by Billy Wharton -

Immigrant rights activists carried out a bold act in protest of SB1070, the anti-immigrant bill signed into law by Arizona governor Jan Brewer. Six activists entered the lobby of the Border Patrol headquarters at Davis-Monthan Airforce Base at around 1 pm (MST) and locked themselves down using what organizers describe as a “lock-box.” After managing to disrupt Border Patrol and ICE operations, border guards arrested the protesters who now face charges of trespassing and disorderly conduct.

Lelani Clark, a media outreach coordinator for the action, stated that the protesters wished to “Bring back indigenous forms of freedom of movement across borders.” The protest group included members of the Indigenous Nations of Arizona, migrant workers and white allies. The group was driven to act, Clark said, because SB1070 “carries with it the legacy of the human rights crisis developing on the border.”

SB1070 is widely considered to be a harshly anti-immigrant law. It requires all forms of law enforcement in the state to check the immigration status of any person they suspect of being illegal. Immigrants’ rights activists call this an open invitation to racially profile Latino communities. Clark took this point further, calling it an attack on all communities of color in the state.

Protests against SB1070 have escalated in recent weeks. May Day marches throughout the country focused on repealing the law and musical artists, including the Hip-Hop group Cypress Hill, have cancelled concerts in the state. On Monday, three immigrant rights activists were arrested after staging a sit-in, in the office of Senator John McCain to protest his reversal of support for the immigration reform Dream Act.

Clark stated that the activists were mobilizing for the May 29 demonstration in Phoenix against SB1070 that has been called by the umbrella group Alto Arizona. Caravans are being organized from Tucson for the event.

The message from protesters at the Davis-Monthan Airforce Base is clear – “Border militarization destroys Indigenous communities.” Direct action seems to be the primary tactic being employed by anti-SB1070 forces who are engaged in the largest struggle for civil rights since the 1960s. Indigenous communities may make unique contributions to this struggle as they draw upon bonds of affiliation that transcend modern conceptions of the nation-state.

***
Billy Wharton is a writer, activist and editor of the Socialist WebZine whose articles have appeared in the Washington Post, Counterpunch, Common Dreams and the Monthly Review Zine. He can be reached at whartonbilly(at)gmail.com

Read the SP-USA's Statement on SB1070

AMY GOODMAN: While President Obama and Calderón were meeting in Washington, another drama was playing out in the state of Arizona. Three immigrant rights activists are facing possible deportation after they were arrested in a sit-in on Monday at the offices of Republican Senator John McCain. The students called on McCain to back the DREAM Act, which would grant permanent citizenship to undocumented workers’ children if they completed two years of college. The three are each undocumented immigrants, marking one of the first known instances activists have risked deportation to back immigration reform legislation.

JUAN GONZALEZ: The activists were held in ICE detention on Tuesday night but were released on Wednesday after a judge ruled they were not a flight risk. The three activists join us now in Phoenix.

Mohammad Abdollahi is a twenty-four-year-old Iranian-born immigrant rights activist. He’s a co-founder of dreamactivist.org, a resource web portal for undocumented students. He’s lived in Michigan since he was three years old.

Yahaira Carrillo is a student at Rockhurst University in Kansas. She was born in Mexico and is the founder of the Kansas Missouri Dream Alliance.

And Lizbeth Mateo is an organizer with DREAM Team Los Angeles. She came to this country at the age of fourteen from Mexico.

Welcome to all three of you. Lizbeth, could you tell us what happened subsequent to your arrest when you entered Senator McCain’s offices?

LIZBETH MATEO: So we staged a sit-in at Senator McCain’s office, and, you know, we were there for a few hours. We refused to leave. And after that, you know, we demanded to—actually, we demanded to get Senator McCain to co-sponsor the DREAM Act. After that, we were arrested and were taken to county jail, where we spent the night. And the next day, we had a hearing, and we were eventually turned over to ICE. We were in custody of ICE for a few hours, and then they determined that we could leave, under a promise to—you know, to appear in court and to, you know, basically just appear in court later, at a later date, when they set that.

JUAN GONZALEZ: Could you tell us a little bit about your personal story and why you made this decision at this particular time to risk the possibility of deportation?

LIZBETH MATEO: Sure. Well, I came to this country when I was fourteen years old and, you know, went to high school. I went to college. I graduated a couple years ago. I’ve been working on the DREAM Act for about seven years now. And throughout that time, I’ve met a lot of young people who have lost a lot of hope, who are so desperate, and who have gone through so much depression and don’t know what to do. I’ve been organizing, like I say, for seven years, and I feel like that I’m, in a way, responsible to do something. You know, I’m twenty-five years old. I’m not so young anymore. And I work with a lot of really young people, high school students who, you know, in a way, look up to me and to other people in my situation who have made it through college. And so, I felt a big responsibility to do something, even if that was, you know, risking possible deportation.

AMY GOODMAN: Mohammad, tell us your story, why you chose to sit in that day at McCain’s office earlier this week.

MOHAMMAD ABDOLLAHI: Certainly, certainly. My family immigrated here from Iran when I was three years old. I’ve been living here pretty much my whole life. I went to elementary school here, middle school, high school. I graduated from high school in 2003. And after graduating, I kind of came up to this roadblock, where I really wasn’t able to do much because of my legal status. And so, I started organizing on the DREAM Act and started working with students that were facing deportation and helping stop their deportations and organizing and getting resources to undocumented students around the country to make sure that, even if I wasn’t able to go to college, other students would have that opportunity, that we could help them with that.

And so, as we were getting down to the end of this year, we were realizing that the DREAM Act really has a very small chance of passing, in terms of time that we have left. And so we started realizing that, you know, we need to escalate as a movement, and we need to start taking bigger risks, so that we can make sure the DREAM Act has a chance of passing before the end of the school year. And so, that’s why we decided to do this action.

Senator McCain was a longtime supporter of the DREAM Act. He was a champion in 2007. And unfortunately, he felt the need to leave the Senate floor fifteen minutes before the vote in 2007. And so, we thought he was a good target here, here in Arizona, to kind of remind him that we respected him in 2007 as a champion, and out of that respect, we wanted to come back to his office and show him that, you know, we’re still here, we’re still undocumented, and we definitely need him to take a risk, just as we took a risk with our lives, and co-sponsor the DREAM Act.

AMY GOODMAN: Mohammad, what would happen if you were deported? Where would you be deported to?

MOHAMMAD ABDOLLAHI: If I was deported, I’d be deported to Iran. And because I’m gay, that’s probably not the best place to go. And to be completely honest, I haven’t really thought about what would happen if I was to go back. At this point, like Lisbeth was saying, doing this action came out of a place where we actually owe a lot of responsibility to the undocumented youth that we work with. And as undocumented students that are a little bit more out there and a little bit more public and have a little bit stronger networks than a lot of the young people that we work with, it’s our responsibility to take bigger risks. And so, I would put my life any day in the hands of the people I’m sitting here with, the undocumented youth that I’m working with. And that’s what we did with this action, because we really need to push the DREAM Act forward.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And Mohammad, what do you say to those Americans who may be sympathetic to your ability to make a successful college career for yourself, but who say that you’re still in the country illegally and that many others from around the world who are trying to come to the country go through the legal immigration process? What’s your response to them?

