPLAN 3502 is indicated by footnotes in a manual for Judge Advocate Generals and military lawyers - Chapter 5 of the Domestic Operational Law Handbook. (PDF 3MB)

The entire JAG manual is frightening, really, for anyone that assures themselves the Posse Comitatus Act really restricts domestic military operations.

A series of footnotes authoritatively point to USNORTHCOM CONPLAN 3502 as containing everything from handling insurance claims to domestic military-controlled detention facilities, and domestic military searches and seizures. Yes, really. (And no one seems to have noticed!)

The same conditions described in JAG manual sections footnoted to CONPLAN 3502 happened in the 2009 G20 Conference in Pittsburgh, in particular military detention operations at the Allegheny County Jail, and fully armored-up riot control style crowd control.

For the rest of the article, see:

http://tc.indymedia.org/2010/nov/tc-indymedia-exclusive-secret-trigger-blueprint-emergency-domestic-military-crackdown-plan-

UPDATE: War Powers addressed at University of St. Thomas Law

2010-10-26T07:18:00.000-07:00

On October 7, students and community members gathered for the Journal of Law and Public Policy Forum on Presidential Powers at University of St. Thomas Law School.
A report from Tackling Torture at the Top and Colleen Rowley:

There was a protester presence the entire day, and two separate rallies during the day. In addition 10 or 11 T3 supporters went in to hear the symposium. Also inside were 30 Delahunty students apparently assigned to come, and around 30 students who looked in or stopped in passing, up in the balcony area.
The symposium was tightly controlled. At the door, attendees were told they couldn't even carry a single flyer in. All questions were handed in and only one question from T3 was selected (that only happened because of T3 insistence).
There were five speakers arguing that presidential powers override all other branches of government and one speaker opposed, but she was not given an opportunity to debate the other speakers. Three were solidly pro-presidential powers (Yoo, Delahunty, and Stokes-Paulsen), while one (Amar) claimed to be a proponent of “Unitary Executive” but only spoke on the President’s power to fire agency heads. He disagreed on some details with his former student, John Yoo. Amar was also one who admitted the war on terror is PERMANENT.
And then Kitrosser argued, in her separate half-hour, for some restraints on illegal actions of a President, while Schultz seemed to be against the extreme ramifications of the theory of presidential power. He confined his remarks to the political analysis of how Obama had not departed from Bush’s stances and therefore had not played to his own base of support which in Schultz’s view was not going to serve him well in the upcoming elections.
The issue of torture was not specifically mentioned in relation to executive branch power.

Do We have the Worst Police in the Midwest?

2010-10-12T07:50:00.001-07:00

Does Minneapolis have the Worst police in the Midwest? What are the problems that the community can address without the police? When do we need them? What are they doing right?
Come discuss these issues, crucial to our community, at Walker Community Church on the evening of Thursday, October 14.
There's a lot more to do than discuss-- the small organization Communities United Against Police Brutality has successfully filed suits against the city before, changed ordinances, shamed officers, and mobilized community members for Cop Watch and much more. Find out how you can get involved, this Thursday!

Yoo & Delahunty to face the University of St. Thomas community

2010-10-03T17:59:00.000-07:00

Journal of Law and Public Policy Forum on presidential powers to take place at University of St. Thomas Law, October 7 2010.
John Yoo, and Prof. Robert Delahunty, former lawyers for the Bush administration's Office of Legal Counsel, will be there as advocates for strong presidential powers. Heidi Kittrosser from the University of Minnesota and Akhil Amar of Yale University – one of this country’s leading law professors -- will support the position for limiting presidential powers. It should be a robust debate.

Anti-torture advocates like Tackling Torture at the Top will be there before the arrival of the registrants to the symposium with orange ribbons, flyers, and banners. People will boycott, people will attend, people will demonstrate outside & raise awareness, others will listen to the speakers and hopefully submit questions. There are speakers that do not support Yoo/Delahunty and there are other speakers that need to answer some pertinent questions.

At the lunch hour, 11:30 -12:30, and at 4:00, there will be demonstrations on the sidewalk outside the building. Everyone could wear an orange ribbon for torture awareness.

John Yoo speaks at 2:15 for 45 minutes. Some people may shun him by leaving the room, or standing
with their backs to him, or may choose to confront him with questions, or a sign. It is not choreographed.
Robert Delahunty is on the panel but not given a time to present an argument.

We need everyone, every body, every mind, to protest the presence of John Yoo and Robert Delahunty. Everyone is welcome to participate in demonstrating our disgust for Robert Delahunty and John Yoo's misuse of the law giving way to the crime of torture. And we believe that accountability is the only way that we can stop this despicable crime.

The use of enhanced presidential powers in time of war would allow the president to negate the laws and treaties that would protect the prisoners from abuse and torture. This is what happened by the memos written by John Yoo and Robert Delahunty. This goes against our laws and our morals. It would be good for UST to refresh their memory to their mission statement at the Law School:
The University of St. Thomas School of Law, as a Catholic law school, is dedicated to integrating faith and reason in the search for truth through a focus on morality and social justice.

On the same day, a different university in nearby St. Paul is making quite a different point of human rights issues.

My Sister's and Brother's Keeper?

Human Rights in the Era of Globalization

This year's theme of the 2010 Macalester International Roundtable is "My Sister's and Brother's Keeper?: Human Rights in the Era of Globalization."
The Macalester International Roundtable will take place on October 7, 8, & 9, 2010 at Macalester College 1600 Grand Avenue St. Paul, Minnesota
All sessions will be held in the John B. Davis Lecture Hall.

The discussions will revolve around such questions as:
What are the main human rights concerns of the 21st century?
What are the primary forces (and contexts) responsible for these issues, and why?
In what specific ways could human rights be advanced, and by whom?

Free and open to the public.

Community Response to FBI Raids across the Nation

2010-09-26T20:48:00.000-07:00

Statement of Solidarity with Activists Raided and Subpoenaed on 9/24/10

The raids and grand jury subpoenas against antiwar and international solidarity activists on the morning of Friday, September 24, 2010 are not just an attack on particular activists, but on our movements for social justice as a whole. With a united voice, we condemn this repression; we demand the federal government cease its investigation and withdraw the subpoenas immediately; and we vow to continue our work for true justice.

We reject the allegation that the government's investigation into our movements is based on "material support for terrorism" in any form. This allegation is particularly ludicrous considering the terror tactics the U.S. government engages in on a daily basis, both globally and domestically. Aimed against valued members of our community, the raids against activists on Friday morning were particularly offensive to us. However, we recognize that they are unexceptional instances of repression when compared to the daily crimes against humanity carried out by U.S. imperialism.

We refuse to let the accusations of a notoriously untruthful, repressive government divide us in any way. Because an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us, we resolve to set any ideological or other political differences aside and respond in solidarity with one another. Our struggle will continue.

Signed,

Becca at the Persistent Press

and-- you!

If you would like to add your name and/or organization to this list, please email ActivismIsNotTerrorism@gmail.com

Complicit in Torture: University of St. Thomas defends its star Law Professor

2010-09-06T18:26:00.000-07:00

Law students headed to class Monday morning at the University of St. Thomas School of Torture-- so called by anti-torture activists waiting outside.

At 10:30 am on August 30, Professor Robert Delahunty taught his first class of the school year at the School of Law, but not without facing the protesters on his way to work. An activist group called Tackling Torture at the Top was there to educate the public about Delahunty's role in the Bush administration, paving the way for CIA and military torture as a tool against terrorists.

See video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_rwq6-Pc8Y

Delahunty, as a member of the Office of Legal Counsel, wrote legal memos supporting presidential war powers under the Constitution is a higher law than any treaty, intimating that the president can use his Constitutional war powers to override treaties.
"As the Nation's representative in foreign affairs, the President has a variety of constitutional powers with respect to treaties, including the powers to suspend them, withhold performance of them, contravene them or terminate them."

-Yoo and Delahunty, Application of Treaties and Laws to al Qaeda and Taliban Detainees.

His legal opinion denies that the Geneva Conventions apply to non-state actors or enemy combatants. His legal memos built upon other legal decisions and memos, and they in turn were expanded upon by the John Yoo/Jay Bybee legal memos. Those explicitly permitted torture and water-boarding by redefining torture as anything that pushes the body to organ failure or death.

For a physical act to constitute torture, "It must be of an intensity akin to that which accompanies serious physical injury such as death or organ failure."
-Bybee, Standards of Conduct for Interrogation under 18 USC SS 2340-2340A
After the Obama administration released the "torture memos" for the world to see in April 2009, anti-torture activists and law students alike read them in horror. Thousands of Americans pressed Attorney General Eric Holder to prosecute the officials who allowed for torture, through petitions, calls and demonstrations. However, the Obama administration would not go forward with prosecutions, claiming that they had to "look forward" and not back.

As the T3 activists waved their flags outside the law school, they talked to several passers-by who expressed their familiarity with the torture memos.

The activists have brought their concerns to Delahunty as well as to the University of St. Thomas' Law School Dean Mengler and its Board of Governors.

Delahunty went by without comment, today as usual, but the Board of Governors did respond to the group's complaints and letters and protests of the past few years. Last week, the Chair of the University Law School's Board of Governors, Laurence Fl LeJeune, wrote to the group with full awareness of the controversy around Delahunty, and in full support of him as a law professor at this Catholic, ethics-centered University.

Mr. LeJeune noted that they have been very well advised by Dean Dr. Mengler and others of the facts about Delahunty and they are very satisfied with him as an employee. As has been noted by Dean Mengler, they feel that Delahunty has served "four presidential administrations, and other institutions with distinction. His impressive academic and professional record can be found on the School of Law website.” He noted too how "the graduating class of 2010 selected Professor Delahunty as its Professor of the Year - for his excellence as a teacher and scholar, and for the many ways in which he works with and supports our students."

Individuals on the Law School Board of Trustees have also been contacted. Neither the Board of Governors nor the Board of Trustees will meet with T3. These individuals influence not only the University but the larger community and economy as well: among the highest paid CEO's in Minnesota in 2008 were two UST Board of Trustees members. The Star Tribune then listed Stephen Hemsley of United Health Group as 5th highest paid, and George Buckley of 3M as 13th highest paid.

Natl. Park Service Cracks Down on ColdWater Spring Use

2010-06-19T15:02:00.000-07:00

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - Prepare for the enforcement of permits in the area of ColdWater Spring in Minneapolis, like never before.

For years the land surrounding the historic and sacred Cold Water Spring and well house has sat idly. Cold War-era research facilities of the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Mines as well as old FEMA offices have been abandoned, broken into, and boarded up time and time again.

The land used to be guarded by a barbed wire fence and gate that closed at night. In 2008, the spring and the nearby field were occupied by Mendota Dakota people and the American Indian Movement, who boldly claimed native sovereignty of the land during the dark days of the Republican National Convention that was hosted in St. Paul. They set up teepees and a sweat lodge; law enforcement tore them down; the occupying activists set them up again. In the end, they won 24-hour access for all-- the gates to the land came down.

(see press conference, interviews: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/09/05/18533493.php)

In January 2010, the land was transferred to the National Park Service from the federal Dept. of the Interior.

Steve Johnson works at the National Park Service office in St. Paul. He's the one you see for a free permit to use part of the land for events, or building or placing something there. The need for such permits has not been strictly enforced until this month of June-- after local movements raised the issue of sovereignty again with the Take Down Fort Snelling rallies of May 29 and 30, 2010.

(see some clips: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdFYRuZD4js)

At an informal meeting last week, Johnson said that the Park Service wanted to give the land to the city of Minneapolis, but they didn't want it. They wanted to give it to the Mendota people, but their tribe isn't recognized by the US, and all government entities have to make transactions with government-recognized entities. According to Johnson, other tribes, like the Shakopee, wanted the land but the Park Service didn't want to play favorites amid such deep factionalism.

