Merciless disease, preventable death unjust

“Haiti...just another death by cholera”

Thursday January 20, 2011, Amy E. A. Osborne, a medical student volunteered in Haiti over the Christmas break and wrote to CBC’s Dispatches
Excerpt, minor editing by Carolyn Bennett

“Cholera treatment centers are easy to set up. It just takes resources — people and supplies… Someone actually caring,” Amy E. A. Osborne wrote from Haiti —

“…Our driver came up, tapped me frantically on the shoulder. He tells me there is an emergency. I follow him to the other ward and find a teenage boy lying half-naked on one of the cholera beds. I think to myself that he must be mortified to be lying there, so exposed, his naked buttocks hanging over the hole cut in the cot so his diarrhea will simply fall into the bucket placed below his bed.…

“I get closer and see that he is not mortified because he is barely conscious. His eyes have sunken into his head; the skin on his face pulled taut over his now-prominent cheekbones. I rush over and feel for a pulse in his right wrist. It is not there and his hand is cool. I grab his other wrist and there is still no pulse.…

“I notice something white coming out of the boy’s mouth and I look closer — white foam is bubbling out. It begins to pour out of his mouth and both nostrils. At first, I wipe it away, but then I notice that he is not choking on it because he is no longer breathing. I sit back and just watch it flow out. The doctors arrive and one of them stands back and observes (he has a tendency to be less than inclined to touch cholera patients) while the other doctor does a few half-hearted chest compressions. We have not been able to find a vein and there is nothing more to be done. It is over.

“There is little time for compassion in a cholera outbreak. The ‘corpses’ are highly contagious and need to be quickly cleaned with disinfectant and then put in a body bag to be buried. I want to give the family time to grieve — they just lost a 19-year-old boy — but the families of the other patients want him gone immediately. Someone runs for a body bag.

“I pull the sheet over his face as people are gathering around to gawk. His mother is in shock and does not seem to believe that he is really gone. She goes over and pulls the sheet down. She touches his face. She pulls the sheet down further and touches his stomach. Then she touches his feet, one at a time. I do not know what she is looking for, but she does not find it. She sits down beside him and looks incredulous. I am about to be the only person in the room to cry so I step out onto the balcony and take deep breaths. I manage to pull it together.

“Someone arrives with the body bag and Kanako lays it out on the bed … Together we open it and [the 19-year-old’s] mother and brother take his arms and legs and lift him into it. Kanako and I reach in, take his hands and lay them on his chest. Then we zip the bag closed, over his still open eyes.

“He does not look dead. He looks like even he cannot believe that he has gone — that one day he was a normal teenage boy and the next day he died the most degrading death a human being can ever experience.

“Cholera is merciless. It robs you of any and all dignity you once had. Untreated, you can lose up to 20 liters [5 gallons or 21 quarts] of fluid a day in the form of diarrhea and vomit. You will lose all of your strength and you will literally lie in a pile of your own diarrhea until you die. The management is simple. You need fluids. It is just that easy. Cholera treatment centers (CTCs) are easy to set up. It just takes resources — people and supplies. It just takes someone actually caring…

“What is happening [in Haiti] is unjust.”


Source
January 27 and 30, 2011 letters, Dispatches with Rick MacInnes-Rae, http://www.cbc.ca/dispatches/the-view/your-dispatches/2011/01/20/haitijust-another-death-by-cholera/
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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Four more years’ YWC cliché, E. coli”

Re-reporting, editing, comment by Carolyn Bennett

“Yes we can” brings you the same ole pandering, purposely clueless, precedent-keeping status quo
The citizens can judge if they will

Only a fool believes — or an astute person is unprincipled enough to peddle such nonsense — that regulation off shores jobs and destroys financial sectors, sustains polluted air and unclean water and tainted or otherwise unsafe food.

Public protections have been grossly inadequate in the past several years, Public Citizen’s Robert Weissman wrote in mid January. Under-regulation and corporate disregard of safety rules have resulted in multiple salmonella and E. coli outbreaks, a flood of lead-tainted toys, a massive and environmentally devastating oil spill, deadly mine disasters and the collapse of our economy — costing eight million U.S. jobs.

“We need to focus most urgently on fixing these problems and others,” Weissman says, not cutting back, conducting internal reviews, creating red tape, and further burdening agencies already overworked and under-resourced.

President Barack Obama’s January opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal “adopts business and right-wing think-tank talking points about the harms of regulation and urges ‘balance’ in achieving the right amount of regulation. This, Weissman says, “is the wrong way to think about regulation, and it is the wrong direction for the American people.

Markets cannot function without proper regulation. That means businesses cannot function without proper regulation.

We do not need a ‘balance’ between regulation and the free market. We need effective regulations that foster the right types of markets.”

The current U.S. president in a long line of presidents is deliberately, calculatedly, clueless, pandering to corporate while pushing broad sectors of the American people [the country, its union, its institutions] more deeply into danger, despair and disaffection.

In this year’s State of the Union address, amidst much pandering and the usual pathetic platitudes and clichés (not a syllable on employment/unemployment, poor/poverty, environmental health), the U.S. president self-identifies as the cunningly clueless figure most people by now know him to be. Like his presidential predecessors (now members of his cabinet and inner circle) who “felt your pain” and sold you out, subliminally telling you “you’re on your own,” the president said — as if you did not know — “The competition for jobs is real.” How astute is that? And —

“None of us can predict with certainty what the next big industry will be or where the new jobs will come from.” This is a leader without vision — a regressive in a requisite era of “progress.”

Is the choir this Sunday singing “four more years” of this “yes-we-can”?

Somehow, I doubt it.