MOHAMMAD ABDOLLAHI: I would just remind them, just like myself and Lizbeth and Yahaira sitting here, we’ve pretty much grown up in this country, and so we consider this country our home. And so, whenever people say things like that, for us, it’s just—we’re about—we’re trying to improve our home, which is this country, and that’s why we’re trying to work for the passage of the DREAM Act, because we see a problem in our country, and we want to solve that. And so, that’s why we’re working towards the DREAM Act, because we want the same thing as those people. And so, hopefully we can work together to pass the DREAM Act.

AMY GOODMAN: Yahaira Carrillo, tell us your story. You’re a student. And tell us how you ended up sitting in at John McCain’s office.

YAHAIRA CARRILLO: Well, first of all, thank you for having us here today.

Yes, I am a student at Rockhurst University. I graduated high school in 2003 and have been working on my bachelor’s degree since then. Currently, that’s been seven years in the making. I expect to graduate, hopefully, next spring, which will make eight years since I’ve been working on my degree. I came to the US when I was seven. So, just like Mohammad states, this feels like my home.

And just like Lizbeth stated, we’ve been organizing for years around the DREAM Act. And this action is bigger than ourselves, is one thing that we like to remind ourselves of, and that it’s not about us as individuals. It really is about the thousands of students that we work with and the urgency that they feel and the desperation that they feel, and really the need to pass the DREAM Act, because we need to give young people hope, because their dreams are being truncated and their hopes are being dashed every single day, especially now that we’re in graduation season. It’s a bittersweet time for undocumented youth who are graduating high school and really don’t know what the next step is and where their lives are really going to go. And that’s why I decided to step up and to be there at Senator McCain’s office.

AMY GOODMAN: Where would you be deported to?

YAHAIRA CARRILLO: I would be deported to Mexico.

AMY GOODMAN: And what is your sense right now of what is going happen in all of your cases? Will you be deported? And what has Senator McCain had to say about this? This will be the first time in the country that young undocumented immigrants will be deported for protesting around immigration reform.

YAHAIRA CARRILLO: When we decided to take this step to really step up to the plate and be the leaders that young people look to us as, we knew that that was a risk. But like I said, this is beyond ourselves, and we were willing to take that risk for the young people that we work with. You know, it’s about the DREAM Act. We have to remember the message is not about our individual cases and whether we will or won’t be deported. But the passage of the DREAM Act would address that. The passage of the DREAM Act would stop our deportations and really allow us to move forward with our futures and the dreams that we have of bettering our communities and fully integrating as the Americans that we feel.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And Yahaira, what’s been the reaction of your parents to your actions, and the rest of your community?

YAHAIRA CARRILLO: My community has really shown, and all of our communities have shown, an outpouring of love and support for us. They know how hard we have been working for the past years. They know that we’re dedicated, and they know why we’re doing this. And they are with us every step of the way. We definitely feel their love and their support, and we know that they’re doing everything they can to work with us for passage of the DREAM Act.

My mom, you know, it’s hard for her to see her little girl grow up and be taking these kinds of steps, but I know that she is proud of me and, you know, the leadership that I portray. And she knows why I’m doing this. It’s for the right reasons. It’s for bigger reasons than myself. I mean, I wanted to be a teacher. It’s really about those young people who, I hope, will continue to learn and to grow. And without the DREAM Act, they really don’t have that incentive to continue learning, to continue growing and fulfilling themselves as human beings. And that just doesn’t make sense to me.

AMY GOODMAN: Lizbeth, has John McCain weighed in? You all have said that he was for the DREAM Act, and now he is not supporting it. Has he spoken with you, or has his office spoken with any of you?

LIZBETH MATEO: No. No, he hasn’t. One of the things that we did get out of that, you know, sit-in was to eventually schedule a meeting with him when he’s in Arizona, which will be in a couple weeks. So hopefully we’ll be meeting with him in person.

He hasn’t said anything really about the DREAM Act. I know that—we know that he supports it. We know that it’s an election year, and so he has to play politics. But we’re really tired of politicians playing politics with our lives, because they’re not just—you know, they’re thousands of lives. And so, we’re hopeful that he will finally come out in support of the DREAM Act and that both Republicans and Democrats will stop blaming each other for their inaction. I think we need a leader. And we are definitely looking up to not just Senator McCain, but other senators, key leaders in the Senate, to step up to the plate and, you know, take the risk that—a similar risk that we took, you know, have the courage to take that risk, just like we did and just like thousands of students do every day, when they finally say, you know, "I’m going to put fear aside, and I’m going to be myself, and yes, I am undocumented."

AMY GOODMAN: We want to thank—

LIZBETH MATEO: So we’re hopeful that that will happen.

AMY GOODMAN: We want to thank you all for being with us, Lizbeth Mateo, Yahaira Carrillo and Mohammad Abdollahi. Thank you for joining us from Phoenix. We hope to be able to talk to you again soon, and we hope that won’t mean that you’re no longer in this country. We will follow your case around whether you will be deported or not for protesting, for sitting in at Senator McCain’s office.

from Democracy NOW

PHOENIX, AZ – MALDEF and a coalition of civil rights groups filed a class action lawsuit today in a federal court in Phoenix challenging Arizona’s new law requiring police to demand "papers" from people they stop who they suspect are not authorized to be in the U.S. The extreme law, the coalition charged, invites the racial profiling of people of color, violates the First Amendment and interferes with federal law.

The coalition filing the lawsuit includes the American Civil Liberties Union, MALDEF, National Immigration Law Center (NILC), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), ACLU of Arizona, National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON) and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC) – a member of Asian American Center for Advancing Justice.

"Arizona's law is quintessentially un-American: we are not a 'show me your papers' country, nor one that believes in subjecting people to harassment, investigation and arrest simply because others may perceive them as foreign,” said Omar Jadwat, a staff attorney with the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project.

“This law violates the Constitution and interferes with federal law, and we are confident that we will prevent it from ever taking effect."

The lawsuit charges that the Arizona law unlawfully interferes with federal power and authority over immigration matters in violation of the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution; invites racial profiling against people of color by law enforcement in violation of the equal protection guarantee and prohibition on unreasonable seizures under the Fourteenth and Fourth Amendments; and infringes on the free speech rights of day laborers and others in Arizona.

“This discriminatory law pushes Arizona into a spiral of fear, increased crime, and costly litigation,” said Victor Viramontes, MALDEF Senior National Counsel. “We expect that this misguided law will be enjoined before it takes effect.”

One of the individuals the coalition is representing in the case, Jim Shee, is a U.S.-born 70-year-old American citizen of Spanish and Chinese descent. Shee asserts that he will be vulnerable to racial profiling under the law, and that, although the law has not yet gone into effect, he has already been stopped twice by local law enforcement officers in Arizona and asked to produce his “papers.”

Another plaintiff, Jesus Cuauhtémoc Villa, is a resident of the state of New Mexico who is currently attending Arizona State University. The state of New Mexico does not require proof of U.S. citizenship or immigration status to obtain a driver’s license. Villa does not have a U.S. passport and does not want to risk losing his birth certificate by carrying it with him. He worries about traveling in Arizona without a valid form of identification that would prove his citizenship to police if he is pulled over. If he cannot supply proof upon demand, Arizona law enforcement is required to arrest and detain him.