According to George Spears of First Nations United, the Park Service has been invited to meetings around the fire by Cold Water Spring, multiple times. Mendota Dakota people and First Nations United meet at the spring every other Sunday at 5 pm, for a brief council. They want to work out something with the Park Service so it would recognize the land as sacred; something similar to the Park Service's deal with native people over Bear Butte. However, no Park Service representatives have showed up to these ongoing council meetings.

In these last weeks of June, the Park Service is clearing brush and buckthorn from the land and seeks volunteers.

Paul Labovitz, National Park Service superintendent of the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area (MNRRA), wrote that the earliest the run-down buildings could be removed is spring of 2011.

Speaking out about El Salvador; New documentary slated for this summer

2010-06-19T14:47:00.000-07:00

MINNEAPOLIS, SATURDAY JUNE 12 – “One of my three addictions is El Salvador,”

Said Wayne Wittman, to those gathered at the Resource Center of the Americas to commemorate the life of Archbishop Romero. Wittman, Steve Boyer and Duane Krohnke spoke about their many visits to El Salvador in delegations with Augsburg College Center for Global Education, Peter Yarrow, Veterans for Peace, Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, and others.

Their most recent visit brought them to the massive marches commemorating the 30^th anniversary of the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero, on March 24, 2010. Romero was one of the world’s great champions for the poor and oppressed, constantly speaking out against violence until 1980, when he was shot in the chest at the conclusion of Mass.

The American visitors to El Salvador saw "Monseñor: The Last Days of Oscar Romero” at its world premiere in El Salvador, and this summer the documentary about his life will be released in the U.S.

Many who gathered had visited El Salvador and shared insight on the causes of conditions there, including poverty, crime, & the impunity of war criminals, as well as the responsibility that Americans have—

to stop our military aid to Central America, change America’s policies of aggressive free trade, and shift immigration issues into the light of macro-economic crises rather than that of individual morality.

The U.S.’ Involvement in El Salvador

The US has been involved in El Salvador’s affairs at least since Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, when Roosevelt reached out to Central America with a paternal attitude.

What the US accomplished by military force in the past, it now attempts to accomplish through trade agreements like CAFTA, the Central America Free Trade Agreement.

Before 1980, the US used Low Intensity Conflict to protect its interests (corporations) in Central America. Oscar Romero was one of few in the Catholic Church who spoke out against Low Intensity Conflict strategies used in El Salvador: torture, rape, and cycles of indiscriminate assassinations & selective assassinations.

According to the 1989 volume War Against the Poor,

“US low-intensity conflict strategy in El Salvador utilized generalized terror against civilians in order to sow fear and shape the collective memory of the people. It was hoped that once terrorized the people could be intimidated into silence with lesser amounts of violence, that is, through selective terror. If over time selective terror proved an insufficient deterrent to the 'crimes of the poor,' then violence escalated accordingly.”

Between 1980 and 1992, the Salvadoran Civil war was fought in the context of the global Cold War, with Cuba and the USSR backing the Marxist-Leninist rebels and the United States backing the right wing military Salvadoran government. It was not just a proxy war of superpowers, but also an economic & psychological war against poor people's movements & their ability to organize from the bottom up.

The military fought the rebels with American guns and helicopters, paid itself with American aid money, and sent its officers to the School of the Americas in the state of Georgia, where they graduated with degrees in torture, assassination, mass murder and mass intimidation. Every November Americans protest this training at the School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia—though now the School is renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

In 2004, Vice President Dick Cheney remarked that El Salvador was our model of democracy. His ominous remark hung over the debate at the Resource Center of the Americas like a shadow. How many more countries will we spread democracy to, if democracy looks like civil war, impunity, kidnappings, and the endless intimidation of civilians?

This sort of democracy came to Nicarague as well as El Salvador, where Father Miguel D’Escoto told Minnesotan Professor Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, years ago,

“A nation that wages war against the poor in Nicaragua will ignore the needs of its own poor. A country which in the name of ‘democracy’ fights wars against the self-determination of other peoples cannot remain a democracy. I have felt for a long time that the U.S. people will one day be the most repressed in the world.”

(War Against the Poor, Nelson-Pallmeyer, 1989)

President Mauricio Funes

On March 15, 2009, Mauricio Funes, a television journalist, became the first president from the FMLN party. Like President Obama, he is a center-left politician who decided to resume relations with Cuba in 2009. Also like Obama, his platform was transparency and revealing the corruption of past governments, but his popularity has declined throughout his first year in office.

Those marching on March 24 demanded an investigation of Romero’s death, the end of impunity, and refusal of amnesty to the perpetrators of the massacre, though many of them are dead.

First Recognition of Romero by Salvadoran Government

Today a mural with images of Romero hangs in the departure zone of the San Salvador International Airport. It was the government’s first recognition of Romero’s assassination as a tragedy. When his life was commemorated this year, the government recognized him as the country’s Spiritual Guide.

Roberto D’Aubuisson

The speakers' delegation passed a notable statue in San Salvador: a monument to Roberto D’Aubuisson, unmarked but for a plaque in remembrance of D’Aubuisson's son. Roberto D’Aubuisson founded the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA), which he led from 1978 to 1985. He was behind the paramilitary death squads and ordered the assassination of Archbishop Óscar Romero in 1980.

They saw a demonstration against D’Aubuisson at the monument, and a counter-demonstration. They saw a man in black spray-painting swastikas and epithets on the sidewalk near the monument; police stood by and later cleaned up the spray paint. The delegates noticed that police tended to avoid confrontation in the open.

The US embassy recognizes this as a culture of impunity. The embassy told the delegates that only 5% of common crimes result in convictions in El Salvador, corruption and impunity prevail, and there is a greater fear of crime in cities now than there was fear in the countryside during the Civil War.

CAFTA

The speakers spoke about the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by CAFTA when they projected their photos of shanty towns and cardboard homes in El Salvador.

The Central American Free Trade Agreement is a force of globalization acting on not only the imports & exports of economies, but the farms, villages, and towns of Latin America. It frees the flow of capital from country to country, but restricts the flow of people. Foreign companies are free to set up shop in countries where they can use up the natural resources, offer goods at prices that kill local competition, and bust unions mercilessly. When governments try to impose regulations for environmental protection or worker safety, they are often hindered by the free trade agreements, and multinational corporations can actually sue them for denying their rights to invest however they like.

Liberation Theology

Brazilian Archbishop Dom Helder Camara once said that when he gave food to the poor they called him a saint, but when he asked why people were poor they called him a communist. This association with communism is the main accusation made against Romero's sort of liberation theology, which still divides religious people in El Salvador.

The American delegates who spoke had noticed a sharp struggle between the rich, powerful, and very real Opus Dei and liberation theology. One encourages bodily suffering and endurance of suffering on earth for the rewards in heaven; the other wants to end the suffering of the poor.

Upcoming Trips to El Salvador

Americans continue to visit El Salvador to learn Spanish, listen and join in solidarity with people's movements. Minneapolis' Holy Trinity Lutheran Church is taking a delegation there this summer, and the Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad is taking a special delegation there in November.

http://www.cis-elsalvador.org/

Gold Mining Controversy

The American delegates learned of a fight over potential gold mining in the Department of Cabanas. The Canadian mining company Pacific Rim opposes El Salvador's ban on gold mining for environmental reasons. Pacific Rim is prospecting for what it calls the El Dorado Project.

Three anti-mining activists from the Cabanas Environment Committee have already been killed in 2009: Gustavo Marcelo Rivera, Ramiro Rivera, and Dora Alicia Recinos Sorto. Their murders fit the pattern of Low Intensity Conflict: mysterious, unidentified killers go after the opponents of the Church, the government and foreign companies, then the government says that guerrilla fighters are responsible and denounces their terrorist tactics.

Journalists and staff of the independent Radio Victoria have also received death threats for their coverage of this controversy in Victoria, Cabanas.

RECOMMENDED ACTION:

Send appeals to authorities:
calling on them to order a prompt, full and independent investigation into the threats against Radio Victoria staff, and the recent killing of Ramiro Rivera and Dora Alicia Recinos Sorto, environmental activists in Cabañas department, and to bring those responsible to justice
requesting that they ensure that full protection is provided to all Radio Victoria staff and volunteers, and to members of the Cabañas Environment Committee and their relatives who have received threats

APPEALS TO:

Presidente Mauricio Funes
(President)
Casa Presidencial
Alameda Dr. Manuel Enrique Araujo, No. 5500
San Salvador, El Salvador
Fax: +503 2243 9947

Fiscal General
(Attorney General)
Fiscalía General de la República
Final 4a Calle Oriente y 19a Avenida Sur, Residencial Primavera
Santa Tecla, La Libertad
San Salvador, El Salvador
Fax : +503 2523 7170
E-mail: astor.escalante@fgr.gob.sv
E-mail: cc: radelgado@fgr.gob.sv

Comisionado Carlos Asencio Girón
Director de la Policía Nacional Civil
(National Police Director)
Policía Nacional Civil
6ta. Calle Oriente entre 8va y 10ma
Ave. Sur, # 42 Barrio La Vega
San Salvador, El Salvador
E-mail: carlosascencio@pnc.gob.sv

Please send copies and messages of support to:

Radio Victoria
Av. José Matias Delgado #47
Victoria, Cabañas, El Salvador, C.A.
E-mail: radiovictoriapopular@yahoo.es

Peter Erlinder Jailed for Helping Rwandan Opposition

2010-06-12T13:31:00.000-07:00

KIGALI, RWANDA – As President Paul Kagame’s regime faces elections,
as well as the International Criminal Tribunal proceedings about the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, his administration has jailed opposition leaders and used other repressive tactics.
Things are heating up in Rwanda, and they’re starting to in St. Paul as well, where concerned Americans are pushing back.
St. Paul’s Peter Erlinder, law professor at William Mitchell Law School, long time human rights lawyer and Lead Defense Counsel for the International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda,
was arrested by Rwandan Authorities the morning of Friday, May 28.

Background

Erlinder had traveled to Rwanda's capital, Kigali, on May 23 to join the defense team of Rwandan presidential candidate Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza. Umuhoza was jailed in April, and released on bail one day later. According to Erlinder, her lawyer, “Ingabire was arrested on trumped-up, political thought-crimes, including: association with a terrorist group, propagating the genocide ideology, genocide denial, revisionism and divisionism, all arising from the “crime” of publicly objecting to the Kagame military dictatorship, and Kagame’s version of the Rwandan history.“
Erlinder is being held in a Rwandan prison and was recently denied bail. He is reportedly being interrogated at the Rwandan Police Force's Kacyiru headquarters.
In the run-up to the national election, the administration of President Kagame has engaged in increasing repressive tactics including shutting down independent media and jailing opposition candidates and their supporters under a vague charge of "genocide ideology" ¬the same charge Professor Erlinder is now accused of.
The Genocide Ideology Law is vaguely worded, requires no link to any genocidal act, and can be used to criminalize a wide range of legitimate forms of expression. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and even the U.S. State Department have denounced it as a tool of political repression. The Kagame administration has used it widely to target political opponents.
The Obama administration has done little to address Professor Erlinder's situation. This is because the US backs the Kagame regime.
According to The Guardian, Erlinder’s arrest prompted other defense lawyers at the UN tribunal to refuse to participate in proceedings.

