Angry White Kid

ANSWER's big plan revealed

Confounded as to why anti-war sentiment in the US has been steadily increasing while attendance at their demonstrations (in monotony) has been decreasing, the ANSWER Coalition (who I've made clear I'm no fan of) released a proposal yesterday, asking What Should the Anti-War Movement Do Now?:

It is clear that the anti-war movement is not sufficiently strong at the moment to bring this criminal and despised war to an end. Every organization must ask why is this so and most importantly what can be done to change the situation immediately.

The first question to ask and answer is: Can a people's movement in the United States overcome the commitment of the White House, Congress and the Pentagon to authorize, extend and finance the war and occupation in Iraq?

If the answer to the question is yes...we must assess various factors and craft a strategy that will be fundamentally different from the current path of the anti-war movement. [Emphasis added]

So what's this great "new" strategy?  Unfortunately, it doesn't involve ANSWER dissolving and us rejoicing.  It involves...hold your breath...one big protest!  Taadaa!  Because that new/old strategy of organizing big protests has been working so well, ANSWER wants to get one million people to march on DC.  In six months to a year's time.  In the meantime, you can all take a nap.

Brilliant!  Why didn't anyone think of having a big protest in Washington, DC before? 

Oh wait, they have? 

Oh wait, and the war is still going on? 

Oh wait, no one pays attention to a "movement" that only involves showing your face once or twice a year at a boring, cop-coordinated rally?

Is this really the best that the "leaders of the vanguard" at ANSWER could come up with?  I guess adherence to Stalinism really does stifle creativity.

No wonder the US left is a worldwide laughingstock.  It's been co-opted (willingly) by the likes of ANSWER and their cult of banality and faux-dissent.

At this point, I think Bill Hicks and I are going to go watch American Gladiators.

Woodfin Suites Hotel organizes and provides free lodging for anti-immigrant activists

If we're rent-a-thugs, these kids must have been rented from their parents' country clubs. Perhaps that sign is self-referential.

In an earlier post I called Woodfin an "evil corporation."  But even according evil corporation standards, this is just downright appalling.  An email from the East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy reports the following:

The right-wing, anti-immigrant, anti-worker squads are at it again. This time, they're being sponsored, and paid for, by the Woodfin Suites Hotel in Emeryville.

This past Saturday, during our regular picket at the Woodfin, we were joined by twenty five counter-protestors identifying themselves as College Republicans from UC Davis and San Francisco State. They showed up carrying provocative placards - “No Green Card, No Work”, “Justice is at the Back of the Line”, “Union Thugs Go Home”, "Legals YES, Illegals NO," and “Marx Would Be Proud” - and tried to disrupt our protest.

The counter-protestors were openly taking direction from the Woodfin's management, going where the hotel’s General Manager told them to, standing on hotel property. They even bragged that Woodfin management had put them up in free hotel rooms the night before!

When we tried to separate ourselves, they physically shoved into our picket line- even pushing and berating the young children of Woodfin workers! Finally, the Emeryville police created a barrier between them and our peaceful picket, for the safety of all involved.

Join the pickets. Contact the Woodfin.

SSA shut down at Port of Oakland

My crappy cell phone photo of the picket.

This (early) morning a community picket successfully shut down the war profiteer SSA (Stevedoring Services of America) at the Port of Oakland.  The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) locals decided to honor and not cross the 100+ strong community picket. 

Therefore SSA, which was at full capacity with three ships waiting to be loaded and unloaded, wasn't able to do any business this morning.  The picket is continuing as the second shift of longshore workers arrives at 4:30PM, hopefully to meet with the same results.  I'm sure more photos and reports will go up at Indybay. May this only be the beginning.

UPDATE: SSA was indeed shut down all day by the picket. From a obnoxiously sectarian reportback:

When scores of picketers blocked the gates at the SSA terminal beginning at 7 a.m., the company eventually gave up and called off the shift. In the evening, an arbitrator ruled that this was not a bona fide “health and safety issue” and ordered the workers to go to work. However, the dock workers collectively refused.

Saturday: Picket to shut down the war profiteers

Support community radio and authentic journalism

Mid-afternoon on May 1, Labor Day, students took over the radio station at the Autonomous University Benito Juarez of Oaxaca, in Oaxaca, Mexico. They explained that they intended to cover two days' events which included a march by the Popular Assembly and Teacher movement.