Sources and notes
Public Citizen President Robert Weissman wrote on January 18, 2011, “Obama’s new approach to regulation is misguided” Instead of fewer, “we need stronger controls over big business, ” Statement of Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen, January 18, 2011,
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/pressroomredirect.cfm?ID=3258

“Unprecedented bailouts, Outlandish bonuses, Token regulation, Too big to fail getting even bigger, The global economy sacrificed to feed a boundless greed,” these, according to Public Citizen, are the destroyers of quality — a quality of life the Same Ole Washington barons persist in imposing on people’s lives.

Public Citizen for nearly four decades has championed citizen interests before Congress, the executive branch agencies and the courts. The group has successfully challenged abusive practices of the pharmaceutical, nuclear and automobile industries; and has led the charge against undemocratic trade agreements that advance the interests of mega-corporations at the expense of citizens worldwide. Public Citizen is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization with two offices in Washington, D.C., and Austin, Texas, https://www.citizen.org/Page.aspx?pid=2306

Remarks by the President in State of Union Address, the White House, Office of the Press Secretary, For Immediate Release January 25, 2011, United States Capitol, Washington, D.C., http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/01/25/remarks-president-state-union-address

Also: CounterSpin, January 28-February 3, 2011, “Laila El-Haddad on Palestine Papers [and] Robert Weissman on Obama and Big Business,” http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=4241


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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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“RESIST” State terror on activists

Excerpt (from Fight Back), minor editing by Carolyn Bennett
“Subpoenas”
By veteran Civil Rights lawyer Lynne Stewart from Carswell Federal Prison

“I began my career as a political movement lawyer. The government was rounding up the last of the diehard militants, many of whom had been underground, and prosecuting them as a part of the pincer movement.

“The government also subpoenaed anyone with any tangential relationship to those arrested — their daters, their lovers, their teachers, their religious leaders, their estranged relatives, those who had attended meetings, rallies, etc.

“… The government's purpose — To intimidate that branch of the movement that could be counted on to support militancy; [to] troll for even the most insignificant crumbs of information that might be fitted together to enmesh suspects.

“What happened — Most people who had been tapped by the government lawyered up with movement lawyers, guided in part by the legal work of Bob Boyle and Guild lawyers who had written legal representation before Grand Juries. This work remains the standard on what to do and when to do it.

“A person subpoenaed is in the unenviable position of having only the vaguest idea of what the government may want and is faced ultimately with the choice of testifying against comrades or spending long months in jail.

“A person may even face a possibility of being indicted for contempt and facing a sentence that is completely up to a judge. In the face of this challenge, in that day, I can only say that most people chose not to testify and to wait out the government. They gave up an existence as they were living it — jobs, relationships, all that constitute daily life; and they went to jail. They stayed in jail for many months, and they didn’t give in.

“Now we are in another era — one not rising from the euphoria and idealism of the 1960s — and the government is once again arresting, subpoenaing and tormenting movement people, hoping they will become informants.

“The reaction of the movement — We resist.

“We stand strong with the resisters who elect not to become part of the same prosecution team that has terrorized the world. Now the so-called Department of Justice (ha!) has decided to focus on support groups of the world’s peoples, also on eco-terrorism. Why? Because they can! [They are sending] a message to the people that [resistance] is dangerous: 'Don’t join.' 'Don’t resist.'

“The State's message must once again be shouted down: first by the resisters who will go to jail; second by us — the movement that must support them by always filling those cold marble courtrooms to show our solidarity and by speaking out so that their sacrifice is constantly remembered.

“Our principle of non-collaboration has so far proved robust. There has been no wavering. Our support must continue to convince everyone involved that these are issues of principle. There can be no compromise.

“Resisters must be defended to the utmost of our strength and abilities.”


Alissa Clare wrote of lawyers in 2005 —
“We Should Have Gone to Med School: In the Wake of Lynne Stewart, Lawyers Face Hard Time for Defending ‘Terrorists’”

On February 10, 2005, “A federal jury in Manhattan convicted Lynne Stewart, a New York civil rights lawyer and self-proclaimed radical, ‘on on all five counts of providing material aid to terrorism and of lying to the government when she pledged to obey federal rules that barred her client, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, from communicating with his followers.’

“With this conviction, the Justice Department scored a major victory in its War on Terror, by applying to attorneys the statute proscribing material support to terrorism. Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez stated, ‘these convictions send a clear, unmistakable message that this department will pursue both those who carry out acts of terrorism and those who assist them with their murderous goals.’ Stewart faces thirty years in prison and was immediately disbarred as a result of her felony conviction.

“…Stewart’s case implicates diverse political, constitutional, and ethical issues. Her conviction creates a grave danger of chilling legal representation for accused terrorists due to the lack of clear guidelines and notice regarding the application of criminal statutes to the lawyers who defend them.

“Times of national crisis exacerbate the persistent tension between civil liberties and national security. The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, sparked our current national crisis, upsetting the balance ...”


Sources and notes
“‘Subpoenas’” (Lynne Stewart, Carswell Federal Prison) — “Lynne Stewart’s message to January 25 protests” Fight Back News Service is circulating on the day of protests “against the FBI and Grand Jury witch hunt that has been unleashed on anti-war and international solidarity activists.” Lynne Stewart [is] a heroic and long-time progressive lawyer [now] serving a ten-year prison sentence in Fort Worth, Texas, for allegedly helping terrorists. Her courage and determination stand as an example to all of us who are working for peace, justice and equality. http://www.fightbacknews.org/2011/1/25/lynne-stewart-s-message-jan-25-protests

CURRENT DEVELOPMENT 2004-2005: “We Should Have Gone to Med School: In the Wake of Lynne Stewart, Lawyers Face Hard Time for Defending Terrorists,” Summer, 2005, 18 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 651, Author ALISSA CLARE, Excerpt INTRODUCTION
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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Vt votes to correct Supremes’ Cit. U v. FEC— Corp not human

Excerpting, minor editing by Carolyn Bennett

The Vermont General Assembly (Senate and House of Representatives) has acted in resolution urging the U.S. Congress of the United States to propose an amendment to the Constitution of the United States for consideration by the states “which provides that corporations are not persons under the laws of the United States or any of its jurisdictional subdivisions.”