In a joint statement to the court and the UN security council, seen by the Guardian, more than 30 defense lawyers said they fear for their own safety, demanding Erlinder's release.
"We hereby resolve to postpone all activities, other than those which strictly conserve the interests of our mandates, until such time as the minimum conditions or the normal exercise of our missions have been restored by the removal of threats," the statement says. "[We are] aware of the dangers which immediately and directly threaten most of our number."

The People Push Back

Sarah Erlinder, Arizona attorney and NLG member said, "My father has made a career defending unpopular people and unpopular speech -- and is now being held because of his representation of unpopular clients and analysis of an historical narrative that the Kagame regime considers inconvenient. We can help defend his rights now by drawing U.S. government and media attention to his situation and holding the Rwandan government accountable for his well-being."
On the evening of Tuesday, June 8, Minneapolis groups rallied in support of Peter Erlinder, at the Federal Building behind Minneapolis City Hall. Communities United Against Police Brutality and Women Against Military Madness brought their message to the people downtown and the government workers as they were leaving work for the day. St. Paul supports are now planning a benefit event for Peter Elinder. They’ll meet on Sunday, June 13 at 1:00pm, in Room 105 at Hamline University School of Law, 1536 Hewitt Avenue, Saint Paul.

Though local universities don’t want to touch the issue, several organizations want to hold an event to raise awareness of Peter’s arrest, the role of defense attorneys, or a benefit to raise money for his defense. Representative Betty McCollum responded to pressure and introduced a bill in the House calling for the Government of Rwanda to release Peter Erlinder. Representative Keith Ellison has agreed to co-sponsor the bill. According, to Minnesota Public Radio, McCollum said the Rwandan embassy in Washington D.C. hasn't responded to repeated inquiries from her office. She said that pattern could eventually jeopardize the partnership between the two countries.
Only two representatives have commented on voting for House Resolution 1426.
Minnesotans continue calling their Congressmen and Secratary of State Hilary Clinton. This is not a local issue but a State Department issue. When an aide answered the phone this week, they said, "Minnesota? You must be calling about Peter Erlinder!"

Call and demand the immediate release of Professor Peter Erlinder:

Senator Al Franken
(202) 224-5641
Or send an email at franken.senate.gov/contact/

Senator Amy Klobuchar
202-224-3244
Or send an email at klobuchar.senate.gov/emailamy.cfm

Representative Keith Ellison
202-225-4755
Or send an email at forms.house.gov/ellison/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm

Representative Betty McCullom
(202) 225-6631
Or send an email at
forms.house.gov/mccollum/webforms/issue_subscribe.htm

Write to: publicaffairs@panet.us.state.gov

---Many thanks for the contributions of National Lawyers’ Guild Minnesota, Women Against Military Madness, The International Humanitarian Law Institute & Communities United Against Police Brutality to this article & cause. ---

May 29 Marches to Take Down the Fort

2010-06-03T15:27:00.000-07:00

On May 29 and 30, protesters gathered outside historic Fort Snelling by Minneapolis, Minnesota. They protested the state & the maintenance of the Fort by the state, entering the grounds without paying the admission fee, by invitation from Dakota activists who passed freely by their rights under the Treaty of 1805.
Please read more about this long-running campaign at
http://www.takedownthefort.com/

Here I present the reflections of an observer.

There is a cycle to oppression and resistance. A cycle of give and take.
The cycle is like the oscillations of sound waves when people chant, sing, and pray together.
If it is steady, it has an effect; if the singers are disciplined, their song will grow and resound; if resistance continues no matter what sets it back, it will influence the whole world. Though oppression has been normalized, resistance is a part of all of us too; it speaks to each of us with relevance too.
It speaks even louder than fear to the wild core of our souls. It speaks with actions, and here I meekly summarize with words the way of human determination that will win back the world.
We will win because we must. Because the ecosystems must be restored, we must win back the planet with paradigms of Mother rather than of Lord.
he environment demands equilibrium again. This doesn’t come easy in the city, but suddenly the heat of the day is breezy as Dakota people gather and pray.
There was a prayer in the parking lot of St. Peter’s Church, before a group of Minnesota’s indigenous activists took up their signs and their staff, before they marched in a line over Mendota Bridge.
There was a prayer and a song that lifted their spirits and thanked Wakan Tanka for the day and their lives.
It was always said that Native American spirituality is incorporated in every aspect of life, like tobacco smoke permeating the smells of labor and cooking and cars and clothes.
It’s still true. Ceremonies and spirituality are still as important to culture as water is to the trees.
Yet I find myself in a culture somewhat drained, among the white American Left, a spectrum of people who shed religious and spiritual heritages, teachings, and hierarchies, like a porcupine sheds quills.
That is to say, we carry around both emotional baggage and spiritual confusion, though we don’t see it; when we feel threatened we do see it as our quills stand up, our baggage is apparent, and we throw off the spiritual and emotional inklings we carry like weapons against attackers. Our critiques of the spiritual and metaphysical are sharp and stinging.
The Left believes in hard work for justice, and when it sees neighbors pause to pray, it asks where divine justice was when we needed it.
Where was the Creator during the American genocide? Where was the Savior throughout over 500 years of colonization of the African and American continents? Where were the Spirits during China’s Great Leap Forward?
The refrain goes, ‘No, no, it’s not enough to pray. There’s a lot of work to do before justice has its day.’
So many arguments flit back and forth over this issue, which appeal to critical thinkers on an intellectual level but often surface because of the deep wounds where we stung ourselves.
The anarchist, anti-theist arguments drift away as smoke billows over the heads of activists and lifts up their prayers.
Today, May 29, 2010, a hot parking lot filled up with intention and power as indigenous people and allies came together: intentions to set things right, to remember injustices of the past, to let nature take its course with Fort Snelling.
The old military post at the confluence of Mississippi and Minnesota crumbles; large white families pour in for opening day of tourist season; the legislature allocates money to the Minnesota Historical Society for renovation and restoration of a most violent racist period.
Today white children picnicked in the shade of the Visitor Parking Lot with George Washington stickers on their T-shirts-- and observed native children carrying banners and clapping and shouting along with Dr. Waziyatawin
at the megaphone, in the shade outside the Fort.
Wandering white adults enjoyed Memorial Day weekend with a cigarette atop the Fort’s reinforced rotunda, looking down over the cheering and chanting brown people who came to meet them. Their stickers bearing dead presidents showed their casual monetary support for the Fort that was once the military’s defense of traders and settlers, against the Dakota people in its concentration camp downhill.
Tax-payer funding was challenged and, in a way, so was the entire consumer routine of our lives. Why continue rebuilding this model of the original foundation of Statehood? So that future generations can reenact settler life in elementary school, reenact the Civil War in middle school, tour Cold War sites in high school, and then enlist against the War on Terror??
Someone waved a sign that read, ‘They don’t have reenactments at Auschwitz.’
I’ve been to Auschwitz.
Rather than historical reenactments, I saw the words of Churchill greeting tourists: “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
In that way, history too has a wavelength. History is a turning oscillation of similar events. Only by learning—by Consciousness – do we get to higher planes called the future.
It takes discipline to learn, to open your mind, to change the song sung by the generations, in the same way it takes discipline to chant, to sweat, to endure these afternoons with messages for the masses while staying on your toes between barricading Sheriff cars and plain-clothes police.
How will Mnisota’s wheel turn now?
Will the big wheel of fear turn and grind us down, or will we switch gears like equal peers, leaving behind the racist fears?
Latinos and allies met the native marchers at the Fort to protest all the steps backward our nation takes. The Arizonan law against illegal immigration, SB1070, was heavy on the hearts of those who walked from Immigrations and Customs Enforcement building to Fort Snelling.
As speakers related at the megaphone, already their friends and family down south were being harassed & pulled over by cops in the state where brown skin is probable cause for suspicion of illegal immigration. The northern blue states would not be immune to this case of racial profiling; in the past legislative session a similar law was proposed for Mnisota. It had just a few sponsors—Congress people who we will not vote for again—but next year it will be reintroduced as if it made sense.
How will the wheel turn? When will we find the frequency of harmony and peace?
Maybe it can’t be found in this world of well-funded violence and state-supported ignorance—but it can be created by people, powerhouses of conscious energy that we are.
The sacred staff touched the Fort’s stone wall. The cheers rose up for one and all. People harmonized in solidarity: Dakota people, SEIU, MIRAC, First Nations United, and CUAPB. The chants grew louder:
‘Take Down the Fort!’
By their rights native people entered, presented the treaty of 1805, and invited everyone gathered to invade the Fort and educate from inside.
Within the visitor center and ‘historic’ re-creation, no marker mentions the imprisonment of displaced native people or the hanging of leaders.
With history preserved in a supposed moral vacuum, with costumed actors firing canons every day on site, dark days are ahead in the land of the free and the home of the hidden mass graves.
In spite of it all, these people standing up for their rights have an attitude of gratitude towards the spirits they thank. It sounds so cliché, but it’s what we need to have strength to fight another day:
an attitude of gratitude, humility, disciplined persistent positivity.
That’s how we can influence history’s waves so that they do indeed arc towards justice in the end.

Torture and Minnesota's Congressmen

2010-05-30T18:43:00.001-07:00

This letter comes from the hearts of anti-torture activists in T3, or Tackling Torture at the Top. Let's hope our Congressmen hear & act!

Dear Senators Klobuchar and Franken, Representatives Ellison and McCollum:

We are a group of people who met with a staff member of each of your offices between January 5, 2010, and April 2, 2010. Most of us attended more than one of these meetings. Our concern is torture and torture accountability. With three of you, we specifically addressed the issue of investigations of credible claims of torture committed in our names and under color of law since September 11, 2001. We are concerned with investigating, and if necessary prosecuting, not only perpetrators but also those who ordered, authorized, "legalized" or conspired to commit acts of torture. At the fourth meeting, our focus was on military commissions, a "Truth Commission," and raising the torture issue in a public manner, but the issue of prosecutions was also discussed. So far the response from the four of you has been uniform.

Silence.

We are aware of Congressman Ellison's participation in the "Reckoning With Torture" program at Georgetown Law School, where he read from recently released documents on torture, as well as his House Judiciary Committee questioning of John Yoo on the definition of "implement." We also are aware of Senator Franken's raising the issue of regulatory versus treaty standards for rendition at a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on the implementation of human rights treaties. But none of you has been at all visible in calling for holding accountable those who violated our most fundamental values, our treaty obligations, and several federal statutes.

June has been designated by the United Nations as "Torture Awareness Month." With that in mind:

ARE YOU AWARE that the statute of limitations applicable to the Federal Torture Statute is eight years? We began what Major General Antonio Taguba called our "systematic regime of torture" eight years ago.

ARE YOU AWARE that since 9/11, up to 100 detainees have died in our custody from other than battlefield wounds, suicides, or natural causes? The precise number is not known because our government has ceased releasing the data.

ARE YOU AWARE that secret places of detention are being discovered to this day? One at Bagram and another at Guantanamo have just recently been revealed.

ARE YOU AWARE that we rendition people to countries that we describe in our own State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices as having systematically violated the human rights of people held in its prisons? We say we're getting "diplomatic assurances" that torture will not occur. The Convention Against Torture, ratified by the United States Senate in 1994, includes nothing about "diplomatic assurances" in its prohibition against rendition.

ARE YOU AWARE that the Convention Against Torture, in Article 2, says: "No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture"? Yet we have heard from several government officials, e.g., Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, and John Yoo, that we have to understand the times. After all, we had just been attacked.

ARE YOU AWARE that President George W. Bush advocated greater accountability than President Obama advocates with respect to torture? On June 26, 2004, the U.N.'s International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, President Bush issued a statement that included the following: "America stands against and will not tolerate torture. We will investigate and prosecute all acts of torture and undertake to prevent other cruel and unusual punishment in all territory under our jurisdiction." In looking forward, President Obama has taken a step backwards.