Several prominent law enforcement groups, including the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police, oppose the law because it diverts limited resources from law enforcement’s primary responsibility of providing protection and promoting public safety in the community and undermines trust and cooperation between local police and immigrant communities.

“This ill-conceived law sends a clear message to communities of color that the authorities are not to be trusted, making them less likely to come forward as victims of or witnesses to crime,” said Linton Joaquin, General Counsel of NILC. “Arizona’s authorities should not allow public safety to take a back seat to racial profiling."

“African-Americans know all too well the insidious effects of racial profiling,” said Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and Chief Executive Officer of the NAACP. “The government should be preventing police from investigating and detaining people based on color and accent, not mandating it. Laws that encourage discrimination have no place in this country anywhere for anyone.”

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of labor, domestic violence, day laborer, human services and social justice organizations, including Friendly House, Services Employees International Union (SEIU) International, SEIU Local 5, United Food and Commercial Workers International (UFCW), Arizona South Asians for Safe Families (ASAFSF), Southside Presbyterian Church, Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Asian Chamber of Commerce of Arizona, Border Action Network, Tonatierra Community Development Institute, Muslim American Society, Japanese American Citizens League, Valle del Sol, Inc, Coalicíon De Derechos Humanos, individual named plaintiffs who will be subject to harassment or arrest under the law and a class of similarly situated persons.

“This extreme law puts Arizona completely out of step with American values of fairness and equality,” said Julie Su, Litigation Director of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center. “In a state where U.S. citizens of Japanese descent were interned during World War II, it is deeply troubling that a law that would mandate lower-class treatment of people of color, immigrants and others seen to be outsiders would pass in 2010.”

“Day laborers have repeatedly defended their First Amendment rights in federal courts and successfully established their undeniable right to seek work in public areas,” said Pablo Alvarado, Executive Director of NDLON. “Arizona's effort to criminalize day laborers and migrants is an affront to the Constitution and threatens to disrupt national unity, and we are confident that federal courts will intervene to ensure the protection of our bedrock civil rights.”

Even prior to the passage of the statute, local enforcement of federal immigration law has already caused rampant racial profiling of Latinos in Arizona, most notably in Maricopa County. The ACLU, MALDEF and other members of the coalition have several pending lawsuits against government officials in Arizona because of civil rights abuses of U.S. citizens and immigrants.

Organizations and attorneys on the case, Friendly House et al. v. Halliday et al., include:

ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project: Jadwat, Lucas Guttentag, Cecillia Wang,
Tanaz Moghadam and Harini P. Raghupathi;
MALDEF: Thomas A. Saenz, Nina Perales, Cynthia Valenzuela Dixon, Victor
Viramontes, Gladys Limón and Nicholás Espiritu;
NILC: Joaquin, Karen C. Tumlin, Nora A. Preciado, Melissa S. Keaney, Vivek
Mittal and Ghazal Tajmiri;
ACLU Foundation of Arizona: Dan Pochoda and Annie Lai;
APALC: Su, Ronald Lee, Yungsuhn Park, Connie Choi and Carmina Ocampo
NDLON: Chris Newman;
NAACP: Jealous and Laura Blackburne;
Altshuler Berzon: Jonathan Weissglass;
Munger of Tolles & Olson LLP: Bradley S. Phillips, Joseph J. Ybarra, Susan
T. Boyd and Yuval Miller;
Roush, Mccracken, Guerrero, Miller & Ortega: Daniel R. Ortega, Jr.

To view the complaint and accompanying documents, please click here

by Dave Zirin -

Chuck D. The Hard Rhymer. The man on the mic for the most politically explosive hip-hop group in history, Public Enemy. With albums like “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back,” “Fear of a Black Planet,” and anthems like “Fight the Power” and “Bring the Noise” along with the breathtaking production of the Bomb Squad, PE created a standard of politics and art. Perhaps their most controversial track was “By the Time I Get to Arizona” (1991) about seeking revenge against Arizona political officials for refusing to recognize Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday [Lyrics include: 'Cause my money's spent on The goddamn rent/Neither party is mine not the Jackass or the elephant.] Today, in the wake of Arizona’s draconian anti-immigration Senate Bill 1070, “By the Time I Get to Arizona” has been remixed and revived by DJ Spooky. Chuck D also recorded his own track several months before the bill was passed called “Tear Down That Wall.” I spoke to Chuck about the music and the nexus between immigration politics and sports.

DZ: Why did you choose to record “Tear Down this Wall?”

Chuck D: I had done "Tear Down this Wall" four or five months ago because I heard a professor who works with my wife here on the West Coast speak in a speech about the multi-billion dollar dividing wall between the U.S. and Mexico, so, therefore, I based "Tear Down that Wall" on the policy of the United States border patrol in the states of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas. I just wanted to put a twist of irony on it saying if Ronald Reagan back in 1988 had told Mr. Gorbachev to tear down that wall separating the world from countries of capitalism and communism, we have a billion dollar wall right here in our hemisphere that exists that needs to have a bunch of questions raised. Questions like: “What the Hell?” I wrote the song about five months ago and I did it coincidently, with all that’s brewing in the state of Arizona. Immigration laws and racial profiling is happening right here and I think the border situation, not only with the U.S. and Mexico but the U.S. and Canada, on both sides is just out of control. It's crazy.

DZ: You did "Tear Down This Wall," we have the DJ Spooky remix of "By the Time I Get to Arizona," and with your wife, Dr. Gaye Theresa Johnson, you wrote a syndicated column on SB 1070. What’s the response been to you being so out front on this issue?

Chuck D: Well the response is the usual, but I make it a habit not to look at any blogs, because I think the font of a computer gives as much credence to ignorance as it does to somebody who makes sense. So I try not to read those responses, because anybody can respond quickly. Back when people had to write letters it took an effort, especially if someone didn't have decent penmanship and handwriting. I try not to look at the responses. I try to do the right thing. I tell you this much, there is a rap contingent, a hip-hop contingent from Phoenix, who did a remake of "By the Time I Get to Arizona." I think that needs to be recognized because these are young people. The song is about eight minutes long. There's about 12 MCs on it, and they are putting it down. They are talking about how ridiculous this law is. They are speaking out against it and they are putting all the facts on the table, and they need to be acknowledged and highlighted. There is a stereotype about young people and young MCs [being apolitical]. They break it.

DZ: It’s remarkable how the original “By the Time I Get to Arizona” has been resurrected from the early 90's now that the struggle has picked up. Did you hear former NBA player Chris Webber before the Suns/Spurs game say, "Its like PE said ‘By the Time I get to Arizona.’”?

Chuck D: [laughs] My Dad told me about that, You know Chris Webber is the man. I wasn't tuned into TNT at that particular time.

DZ: He said more than that. He said, “Public Enemy said it a long time ago. ‘By the Time I Get to Arizona.’ I’m not surprised. They didn’t even want there to be a Martin Luther King Day when John McCain was in [office.]. So if you follow history you know that this is part of Arizona politics.’” So he brought it all together with Public Enemy at the center of it.

Chuck D: Unfortunately when it comes to culture, the speed of technology and news today makes things out of sight, out of mind. While these situations [the MLK fight and the immigration fights] are different, the politics of both things stay around like a stain.... Once again Arizona has put themselves into this mix. I don't know what the hell was on Gov. Jan Brewer’s mind or what contingent is behind her, but, you know, to make a decision like this and to be told to ignore the people who have been in this area on this earth the longest period of time. It just kind of resonates with me as being crazy.