Joint Resolution (J.R.S. 11.)
Referred and read the first time Friday, January 21, 2011, By Senators Lyons, Sears, Ashe, Ayer, Baruth, Fox, Giard, MacDonald,McCormack, Miller and Pollina

Whereas, free and fair elections are essential to American democracy and effective self-governance, and

Whereas, individual persons are rightfully recognized as the human beings who actually vote in elections, and

Whereas, corporations are legal entities that governments create and can exist in perpetuity and simultaneously in many nations, and

Whereas, they do not vote in elections and should not be categorized as persons for purposes related to elections for public office, and

Whereas, corporations are not mentioned in the United States Constitution as adopted, nor have Congress and the states recognized corporations as legal persons in any subsequent federal constitutional amendment, and

Whereas, during the 1885–1886 United States Supreme Court term, in the midst of oral arguments leading to the decision Santa Clara vs. Southern Pacific Railroad Company, 118 U.S. 394, Chief Justice Waite stated that all the justices agreed that the Fourteenth Amendment’s prohibition on a state denying equal protection to a person applies to a state’s treatment of private corporations, and

Whereas, this brief but extraordinarily significant comment of Chief Justice Waite sanctioned private corporations to sue municipal and state governments for adopting laws that violate a corporation’s rights even when those laws serve to protect and defend the rights of human persons, and

Whereas, the United States Supreme Court has continued to adhere to this legal position in its jurisprudence for over a century, and most recently applied it in its decision Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission, 130 S. Ct. 876, that eliminated many restrictions, including any total prohibition, on corporate spending in the electoral process, and

Whereas, the Court in Citizens has created a new and unequal playing field between human beings and corporations with respect to campaign financing, negating over a century of precedent prohibiting corporate contributions to federal election campaigns dating to the Tillman Act of 1907, and

Whereas, the Citizens decision has forced candidates for political office to divert attention from the interests and needs of their human constituents in order to raise sufficient campaign funds for election, and

Whereas, corporations are not and have never been human beings and therefore are rightfully subservient to human beings and the governments that are their creators, and

Whereas, the profits and institutional survival of large corporations are often in direct conflict with the essential needs and rights of human beings, and

Whereas, large corporations have used their so-called rights to successfully seek the judicial reversal of democratically enacted laws passed at the municipal, state, and federal levels aimed at curbing corporate abuse, and

Whereas, these judicial decisions have rendered democratically elected governments ineffective in protecting their citizens against corporate harm to the environment, health, workers, independent business, and local and regional economies, and

Whereas, large corporations own most of America’s mass media and employ those media to loudly express the corporate political agenda and to convince Americans that the primary role of human beings is that of consumers rather than sovereign citizens with democratic rights and responsibilities, and

Whereas, the only way to reverse this intolerable societal reality is to amend the United States Constitution to define persons as human beings and not corporations, now therefore be it

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives:

That the General Assembly urges Congress to propose an amendment to the United States Constitution for the states’ consideration which provides that corporations are not persons under the laws of the United States or any of its jurisdictional subdivisions, and be it further

Resolved: That the Secretary of State be directed to send a copy of this resolution to the Vermont Congressional Delegation.

Thereupon, the President, in his discretion, treated the joint resolution as a bill and referred it to the Committee on Government Operations.


Sources and notes
Title: JOINT RESOLUTION URGING THE UNITED STATES CONGRESS TO PROPOSE AN AMENDMENT TO THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION FOR THE STATES’ CONSIDERATION WHICH PROVIDES THAT CORPORATIONS ARE NOT PERSONS UNDER THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OR ANY OF ITS JURISDICTIONAL SUBDIVISIONS
Bill: J.R.S. 11 JOURNAL OF THE SENATE 70

Sponsor(s): Lyons, Virginia (Ginny), Sears, Dick, Ashe, Tim, Ayer, Claire, Baruth, Philip, Fox, Sally, Giard, Harold, MacDonald, Mark A., McCormack, Dick, Miller, Hinda, Pollina, Anthony, http://www.leg.state.vt.us/database/status/sponsors.cfm?BillID=2929&Session=2012 http://www.leg.state.vt.us/ docs/2012/journal/SJ110121.pdf#page=1
Status Header Full Status: Read 1st time & treated as bill; referred to Committee on Government Operations per Rule 51, January 21, 2011 SJ 8 P. http://www.leg.state.vt.us/database/status/summary.cfm?Bill=JRS011&Session=2012
The Vermont Legislative Bill Tracking System, http://www.leg.state.vt.us/database/rresolut/rresolut.cfm?Session=2012
Resolutions Introduced 2011 - 2012 Legislative Session, http://www.leg.state.vt.us/database/rresolut/results.cfm


Christopher Ketcham recaps on AlterNet, “A year ago today, the Supreme Court issued its bizarre Citizens United decision, allowing unlimited corporate spending in elections as a form of ‘free speech’ for the corporate ‘person.’ Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the dissent, had the task of recalling the majority to planet earth and basic common sense.

“‘Corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires,’ Stevens wrote. ‘Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their “personhood” often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of “We the People” by whom and for whom our Constitution was established.

“Fortunately, movements are afoot to reverse a century of accumulated powers and protections granted to corporations by wacky judicial decisions.