ARE YOU AWARE that Article 14 of the Convention Against Torture says: "Each State Party shall ensure in its legal system that the victim of an act of torture obtains redress and has an enforceable right to fair and adequate compensation"? Yet our Justice Department continually argues in court against such redress, invoking state sovereignty and state secrets doctrines.

ARE YOU AWARE that judges, inspectors general, general counsel of the military branches, Pentagon investigators, and F.B.I. interrogators have all said that we have tortured human beings in our custody?

ARE YOU AWARE that the Convention Against Torture, in Article 12, says: "Each State Party shall ensure that its competent authorities proceed to a prompt and impartial investigation, wherever there is reasonable ground to believe that an act of torture has been committed in any territory under its jurisdiction"? Yet President Obama wants to investigate only those who exceeded the standards prescribed by the faulty OLC memos.

ARE YOU AWARE that since the Federal Torture Statute was passed in 1994, only one person has ever been charged and convicted under it? And that was for torture committed for the government of Liberia. His name was Chuckie Taylor, he was the son of the President of Liberia, Charles Taylor, and he tortured people as part of that country's Anti-Terrorism Unit. Torture justified as anti-terrorist. Does that sound familiar?

In our meetings with your staff members, we heard about taking the lead from President Obama, lack of seniority, and a lack of political will in Washington to deal with this issue. We reject these as reasons for inaction. First, we all learned in elementary school that the checks and balances embodied in our Constitution ensure that no one branch exceeds its power. The role of Congress is not simply to ratify executive branch decisions. Second, Hubert Humphrey in his 1948 civil rights speech defied Democratic Party leadership before he was even elected to the Senate. Third, our most courageous leaders have created, not followed, the political will. Hubert Humphrey on civil rights, Eugene McCarthy on the War in Southeast Asia, and Paul Wellstone on the invasion of Iraq were at their best when they opposed the political will in Washington, not succumbed to it.

For one of you to come out and take a leadership role -- if you will, a prophetic role -- on torture accountability might not be politically wise. It is not a unifying issue. You all are politicians, but this isn't about politics. We are asking you to be statesmen and stateswomen. This issue is literally about the soul of our country. Nothing could be more important.

Only recently did we apologize to and compensate those Japanese-Americans we had shamefully incarcerated a half century earlier. Fifty years from now, people will surely ask: "In the time when America tortured people, where was Senator Klobuchar? Where was Senator Franken? Where was Representative Ellison? Where was Representative McCollum? Were they not aware of what was happening?"

Silence.

Rally Friday + Update on the Foreclosure Five

2010-04-07T07:03:00.000-07:00

Stop Foreclosures!
Justice for Michael Kidd!

On Friday, April 9, 4:30 p.m., friends, neighbors and other supporters will join the Minnesota Coalition for a People's Bailout at the home of Michel Kidd, 1321 23rd Ave North, in Minneapolis.

Mr. Kidd has been fighting to keep his home for over a year. He has had enough of the mortgage servicer, Aurora Financial, stalling, changing terms, 'forgetting' about past agreements and items faxed and mailed several times and apparently refusing to negotiate in good faith.

Mr. Kidd is an independent trucker. In 2004 he put down $45,000 cash and got a regular, fixed-rate mortgage. Because of the recession, his trucking business slowed. Last year, he tried to renegotiate the terms of his mortgage so his payments would be more affordable - with the expectation, based on the terms of the federal Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), that the home's current value to be taken into account.

In 2004, when Kidd bought the house, it was valued at $190,000. Now it is valued between $65,000 and $90,000. Aurora Financial, in direct contradiction the federal HAMP program, is not offering to refinance the home at its "net present value."

Mick Kelly, of the Minnesota Coalition for a People's Bailout, puts it bluntly: "Michael Kidd is being robbed. Aurora is pressuring him into taking a bogus deal that only makes Aurora richer. They are basically turning his house into an ATM for the banks."

Michael Kidd and many others who have lost homes on the north and south sides of Minneapolis are examples of the racial disparities in home foreclosures and remodifications. As an African American born and raised in North Minneapolis, Kidd says he could have moved away, but chose to stay and build his community. "I won't just be speaking for me, but for thousands in my situation," said Mr. Kidd. "There are empty homes all around this neighborhood. We don't need any more."

The Minnesota Coalition for a People's Bailout will join Michael Kidd in demanding that Aurora Financial come to the table, follow the rules of the HAMP program and renegotiate the mortgage at the home's current value. Give Mr. Kidd a deal he can afford.

Contacts: Mick Kelly 612-715-3280,
Rick Jacobs 612-788-418

The Latest on the Minnesota Five

Leslie Park's bank just issued an ultimatum that she obtain financing to close on buying her home for $100,000 by May 15th. Clearly time is critical. IF YOU KNOW of any lender who would facilitate a fixed-rate mortgage agreement with her even though her good credit rating was ruined as a result of her bank's policies and actions --PLEASE contact us ASAP!

Meanwhile she will be speaking Friday, April 9, 4:30 p.m., on behalf of Michael Kidd (1321 23rd Ave. in North Minneapolis)-see below for details.

Barbara Byrd STILL has not received ANY response from EMC Mortgage. She waits for a call, watches for a letter, and listens every day for a knock on the door, wondering what's going to happen.

Linda Norenberg is PREPARING to celebrate her victory--but NOT until papers are signed on a rate that she can afford to keep her family home in Robbinsdale. Hats off to Linda, her family and supporters...and especially to her generous lawyer Kelly for keeping up the pressure for so many months on the bank, holding out for an acceptable outcome.

Ann Patterson is tired of making trial payments -several months past the "trial period"-to Wells Fargo that were not paying down principal. Rather than continue living in limbo indefinitely, she has taken initiative and informed Wells Fargo that she will not give her house back to the bank on a short sale-a sale that only would benefit the bank, yet still slam her credit rating. She hopes to move her family into rental housing as early as next month. Watch for details and date for likely yard-sale. Meantime, the bank keeps asking for her current payment! Apparently they still don't get it.

Rosemary Williams started out today from New Orleans on the PPEHRC caravan and March to Fulfill the Dream
http://www.ussf2010.org/node/68
-- from the Delta to Detroit in time for the U.S.Social Forum (USSF) being held June 22-26. She has been making preliminary contacts with activists in the cradle of the Civil Rights Movement in cities en-route like Selma, Birmingham, and Montgomery. Many of us from Minnesota will be joining the caravan and/or attending the USSF. She plans on returning to Minneapolis briefly in mid-April, then rejoining the marchers as she continues inspiring others along the way with her message of resistance.

Health Care Reform needs another push-- and another.

2010-03-08T15:08:00.000-08:00

This week in March, Americans note that federal health care reform has been in the works for a whole year.
Bills have been written and amended; support has been promised and at times withdrawn.
As time went on, progressives pushed again and again for a strong single-payer health care system to emerge from federal law or their state legislatures. As time went on, a resurgence of conservative activists grew more fearful and vocal about the dangers of such change. President Obama started out the year speaking on the bright shining idea of a public option, or state-funded insurance plan that could cover any citizen who chooses it. The President's stance grew weaker and more beholden to private insurance companies as the debates dragged on, from summer to fall.
We lost Senator Ted Kennedy in this last fateful year, and still his long fight for reform, including meaningful health care reform, is impressed upon us. But what will actually be done?

Can Americans get beyond the scary rumors, spun out by lobbyists and paid provocateurs, that pit us against each other? Can members of Congress stop the filibusters and see the truth of the thousands of lobbyist-written pages in the bills on their docket?

If a health care reform bill is passed this year, with the help of petitions and protests and citizen-funded ad campaigns, will it be enough to dig us out of our hole of debt and poor health? Or will new laws be enacted to restrict consumers as well as health care industries, to make abortions more costly than ever, and to tax the people at rates higher than inflation?
It's hard to tell, when no single person has the time to even read the grossly lengthy bills written in legal-ese.
Still, progressives keep on pushing for what they want: single-payer health care for all, not a weak public option, not a government take-over of medicine.

IndyMedia volunteers recently released a compilation of the actions and advice of the local health care reform movement. The Health Care Reform Movement: Rumors and Facts includes the expert analysis of Dr. Joel Albers, active with the Universal Health Care Action Network of Minnesota, and Dr. Lisa Nilles, active with the Minnesota Universal Health Care Coalition.

This short documentary should clarify the issues and propel us to pass meaningful reform. It can be viewed online:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hc8aMQi6H6E

Eye on Justice to air locally, online

2010-01-09T14:43:00.000-08:00

In metropolitan Minnesota, Comcast pays a price for its media monopoly. The internet, cable, phone, and billboard company's contract monopolizing the cable TV running throughout the Twin Cities mandates opening several cable channels to locally produced PEG-- Public, Education, and Government programming.
In Minneapolis, only 3 of these channels are utilized by busy volunteer media-makers: cable channels 16, 17, and 75. Anyone can submit TV shows as long as they are non-commercial. Check out the guidelines at www.mtn.org
Groundbreaking new shows are being prepared to air on Minneapolis Television Network and St. Paul Network, like a news/talk show about police brutality and local politics: Eye On Justice. This project is an effort of the entirely volunteer-driven grassroots group, Communities United Against Police Brutality, to reach out to the public and open people's eyes to some famous cases of police misconduct.
You can keep your eye on justice (and injustice) by sneaking a peek at the first three shows by CUAPB TV, online:
eyeonjustice.blip.tv
Each is about 45 minutes. Upcoming shows will explore more famous and shocking true cases of law enforcement out of control, illustrating that nationwide trend. They will draw on reporting done by Twin Cities IndyMedia Collective and footage from CopWatch shifts, when CUAPB members tape actualities of police conduct out in the streets.
If you have such a story to tell, please contact this group of Cop and Court Watchers:
www.cuapb.org
Their 24-hour hotline is 612-874-STOP

Small Foundation plans to take on World

2009-12-05T10:17:00.000-08:00

Kalpulli Turtle Island Multiversity:
A small land restoration foundation prepares to expand and take on its share of land and community restoration in the world.