DZ: Do you support an athletic or artistic boycott of Arizona until this gets settled?

Chuck D: Dave, you know I do. Artists and musicians can say we’re going to play Texas, El Paso, New Mexico, Albuquerque, and we gotta play L.A. But we’ll skip Phoenix, Flagstaff, Tucson and the like. But you know what this is really a challenge for: that’s Major League Baseball. You’ve got nearly a third of the players that are Latino. If they don’t stand up to this bill, they will actually be validating the divide amongst Latinos [between documented and undocumented immigrants]. At the same time they’ll also be lining themselves right into the stereotype of what an athlete is if they don’t speak out: a high priced slave that doesn’t say anything. And to me it’s beyond just boycotting the All-Star game. What are those Latino players on the Diamondbacks going to do? What are the players going to say who go into Arizona to play against the Diamondbacks? What are they going to say and what are they going to do? Major League Baseball has to step up. The NBA has very few players of Latino descent and [the Suns] are saying something. But Major League Baseball, if they don’t say anything, it’s crazy. The owners, the team, the league, and especially the players, whether they come from the Dominican Republic, whether they come from Venezuela, whether they come from Puerto Rico, they better step up. If they don’t step up, the music industry, at least from my area, we’re going to clown them. For us to speak out against this law, and basketball stepping up, and Major League Baseball not stepping up at all?! Come on now, give me a break. And I know a lot of the cats they live in the Dominican Republic or Puerto Rico or whatever, there’s like a trillion years difference between them and their high salaries and the average people living in the streets. They might build themselves a castle with a militia to protect them, but this is the time to unite yourself with the people and at least live in the legacy that [Major League Hall of Famer] Roberto Clemente set of uniting people just to protect against the nonsense that the other side can come up with. They need to know that it’s going to spread if they don’t come up and say something about it.

DZ: Any final thoughts? Perhaps about Major League Baseball pulling the All Star Game out of Phoenix?

Chuck D: At the end of the day man, sports is really not that important compared to people living their everyday lives. Say you have a Major League player, and he happens to play for another team, or he happens to play for the Diamondbacks and he gets pulled over because people think he’s an illegal immigrant. Then all of a sudden that’s when the “ish” finally hits the fan? Come on. This is beyond sports. We want athletes to speak up because they have advantages. They have everyday coverage. They’re covered by a person that has a mic and a camera in their face, and this is the time to step up. Major League Baseball pulling the All-Star game out of Arizona should be the least of it.

***
Dave Zirin is the author of the forthcoming “Bad Sports: How Owners are Ruining the Games we Love” (Scribner) Receive his column every week by emailing dave@edgeofsports.com. Contact him at edgeofsports@gmail.com.

from the Edge of Sports

Arizona Boycott Clearinghouse (ABC) is a coalition formed by Arizona-based civil rights, immigrant and community organizations, business partners, individuals and faith leaders that unites, informs, orients and mobilizes interested organizations and individuals to actions that lead to the reversal of Arizona’s unconstitutional, unjust and immoral SB 1070 law.

ABC will pursue its mission by:

1. Asking institutions to not hold any conventions, meetings or events in Arizona.
2. Informing the public about businesses that support SB 1070 and its enablers so that their acts have an economic adverse effect on them.
3. Highlight businesses and institutions that oppose SB 1070, so that they can be supported. Contact us with the name and contact information of businesses the community can support.
4. Educating individuals and, the local and global community on their human rights, particularly as affected by SB 1070.
5. Encouraging and facilitating voter education and mobilization efforts.
6. Providing a uniting forum that exchanges ideas and suggestions for peaceful, non-violent, active resistance.

from the Arizona Boycott Clearinghouse

Our world is in the grips of the most calamitous economic crisis since the Great Depression – and its epicenter is the imperial United States, where hallowed investment banks have disappeared overnight, giants of industry have gone bankrupt, and the financial order has been shaken to the core.

While many around the globe are increasingly wondering if another world is indeed possible, few are mapping out potential avenues – and flagging wrong turns – en route to a post-capitalist future. In this groundbreaking analysis of the meltdown, renowned radical political economists Albo, Gindin and Panitch lay bare the roots of the crisis, which they locate in the dynamic expansion of capital on a global scale over the last quarter century – and in the inner logic of capitalism itself.

With an unparalleled understanding of the inner workings of capitalism, the authors of In and Out of Crisis provocatively challenge the call by much of the Left for a return to a largely mythical Golden Age of economic regulation as a check on finance capital unbound. They deftly illuminate how the era of neoliberal free markets has been, in practice, undergirded by state intervention on a massive scale. With clarity and erudition, they argue persuasively that given the current balance of social forces – as bank bailouts around the globe make evident – regulation is not a means of fundamentally reordering power in society, but rather a way of preserving markets.

Contrary to those who believe US hegemony is on the wane, Albo, Gindin and Panitch contend that the meltdown has, in fact, reinforced the centrality of the American state as the dominant force within global capitalism, while simultaneously increasing the difficulties entailed in managing its imperial role.

In conclusion, the authors argue that it’s time to start thinking about genuinely transformative alternatives to capitalism – and how to build the collective capacity to get us there. We should be thinking bigger and preparing to go further. In and Out of Crisis stands to be the enduring critique of the crisis and an indispensable springboard for a renewed Left.

from In and Out of Crisis


Listen to Doug Henwood's radio show with the In and Out of Crisis authors:

Lyubov Sergeyevna Popova - (April 24, 1889 – May 25, 1924) was a Russian avant-garde artist (Cubist, Suprematist and Constructivist), painter and designer. She was also a rarity in the highly masculine world of Soviet art.

In 1916 she joined the Supremus group with Kazimir Malevich, the founder of Suprematism, Aleksandra Ekster, Ivan Kliun, Nadezhda Udaltsova, Olga Rozanova, Ivan Puni, Nina Genke, Ksenia Boguslavskaya and others who at this time worked in Verbovka Village Folk Centre. The creation of a new kind of painting was part of the revolutionary urge of the Russian avant-garde to remake the world. The term 'supreme' refers to a 'non-objective' or abstract world beyond that of everyday reality. However there was a tension between those who, like Malevich saw art as a spiritual quest, and others who responded to the need for the artist to create a new physical world. Popova embraced both of these ideals but eventually identified herself entirely with the aims of the Revolution working in poster, book design, fabric and theatre design, as well as teaching. At 0.10 she had exhibited a number of figurative painted cardboard reliefs in a cubist derived style. In 1916
she began to paint completely abstract Suprematist compositions, but the title 'Painterly Architectonics' (which she gave to many of her paintings) suggests that, even as a Suprematist, Popova was more interested in painting as a projection of material reality than as the personal expression of a metaphysical reality. Popova's superimposed planes and strong colour have the objective presence of actual space and materials.

From 1921–24 Popova became entirely involved in Constructivist projects, sometimes in collaboration with Varvara Stepanova, the architect Alexander Vesnin and Aleksandr Rodchenko. She produced stage designs: Vsevolod Meyerhold's production of Fernand Crommelynck's The Magnanamous Cuckold, 1922; Her Spatial Force Constructions were used as the basis of her art teaching theory at . She designed typography of books, production art and textiles, and contributed designs for dresses to LEF.