By seven o'clock that night, the government supporters were already hard at work jamming the university signal. By 10:00 the students were no longer audible.

The government fears that the public might hear honest news, news of real events that affect their lives.

The only available remedy is community radio. Right now, young Oaxaquenos are working to put on the air as many community radio facilities as the communities can afford. The technical support project for them is completely Oaxaqueno in staff and muscle. It's controlled and managed at the base, in a system of democratic participation. But the funding comes in part from people like you.

This is the moment to show Oaxaca communities that they are not alone in wanting the truth as it relates to them, in their towns and villages.

Your donation, of any amount, will help to maintain the vital training and technical support provided by SeComo (SERVICIOS DE COMUNICACION DE OAXACA).

The best way to send money from the USA is to mail a check made out to Jean Rodriguez,  "for the community radio project in Oaxaca". Send it to:

Jean Rodriguez
917 N. Van Ness
Fresno, CA 93728 
Her telephone number is 559.445.0425
Her email address is wabob@earthlink.net

From within the European orbit, money can be wired to:
Frankfurter Volksbank
BLZ: 501 900 00
Kontonummer:  6001801196         (Account number) 
Kontoinhaber:  Kurt Herrmann        (Beneficiary)
BIC (Swift code):  FFVBDEFF               
IBAN:  DE55 5019 0000 6001 8011 96

Notify davies_me@yahoo.com and you will receive confirmation that your donation was received.

Social revolution is not tax deductible.

Thank you from Oaxaca,

Nancy Davies, for authentic journalism

Warriors, warming and awesome kids

Though I was just giving a friend some flack about engaging the spectacle when he tried to convince me how great Obama is, I gotta say, the Golden State Warriors are unreal. Making Oakland proud.

Here's a gem from Arkansas my uncle sent me.  Honestly, I was unaware of this liberal conspiracy.

And these kindergarten kids have just conducted the best May Day/anti-Minutemen protest ever.

I'm off to Wyoming for the weekend, so any comments might not go up until Sunday night.

May Day 2007

The origins of modern May Day. Haymarket, 1886.

Probably don't need to tell readers of this blog that May Day is coming up.

In the U.S., the National Immigrant Solidarity Network is calling for decentralized, multi-tactic actions based around these ten demands:

1) No to anti-immigrant legislation and the criminalization of the immigrant communities.
2) No to the militarization of the border.
3) No to immigrant detention and deportation.
4) No to the guest worker program.
5) No to employer sanction and "no match" letters.
6) Yes to a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
7) Yes to speedy family reunification.
8) Yes to civil rights and humane immigration law.
9) Yes to labor rights and living wages for all workers.
10) Yes to education and LGBT immigrant legislation.

There are marches, strikes and protests planned.  Here's an incomplete national list of events.  In the Bay Area there are actions in Oakland, San Francisco, Berkeley, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz and more.  Indybay is the place to check.

Doha Debate on the right of return

For those interested in Palestine and the right of return of Palestinians refugees, I highly recommend watching this debate and Q&A that aired this past weekend on BBC World.  It featured Bassem Eid and Yossi Beilin arguing against the right of return and Ali Abunimah and Ilan Pappe arguing for it. 

In my opinion, and in the opinion of the house, Abunimah and Pappe do a fantastic job while Eid  basically voices his surrender to the occupiers and Beilin can't fathom why Palestinians won't accept apartheid. An interesting post-debate exchange between Eid and Abunimah can be read here.

One of my favorite quotes:

Tim Sebastian, moderator:You don't think there should be compromise? 

Ali Abunimah: Of course there should be compromise.  The compromise is that I have no objection, in fact I'm very glad, that Yossi Beilin and his family and his ancestors live in the country. They're there.  The compromise is that they live there, with us, together in peace.  The thing I can't understand is why he finds it so horrifying that my mother should live in the country with him.

That illustrates an important point.  People are always saying that "both sides need to compromise" and "make difficult concessions for peace" and so on, but the failure of that line of thinking is that it ignores the concessions Palestinians have had forced upon them for the past sixty years.  78% of their country was stolen and they were expelled. The rest of it is slowly being colonized.  They've lived under military occupation for 40 years.  Palestinian citizens of Israel are treated as third class citizens.  Basic human rights of every imaginable kind are consistently denied to them.  And the list goes on.

