August 2008 Archives

I have been out all day at a music festival - a peaceful gathering where I have not followed any news. I came home and checked my email and found a convergence of disturbing information. The old intimidating "catch and release" is happening in the Twin Cities, just prior to the RNC Convention.

First of all, Kayakbiker lives in Minneapolis so he has published first-hand accounts at his blog and will be adding more. The first two are these:

Pre-emptive arrests, with Kayakbiker's videos and eyewitness accounts.

Lawyer's opinion on legality of arrests

I also got a copy of this letter from a friend in CA and it has also been posted at DailyKos:

They weren't even marching. This was a case of the cops breaking into the places where they were staying, or meeting, before any actions had even taken place. The author of this piece is a well-known environmental and peace activist who continually preaches nonviolence.

************************************

Raid on the Convergence Center

By Starhawk

It¹s Friday night. Our Pagan Cluster is sitting on the bluff of the
Mississippi having our first real meeting, when Lisa gets a call. The
cops are raiding the Convergence Center, where we¹re organizing meetings
and trainings for the protests against the Republican National
Convention. It's not a role play, the caller says. It¹s real.

Instantly, we jump up and hurry back the six or eight blocks to the old
theater we are using for meetings, trainings and social gatherings. I've
spent the last two days doing magical activism trainings, teaching
people how to stay calm and grounded in emergency situations and when
things get chaotic. Now it's time to put the training into practice.
Aaron, a tall, red-headed young man who could be one of my nephews
strides along beside me. "Are you grounded?", I ask him. He nods, and
runs ahead.

Nobody can keep up with Lisa, who speeds ahead like an arrow, walking,
not running, but still covering the ground quickly. Andy and I trail behind.

We're often street buddies, because we¹re both big, slow, and supremely
calm and stubborn, willing to wade into almost any situation and become
the immovable object.

We're stopped by a line of cops just before we reach the building. They
refuse to let us through, or to move their van which is blocking
Scarecrow's car. There¹s an investigation underway, they say, and won¹t
say more.

Brush, our dear friend, is inside, having gone to a jail solidarity
meeting, ironically enough. So are two very young people who had just
joined our cluster that night. I try calling Brush's cell phone, but get
no reply.

We wait. That¹s what you do when the cops have guns trained on kids
inside a building. You wait, and witness, and make phone calls, and try
to think of useful things to do.

We call lawyers. We call politicians. We try to call media. We call
friends who might know politicians and media.

Through the kitchen door, we can see young kids sitting on the floor,
handcuffed. We walk across the street, back, made more phone calls. An
ambulance is parked in front, and the paramedics head into the building,
leaving a gurney ready. Susu, from her car around the corner, reports
that the cops have been grabbing pedestrians from the street, forcing
them down to the ground, handcuffing them.

Song, one of the local organizers, calls her City Council member. She
wants to call the Mayor, Chris Coleman, who has promised that St. Paul
will be as welcoming to protestors as to delegates, but no one has his
home number.

What I have forgotten to tell people at the training is how much of an
action is just this: tense, boring waiting, with a knot of anxiety in
your stomach and your feet starting to hurt. Song talks to a helpful
neighbor, who's come over to find out what¹s happening. He knows where
the mayor lives, says it's just a few blocks away, and draws us a map.

We decide to go and call on the Mayor, who could call off the cops.
About five of us troop down there, through the soft night and a
neighborhood of comfortable homes and wide lawns on the bluffs above the
Mississippi. The Mayor's house is a comfortable Dutch Colonial, and
lights were on inside.

We decide that just a few of us will go to the door, so as not to look
intimidating. Song is a round, soft-bodied middle-aged woman with a
sweet face. Ellen is a tiny brunette with a gap-toothed smile, and Lisa,
formidable organizer though she is, looks slight and unthreatening. The
rest of us hang back. Someone opens the door. Our friends have a
conversation with the mayor's wife, who is not pleased to be visited by
constituents late at night, and who tells us we should call the office.
The Mayor, she says, is asleep, and she will not wake him up.

We think a mayor who was doing his job would get up and go see what¹s
going on. Nonetheless, we head back to the convergence space.

A protestor has been released from the building. A small crowd has
gathered across the street, and Fox News has arrived. They interview
Song, who does her first ever Fox media spot. She tells them the truth
-- that people were in there watching movies -- a documentary about
Meridel Le Seuer. Meridel would be proud, and I¹m glad she is with us in
some form.