Popova died of scarlet fever in 1924 in Moscow. A large exhibition of her work opened in Moscow on December 21, 1924.

from Wikipedia

by the SP-USA -
Language matters, especially at times of crisis. The explosion on BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig that released hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico has been called a “disaster” by many. It isn’t a disaster. It is a crime. Early estimates are that the spill will cost more than $14 billion to clean, will devastate local fisheries for generations and will result in untold damage to all parts of the ecology in the Gulf region. Corporations are the criminals here - British Petroleum (BP) and, a company that is no stranger to corporate crime, Halliburton. This massive spill highlights both the need for an immediate transition to clean energy sources and the need to apply democratic controls to inherently criminal multinational corporations.

The clean up of the area must begin immediately, it must be conducted with the consultation and best interest of local fishermen and environmentalists and it must be entirely paid for by BP. In addition, BP should be made to pay into a public fund that would be used for the continued clean up and preservation of the local ecology. Any failure to meet these demands should result in the seizure of the US holdings of BP and its banning from conducting business in this country. Anything less than this should be considered as a betrayal to the best interests of residents of region and the broader international community.

This massive oil spill demonstrates the urgent need to transition to clean renewable energy forms. Such a transition will not likely take place inside of a capitalist system where short-term profiteering dominates the allocation of capital funds. BP has fought the federal government on safety procedures that might have minimized the impact of the most recent spill for more than a decade. CEOs do not get bonuses based upon ensuring future generation’s access to resources, clean air, or a hospitable climate. The purpose of corporations is not to oversee the welfare of the people of the world, but to make money. Environmental damage is not factored into the corporate calculations of costs and profits. Instead, environmental damage is viewed as the collateral damage of the free market in operation.

Not surprisingly, BP had a partner in this crime – Halliburton. Fresh off their stint bilking US taxpayers during the war in Iraq, the company was contracted by BP to cement the drill, oil well and pipe into the ocean floor. The Los Angeles Times reports that this task was completed a mere 20 hours before the well exploded. Not surprisingly, Halliburton has also been accused of being responsible for another oil spill in the Timor Sea last August after completing a similar cementing job. Here was see the logic of capitalism in full display. BP wants to take the cheapest bid for the job and Halliburton wants to pocket the most money with the least costs. All with no mind paid to the environment, local fishermen, or the future of the planet.

Meanwhile, politicians from the Democratic and Republican parties serve as willing accomplices to the corporations. In 2008, the McCain/Palin ticket was run on the suicidal slogan of “Drill Baby Drill!” The campaign of now President Barack Obama softly dismissed these claims, but once in office, designed a plan to allow oil exploration off the coastline of North America. The current spill exposes the bankruptcy of Obama’s drilling plan and the futility of his cap-and-trade market based proposals to address carbon emissions. Corporations will continue to pollute the environment as long as they have political partners who will allow them to evade the desires of the vast majority of people in this country for clean energy and a safe environment.

The Socialist Party USA offers a clear eco-socialist alternative to the proposals of the two parties. By establishing a system of public ownership and democratic control over our natural resources, we will ensure that corporations are prevented from exploiting and spoiling our environment. By creating strong enforceable laws regarding endangered species that focus on habitat-centered protection, we propose to begin repairing the damage done by capitalist production. Finally, we intend to bring the United States back into line with the world by signing on to international environmental treaties and participating and supporting grassroots environmental justice efforts. In short, our goal is to create a cleaner, more democratic future where environmental preservation, instead of profit motive, becomes a primary part of economic decision-making.

Capitalist profit-motive will be the death of our planet. Democratic socialism, operating on an international basis, can save our fragile ecosystem and our health by defending the rights of future generations to clean water, clean air and a democratically run society.

from Socialist Party USA, National Action Committee
download this statement in pamphlet form click here

by the Center for Biological Diversity -

HOW BIG IS THE SPILL?
BP initially asserted that 1,000 barrels of oil per day (42,000 gallons) were gushing forth from the broken pipeline. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration soon upped the estimate to 5,000 barrels per day (210,000 gallons). Then experts stated the gusher is more likely on the order of 25,000 barrels per day (1,050,000 gallons). Recently a scientific analysis of video of the spill source made available by BP showed that the true figure might be far higher — closer to 70,000 barrels a day. Whether 25,000 or 1,050,000 barrels per day, the BP spill is already far larger than the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident in Alaska, making it the worst oil spill in American history. On May 4, BP officials reported that the oil spill could grow at 12 times the initial estimate, releasing 2.5 million gallons of oil per day into the Gulf of Mexico. If the wellhead fails completely — which hasn’t happened yet — the spill rate could increase to 6.8 million gallons of oil per day.

Oil has hit shore at South Pass, an entrance to the Mississippi River, and at Whiskey Island on the south end of the Chandeleur Islands. On May 12, A Shoreline Cleanup Assessment Team discovered a trail of oil debris on the shoreline of Raccoon Island, a protected bird breeding sanctuary. Tarballs 3.9 inches to 4.7 inches in diameter have been reported along 1.2 miles of Gulf Shores, Alabama. Oil has also landed on areas of the Breton National Wildlife Refuge. Oil-covered gannets, egrets, and brown pelicans have been found, and the refuge was closed to the public for safety reasons. The area provides key nesting and migratory stopover habitat for thousands of birds, as well as important fishery habitat. Tar balls have also washed up on Alabama's white sandy beaches of Dauphin Island. Some of the oily foam, a mixture of oil, water, and dispersants, is also washing up near the Mississippi delta. The stench of crude permeates coastal areas, where it’s causing headaches, burning eyes, and nausea among the people who live there. Meanwhile, a ban on fishing continues as the oil continues to seep into the Gulf.
Burning oil

Controlled in situ burns of the oil slick have spewed fire and massive amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Click here for a Navy video of the scene.

Plugging one of the three leaks in BP’s crumpled pipeline has failed to slow the gush of oil, and BP’s next-best hope of drilling an adjacent well to relieve the pressure from the damaged well, so it can be capped, is at least 90 days away. BP attempted to contain the spill with a giant steel box placed over the leaks, but in the deep waters a mile below the surface the dome has frozen gas hydrates clogged the funnel. Efforts to solve the problem continue, but the dome has been set aside for a few days. Other fixes in the works include: using a smaller containment box, shooting debris such as tires and golf balls into the well, or cutting the leaking pipe and putting larger pipe like a straw over it. These are all untested and risky solutions and some of them also have the potential to increase the flow of oil. In the meantime, controlled burns of the oil on the surface have belched fire and smoke into the atmosphere.

HOW FAST IS IT SPREADING?

The surface oil slick covers an area of approximately 4,500 square miles (about the size of Connecticut). It appears to be circulating counterclockwise; oil continues to gush unchecked into the seas below. It's expanding toward the Mississippi Delta, and there's a large patch of oil that has moved west near Port Fourchon. Compare the size of the spill to your city.

If the spill continues to grow at the current pace, it’s likely to reach the Gulf Stream. This will whisk the oil into the Florida Keys, around the tip of Florida, and into the Atlantic Ocean. From there, it could begin fouling Atlantic Coast beaches, bays, and coral reefs. Some predict that some small oil filaments may have already reached eddies on the cusp of the Gulf Stream.

See the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s daily map of the spill.