Removing settlements, taking down the wall, ceding control of East Jerusalem, implementing the right of return - these are not concessions for Israel to make and for Palestinians to counter with concessions of their own.  They are obligations under international and humanitarian law.  Just as ending apartheid in South Africa was not a concession but an obligation.  You don't get points for dismantling structures that you knew were illegitimate, contrary to international law, and shouldn't have been constructed in the first place.

Woodfin struggle continues

The actions of Woodfin Suite Hotels in the East Bay city of Emeryville epitomize the term "evil corporation." Since September of last year they have been trying to fire immigrant workers who are simply demanding that Woodfin comply with Emeryville's recently-passed living wage law.

Every other hotel in town had no problem complying, yet the Woodfin apparently feels it is entitled to continue exploiting workers - paying them poverty wages and then trying to fire them when they demand what they are due.

In truly vindictive fashion, just ten days before Christmas the Woodfin made good on its threat and fired twenty one workers. A court temporarily blocked the firings and ruled the workers should be permitted to stay on the job until April 20, which is fast approaching.  Woodfin is even suing the city over Measure C, the living wage law.  Seems they're doing everything possible to avoid respecting workers' rights and meeting the requirements of the measure.

An easy thing to do is send an email to the Woodfin CEO telling him to meet the workers' demands and that you'll boycott the Woodfin. Keep an eye on WoodfinWatch.org for further developments. And of course, spread the word.

A protest on April 10 at Emeryville's City Hall, followed by a march to the Woodfin. It's hard to see, but there are about 10 various monks and priests on the stage.  Even god (in its hypothetical christian incarnations) is pissed off at the Woodfin.

Smug Woodfin workers watching the April 10 rally. Apparently they have yet to learn the boss will be more than happy to kick their asses to the curb, too.

A Christmas protest following the original firings.

They didn't like us dropping by.

Grinch is pissed, too.

Defend Rev. Pinkney

I wrote about Reverend Pinkney and Benton Harbor back in 2005 and last month he was convicted of election fraud and faces twenty years in prison.  Here's a brief backgrounder on the situation, for more in-depth info, visit the BANCO blog.

Benton Harbor Michigan is 94% Black with an average income of $8,000. Across the river is St. Joseph, world headquarters of the Whirlpool Corporation, nearly all white, $41,000 average income. In 2003, the police killing of a young Black man erupted in so-called riots in Benton Harbor. Rev. Pinkney was already publicly identified as a leader of the overwhelmingly Black disadvantaged community. Rev. Pinkney works with his wife Dorothy and others in the Black Autonomy Network of Community Organizations (BANCO). Together they organized the regular monitoring of courthouse proceedings, pickets of the local newspaper, and openly named those involved in corrupt and racist practices.

When the CEO of Whirlpool announced a “development plan” for 465 riverfront acres in Benton Harbor, BANCO and Rev. Pinkney were outspoken in their opposition to this land grab that would do nothing for those of us who have nothing. They successfully recalled a City Commissioner for being in the pocket of Whirlpool, but the recall was overturned and the Commissioner reinstated. Meanwhile the power elite attempted to criminalize Rev. Pinkney, accusing him of election fraud, and charging him with paying $5 for votes and being in possession of absentee ballots.

The first trial, whose jury included two Black people, ended in a hung jury. A new trial was ordered.

During the second trial, as in the first, the Black residents of Benton Harbor came out in support of Rev. Pinkney both inside and around the courthouse. Despite lack of evidence or credible witnesses for the prosecution, on March 21, 2007 the all-white jury found Rev. Pinkney guilty of election fraud, and he now faces 20 years in prison. He is currently under house arrest as his appeal goes forward. Sentencing has been set for May 14.

Between now and then, all fair-minded individuals, particularly those who have had the privilege to meet Reverend Pinkney or follow his work, should write letters of support.

THEY SHOULD BE ADDRESSED TO: The Honorable Alfred M. Butzbaugh, Berrien County Circuit Court, 811 Port Street, St. Joseph, Michigan, 49085-1187, regarding the case of People v. Reverend Edward Pinkney.

BUT THEY SHOULD BE SENT TO: Hugh M. Davis, Constitutional Litigation Associates, P.C., 450 West Fort Street, Suite 200, Detroit, Michigan, 48226. Phone: 313-961-2255; Fax: 313-961-5999; email: conlitpc@sbcglobal.net.