“In Vermont, state senator Virginia Lyons on Friday presented an anti-corporate personhood resolution for passage in the Vermont legislature. The resolution, the first of its kind, proposes ‘an amendment to the United States Constitution ... which provides that corporations are not persons under the laws of the United States.’ Sources in the state house say it has a good chance of passing.

“Resolution Calling to Amend the Constitution Banning Corporate Personhood

Introduced in Vermont On the anniversary of the Citizens United decision, Vermont politicians are moving to deny corporations the rights that humans enjoy,” Alternet, http://www.alternet.org/rights/149620/resolution_calling_to_amend_the_constitution_banning_corporate_personhood_introduced_in_vermont


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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Seven days in blood

U.S. foreign and domestic force, fatalities, occupation
Compiled and edited by Carolyn Bennett

HOMELAND USA

U.S. soldiers
Free Speech Radio News last week reported a 25 percent increase in suicides in the United States military. “Military suicides continue to reach record levels. According to the Defense Department, 343 soldiers, Army civilians, and family members committed suicide in 2010,” a 25 percent rise compared with 2009 figures.

Detroit shooting
A shooter walked into a Detroit police station Sunday and opened fire wounding Sgt. Carrie Schulz, Commander Brian Davis, Sgt. Ray Saati and Officer David Anderson. The shooter was then shot dead. According to the Detroit Free Press, “Sunday’s shooting was not the first time a gunman has attacked Detroit police on their own turf.”

St. Petersburg shootings
Two police officers died and a U.S. Marshal suffered wounds today during a shootout with a man in St. Petersburg, Florida. Miami today buried two Miami-Dade County police officers shot and killed last week by a “fugitive murder suspect” [also killed].

U.S. detainees
The American Civil Liberties Union has released new documents showing widespread abuse and unjustified homicide of detainees at U.S.-run jails in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. The records show autopsy reports revealing that many detainees who had died “from interrogation” had “injuries to their bodies.… In at least one case a person was frozen to death when he was held naked outside (Afghanistan is a cold place) and cold water was put on him.”

One hundred and ninety (190) detainee deaths have been detailed in the records. The recently available information results from an ACLU lawsuit against the U.S. military under the Freedom of Information Act.

SOUTHWEST ASIA – MIDDLE EAST

AFGHANISTAN
Two Taliban leaders died Friday in eastern Afghanistan. “The international military alliance” is reported saying “its forces killed the Taliban shadow administrator for Nangarhar province’s Hisarak district in a strike last Friday [and] a Taliban operative in Logar province’s Pul-e-Alam district in a strike on Sunday.

NATO had previously announced the strike but said they were unsure if Maulawi Anwar had been killed; about the Sunday’s killing, the coalition said the man killed, Abdul Bari, helped Taliban leaders get weapons and vehicles.

AFGHANISTAN
Twenty civilians died (among them six women, 13 children) Wednesday when a roadside bomb exploded in southeastern Afghanistan. These deaths bring the four-day total to 28 Afghan civilians killed in three roadside bombings.

Three days before the Wednesday bombings, nine civilians (including six women, two men and a child) died when a roadside bomb exploded in northern Afghanistan. These civilians had been travelling to a wedding on a road often used by foreign forces. “Afghan officials say that last year 2,043 civilians died as a result of Taliban attacks and military operations targeting the fighters.”

PAKISTAN
“Thousands of people have rallied in northwestern Pakistan to protest ongoing U.S. drone attacks that killed scores of civilians. On Sunday, demonstrators in the city of Peshawar blocked a main road and held a vigil to mourn drone attack victims. According to Agence France-Presse, U.S. drone attacks doubled in the North Waziristan region last year, with over 100 drone strikes killing more than 670 people. At least 13 people were killed in three recent attacks.”

PAKISTAN
Two “suspected foreign fighters” died in U.S. drone strikes on Sunday in northwestern Pakistan. “Sunday’s attack came several hours after a drone fired two missiles at a vehicle and a house in Doga Mada Khel village, located near North Waziristan's main town of Miranshah, killing at least five armed fighters. A similar strike killed at least three people in North Waziristan on January 12. A string of attacks killed at least 15 people and destroyed a Taliban compound on January 1.

A tally conducted by the AFP news agency shows “the covert campaign doubled missile attacks in the tribal area last year. “More than 100 drone strikes killed over 670 people in 2010 compared with 45 strikes that killed 420 in 2009.”

IRAQ
Twelve people died and 150 suffered wounds Monday when car bombs exploded near Iraq’s shrine city of Karbala. Pilgrims were involved in religious rituals. A home-made bomb killed Brigadier General Thamer Hassan Saleh who worked for services linked to the office of Iraq’s prime ministers.

Also on Monday two anti-Qaeda militiamen in the northern city of Kirkuk and a military officer in Baghdad died and a military officer and two guards, an intelligence official and eight civilians suffered wounds when shooters open fire or roadside bombs exploded.

The past week saw “a surge of violence in Iraq… which included suicide bombs, blasts killing around 130 people and wounding scores more.” In the whole of December, Agence France Presse reports, “a total of 151 people were killed.”