One by one, protestors trickle out. Now we get more pieces of the story.
The cops burst in, with no warning. They drew their guns on
everyone, including a five year old child who was there with his mother,
forced everyone down on the floor. It was terrifying.

They had a warrant, apparently, from the county, not the city, to search
for "bomb making materials." They were searching everyone in the
building, then one by one releasing them as they found nothing.

They continue to find nothing, as we wait through long hours. Meanwhile,
more and more media arrives. These cops are not as creative as the DC
cops during our first mobilization there against the International
Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Those cops confiscated the lunchtime
soup, which included onions and chili powder, claiming they were
materials for home made pepper spray.

We wait until the last person gets out. He¹s a twenty year old who the
cops have accused of stealing his own backpack, but apparently they
relented.

And now it's morning. I wake up to the news that cops have been raiding
houses where activists are staying, bursting in with the same bogus
warrant and arresting people, including a four year old child. They¹ve
arrested people at the Food Not Bombs house, a group dedicated to
feeding protestors and the homeless. They¹ve arrested others, presumably
just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The Poor Peoples' Campaign, which had set up camp at Harriet Island, a
park in the middle of the Mississippi, has also been harassed, its
participants ordered to disperse and its organizers arrested.

Let me be perfectly clear here: all of us here are planning nonviolent
protests against an administration which is responsible for immense
violence, bombs that have destroyed whole countries, and hundreds of
thousands of deaths.

This is the America that eight years of the Bush administration have
brought us, a place where dissent is no longer tolerated, where
pre-emptive strikes have become the strategy of choice for those who
hold power, where any group can be accused of "bombmaking" or
"terrorism" on no evidence whatsoever, in order to deter dissent.

Please stand with us. Because it could be your home they are raiding, next.

Call the Mayors of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Tell them you are outraged
by these attacks on dissent. Urge them to let Poor People encamp and to
let dissent be heard.

FLOOD THE MAYORS' OFFICES ASAP

St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman

651-266-8510

Minneapolis Mayor RT Rybak

(612) 673-2100

(612) 673-3000 outside Minneapolis

Gearing Up in Colorado

I am in Manitou Springs and my vista is peaceful and beautiful. On the internet, I see this scene of the 1968 Democratic Convention that some conservative talk show hosts (and liberal nostalgics) wish upon the upcoming DNC Convention in Denver. There is even a group to "Recreate '68."

I'm here to say it probably won't happen. There is a peace rally in Denver tonight with Cindy Sheehan and many others. They have a permit, which the protesters in 1968 did not, and it is for a time slot that is essentially BEFORE the convention, which should keep things relatively quiet. Trouble was predicted for Boston in 2004. What we actually saw was a lot of overlap between delegates and protesters and a handful of rightwing protesters. I expect it will be much the same, despite the speculation of the punditry.

Now we have the internet, and in so many ways, 1968 and 2008 are not comparable. I did hear that Colorado Springs cancelled an Al-Jazeera picnic, so there is still alot of potential for craziness. I will be in the Big Tent (pictured below, in final stage of construction) for "new media" (the new buzzword) and report from there. The "money collecting" shot with McCain, Clinton and Obama is posted below because I read that there will be over 400 corporate parties at the convention, and I'm sure the RNC is the same!

We have interspersed nature walks with political television, which I generally avoid, but most of it has been a hashing and rehashing of the implications of the DNC. Finally though, they are discussing the new role of the interior west. Colorado only has nine electoral votes, but may be a new "bellwether" and I have certainly seen alot of sprawl and spread across the spectrum just in my weekend - from the exurbs surrounding the headquarters from Focus on the Family to the woman I met today who practically wallpapered her house with Democratic souvenirs.

more photos

DNC panel from Huffington Post on the "New Media"

PBS article about political circus predicted

DailyKos story about Big Tent

Amnesty Inernational virtual torture cell to be on display

She tried. Rest in peace, Stephanie. Thanks for fighting for all of us.

January 6, 2005

Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, along with Senator Barbara Boxer (CA), entered a formal objection to the certification of the state of Ohio's (2004) electoral votes. Her prepared floor
statement, in part, was as follows:

"I, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, a representative from Ohio, and Ms. Boxer, a Senator from California, object to the counting of the electoral votes of the State of Ohio on the ground that they were not, under all of the known circumstances, regularly given.