BP is flooding the surface and deep ocean with hundreds of thousands of gallons of toxic chemical “dispersants” in a desperate attempt to keep the visible surface slick in check. Dispersants, which scientists agree are toxic where they’re applied, have never been pumped into a marine ecosystem in such enormous volumes or at such depths. These chemicals bind with oil droplets so that they sink and become “dispersed” by currents. As of May 14, more than 517,000 gallons of dispersants have been applied in an effort to dilute the oil. Learn more.

Much of the oil remains underwater, where it can poison the plants and animals that form the base of the Gulf food web. Scientists fear that submerged oil may end up settling on valuable coral formations in the Gulf, like the Flower Gardens.

WHAT SPECIES ARE THREATENED?

The BP oil spill threatens some of the most productive — and fragile — marine ecosystems in the United States. About 25 percent of the nation’s wetlands lie in the Mississippi River Delta, providing habitat for nesting seabirds and resting migratory birds. The Gulf itself is home to dozens of threatened and endangered species, as well as commercially important fish, crab, and shrimp that provide much of the basis of the Gulf Coast economy. While the response to the oil spill has largely focused on stopping oil from reaching shore, the offshore ecosystem, from plankton to dolphins, will suffer devastating impacts. A endangered sperm whales and stripted dolphins have already been spotted passing through the giant slick — which, on May 7, hit critical habitat for the federally protected piping plover on the Chandeleur Islands. On May 9, the Coast Guard reported dead birds and porpoises onshore, but further investigation is needed to determine if they were victims of the oil spill. Oiled gannets and brown pelicans were the first victims discovered by response teams, and some recovered birds were released on May 10. On May 14, an adult green heron that was found lightly oiled May 7 and rehabilitated was released at Sherburne Wildlife Management Area in Krotz, Louisiana. On the morning of May 15, an unidentified dead sea turtle was found on the beach in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. The Coast Guard reports that 18 birds, 87 sea turtles, and six dolphins have been found dead, although it has yet to confirm whether the deaths are oil related.

The timing of the spill could not have been worse. Imperiled species including the Atlantic bluefin tuna, Kemp’s ridley sea turtles, loggerhead sea turtles, piping plovers, and sperm whales are flocking to the Gulf right now to spawn, migrate, and feed. For many of them, there’s nowhere else to go.

The state of Louisiana has identified 210 birds, reptiles, amphibians, and mammals likely to be affected by the spill — including about a dozen threatened and endangered species. Another 445 fish and invertebrate species will also be impacted. No estimate exists yet as to the number of corals and plants such as sea grass and wetland vegetation likely to be covered in oil.

Numerous species of seabirds, dolphins, and sea turtles have been spotted struggling through the oily muck. Dead seabirds, including gannets and brown pelicans; jellyfish; and fish have already started washing up on the shores of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. Shoals that are favored by spawning blue crabs, a vital food source for Kemp’s ridley sea turtles and a staple of the regional economy, are awash in oil.

Read more about threatened species and see a map of the spill and nearby critical habitat.

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE?

1. The Bush administration. The oil-drilling lease was sold to BP by the George W. Bush administration in 2007 under its 2007-2012 Five-Year Offshore Oil Drilling Plan.

2. The Obama administration. The actual exploratory drilling was approved by the Obama administration on April 6, 2009.

Within days of the 2009 approval, the Center for Biological Diversity and its allies won a court order vacating the Bush Five-Year Offshore Drilling Plan. Rather than use the court order as a timeout on new offshore oil drilling to develop a new plan, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar filed a special motion with the court to exempt approved oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. He specifically identified BP’s operation as one that should be released from the vacature.

In July 2009, the court agreed to Salazar’s request, releasing all approved offshore oil drilling — including the BP operation — from the vacature.

3. BP. BP has the worst environmental and safety record of any oil company operating in America. Even after the 2005 Texas City Refinery blast that killed 15 people, BP has continued to rack up safety violations. Despite the dangerous nature of all offshore oil drilling and BP’s own egregious safety record, BP’s exploration plan downplayed possibility of a spill, repeatedly asserting that it was unlikely or virtually impossible. Amazingly, Secretary Salazar’s Minerals and Management Service approved BP’s exploration plan without any consideration of the environmental consequences of an oil spill.

4. The oil industry and its political backers. The Gulf crisis shows that the glib safety claims of the oil industry cannot be trusted.

There’s no way guarantee that a massive oil rupture will not occur. And if one does occur, there’s no way to contain it quickly and fully enough to avert unacceptable environmental damage. Ultimately, it’s the inherently dangerous nature of offshore oil drilling that led to this disaster. That’s why the Center is calling on the Obama administration to 1) revoke its 2010 decision to open up Alaska, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic Coast to offshore oil drilling, 2) cancel Shell Oil’s permit to start oil drilling in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea immediately, 3) not permit any new offshore drilling anywhere, and 3) transition the nation away from fossil fuel so the pressure to continue offshore oil drilling dissipates.

from Center for Biological Diversity

by Brinkley Hutchings -

I grew up in one of the most beautiful places. Montrose, Alabama. My family lives on Mobile Bay, and I spent my childhood exploring the many bays, rivers, streams and creeks near my home. Starting at age 7, I would spend whole days exploring the local waters and shorelines with my little 13 foot boat. What existed naturally in my own backyard was truly utopian. Now, all the beautiful trees, wildlife and pristine waters, all will see the thick black and red oil within these next days. It brings a deeper ache than I can express.

As I flew out to the spill last Friday with my father (he’s a pilot), I wasn’t prepared for what I was going to witness. Here are some notes I took during the flight as we approached the source of this disaster:

“We are starting to smell oil…the pungent smell burns my nostrils and I feel nauseated to the core of my being….oh my God…red streaks of oil are everywhere…thick black near the well…it is crude oil and it stretches as far as I can see…I am sick…I can’t feel my own body or distinguish any of my feelings right now… this is the worst and most saddening situation I have ever seen in my life…The boats are randomly skewn about, and they are so disorganized! The cleanup efforts look completely haphazard and ineffective. It is utter chaos down there! Boats randomly placed, pulling booms that are simply swirling the oil around in circles! I really don’t feel alive right now…this is a horrible dream…why the heck didn’t BP have to have a plan in place for a disaster like this?!”

It was so much worse than I could have ever imagined and not even close to what the media has been portraying. I couldn’t even take it all in. I saw miles and miles of crude oil pouring from the Earth’s core to the ocean’s surface, red as blood, where it then proceeded to move eerily and ominously with the current toward my home. Before I even registered sadness, tears poured down my face. My entire body cried. I felt so helpless looking down at that uncontainable and chaotic mess. I will never be able to clear that picture from my mind.

This disaster could have been prevented, yet it wasn’t due to BP’s own negligence and a weak national energy policy. What’s outrageous is that BP is doing everything they can to avoid assuming responsibility for this spill. How dare they try and sidestep responsibility for the worst disaster in the Gulf’s history?!?!?!

Over 4 million gallons of crude oil are destroying the Gulf coast and innumerable wildlife habitats while also crippling local economies – this is destroying my home.The time of giveaways and loose regulation of the oil industry must end.

I hope with all my heart that this disaster will be a huge wakeup call. Things must change. We must all work to lessen our dependence on fossil fuels and be involved in a clean energy revolution. Congress needs to ban offshore drilling and President Obama needs to provide unwavering support to end offshore drilling.