U.S.-led WAR DEAD

Casualty sites reporting January 24, 2011

(accurate totals unknown)

• Anti-war dot com Casualties in Iraq since March 19, 2003

[U.S. war dead since the Obama inauguration January 20, 2009: 207]

Wounded 32,965-100,000

U.S. veterans with brain injuries 320,000

Suicides estimated: 18 a day

Latest update on this site: January 17, 2011

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

• Iraq Body Count (civilian deaths from violence) figures:

‘We don’t do body counts’— General Tommy Franks

Documented civilian deaths from violence

99,393 – 108,514

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/

• ICasualties figures:

IRAQ: 4,436 U.S.; 4,754 Coalition

AFGHANISTAN: 1,466 U.S.; 2,308 Coalition

http://icasualties.org/oif/

Sources and notes

“4 Detroit police officers shot, gunman dead in ‘horrifying’ attack” (also “Detroit police ID gunman who shot four officers”), January 24, 2011, http://www.freep.com/article/20110124/NEWS05/101240382/4-Detroit-police-officers-shot-gunman-dead-in-horrifying-attack
http://www.freep.com/article/20110124/NEWS01/110124019/1318/Detroit-police-ID-gunman-who-shot-four-officers

“Two police killed in St. Petersburg, Florida, ST. PETERSBURG, Florida” (Reuters), January 22, 2011, http://newas.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110124/us_nm/us_florida_shooting_3

“U.S. interrogators on killing spree” (Interview with Paul Wolf, Human rights and international lawyer in Washington), January 23, 2011, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/161603.html

“NATO: 2 Taliban leaders killed in east Afghanistan,” KABUL, Afghanistan January 24, 2011,
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/ap/20110123/twl-as-afghanistan-38359fb.html

“Afghan civilians killed in blast — an improvised explosive device explodes as a rickshaw passes over it, killing women and children,” January 19, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/01/20111199305332564.html
4436 179 139 4754

“Thousands Protest U.S. Drone Strikes in Pakistan,” Democracy Now January 24, 2011,
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/1/24/headlines

“‘US drone strikes’ claim lives — The attacks are the first since Friday’s protest rally in Pakistan condemning civilian deaths in U.S. drone strikes, January 24, 2011, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/01/201112335951391718.html

“Triple attacks on Shiite pilgrims in Iraq kill 12” (KARBALA, Iraq, AFP), January 24, 2011, http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20110124/twl-iraq-unrest-575b600.html

“Thousands demonstrate against U.S. drone strikes,” PESHAWAR (Xinhua) Tehran Times, January 22, 2011, http://www.tehrantimes.com/Index_view.asp?code=234534

“Death toll in Iraq bombing rises to 56 — Ayatollah Sistani criticizes Iraqi security forces”
(BAGHDAD, AP, http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=234520



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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Self-fulfilling prophecy — a Setup

West-Persia relations persist in
cruelty, mendacity, hegemony
It does not have to be this way.
Re-reporting, editing, comment by Carolyn Bennett

“Respecting the rights of nations is not just a recommendation but a requirement. Instead of common logic, other instruments are used — that is not called a dialogue; it is called an order” [Islamic Republic of Iran’s chief negotiator at Istanbul meeting with six powers].

Disproportionate power and the inordinate wielding of power, brute force, caustic coercion and condescension — the flagrant, age-old arrogance of power renders the hegemon unstable, delusional and, of course, suspect by the world’s sovereign nations and peoples.

Old hegemons late last week went to Istanbul, Turkey, intent on fulfilling their own prophecy. As if falsifying evidence or packing data to make research results come out the way the researcher wants, the hegemons failed (caused to fail) a conference. With good intentions, this could have been a quiet teleconference. But there were no good intentions leading up to or within the meeting. The actors, particularly the United States and Britain, wanted the world to see the failure they had set in motion.

The way of the hegemon— aided and abetted by mass corporate multimedia

• Bullies engage in long-standing aggression: they taunt and threaten and commit violence against their prey 
• They conspire over time in setting the world against that nation or people (Saddam Hussein and Iraqis, Taliban and Afghans and Pakistanis)
• They agree to a conference (with their prey) and, leading into the scheduled conference, they announce to the world that “no progress” will come out of the conference; the conference will be a failure because a key conferee is a bad guy, an arm of an “axis of evil,” an uncooperative setter of conditions
• Powers come to conference, the hegemon fulfills his prophecy and quips: “See, I told you so.”
• No compromise. No progress. The status quo stands.

The Islamic Republic of Iran together with Britain, China, France, Russia, the United States and Germany met Friday and Saturday in Turkey. Agence France Press yesterday reported, “Talks between world powers and Iran ended Saturday without progress in tackling concerns over Tehran's nuclear program, and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said no more are planned.” 

Iran’s chief negotiator responded: “Respecting the rights of nations is not just a recommendation but a requirement. Instead of common logic, other instruments are used — that’s not called a dialogue. It’s called an order.” 

I agree.  

My way of being is such that it refuses me the luxury of ignoring cruelty and mendacity — not matter the perpetrator or at whose expense. 

Nuclear power, for whatever reason or use, is ill advised and dangerous for the short and long term but the United States cannot reasonably expect any nation, if it can do otherwise, to lay down its defense or development measures when all around that nation is nuclear armed to the teeth. Iran has nuclear bombed no nation or people; the United States can never make this claim.  

Only the United States of America has dropped a nuclear bomb on cities and civilians. Only the U.S. is raining remote bombs on the peoples of Southwest Asia, the Middle East, the southern tier of the Mediterranean Sea to the Gulf of Aden. 

Anglo Saxons have exacted unspeakable cruelty on the peoples of India and Africa and Asia. Western Europeans and North Americans have committed and sustained cruelties against peoples of the Americas, Central and Western Europe. Consider the Roma. Consider Indians of the Subcontinent and North America. Consider the Japanese and Vietnamese and Pacific and other indigenous islanders. The West has a history flowing with blood and unspeakable cruelty lasting to the present day. 

Nuclear materials are dangerous no matter the use but the U.S. and Britain are in no position to lecture or demand that nations put down their arms or restrict their energy sources when the policies and practices of United States and Britain have retarded growth, created and sustained poverty, obstructed progress, oppressed peoples, terrorized and failed nations. They are persisting, moreover, in destroying the whole world, on a variety of fronts, for their pleasure.  