Because of the persistence of Ray Tricomo and other board members of a growing organization called Kalpulli, vegetables are growing at a SPROUTS community garden in St. Paul and 100 new trees are being planted at Nature Conservancy sites along the Amazon River. Between SPROUTS, a Hamline University club, the Nature Conservancy, and the donations that made these projects possible, are the expanding webs of activist support and education spun by the little Kalpulli network. It intends to reach and support like-minded people across all the Americas, or Turtle Island, as natives have called this land mass for centuries, hence the organization's title.
For years, Green Party expatriate Ray Tricomo has been pulling together people and ideas to form a new learning center and support system called Kalpulli Turtle Island Multiversity. After a failed run for office and many efforts to reach out to the people of the Twin Cities by teaching free college-level classes, Tricomo is pouring his abundant energy into working as Kalpulli's founder, rather than as a politician or part-time professor.
Kalpulli, an Aztec word meaning community, should become a household word among everyone seeking real community support and not the distanced, passive-aggressive, Minnesota nice 'community' that we're used to in our loosely supportive but highly structured society. The Kalpulli Board of Directors doesn't pretend that the typical role of 501(c)3 non-profit is going to cut it, when people of the Americas are facing species depletion, droughts, warming oceans, hyper-security states, hyper-surveillance, 'free' market economic coercion, and possible currency collapses.
Rather, they're trying to build a foundation that can connect and economically support the work of volunteers working for real change in real sustainable ways, like teaching people to garden and feed themselves and their neighbors, or like learning college-level skills for free through the Twin Cities Experimental College. Eventually they'll find the money to support low-power radio and stream relevant news on Radio Kalpulli, open a Kalpulli alternative library, and address the United Nations to support fundamental changes. Everyone in this foundation can have a unique yet equal, governing role, so everyone has a stake in its success. There is always room for more Board members, or Kalpullistas.
One of Tricomo's mottos is, "If Mr. and Mrs. Indigenous aren't at the table, I'm not at the table." The importance of indigenous people's voices to Kalpulli, and to anything aiming for sustainability, is paramount. Everyone, indigenous or not, is welcome to come brainstorm at monthly meetings, the next one being in St. Paul on Wednesday December 16.
www.kalpulli.net

COPBUSTERS

2009-11-29T06:00:00.000-08:00

When there's something strange in the neighborhood...
Who ya gonna call?
COPBUSTERS-- volunteers who bust open police and court misconduct in their community. In Minneapolis, volunteers are busting open police brutality cases for all of Minnesota through a group called Communities United Against Police Brutality.
They staff a 24-hour hotline for anyone to call and document cases of police brutality.
612-874-STOP
They listen to victims' stories at weekly meetings, held Saturday afternoons at Walker Community Church in Minneapolis, and refer them to good lawyers. They do CopWatch: shooting and gathering footage of police activity outside of homeless shelters and in Northeast Minneapolis. According to volunteer and board member Darryl Robinson, "Sometimes it's needed down at the shelter, where there's a strong cop presence, or needed in Northeast, where there's a strong cop presence." He noted that incidences of brutality "pick up in the warmer months."
Every October 22nd, they organize demonstrations as a part of the national day against police brutality. The group hands out information and raises policy issues, like that of taser use in the Twin Cities.
In the colder months, grassroots organizing is crucial preparation.

The growing group helps survivors of police brutality by doing CourtWatch: showing up in large numbers at hearings to watch judges and prosecutors, keeping an eye on the fairness of trials. According to Robinson, this is "stopping misconduct in the courtrooms," because judges and prosecutors look more closely at evidence and due process when people are watching than when someone comes into the courtroom alone.
The community group is extending this vigilance by beginning its own TV show: Eye on Justice. Its premier episodes will soon air on Minneapolis' and St. Paul's public access channels, MTN and SPN. Its host, Darryl Robinson, said, "It's just a way to hear what the community has to say, see what's happening to the community, and it would be the voice of the community."
More volunteers are always welcomed, as long as cases are kept confidential.
Stolen Lives ceremonies are held to honor those killed by police, and rallies are organized so the cases are not forgotten. CUAPB's actions take place even in the unlikeliest places, like Newport City Council and downtown Hastings. In July, they showed up at Hastings' first demonstration, during an antique car show and Rivertown Days. This demonstration protested the Medals of Valor that were given to two Hastings police officers who had killed a young man, Brandon Rodriguez, one year earlier. Rodriguez had had a mental health crisis and police arrived, though they had no training in dealing with mental health crises. The police chased Rodriguez into the cemetery behind his house, where he held a sword and "refused their commands," according to the police report. The four officers used a taser, but it didn't work, so Sgt. James Galland then shot Brandon several times, killing him.
Please see the video below for an example of CUAPB's work.

"Police Murder of Brandon Rodriguez: One Year Later"

www.cuapb.org

Condoleezza Rice speaks about Iraq, Iran, Israel at Beth El Synagogue

2009-11-08T20:22:00.000-08:00

Former Sec. of State speaks to high-paying audience in St. Louis Park, MN
(see video : http://twincities.indymedia.org/2009/nov/condi-chat-beth-el-brings-secret-permit-first-amendment-area-dissing-goldstone-anti-torture)
On Sunday night, November 8, Beth El Synagogue in St. Louis Park hosted Condoleezza Rice as this year's speaker in its National Speaker Series. She was National Security Adviser and then Secretary of State to the Bush administration, and was notably the first White House official to approve the torture, or 'harsh interrogation,' of 'enemy combatants' in 2002.
Anti-torture activists and dismayed Beth El congregants gathered on the sidewalk for a candle-lit vigil, remembering the victims of U.S.-sponsored torture. They chanted "Shame on Condi," waved anti-war signs and called for Condoleezza Rice's arrest for violating federal laws against torture. FBI whistleblower Coleen Rowley was there to hand out the letters calling for Rice's arrest or questioning by the FBI. She tried to deliver this petition for arrest to local police who were monitoring protests, but they wouldn't take it.
Inside, Don Shelby, local news anchor, introduced Ms. Rice, drawing on his recent experience as a WCCO reporter embedded with the 34th Infantry Red Bull Division of the Minnesota National Guard. He spent 12 days in Iraq and kept an online blog for readers back at home. At the Beth El podium, he said that just 50 hours ago he was standing at the place where Abraham was born. He acknowledged Iraq as a holy place as well as the cradle of civilization, worth protecting-- militarily.
He then brought Ms. Rice to the stage facing a standing ovation in the packed sanctuary.
Ms. Rice said a special hello to "her friend" Norm Coleman, sitting in the third row, in the acknowledgment part of her speech. Coleman, a Republican who narrowly lost the race for U.S. Senator, was there with his wife, answering questions for the student press before the event began.
High school students from St. Louis Park, Minneapolis and the private Benilde-St. Margaret's schools filled two rows in the student section in the back. Best Buy's @15 program paid for their seats, as Elliot Badzin announced at the very beginning of the event.

Ms. Rice said that, now that she's out of office, she likes to pick up the paper every day and not have to worry about doing something about the headlines. She said we all need to pay attention to work that's important, not just urgent. She said we need to consider history's judgments more than the latest headlines.
She admitted historic mistakes that the US has made in the Middle East, pushing for stability in the Middle East instead of democracy-- and the world saw neither develop in the Middle East. She referred to Saddam Hussein, Hamas, Hezbollah, and Muslim radicals in her condemnation of tyrants around the world who make the world less secure. She said that countries could not hate on Hussein while hugging Hezbollah, which she regarded an illegitimate, though democratically elected, government of Lebanon. She expressed faith that Hezbollah will lose in coming elections, as will any regime that doesn't deliver for its people. I couldn't help drawing parallels to our own American regime...
Ms. Rice called the U.S.A. the greatest and most compassionate nation of all time, unique for its fairness to immigrants, melting pot, and social mobility, and said how fortunate it is that it's also the most powerful nation. She told of travels to countries that don't like the U.S.; how those that resented its wealth were later glad for that wealth when people were hungry and AIDS needed fighting; how those that resented its military were later glad for protection from the 'bad guys.' It was strange to hear the term 'bad guys' in the middle of such intelligent, confident rhetoric. When Rice asked "What if the bad guys win an election?" she was being no more specific than Bush when he defined 'terrorists' as anyone using violence for political means.
She talked about right and wrong being cut and dry in regards to the violent tragedies of terrorism. Later she talked about the military's work in Afghanistan as shifting between war and peacework: "war and peace are a continuum."

She demonstrated an awareness of Palestinian, Israeli, Iraqi and Afghan people who do want to live in peace and cooperation. She addressed old stereotypes that have kept U.S. policy from encouraging democracy abroad, saying that there was a time when Latin America was deemed not yet ready for democracy-- as if the people preferred juntas. She said there was a time when Africa was considered not ready for democracy, because its people were 'too tribal,' and there was a time when black Americans weren't considered ready for democracy, because they were 'too childlike.' She came across as pro-democracy when she declared such stances condescending, but didn't recognize how condescending it is for the U.S. to make such foreign policy decisions about which people are ready for what.
She rallied the applauding audience around her idea of a 'step up' that has happened in Iraq: a multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian government on the horizon for the new Parliament that even includes four women. She described U.S. troops' work as reinforcing Iraq's security forces, fostering opportunities for governance, and building bridges and roads, as Mr. Shelby had described the Army National Guard unit he observed as humanitarians.

She spoke out against human rights abuses, yet she said that there is no place in the civilized world for suicidal terrorists. This was consistent with the former Bush administration's treatment of terrorists as 'enemy combatants,' a separate sort of people, sub-human, worth imprisoning and torturing and abusing after taking away their human rights.
She said that Iran does have nuclear ambitions beyond nuclear power, for acquiring the nuclear bomb option. She also said that it's important for the U.S. to keep all options on the table, including its own nuclear program.

She called Israel America's most important ally, appeasing the audience of AIPAC members and others who view Israel as religiously important and vindicated. Ms. Rice noted that visiting Israel as an official had felt like going home to a place she'd never been. Clearly, her relevance to the Synagogue was in her expertise in Middle East policy and politics, which directly impacts Jewish people who live there and their families here.
Ushers passed out note cards to the rows of audience members, and accepted a few of them as questions to present to Ms. Rice.
The first question that Don Shelby, the moderator, read was that of whether or not war on Iraq was really part of the war on terror initiated by September 11 terrorist attacks. She quickly dived into her defense of targeting Iraq as the source of hate that fueled organized terrorist attacks, and her condemnation of Hussein as the main problem with Iraq. She said that she regretted that no WMDs were easily or quickly found there, as expected.
Other questions were just as pointed: Did she believe in the Human Rights Council's report on Israel's genocidal tactics, or was that report just another slam against Israel? ("I don't believe in anything the Human Rights Council does.") Did she think that China would eclipse America as an economic power? (No, but America "might eclipse itself.")

After an hour the speech and questions were over, the audience headed out to the parking lot, past chanting protesters, and VIP guests filed into the ballroom for private dinner with Ms. Rice.

Tent City to End Foreclosures

2009-10-22T09:39:00.000-07:00

Please see the foreclosure documentary I helped to shoot, both long and short versions:
http://www.youtube.com/user/glassbeadian#p/u/11/zQeNyVjHuvQ

In 1929 the view from the White House was Hooverville: a tent city set up by activists and those living outside to make homelessness visible. People were losing their homes and livelihoods then, as many Americans are now.
Here's the word from Minnesota's Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign:

Foreclosure Moratorium Tent Encampment Is Up

The Minnesota Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign is calling for community support to fight the imminent eviction of Leslie Parks from the duplex where she has lived for 21 years. Tents are pitched on her lawn with signs like “10% of homelessness results from foreclosure.” Press conference to be held at Ms. Parks’ at 3749 Park Ave. South in Mpls. tomorrow, Wednesday, October 21st, at 4:30 pm.
The redemption period for the Parks’ residence ends November 20th , 2009. Now is the time for the community to show support for
our Minnesota Five women who are resisting foreclosure.
Foreclosure evictions push people into homelessness. To highlight this crisis, tents will be going up not only in the Parks’ yard but in the yard of Ann Patterson who is in pre-foreclosure, desperately trying for months to negotiate with Wells Fargo to lower her mortgage payments. Both Ann and Leslie work full time. More encampments will go up on college campuses in the area. They will call attention to big financial institutions that get billions of dollars to avoid losses from their bad loans, while victimized homeowners still get thrown out on the street.

Winter is upon us. The current housing crisis is so DEEP that we are urging emergency passage of a foreclosure-moratorium bill that our governor vetoed last spring. This Wednesday we are launching a foreclosure moratorium petition drive throughout the city to let legislators know that ACTION IS NEEDED AT ONCE.

We can all be Biological Engineers: Bioneers

2009-10-18T12:19:00.000-07:00

Northland Sustainable Solutions is hosting many pioneers in earth science at the Bioneers conference this weekend!
I will be there at the Green Wave Energy Architecture booth! Come say hi!
Here's the press release for more info:

October 24 – 25, 2009, U of M, Willey Hall, Minneapolis, MN. This affordable conference welcomes all interested in better understanding issues of environmental and social sustainability, and how we can help shape a healthy and sustainable future for ourselves and future generations. The two day conference highlights inspirational work being done on both the local and national levels and provides opportunity for discussion and networking among individuals concerned with cultivating a sustainable future. The conference includes numerous workshops ranging from green business and youth involvement in sustainability efforts to water rights and environmental restoration, as well as organic food and numerous artistic interludes.