Please talk to your friends. Talk to your neighbors. Start organizing yourselves. Become involved with these serious issues we are facing. If we continue on our current path of carelessly extracting fossil fuels like oil and coal, rather than harnessing clean, renewable energy like wind power, we will see many more tragedies like the BP oil spill.

From the disaster zone,

Brinkley Hutchings

from It's Getting Hot in Here

by Doug Henwood -
Ok, onto the mundanities of the dismal science. On Thursday morning, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that productivity rose 3.6% in the first quarter of the year. Productivity is a measure of how much output—measured in the form of inflation-adjusted money—workers can create in an hour of labor. Growth in productivity is what makes possible a rising standard of living over time—though it’s no guarantee of that. That depends on how the gains of productivity are distributed. During the troubled years of the 1970s, productivity growth slowed to a crawl in the U.S., which contributed to the stagflation of the time. Then, sometime around 1996, productivity growth accelerated dramatically, and it’s kept growing at a fairly rapid clip ever since. But aside from a few years in the late 1990s, when there were broadly distributed gains in real wages, most of the gains of that productivity acceleration have gone to the upper orders—CEOs, stockholders, venture capitalists, and the like, and not the workers who actually make and do stuff.

Moreover, the productivity acceleration of the late 1990s was driven by high levels of corporate investment in high-tech capital goods. After the dot.com bubble burst in 2000, however, corporations really cut back on their investment. Since then, productivity gains have mainly come from squeezing the workforce harder while keeping a lid on pay. Normally, productivity growth falls in a recession, as output falls faster than employment. Not this time. Productivity stayed strong in the recession and initially accelerated with the economy’s weak recovery. In fact, productivity growth in the second half of 2009 was some of the strongest on record—but employment was falling, and real wages were stagnant. As a consequence of all this, profits held up remarkably well in the recession and have recovered nicely with only a modest upturn in growth.

Can this continue? Corporations remain very tight-fisted about investing in equipment. You can only increase the rate of explotiation so much before you run out of room to squeeze. The whole profit-maximizing strategy of U.S. capital—of starving the public sector, underspending on education, letting the infrastructure rot—doesn’t have the look of long-term sustainability about it. But it must be conceded that this approach has worked pretty well for the U.S. ruling class over the decades. As long as things don’t start flying apart, and as long as the population continues to play along with the game instead of breaking into open rebellion, they have no incentive to change their approach. Maybe the sense that the approach will turn and bite them in the butt someday is just a form of wish-fulfillment. But it does seem like it’s going to bite them in the butt someday. Too bad it will take more than a few pounds of nonelite flesh, too.

from LBO Notes

SLEEP WITH THE RIGHT PEOPLE is a coalition between the LGBT community and UNITE HERE, a union representing over 300,000 hospitality and manufacturing workers across North America. Together, we fight for the fair and equal treatment of all individuals.

"The solidarity between the labor movement and the LGBT movement is a powerful coalition. In San Diego, the owner of the Manchester Grand Hyatt—the second largest Hyatt in North America—gave $125,000 to put Proposition 8 on the ballot. Our union and the LGBT community are boycotting the Manchester Grand Hyatt, because there is power in the union and there is power in coalition."

--Cleve Jones,
Founder of the NAMES PROJECT AIDS Memorial Quilt
and Supporter of Sleep With The Right People

by Jordan Flaherty -

Sheriff Scott Franklin of Jena says he is trying to rid his community of drugs. Critics say he is pursuing revenge against the town’s Black community.

At four am on July 9 of last year, more than 150 officers from 10 different agencies gathered in a large barn just outside Jena, Louisiana. The day was the culmination of an investigation that Sheriff Scott Franklin said had been going on for nearly two years. Local media was invited, and a video of the Sheriff speaking to the rowdy gathering would later appear online.

The Sheriff called the mobilization “Operation Third Option,” and he said it was about fighting drugs. However, community members say that Sheriff Franklin’s actions are part of an orchestrated revenge for the local civil rights protests that won freedom for six Black high school students — known internationally as the Jena Six — who had been charged with attempted murder for a school fight.

One thing is clear: the Sheriff spent massive resources; yet officers seized no contraband. Together with District Attorney Reed Walters, Sheriff Franklin has said he is seeking maximum penalties for people charged with small-time offenses. Further, in a parish that is eighty-five percent white, his actions have almost exclusively targeted African Americans.

Downtown Baghdad

According to a report from Alexandria’s Town Talk newspaper, LaSalle Parish Sheriff Scott Franklin prepared the assembled crowd for a violent day. “This is serious business what we’re fixing to do,” said Sheriff Franklin. “If you think this is a training exercise or if you think these are good old boys from redneck country and we’re just going to good-old-boy them into handcuffs, you’re wrong. These people have nothing to lose. And they know the stakes are high.”

“It’s going to be like Baghdad out in this community at five am,” he continued dramatically, explaining that their target was 37-year-old Darren DeWayne Brown, who owns a barbershop – one of the only Black-owned businesses in town – and his “lieutenants,” who Franklin said supplied eighty percent of the narcotics for three parishes. “Let me put it to you this way,” declared the Sheriff, “When the man says, ‘We don’t sell dope today,’ dope won’t get sold.”

Sheriff Franklin said that option one is for drug dealers and users to quit, option two is to move, and option three is to spend the rest of their lives in prison. And this day was all about option three. “They will get put in handcuffs, put behind bars today and never see the light of day again unless they are going out on the playground in prison,” he boasted.

At the end of the day, a dozen people were arrested on charges that ranged from contempt of court to distribution of marijuana, hydrocodone, or cocaine. Despite catching the accused residents by surprise with early morning raids, in which doors were battered down by SWAT teams while a helicopter hovered overhead and then search teams were brought in to take houses and businesses apart, no drugs or other physical evidence were retrieved.

All evidence in the cases comes from the testimony of twenty-three-year-old Evan Brown of Jena, who also wore a hidden camera during the investigation that parish officials have said provides powerful visual evidence. “We’re completely satisfied with the results,” said LaSalle Sheriff’s Department Narcotic Chief Robert Terral, who refused further comment on the operation.

Lasalle Parish is a politically conservative enclave located in northwest Louisiana. Former Klansman David Duke received a solid majority of local votes when he ran for governor in 1991 — in fact, he received a higher percentage of votes in LaSalle Parish than in any other part of the state.

The Parish became famous in 2007 for the case of the Jena Six. In demonstrations that were called the birth of a 21st Century civil rights movement, an estimated 50,000 people marched in Jena. They were protesting a pattern of systemic racism and discriminatory prosecutions. All six youths, who once faced life in prison, are now either enrolled in college or are on their way.

The Sheriff told the Jena Times that he began preparing for Operation Third Option in November of 2007, less than two months after the historic protests.

A Terrifying Morning

Catrina Wallace, 29, was sleeping in her bed with her youngest child when her door was broken down and she awoke to the feeling of a gun to her head. When she opened her eyes, her small home was filled with police. “I never seen that many police at one time,” she recalled. “Everywhere I looked all I saw was police. There were six or seven just in my bedroom.” She says police pointed guns at her small children and wouldn’t let her comfort them.