The European Union foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, a Briton, told reporters after the weekend conference that was set up to fail, “We had hoped to embark on a discussion of practical ways forward, and have made every effort to make that happen. I am disappointed to say that this has not been possible.” 

In the face of several years’ histrionics against Iran, this simply is untrue: entrenched power set the conference up to fail. The ridiculousness of Aston’s remarks would be laughable if the foreign relations situation in the Middle East and Persia were not so grave. 

For the world and for women in particular, it is sad indeed that the likes of Catherine Aston and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, whether camouflaged in trouser or skirt suits, are mindlessly reading the hegemon’s chauvinistic, mendacious, cruel script. 

This is why it is not enough to set our hopes on women in high office, women in power. We must find women who are secure in their womanhood — not chauvinists or “one of the boys” or women who want to please men or be “just like them”: clones of entrenched ancients. We must find honest change agents, serious, courageous women who will be leaders dedicated not to personal image or the hegemon’s script but to assisting substantive world progress. 

The Iranian chief negotiator’s words at the Istanbul conference can be more than the content for headlines or slogans. They are worth pondering in a movement to uproot entrenched power. Demand that world powers of all stripes desist in hegemony, mendacity, chronic cruelty; and seriously engage with all nations for the benefit of all nations and peoples.

“Respecting the rights of nations is not just a recommendation. It is a requirement.”

News source 

“Multilateral nuclear talks with Iran end without agreement,” France 24 International News, January 22, 2011, http://www.france24.com/en/20110122-multilateral-nuclear-iran-talks-turkey-istanbul-end-without-agreement-ashton-jalili-p5
http://www.france24.com/en/20110120-iran-talks-should-include-ending-sanctions-russia

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Officers corrupt evidence in Immigrant killing

Standing trial before a jury not of the dead victim’s peers are Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, police officers Nestor, Moyer, and Hayes

Editing by Carolyn Bennett

In her opening statement at trial in the case of three police officers accused of abuse of power, altering evidence, obstructing justice in the 2008 killing of immigrant Luis Ramirez, federal prosecutor Myesha Braden said —

Like teachers and doctors, police officers are intimately connected with American culture. They are expected to protect and serve.

This is a case of police officers who decided to do the opposite of what they were expected to do.

Characters in this case —

Killers and/or accomplishes accused in killing Luis Ramirez (July 12, 2008):

Derrick Donchak
Brandon Piekarsky
Colin Walsh
Brian Scully

Accused conspirators and/or co-conspirators after the fact of the killing Luis Ramirez (July 12, 2008):

Former Shenandoah Police Chief Matthew Nestor
Lt. William Moyer
Patrol officer Jason Hayes

Federal charges against accused conspirator and/or co-conspirator police:

Conspiracy and obstruction of justice: orchestrating what prosecutors say was a swift cover-up of the circumstances of Luis Ramirez’s death.
Altering official statements of witnesses
Concealing evidence
Helping suspects and families [lie] create a story to hide the racial nature of the attack
Shift a measure of the blame from Brandon Piekarsky and Derrick Donchak to Brian Scully

Patrol officer Jason Hayes was dating Brandon Piekarsky’s mother on July 12, 2008. The couple has since become engaged.

Lt. William Moyer is accused of contacting Brian Scully’s parents and instructing them to get rid of the sneakers their son [had worn] on the night of the attack.

Lt. William Moyer and Patrolman Jason Hayes are accused by investigators of mischaracterizing a witness’s account in an official report to make it appear that Brian Scully had a greater role in the attack than he actually did.

“Relationships combined with privilege,” the prosecutor said, “overthrew the rule of law.”

Source
“Conspiracy Trial Opens for Pennsylvania Cops in Immigrant’s Killing” (Anti-Immigrant, Extremist Crime, Ryan Lenz, Southern Poverty Law Center), January 14, 2011, http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2011/01/14/conspiracy-trial-opens-for-pennsylvania-cops-in-immigrants-killing/?ondntsrc=MBQ110170HTW&newsletter=HW012011
Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), 400 Washington Avenue, Montgomery, AL 36104

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Police State Palestine to Police State USA

Edited by Carolyn Bennett

ANTI-IMMIGRATION ARIZONA 15 years on

From Derechos Humanos featured on Wednesday’s edition of Flashpoints (KPFA)

Immigration and ‘border security’ issues [again] grip the U.S. public to an astonishingly hysterical level.

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) fiscal year 2006-2007 saw human remains of 183 men, women and children recovered on the Arizona-Sonora border. 

Since the implementation of border policies in the mid-1990s, an estimated 5,000 migrants have died.  Migrants have been driven into the desert as urban crossing points have been closed. Border communities have suffered division and xenophobia brought by militarization.

We must use tragedy upon tragedy to raise the question why. …The United States government’s mid-1990s launch of ‘prevention-through-deterrence’ policies — also known as Operations Gatekeeper, Safeguard, Hold the Line and Rio Grande — resulted in the funneling of drugs and immigrants through areas in the Arizona-Sonora border. 

Malice with intent

This was the intended strategy and the deadly effects that border communities have since suffered were not only expected. They were included in the plans.

“In the 1994 memo ‘Border Patrol Strategic Plan: 1994 and Beyond’ prepared by the U.S. Border Patrol, then-Commissioner Doris Meisner cited a series of phases to be implemented by the Southern Border Strategy — including the expected effects these strategies would have.  Some of the expected outcomes outlined in the memo included more violence, more sophisticated methods of smuggling, and more lucrative criminal operations.

“Since the implementation of these policies, we have witnessed deadly consequences every day on the Arizona border.