“We are living in era in which an impending sense of global crisis is contrasted with the greatest opportunity humanity has known to heal global divisions and cultivate a new level of respect between the peoples of Earth and between humans and the natural world,” said Oake Gregory, President of Northland Sustainable Solutions. “Ever greater numbers of people across the globe are awakening to the realization that the ways in which we have been living are not sustainable, neither culturally nor environmentally. This realization naturally leads to the question, ‘What can I do?’ We offer the Northland Bioneers Conference as a part of the process of understanding how to answer this question both as individuals and as communities.”

Northland Bioneers Conference organizers engage a wide range of participants and perspectives. It is intended to attract those who want to take personal steps toward being a part of the solutions that guide the world toward global balance and well being for all.

This year’s keynote addresses will be given by Dr. Jonathan Foley, Director of the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment and Susan Hubbard, CEO and Co-president of Eureka Recycling. The conference will feature a geographical breakout networking session facilitated by Sean Gosiewski of the Alliance for Sustainability and a panel examining the issue of sustainable population facilitated by David Paxson of World Population Balance.

Some of this year’s national Bioneers plenary speakers include: Andrew Weil M.D. , one of the nation’s foremost authorities on holistic medicine, Michael Pollan , one of the nation’s most influential thinkers on food and agriculture, Joanna Macy, a celebrated Buddhist teacher, eco-philosopher, and activist in the peace, justice, and ecology movements and Jerome Ringo, the president of the Apollo Alliance.

A full list of national plenary presentations and local workshops, speakers and exhibitors can be found on the website www.nbconference.org. More information on the national organization Bioneers can be found at www.bioneers.org.

Northland Sustainable Solutions is a 501(c)3 nonprofit devoted to educating the Twin Cities and surrounding regions on issues of sustainability and inspiring people to follow nature's lead in developing positive solutions and innovative strategies to the most pressing environmental and social issues of our day.

Eviction on September 11

2009-09-21T08:27:00.000-07:00

The Minneapolis Five and the Eviction on September 11
- by Becca and Lynette -

In the midst of the home foreclosure crisis, many homeowners succumb to feelings of guilt and inadequacy when they can't make mortgage payments, allowing banks to take back houses. The frequency of these land grabs by America's banks is a sign of deepening economic depression.
Still, some homeowners are fighting back. The Minneapolis Five have bravely emerged from the confusion of their foreclosures in the past year, and are publicly fighting to keep their homes.
They are long-term homeowners, unwilling to pick up and move in the middle of their lives, sick of being singled out either for being black or being women.
They are five middle-aged single women from metropolitan Minnesota, and, until September 11, they were all wondering if and when they'd be kicked out of their homes by sheriffs or police.
On September 11, 2009, beneath the hubbub of news surrounding the anniversary of New York terrorist attacks and a local policeman's death, the loud and proud Rosemary Williams was evicted from her house by police. She had made headlines twice before with the bold occupation of her foreclosed home, with family and local activists' support. Now she is the first of the Five to be escorted out of her house with all her belongings while police cover her windows and doors with sheet metal.
Rosemary Williams, 60, grew up on the Clinton Avenue block where her home was purchased 23 years ago. She lived there with her mother until she passed away 6 years ago, and Rosemary refinanced the home with an ARM so her siblings could
receive their portion of the estate. She became unemployed, found work again, and now continues her work and activism though homeless. She made a point of telling her story to the press, to nonprofits that purport to help people in foreclosure, to the unresponsive Mayor R. T. Rybak, and to First Lady Michelle Obama. When her home had already been once paid for, there was no reason for her to be kicked out over an ARM-- but GMAC, the mortgage company, seems to prefer its customers homeless and its assets revolving like musical chairs.
Rosemary's occupied house had become a hub of community gatherings, neighborhood watches, and activist press conferences. It was where the Five gathered to tell their stories to IndyMedia.

Linda Norenberg, also 60, lives on a Robbinsdale property that has been in her family since 1938. Linda's father built the home in 1944 on top of a basement where the family had been living for two years. Always a pillar of her community, she currently is employed and the grandmother of three, great-grandmother of three.

Linda refinanced once with a fixed rate mortgage. But the mortgagor kept calling: "Wouldn't you like to lower your rate?" So she refinanced to an ARM, not realizing until later that her minimum payment was not paying down the principal. After being laid off from her full-time job, she refinanced again in 2003 but was unable to obtain sufficient employment and began falling behind in payments. She received the foreclosure notice in November, 2007 and began looking for assistance right away.

She thought that the sheriff's sale had taken place Dec. 10 the of '08, but in fact it did not take place until Jan. 30, '09. Chase Bank didn't call back to to tell her this until February.she was told that their bank had put a freeze on foreclosures for the month of December. Linda's daughter Katie and her 3 kids ended up losing her apartment, so they all moved in at Christmas. Now three generations depend on this property that could be taken back at any moment.

Leslie Parks, 45, is resisting on behalf of her mother, Tecora. They both work full time. Leslie has lived in the upper level of her mother's duplex for 23 years. Tecora took out an ARM to cover upgrades to the windows in Leslie's duplex because the city ordered the improvements.
One night last winter well after dark, an employee of the bank who perhaps after knocking on the front door, went around to the back and threw rocks at her lighted window, shouting out "THIS BUILDING IS IN FORECLOSURE."
The experience threw Leslie into a high blood-pressure emergency. As she was coping, one night in May, before the sheriff's sale, she came home from work to find an illegal
lockbox on the door. She could not enter her own place even to feed her cats. She paid for a locksmith to break in and install new locks. PPEHRC paid filing fees so that she could press charges against Indy-MAC whose hired inspector made a big mistake, concluding that the property was vacant! The redemption period ends in late November and they are desperately in need of a pro-bono lawyer.

Barbara Byrd, 50, is a working woman whose duplex in Brooklyn Park was financed through EMC. The Bear Stearns Companies, LLC and its subsidiary, EMC Mortgage Corporation, recently agreed to pay $28 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that they engaged in unlawful "predatory lending" practices in servicing consumers' home mortgage loans.

Barbara is to appear in Hennepin County district court Sept.16th to appeal her eviction. In March 2009 when Barbara lost her tennent and fell behind in her ever-rising payments, EMC made notary date-errors in the foreclosure documentation. During her June eviction hearing in housing court, the judge had assured her that should would not have to move. Still a 24-hour eviction was posted on her door July 6th, and Barbara spent sleepless nights for fear of being thrown out. Because she works nights, she isn't at home to witness when inspectors come peeking by to determine whether or not the property is vacant. She has to keep sticking her head out the window to prove that she is living there.

Ann Patterson, 40, is a mother of five. She worked for 19 years at the same hospital. She's never missed a payment on their house of 12 years. Looking ahead to see that six months down the road her ARM will balloon and they will not be able to make the payments, she has made several attempts to remodify with Wells Fargo without results. Any other programs including Habitat for Humanity turned her down because she is not yet in default. Scammers have approached her, and lawyers have demanded Two ( or more ) Thousand dollars up-front to aid her struggle for remodification to an affordable rate. The house supposedly is worth $169,000. The paperwork for each application is a burden, and clerks often lose some of the documents or claim that they never rececived them. The emotional toll of worry for her is heavy and she is losing hope.
http://www.youtube.com/user/glassbeadian#p/u/10/YGZCXaXSbbA

Inner City and White.

2009-08-22T20:59:00.000-07:00

What distinguishes the inner city from the outer city? Why do we associate the inner city with crowded poor people who are stuck?
I believe that the distinguishing factor is the noise and the particles in the air. I know I'm in the inner city when I can't get away from noise, whether in a home or a park or garden. I hear traffic, trains, conversations, sirens, industrial loading docks, and the obnoxious buzz of electric parts constantly-- until I reach some pocket or edge of outer city, where crickets can chirp louder than the traffic, and solace is easier to come by.
It's harder to measure the particles in the air by myself, but I know that inner city environments create asthmatics according to generational studies that have been done. I know the inner city absorbs commuters' exhaust and the drafts of industrial fumes and particles from nearby commercial zones, without an amount of vegetation necessary to cleanse some of the carbon from the air. In the outer city, people breathe a bit easier, and property is allowed to be overgrown more often than in the inner city, so vegetation can help with noise and smog.
But besides those things, I don't think we should differentiate inner city from outer urban or suburban environments too much. There are parks & playgrounds in both places; poverty and riches take residence in both environments; there are stupid and mean people to be found anywhere; homes are crowded and homes are abandoned in both realms; safety and power are illusions regardless of the setting; people are accomplishing amazing things in both settings too.
Now.

What distinguishes someone white from someone European or Euro-American? Have you ever even thought about what makes someone white before? If you are white in America, you likely haven't.
I say being white is a mindset. Being European or Euro-American is a general ethnicity. The latter would know and care what their heritage is.
The white mindset is:

taking racial privilege for granted
questioning 'people of color' and not seeing any of your own color
expecting to understand and be understood in every context
waiting for someone to ask 'How may I help you?'
never having to go to a special barber because you expect everyone to understand your hair
identifying with the majority of your country without thinking about it
considering crime a problem only when it happens to people like you
having no pride or curiosity about your background, recent or ancient
trying to figure out who's 'ethnic' and who 'passes'
referring to your way of life as 'dominant society'
never questioning your very identity because of biological factors
thinking of the 'melting pot' as progress

That is a mindset that society could do without. Give up the white mindset and then there will no longer be white people, but rather, Irish-American, Hungarian-American, British-Canadian, and so on and so on, all of us.
If we could take pride in these little differences that make us uniquely who we are, then that would better unify the human race than assimilation, conformity, or hegemony. We could say 'We are truly all related,' and actually act like it.
Until then, I am researching my heritage and refusing the Caucasian label.
My ancestors didn't exactly come from the Caucasus, I'm not Caucasian, I'm Irish-German-Norwegian-Danish-American.
All of that is supposed to fit into the little 'Caucasian' box on every survey that asks your race. And what is with that extra box saying 'Hispanic- not Caucasian'? Why are they singled out for the separation of the Hispanics?
Anyway, I just check all the racial categories, every time. We are all related. And if the census-taker comes to my door, I'll say I belong to all races and all religions. My specific identity belongs to me, but I belong to the oneness of humanity.

Even Vacation Homes Come in Green

2009-06-18T11:17:00.000-07:00

(I'm trying to publish this in Do It Green! Minnesota)

Whether canoeing on the lake or using the hot tub on the top floor of the cabin, residents relaxing at Rainbow Lake Cabin are still productive. It’s one of only a few green-certified homes in northern Wisconsin, producing much of its own power with 500 Watt solar shingles.

When ingenuity and a commitment to using recycled and on-site materials combine, you get grant-winning architecture like this cabin by the Minneapolis-based Archithesis firm. By developing land in rural Wisconsin, the firm got a rebate on its flexible photovoltaic shingles through the state’s Focus On Energy program, participating in the national One Million Solar Roofs project. The cabin is a candidate for the cap and trade program proposed under the Wisconsin Safe Climate Act. The state is now 5^th in the nation in commitments to energy efficency, according to a study by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.

We can learn a lot from Wisconsin. Just visiting for a weekend at an affordable green cabin can teach the virtues of resourceful, on-site construction, like with Rainbow Lake Cabin’s native oak floors and stone foundation and redwood trim recycled from Napa Valley wine tanks.