Catrina Wallace is the sister of Robert Bailey, one of the Jena Six. Along with her mother, Caseptla Bailey, she was one of the leaders of the campaign to free the accused youths, and she organized meetings and protests for months. Wallace says her political activism made her a target. “I’m a freedom fighter,” she says. “I fight for peoples’ rights. I’ve never been in trouble.”

As with every other house raided that day, the police found no drugs in Wallace’s home. According to Wallace, police initially claimed they found marijuana on her kitchen table, but later discovered that they had collected broccoli stems, left over from dinner the previous night.

Despite the lack of evidence, and the fact that she has lived her whole life in Jena and is raising three small children, she was held for a $150,000 cash-only bond. Her car, a 1999 Mitsubishi Gallant, was also seized by police, who continue to hold it in an impound lot. If she wants it back, Catrina will have to pay twelve dollars a day to the lot for every day since it was seized, in July of last year – an amount already larger than the value of the car.

Tasered and Traumatized

Samuel Howard was sleeping in his bed, naked, when police broke down his door at five am. Howard says police tasered him three times, twice in the back and once in his arm, and pointed guns at his three kids. They took him out of his house still naked, and brought him to a baseball field, along with the other arrestees from that day. There he says he spent another hour without any clothes, standing with the other arrestees, until police brought him an orange jailhouse jumper.

“They treated us like we was hard core killers,” says Howard, who says that in a small town like Jena where everyone knows each other, such violent tactics are uncalled for. “The sheriff knows me,” he says. “We went to school together. He knows I’m not a violent person.”

Howard is being charged with three counts of distribution of cocaine. His trial is scheduled for May 24 (Catrina Wallace’s is scheduled for the same week). As with the other defendants, the only evidence against him is the testimony and video from the police informant. Howard, who has seen the evidence, says he is not implicated in the video.

His home was badly burned up that day, apparently from flares that police fired inside, and his windows were all destroyed. Howard, who does some auto repair work, says his four vehicles – including two older cars that don’t run – were also seized by police.

Racially Motivated

Many of Jena’s Black residents say that the town’s white power structure – including the DA, Sheriff, and the editor of the local paper – wants revenge against Black people in town who stood up and fought against unjust charges. They complain that in a town that is mostly white, all but two of the people arrested were Black, and the only arrestees pictured in the town’s paper were Black. The sheriff “Just wants to humiliate people,” says Caseptla Bailey, Wallace’s mother, “Especially the African Americans.” The editor and publisher of the Jena Times, the town’s only paper, is Sammy Franklin, who has owned the paper since 1968. His son is Sheriff Scott Franklin.

A white-owned store around the corner from the courthouse in downtown Jena sells t-shirts commemorating Operation Third Option, with a design of a person behind bars. Black residents of Jena say that an earlier version of the shirt featured a monkey behind bars. They say that white residents of Jena have gloated about the arrests.

Four of those arrested on that day have pled guilty. Chelsea Brown, who was arrested for contempt of court, received a sentence of 25 days. Devin Lofton, who pled guilty to conspiracy to distribute, received ten years. Adrian Richardson, 34, who pled guilty on April 23 to two counts of distribution, received twenty-five years. Termaine Lee, a twenty-two-year-old who had no previous record but faced six counts of distribution, received twenty years.

Some of the accused have hired attorneys, while others have had public defenders appointed. However, all involved say they doubt they can receive a fair trial in LaSalle. They say that white defendants with similar or worse charges received lower bonds, and face lesser sentences. “It’s crooked,” says Howard. “They ain’t playing fair down here, that’s all.”

Marcus Jones, father of Mychal Bell, one of the Jena Six youths, doesn’t mince words. “This is racially motivated,” he says. “It’s revenge.” He says that the problem is that while the Jena Six youths were freed, there were no consequences for the Sheriff or DA. “Wouldn’t none of this be going on if justice had been done the way it was supposed to have been,” he says.

Jones was not among those arrested, but in a small town like Jena, he knows everyone involved. He says he was shocked at the resources the police brought in. “Why did you need helicopters and military weapons?” he asks. “I could see it if you were going to arrest Noriega or the Mafia, but these are people with kids in their homes. The Sheriff’s department never had any violent run-ins with any of these people.”

Jones believes the entire campaign by Sheriff Franklin has been a gesture of asserting control over the Black community, and he calls for a federal investigation of the Sheriff’s department and DA.

Samuel Howard says that now he mostly stays home with his three kids, ages 12, 14, and 15. He’s afraid of the Sheriff’s office arresting him if he leaves the house, and he wants to stay close to his kids, who were traumatized by his arrest. “It scared them to death,” he says. “They still talk about it to this day.”

“They know they’re wrong,” said Howard, referring to the Sheriff and DA, “You can’t tell me they don’t know.”

***
Jordan Flaherty is a journalist based in New Orleans and an editor of Left Turn Magazine. He was the first writer to bring the story of the Jena Six to a national audience and his reporting on post-Katrina New Orleans has been published and broadcast in outlets including Die Zeit (in Germany), Clarin (in Argentina), Al-Jazeera, TeleSur, and Democracy Now!. He can be reached at: neworleans@leftturn.org.

from Dissident Voice

Walter Sisulu (May 18, 1912 – May 5, 2003) was a South African anti-apartheid activist and member of the African National Congress (ANC).

He was born in Engcobo in the homeland of Transkei (now part of Eastern Cape Province, South Africa). His mother Alice Sisulu was a domestic worker and his father, Victor Dickenson, was a white civil servant. Educated in a local missionary school, he left in 1926 to work. He moved to Johannesburg in 1928 and experienced a wide range of manual jobs. He joined the ANC in 1940. In 1943, together with Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo, he joined the ANC Youth League, founded by Anton Lembede, of which he was initially the treasurer. He later distanced himself from Lembede after Lembede (died 1947) had ridiculed his parentage (Sisulu was the son of a white foreman). Sisulu was a brilliant political networker and had a prominent planning role in the militant Umkhonto we Sizwe ("Spear of the Nation"). He was made secretary general of the ANC in 1949, displacing the more passive older leadership, and held that post until 1954.

As a planner of the Defiance Campaign from 1952, he was arrested that year and given a suspended sentence. In 1953, he travelled to Europe, the USSR, Israel, and China as an ANC representative. He was jailed seven times in the next ten years, including five months in 1960, and was held under house arrest in 1962. At the Treason Trial (1956 - 1961), he was eventually sentenced to six years, but was released on bail pending his appeal. He went underground in 1963 but was caught at Rivonia on July 11. At the conclusion of the Rivonia Trial (1963 - 1964), he was sentenced to life imprisonment on June 12, 1964. With other senior ANC figures, he served the majority of his sentence on Robben Island.

In October 1989, he was released after 26 years in prison, and in July 1991 was elected ANC deputy president at the ANC's first national conference after its unbanning the year before. He remained in the position until after South Africa's first democratic election in 1994.

In 1992, Walter Sisulu was awarded Isitwalandwe Seaparankoe, the highest honour granted by the ANC, for his contribution to the liberation struggle in South Africa.

He married Albertina in 1944. The couple had five children, and adopted four more. Sisulu's wife and children were also active in the struggle against apartheid.

The government of India awarded him Padma Vibhushan in 1998. Walter Sisulu was given a "special official funeral" on 17 May 2003.

In 2004 he was voted 33rd in the SABC3's Great South Africans.

from Wikipedia