 

“More than 2,000 deaths of migrants have been documented on the Arizona-Sonora border.  Among them —

The killing of 18 year-old U.S. citizen Esequiel Hernandez, Jr., murdered on his family ranch by U.S. Marines,

The fatal shooting of a 15 year-old youth on the El Paso border by a U.S. Border Patrol agent,

The killing of local rancher Rob Krentz, murdered on his ranch land

The killing of 18 year-old Bennett Patricio, Jr.

A Tohono O’odham tribal member killed on his native land by U.S. Border Patrol

14 year-old Josseline Jamiletha Hernandez Quinteros who died in the Arizona desert

The killing of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry

“These deaths are not only unnecessary; they can be clearly viewed as a direct consequence of U.S. immigration, border and drug policies.…

“U.S. Immigration policy has been a total failure and needs to be changed.  It has not prevented people from attempting to cross the border but has put the lives of thousands of men, women, and children in serious danger. Their deaths result directly from U.S. policy.

Coalición de Derechos Humanos

“Derechos Humanos (‘The Human Rights Coalition’) calls upon all people of conscience to work together to demand change on the borders and in communities.

Coalición de Derechos Humanos is a grassroots organization promoting respect for human/civil rights and fighting the militarization of the Southern Border region, fighting discrimination and fighting human rights abuses by federal, state, and local law enforcement officials [migration concerns as a direct result of U.S. foreign and domestic policies, whether economic (like NAFTA), military, or political], which affect both U.S. and non-U.S. citizens.

For more than fifteen years, Derechos Humanos has been actively engaged in the long struggle to defend human and migrant rights. … Our responsibility as human rights advocates lies not in supporting what is ‘politically feasible,’ but in defending the just and legitimate rights of our communities.…

The Human Rights Coalition works to defend human rights through —

Promotora de Derechos Humanos (human rights promoters) Program that began in 2002

Bi-weekly Abuse Clinic where we have documented abuses and assisted community members with labor, housing, and law enforcement abuse since 2006

Community consejos (community-defense trainings) that began in early 2007, these also replicated by allied organizations across the state

Work to end the deaths along the border since 1994

Efforts to report/locate migrants who have gone missing while crossing the border

Coalición de Derechos Humanos (‘The Human Rights Coalition’) urges communities to engage in rational and meaningful dialogue. 

Sources and notes

“Another Border Death Underscores the Need for Meaningful Dialogue,” December 15, 2010

Contact: Derechos Humanos: 520.770.1373, December 15, 2010,

http://www.derechoshumanosaz.net/

“Support the Struggle for Human Rights and Border Justice in Arizona and Beyond!” 

December 30, 2010, http://www.derechoshumanosaz.net/

Goals of Coalición de Derechos Humanos (‘The Human Rights Coalition’):

To strengthen the capacity of border and urban communities to exercise their rights and participate in public policy decisions

To increase public awareness of the magnitude of human rights abuses, deaths and assaults at the border resulting from U.S. policy

To seek changes in government policies that result in human suffering because of the militarization of the U.S. border region

To influence Public Policy

Derechos Humanos holds press conferences and interviews, hosts media crews, has demonstrations, weekly vigils, symposiums and marches to draw attention to the unjust policies and inhumane treatment of immigrants. The Human Rights Coalition counters anti-immigrant hysteria and works to change the stereotypes and misinformation about immigrants,

http://www.derechoshumanosaz.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12&Itemid=26

Flashpoints, KPFA, January 19, 2011 (GUESTS: Isabel Garcia, Civil Rights Attorney, co-chair of Coalicion De Derechos Humanos, Maria Federico Brummer, Tucson Public School teacher in Ethnic Studies), January 19, 2011, http://www.flashpoints.net/

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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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State building descends to police state

Aisling Byrne from Beirut on Palestine
Excerpt edited by Carolyn Bennett

A police state is not a state. It is a form of larceny: of people’s rights, aspirations and sacrifices, for the personal benefit of an élite.

When it called for statehood, this is not what the world meant.

A police state is what is being assiduously constructed in Palestine, disguised as state-building and good governance.

Under this guise, its intent is to facilitate the authoritarianism that creates sufficient popular dependency — and fear — to strangle any opposition.…

“This is the level to which statehood has descended. Full demilitarization — taken to the limit — has essentially become no more than occupation by another name. In the process, it has shut out any alternative attempts at nation building and the mobilization of the Palestinian nation under the umbrella of a reformed PLO. … Of course this is what the current paradigm has hoped to destroy.”


Writer Aisling Byrne is Projects Co-coordinator with Conflicts Forum in Beirut (www.conflictsforum.org)
http://conflictsforum.org/2011/building-a-police-state-in-palestine/
Full article appears at www.foreignpolicy.com


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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Past, Prologue — colonized Haiti

Edited by Carolyn Bennett

The editor of Haiti Liberté spoke today with Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman. This is some of what came out of the interview with Kim Ives on Haiti.

Unrelenting poverty, misery, unrelenting occupation

Haiti is the only militarily occupied nation in the Western hemisphere.

Haiti (occupied, its vast areas ill-equipped, lacking necessary infrastructure) suffers doubly the results of a devastating earthquake

More than a million (1.3 million) Haitians still live under tents and tarps.

Cholera has killed close to 4,000 Haitians

Haiti’s horizon sees no end to misery, poverty

In the face of horrendous, historical, preventable misery and poverty, the United States of America concerns itself with “how to put a façade” [cover up, camouflage, pig lipstick] on U.S. and international subjugation of the poorest, most heavily occupied place on the planet.

Past, present, prologue

International community threatens another Haitian head of state with exile — President René Préval

“[Apparently] there was even a meeting … a meeting where they [foreigners] were actually discussing how to get a plane to ship [President] Préval out. After bowing to U.S. and French and Canadian dictates over the past decade, Préval is now finding out that once he begins to resist a little bit or try to do something his way — he’s going to be quickly dispensed with.” Taken out. Deposed. Dispatched. Or worse.