The small and wild Rainbow Lake fills the view from the second-story living room’s expansive south-facing windows at tree-house-level. The slate floor on the ground level is warm in the morning, radiating the heat stored in the large thermal mass below the building, which also gives off autumn’s heat throughout the winter. This radiant slab utilizes cheap off-peak energy in the night to circulate hot water from the boiler throughout pipes in the ground floor. With the wood stove and vertical ventilation along the vintage spiral staircase, it’s easy to heat and cool the home without electricity, even if that’s not what you’re used to.

The green revolution can extend to every part of modern life, including Minnesotans’ hobby of getting away from it all “up north.” Vacationers who don’t want to “rough it” can still comfortably experience wild prairie and lake habitats without being rough on the environment. Architect Jim Widder thinks that this is part of America’s sustainability revolution: living in balance with nature—even in vacation homes with wireless Internet access.

Expressions of the Feminine at Van Brabson Gallery

2009-05-25T09:46:00.000-07:00

The fourth annual Expressions of the Feminine Psyche
exhibit opened this May 2 with food, music, and many friends of the artists.
It's open until June 30, 2009.

At the Van Brabson Gallery in Minneapolis, a nondescript, gray, square building set back from the road, a celebration of spring and Mother Earth inside enlivened the white rooms full of framed photography, glittering cases of jewelry, and impressive oil paintings.
Visitors were greeted by Bonnie Brabson's dark abstracts, and welcomed to scribble their thoughts in the guestbook next to handmade cards and mixed media art by Pam Cox.
According to the gallery owner, who video taped the reception to show her mom on Mother's Day, anything that women artists thought of in relation to 'the feminine psyche' could become that theme. The feminine mystique is shifting and broad, and could include anything as its art-- even her video of crowds mingling and browsing the artwork.
Beneath a row of Untitleds, Marcia Soderman-Olson's strong, abstract oils with their energetic centers, Marcia and a couple of her fellow exhibited artists chatted and snacked. Her paintings' blue-green to black strokes seem to structure colored business within-- or, perhaps, frame the scraped color strokes of attempted paintings past, beneath them. Perhaps they are the structures of the present scratched away in their construction to reveal layers of past adventures, each color a layer. Lines where thumbnails had lifted up fresh paint from the middle of broad strokes made the audience conscious of their creation.
On an adjacent wall, Corean Komarec's clear, realistic photos provided contrast and focus for the show. Nature, balance, and representations of women in sculpture were the themes of her prints, reminding people that the feminine in art is everywhere; it is a major part of perceptions of beauty.
Besides Komarec's prints and Cox's cute cards for sale, Dragon Treasures bracelets and necklaces by Kelly Frampton, worth hundreds of dollars, are for sale at the gallery. Her materials are found and recycled treasures as well as semiprecious stones, which charmed the gallery space from each display case. Frampton spent enough time with each piece to describe the sort of energy boost coming from her jewelry's different sets of stones. From malachite to bloodstone, the whole variety had been cleansed by the four elements in the process of turning found parts into art.

Nancy Schwartz, with paint left over from home projects, created abstract portraits in her series, A Woman Becoming. Her paintings use balance, subdued colors full of the textures of many days of experiments: scraping, thinning, texturing, layering paint in representations of women with blurry faces that fill their frames. Everything about these works requires interpretation of colors, as shadows or flesh or clothes-- and then it seems to ask, 'Why do you think of me as that?'
Everything requires sympathetic interpretation, and that's part of the feminine psyche.

Representative Ellison's Record

2009-05-24T19:03:00.000-07:00

What does it mean to vote 'Present?'
It's got to be better for a Congressman to vote 'Present' than to ditch work, or to submit themselves as 'Not Voting' because of emotional attachment or other concerns.
But isn't it better to take a stand on something than just to vote 'Present?'
My representative in the U.S. House was faced with a Resolution about Israel and Palestine early this year, and he chose not to take a stand.
On January 9, 390 Representatives passed this Congressional position saying that Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks from the Gaza Strip-- implying that this ally should send rockets back at the impoverished, sanctioned people trapped in the Strip-- and Rep. Ellison from Minnesota merely said 'Present.'
As the only Muslim in the House, why could he not say NO to the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people for their religion, their ethnicity, and their claim to the land? Is our well-armed ally, Israel, really so threatened by bottle rockets from little reservations, shooting over the 20-foot wall that separates these peoples?

A young woman at my workplace shared her insight about Rep. Ellison, as one of his former Muslim Minneapolitan campaign workers. She and fellow ex-campaigners visited Ellison at his office in the Minneapolis Urban League, asking simple questions about policy towards Palestine-- he yelled at them in response and ended their meeting. According to this angry young woman, he yelled, "DON'T PUT WORDS IN MY MOUTH! DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO SAY!"

He's our representative in the government, and that's all we can hope to do.

I also hoped to visit Rep. Ellison at his local office, concerning funding for green jobs. Along with some very concerned constituents and both MoveOn.org & H.I.R.E. organizers, we filed into his office in February and gave our petition to a staff member. She heard us out, but the Representative was not 'present.'

Perhaps when the numbers of dead and displaced in Palestine match the numbers killed and displaced in Darfur by Sudan, Ellison will step forward. In the middle of April, Ellison was arrested for protesting for the first time-- outside the Sudanese embassy in D.C. He and four other Congressmen and women thought that genocide in Darfur was worth crossing a police line and paying a $100 fine for.
According to WCCO:

"I have never done this before and its not the kind of thing I plan on doing in the near future. But given the gravity of the situation, the massive numbers of people whose lives were at risk, I thought it necessary to take this action," said Ellison after his release.

http://wcco.com/national/keith.ellison.arrested.2.995458.html

Minneapolis vs. Shrubs & Gardens

2009-05-24T19:01:00.000-07:00

Published in the Twin Cities Daily Planet:
http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/article/2009/05/24/urban-farming-needs-you.html

One day a fastidious gardener and homemaker noticed that his well-groomed shrubs on the boulevard were cut down. He noticed-- when the City of Minneapolis sent him a bill for trimming his shrubs on the boulevard outside his house, though they weren’t in the way of the sidewalk.

A pattern had emerged in the City’s visits to his property, where he poured his heart and soul into raised bed gardens, a greenhouse, and custom heating and cooling for optimum energy efficiency.
When the Housing Inspector cited him for having a treated wood foundation for his house, sturdy but seldom employed in American homes, the City regarded it unstable just because it was different.
When police ticketed him for the inoperable vehicle left in his neighbor’s driveway, they didn’t bother to correct their error following his complaints.
Since he first put an anti-war sign up in his yard, the Housing Inspector routinely bothered him—perhaps that’s where it all began.
Activism can put someone on the City’s bad side, even when he or she just wants to grow herbs and vegetables to support his or herself—for activism is often wound up with community gardening, and vice versa.
The UrbanFarm in Southeast Como neighborhood has been a home for sage, spinach, collard greens, chives, and sustainable construction projects, as a dynamic community garden for the past ten years. Its resident farmer and food deliverer, Roger Peterson, now needs volunteers’ help more than ever.
Organic farming in the city is drawing a lot of interest, but unless the City steps in, it can’t pay any interest—or fees or back-taxes, for that matter. This summer back-taxes are due, and though weekly fundraisers have brought people to UrbanFarm this spring, the garage sales and plant sales haven’t raised enough to save the farm. The City may send police to block Peterson from his house as it decides what to do with his property in the middle of a middle-income neighborhood full of young families.
Who will step up to water the compost pile and weed the beds that span three back lawns, while Peterson is kept away? Who will continue the tradition of carrying buckets of fresh produce on a bike trailer around town, to donate to the Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center and other charities?
As Peterson appeals the property taxes, neighbors and volunteers will likely decide the fate of UrbanFarm, by meeting up at its monthly bonfire and open house this June.

They too can appeal to the City-- for example, for the gardens’ adoption into one of many new ‘green’ initiatives under the umbrella of Homegrown Minneapolis. As part of the Department of Health and Family Support, the initiative’s four subcommittees could provide for proposed projects like small enterprise urban agriculture, locally grown foods in schools, and backyard gardening learning opportunities for youth. They could even integrate these aims—as Peterson did over the years at UrbanFarm.
It has been a place where neighborhood children and Dinkytown youth alike visit and help with the shoveling; where amateur musicians jam on Open House days and college students browse the numerous stacks of science books; where Peterson’s black Labradors greet new volunteers; where kindred spirits in the city meet each other and share produce they help to harvest. It still can be this way.
The super-insulated structures’ solar panels, circulation system, underground water storage and thermal mass stood as examples of innovative architecture for neighbors interested in sustainable living. Peterson himself has been an example of humble activism with his actions, teaching others how to continue the routines at UrbanFarm.

Review: Reaching Past the Wire

2009-03-15T17:26:00.000-07:00

Here's some fairly old news I wrote, to remind us all to wake up to our surroundings.

The Human Face on War

How will Minnesotans acknowledge Iraq war veterans? At every gathering that recognizes those coming back from the war, there is likely to be a mix of people that are grateful, concerned, and critical.

One grandmother retired from the Army Reserves, and came home to Minnesota and a grateful church and group of friends, a concerned family, and a public very critical of her work at Abu Ghraib prison. Readers from human rights groups like Tackling Torture at the Top and sympathetic peers with military experience alike heard what Deanna Germain had to say at her book reading.

On Wednesday, Sept. 5, 2007, Army nurse and author Deanna Germain publicly read from her memoir, Reaching Past the Wire: A Nurse at Abu Ghraib, at McKawber's bookstore. The reading was hosted by St. Paul Public Libraries.

Deanna Germain served as an army nurse reservist in Abu Ghraib and Kuwait. Connie Lounsbury had approached Deanna about writing the book on her military service in the prison hospital, after she heard about it from Germain's sisters. Germain agreed to expand on the emails to her sisters that she'd written, hoping, as she said at her book reading, to “put a human face on war.” The proceeds of her memoir's sales go to the Fisher House Foundation. The national private-public foundation builds and keeps 'comfort homes' on the grounds of major military and VA medical centers, for family members to be close to a loved one in the military during hospitalization for an unexpected illness, disease, or injury.

She worked not in “the hard district” of the prison, but in a hospital, separated by an arm's length of razor-wire from about 4,000 detainees. Her patients came in from Fallujah and Ramadi and nearby villages. They were often injured in combat against US forces, according to Germain. Some prisoners didn't want to describe their injuries, perhaps because their past activities could have endangered their families if they had confessed them.

“I knew some detainees were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Germain said. She described the example of Sami, 15 years old, who was on a bus as “insurgents” blew it up-- and became one of her patients. “We tried to sort people, but it couldn't be done fast enough-- frustrating on all sides-- so a lot more ended up behind the wire,” she said, implying that there were a lot more there who shouldn't have been.

Reaching Past The Wire mostly details her relationships with coworkers, translators, and what she learned from the Iraqi prisoners and civilians she treated. The only section she read aloud at McKawber's was about her daily discomforts and weekly inconveniences: wearing armor all the time, seeing rats crawl over her feet as she tried to make a phone call, and having a cell of the prison for a bedroom. “War is hell,” she read.

Before publishing their book, Germain and Lounsbury sent it to the Judge Advocate General, in case they wanted to look it over. The office gave no response.

The small, crowded bookstore was full of questioning listeners. Germain grimaced as audience members bluntly brought the question of the Abu Ghraib prisoner maltreatment scandals up, just as they had been brought up to her so many times before.

She said that she knew no one at “the hard site,” and could find out nothing about it. Germain said, “I found out about the instance of abuse from my sister who emailed me, who said, 'WHAT IS HAPPENING OVER THERE?'