The Organization of American States is ordering Préval to change the results of the November 28 election.

Haitians are demanding annulment of the recent forced, earthquake-conditions, “completely bogus election.”

Nevertheless, two neo-Duvalierist candidates are positioned to take power, and a despot comes home to ‘help’ his country. Twenty-five years after fleeing Haiti for having committed high crimes against the people of Haiti, former dictator (and son of a dictator), Jean-Claude (Baby Doc) Duvalier returns. Duvalier left Haiti amidst protests in 1986 after a 15-year regime marked by corruption and torture and killing of his political opponents.

Haiti Liberté editor Kim Ives said on Democracy Now, “We think Duvalier’s arrival” — this symbol of the old guard that left power 25 years ago — intends to reinforce international “pressure on Préval and … rally the [old-line] Duvalierist base.”

Sources and notes
“Did Baby Doc Duvalier Return to Haiti to Pressure Préval in the Election?” January 19, 2010, http://www.democracynow.org/2011/1/19/did_baby_doc_duvalier_return_to
Journalist Kim Ives is editor of Haiti Liberté, http://www.haiti-liberte.com/default.asp
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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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Henwood busts (?) civilarians

Edited by Carolyn Bennett

“Against civility” is he.  Hear! Hear! Here’s is some of what “Behind the News” broadcaster Doug Henwood said last weekend.

“The horrendous shootings in Tucson have certainly inspired a lot of [civil] drivel from the commentariat. …

“Perhaps most annoying has been the call for a return to civility. … I don’t feel like being civil. I like being rude. The problem with the rudeness in American political discourse is not that it is so rude. It is often so stupid. …

“The idea that politics can be civil is a fantasy for elite technocrats and the well-heeled.

“I’m reminded of something that Adolph Reed once said to me, characterizing a mutual acquaintance as the kind of person who thinks that if you could just get all the smart people together on Martha’s Vineyard, they could solve all our social problems. …

“… [W]hen was this nation ever innocent?

“When we were trading in slaves and killing Indians?

“There’s no way that could be rendered civil. The field of politics is constituted by vast differences in interests and preferences. Much of the time, we don’t talk about those things directly or explicitly. We talk about them in caricature or euphemism, or take it out on scapegoats.

“What act of ‘healing’ will make this nation less divided? The rich and powerful have a lot of money and might and they are not going to give it up easily.…

“Margaret Atwood once wrote that politics is about ‘power: who’s got it, who wants it, how it operates; in a word, who’s allowed to do what to whom, who gets what from whom, who gets away with it and how.’

“… It is not just the mainstream pundit—so too alternapundits. It is not just that these stock phrases grate on the ears.

“Their use is a symptom that their speaker is evading complexities.”

Sources and notes

“Against civility,” Radio commentary posted by Doug Henwood January 15, 2011, http://lbo-news.com/

Doug Henwood edits Left Business Observer (LBO), a newsletter he founded in 1986, Henwood also hosts “Behind the News,” a weekly radio show covering economics and politics on KPFA-Berkeley, that rebroadcasts on several other stations across the United States; it has a worldwide audience via its Internet archive. Henwood is author of the book Wall Street, http://lbo-news.com/about/

Adolph Reed is a University of Pennsylvania Political Science Professor with interests in American and African American politics and political thought, urban politics, and American political development, http://www.polisci.upenn.edu/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=35&Itemid=26

Margaret Atwood is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, and environmental activist


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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]
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“Strong people don’t need strong leaders”— Ella Baker

Editing by Carolyn Bennett

People must “understand that in the long run they themselves are the only protection they have against violence and injustice,” said a leading figure of the U.S. civil rights movement.

“[People] cannot look for salvation anywhere but to themselves.”

Ella Baker “and many of her idealistic young comrades [in the 1931 Young Negroes Cooperative League, the first political organization she joined) felt the cooperative movement was much more than a survival strategy to ameliorate the suffering of a handful of Black participants. It was also a proving ground for the principles of communalism and cooperation, an alternative to the cutthroat mode of competition that many felt had led to the 1929 stock market crash and the ensuing social disaster. …

“Ella Baker was, above all, a bridge connecting young people to their elders, northerners to southerners, Black people to White people, intellectuals to common folk in a web of organizational and personal relationships.

“She was a historical bridge connecting the social movements of the 1950s and 1960s to the legacy of Black resistance and social protest in the decades that followed.”

Ella Baker was an untelevised legend. You did not see news stories about her. The kind of role she tried to play, she said, was “to pick up pieces or put together pieces out of which … organization might come.”

She was the most important nonstudent involved in the phase of student activism that began with the formation of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee following the dramatic sit-ins of the winter and spring of 1960. She gave 50 years to political activism.

Ella Josephine Baker (1903-1986) “was a pivotal behind-the-scenes figure in progressive African-American political movements from the 1930s [forward].”

Her theory — “Strong people don’t need strong leaders.”




Sources
Women in the Civil Rights Movement: Trailblazers and Torchbearers 1941-1965 (“Ella Baker and the Origins of ‘Participatory Democracy’” by Carol Mueller), edited by Vicki L. Crawford, Jacqueline Ann Rouse, and Barbara Woods (Indiana University Press, 1993)

Black women in America: An Historical Encyclopedia (Volume I), edited by Darlene Clark Hine, Elsa Barkley Brown, and Rosalyn Terborg-Penn (Indiana University Press, 1993)



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Bennett's books available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY]; Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY]; LONGS’ Cards and Books: http://longscardsandbooks.com/ [Penn Yan, NY]

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