“We were watching BBC and any channel we could get, to find some information.

When we did have the reporters people coming through, it was obvious to the patients. We could not tell any of the prisoners or detainees what was happening, but it was pretty obvious that life had pretty quickly changed in our hospital.”

After piecing together snippets of information from whatever television and Internet time thy could afford, Germain and her coworkers reacted to the prisoner abuse with uncertainty and anger. “I haven't known soldiers who would do things like that!” Germain told the audience. “We did a lot of self-evaluation: What are we doing here? If we can change one heart or mind, that'll be our goal.”

Germain wrote one short chapter about prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib, in the middle of her memoir: “When I came to Abu Ghraib, I realized that the soldiers here seemed of a different breed, a little independent of the whole, because we had to be, for survival...We just hoped the leaders would keep things in control....If I asked about anything outside the hospital or had questions about who else was in the camp and what they did, I got vague answers.”

She wrote of the possibility that the hospital distracted the International Red Cross, and other organizations that visited and checked on it, from torture interrogations not too far away: “I have wondered if the hospital where I served was set up as a response, a way to counterbalance it by providing better care for detainees.” This profound line of reason on page 79 was not revisited anywhere else in the book.

When asked about the conditions that prompted and allowed prisoner abuse, Germain said, “When strong...leadership presence isn't there, that can happen.” She added that a lot of medics were 19 or 20 years old, on their first job, “and a lot of young people need supervision-- people to guide them. And they didn't have that.”

Germain enlisted when she was young, in 1970. She provided care for soldiers in Vietnam, and then in America, in the Individual Ready Reserve during Desert Storm. “Thirty days before my retirement, I was called into active duty,” she said. She was called to Abu Ghraib, outside of Fallujah, Iraq, to serve 540 more days in the army than she meant to.

Germain expressed little regret, however. “I think I'm much more aware of what service and sacrifice [are], than before I went on this mission... The next chapter: we're a very rich country; we need to share more with those who have less.”

After giving many copies of her book personal autographs, Germain expanded on this idea of a new chapter for the soldiers, whom she looks on not as fighters, but as protectors. She “joined to protect and serve.” When asked what the military protects, she said, “What we have.” When asked what “we have,” she took a moment.

“Democracy, safety-- I guess that's subjective now. I can't... sorry, it's not a complete thought.”

Germain didn't understand what was going on at Abu Ghraib until outside sources caught the scent of scandal and told her, just as we often don't understand what's going on in the next block down from us, until an outside perspective is brought to our attention. Like Germain, we can wake up to our surroundings-- but are not likely to understand the deeper themes that cause our present dilemmas, which are outside and above and obscured from the news of what's going on.

One small influence

2009-01-01T15:13:00.001-08:00

The other day, Minnesotans gathered outside Senator Amy Klobuchar's office demanding to meet with her, and influence her regarding the Gaza strip crisis. After they occupied a conference room at the State Capitol, Senator Klobuchar agreed to meet with them.

I will write, though it is a small influence to make on someone else who has a small influence in this matter. But we all can do this, we all can add our influence.

Dear Senator Klobuchar,
Happy new year!
I write so that you can add another humanitarian to the demographic of your constituency.
Please also note that you can help change the US' arms deals with Israel in the Senate. This is very important as we in the US hear of more and more horrors that Israel commits against starving Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, with jets and weapons imported from the US.

This week, a humanitarian relief ship called the Dignity was trying to bring international advocates and food to the Gaza Strip, when it was surrounded by the Israeli navy, rammed and damaged. Fortunately a journalist from CNN was on board.That's how I found out about it, and I hope you too will learn more, & meet with the Minnesotans outside your door who come to tell of horrible things happening in the Middle East. We CAN end our complicity in them!

Thank you.

People without a Country, an Opportunity, or Food

2008-12-30T13:31:00.000-08:00

Can you believe travesties of sickening proportions are happening now, are happening just as the patterns of history provide for, are happening just as prophesied and expected and yet they are not at all inevitable? Now, in our time, in our life, when we can do something about it and change it, or lose another part of our life stories to observation and complicity.

The Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are people without a country, without enough land, without internationally recognized leadership or legal power.
They have few opportunities to make money, travel, to even get out of their fenced-in territories and into the country of Israel.
At least in the Gaza Strip, they can access the sea.
But today I woke to several real occurring, recurring nightmares of the Palestinians, happening in that world across the ocean and a sea from me, accessible only by pictures and letters and reports.

Now the people living in the Gaza Strip are running out of food, besides having been cut off from trade and all means of production.

Walled in, Bombed, Surrounded. I hardly imagined that things could get worse-- especially during and right after the holidays.

I hardly imagined that an American I care about would be in the center of this conflict's shifting storm, waking me up and making me care. (God, why do songs and celebrities pull me into the world's heartaches more than written pleas, documentaries, sermons or petitions?)

Ships and caravans and planes have headed to Gaza for many months with humanitarian relief. And today, the Dignity, a ship bearing humanitarians and journalists from many countries, was stopped on its relief mission to Gaza. Now I hear from the Anarchist Black Cross Federation, the US Campaign to End the Occupation of Palestine, and a US Social Forum group that the Dignity was surrounded by Israeli warships at 5 am (US Time) today and rammed into, damaged and losing fuel. The Dignity carries journalists from Al Jazeera, CNN, doctors, and one humanitarian from the US, Cynthia McKinney, who had recently run for President as a Green. Israel wants no dignity or food to arrive at the Gaza Strip for the starving, poor, and displaced, but rather wants the Dignity to return to its launching point, Cyprus, though it doesn't have enough fuel to do so.

How did I get word of this so soon? I don't even know how word got around, but besides prayer, it is our main starting point. The main way that these battles can engage the world.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/12/30/gaza.aid.boat/index.html

Lakotah need Emergency Aid

2008-11-18T12:38:00.000-08:00

As of today, the Republic of Lakotah is in the twelfth day of a Snow Emergency.

The Chief Facilitator, Russel Means, is trying to alert the world, seeking better aid than the Red Cross provided.

Many hundreds of American Indians still snowbound and without electrical power or water on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
Sofia Romero, age 98, snowed in, no power, no water, food situation unknown.
Emme Zimiga, age 96, snowed in, no power, no water, food situation unknown.
Amanda Milk, age 80's, no legs, dialysis patient, snowed in, presumed dead.
Hisle SD - 38 households (average of 17 persons per household on Reservation) still snowed in with out power or water.
Lost Dog Community - 5 families snowed in, no power, no water, food situation unknown.
Lacreek Electric Association reports that over 1,000 power distribution poles broken by the storm have been replaced, but dozens more are still down, while repair efforts have been diverted to the some of the main distribution lines still partially inoperative.
Red Cross Effort Vehemently Incompetent - As documented by Marion White Mouse (605-462-6242), the American Red Cross sent a contingency of one volunteer, Monica Turkleson who departed the Reservation prematurely on Saturday, November 15th. Ms. Turkleson's "aide" consisted of nothing and her behavior was reported as impatient, rude and racist. Russell Means suggests that this organization change its name to the "White Cross."

For More Information About the Situation of the People on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservaton, CLICK HERE

Private Army Designated by Bush

2008-11-02T15:29:00.000-08:00

"Private Army Designated by Bush"

Published in the Augsburg College Echo, 10/31/08.

"NORTHCOMM and Urban Warfare"

Published in Women Against Military Madness newsletter, December '08

(http://www.worldwidewamm.org/newsletters/2008/12080109/northcomm.html)

If you’ve heard rumors about martial law in America, you may wonder how it would ever be possible, and what the supra-military force, NORTHCOMM, has to do with it.

Northern Command is a special military and intelligence joint task force that helps local, state, and tribal authorities in times of crisis on the North American continent. When the I-35 W bridge collapsed in Minneapolis on August 1, 2007, the US Navy was there to help, under a Region Defense Coordinating Officer of the US Northern Command. According to Northern Command’s timeline on its website, www.northcom.mil, the US division of NorthComm also helped states to mitigate flood damage in the Midwest last June. Here is why its new troops may be coming to a city near you in the near future, regardless of natural or manmade disasters in your area.

Deployment of NORTHCOMM

When a leader secures an army and security force dedicated to him and not to any Constitution, he lifts his own office above its prescribed role in the Constitution. That is what happened to the office of the President on October 1, as it has happened several times since George W. Bush took office.

On that day, the homeland tours of a 3,000-4,000 person army, the 1^st Brigade Combat Team, began. NORTHCOMM leads this Brigade of the 3^rd Infantry Division and it answers only to the President and the Secretary of Defense, not Congress, because the President established it on Oct. 1^st 2002.

Congress has been funding it through bills like the Defense Authorization Act of 2007, but because of the secrecy of NORTHCOMM, Congress has even less oversight of it than it does over the five military branches.

The troops currently touring under NorthComm are the first to have ever been given a dedicated assignment to it. The 1^st BCT had just returned from fighting in Iraq, and will tour America for 12 months, after which a different division will be assigned to this permanent mission, according to the Army Times. The Army Times’ article of September 30, “Brigade homeland tours start Oct. 1,” says that the 1^st BCT will

“learn new skills, use some of the ones they acquired in the war zone and more than likely will not be shot at while doing any of it. They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack.”

A CBRNE attack is any chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, or high-yield explosive situations.

The article by Gina Cavallero can yet be found at http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/army_homeland_090708w/

Urban Warfare

Controlling unrest could mean anything from fencing and guarding private property to demanding citizens' guns, house by house, as the National Guard and NorthComm did in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina's devastation. ARMYNORTH, under NORTHCOMM, is not the first military division to have been trained in urban warfare in the U.S. However, the 1^st BCT is also trained to use a special package of non-lethal weapons that will be stored at their tour sites: America’s cities. The above article was corrected so that readers understand the new non-lethal weapons packages can only be used in a war zone. But President Bush and his lawyers made the whole world a war zone with his unofficial declaration of the war on terror.

Appeasement

It didn’t take long for the active BCT to be used as a threat against the American people, as Representative Brad Sherman confessed on the House floor on October 2. During debate on H.R. 1424, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, he explained before his colleagues and C-SPAN that

“Many of us were told in private conversations that if we voted against this bill, on Monday, that the sky would fall, the market would drop two or three thousand points the first day, another couple thousand the second day, and a few Members were even told that there would be martial law in America if we voted ‘no.’”

On October 3 the bill, nicknamed the corporate bail-out bill, was passed 263 to 171.

Emergencies

What does that threat of force have to do with the BCT’s mission to help in “potentially horrific scenarios?” Look at National Security Directive 51, which applies to natural and manmade emergencies. President Bush established his claim on emergency rule with National Security Directive 51 in May 2007. At this time America is not in a state of emergency. However, NSD 51 gives the President the power to determine what and where American emergencies are.

With only his own authority, he signed the executive directive so that, in a catastrophic emergency, “The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government.” It’s hard to determine what that means when only Annex A of that Directive is available at the President’s website, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/05/20070509-12.html

Peter Dale Scott looked into this in his article “The Showdown" on CounterPunch, March 31, 2008. He wrote, concerning members of the House Homeland Security Committee’s request to read the directive,

NSPD 51 contains "classified Continuity Annexes" which shall "be protected from unauthorized disclosure." Congressman DeFazio twice requested to see these Annexes, the second time in a letter cosigned by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Christopher Carney. It was these requests that the White House denied.

------------------

For more, please research:

The US government’s Continuity of Operations plan, from 1946 to the present, and Donald Rumsfeld’s changes to it.

http://www.wikileaks.org/leak/us-army-reg-500-3-continuity-2001.pdf

The 2007 House Report 110-477, NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008, Section 1821.