"I thank God that I have a Senator joining me in this objection. I appreciate Senator Boxer's willingness to listen to the plight of hundreds and even thousands of Ohio voters that for a variety of reasons were denied the right to vote. Unfortunately objecting to the electoral votes from Ohio is the only immediate avenue to bring these issues to light.

"While some have called our cause foolish I can assure you that my parents, Mary and Andrew Tubbs did not raise any fools and as a lawyer, former judge and prosecutor, I am duty bound to follow the law and apply the law to the facts as I find them.

"It is on behalf of those millions of Americans who believe in and value our democratic process and the right to vote that I put forth this objection today. If they are willing stand at the polls for countless hours in the rain as many did in Ohio, then I can surely stand up for them here in the halls of Congress.

"This objection does not have at its root the hope or even the hint of overturning or challenging the victory of the President; but it is a necessary, timely and appropriate opportunity to review and remedy the most precious process in our democracy."

"I raise this objection neither to put the nation in the turmoil of a proposed overturned election nor to provide cannon fodder or partisan demagoguery for my fellow Republican Members of Congress.

"I raise this objection because I am convinced that we as a body must conduct a formal and legitimate debate about election irregularities. I raise this objection to debate the process and
protect the integrity of the true will of the people.

"Again, I thank Senator Boxer for joining me in this objection to the counting of Ohio's electoral votes due to the considerable number of voting irregularities that transpired in my home state.

"There are serious allegations in two lawsuits pending in Ohio that debate the constitutionality of the denial of provisional ballots to voters (The Sandusky County Democratic Party v. J. Kenneth Blackwell) and Ohio's vote recount (Yost v. David Cobb, et al.). These legitimate questions brought forward by the lawsuits, which go to the core of our voting and Democratic process, should be resolved before Ohio's electoral votes are certified.

"Moreover, as you are aware, advancing legislative initiatives is more challenging when you are in the minority party in Congress. However, this challenge is multiplied when you are in the minority in the House of Representatives because of House rules, compared to Senate rules.

"Voting irregularities were an issue after the 2000 presidential election, when Democratic House initiatives relating to election reform were not considered.

"Therefore, in order to prevent our voices from being kept silent, it is imperative that we object to the counting of Ohio's electoral votes and debate the issue of Ohio's voting improprieties.

"There are just over 1 million registered voters in Cuyahoga County - which of course includes the Greater Cleveland area and the 11th Congressional District which I represent. Registration increased approximately 10 percent.

"The beauty of the 2004 election was that more people were fully prepared to exercise their right to vote -- however on Election Day hundreds and even thousands of individuals went to the voting polls and were denied the opportunity to have their vote count.

"In my own county where citizen volunteers put forth a Herculean effort to register, educate, mobilize and protect the vote there were people who experienced irregularities.

"Poor and minority communities had disproportionately long waits -- 4 to 5 hour waits were widespread. Election Protection Coalition testified that more than half of the complaints about long lines they received came from Columbus and Cleveland where a huge proportion of the state’s Democratic voters live. One entire polling place in Cuyahoga County (Greater Cleveland) had to “shut down” at 9:25 a.m. on Election Day because there were no working machines.

"Cuyahoga County had an overall provisional ballot rejection rate of 32 percent. Rejection rates for provisional ballots in African American precincts/wards in Cleveland, Ohio averaged 37 percent and ranged as high as 51 percent.

"Thousands of partisan challengers -- concentrated in Cuyahoga County’s minority and Democratic communities -- effectively served to intimidate voters and confuse poll workers. There were both inconsistent and illegal requests for photo identification.

"There were problems with absentee ballots including incorrect information provided to voters by the Secretary of State and, consequently, the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections telling voters they could not vote in their precinct"- effectively disenfranchising hundreds and more likely thousands of voters.

"This objection points out the inadequacy of a great election system which permits 50 Secretary's of State to administer a federal election and impose so many different state laws regulating the election.

"In Ohio, the Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, who served as Co-Chair of the Bush re-election campaign, issued a bizarre series of directives in the days preceding the 2004 Presidential election that created tremendous confusion among voters in Cuyahoga County and across the state of Ohio.

"For example; on September 7, 2004, Secretary Blackwell issued a directive to local boards of elections mandating rejection of voter registration forms based on their paperweight " 80lb text weight. Mr. Blackwell’s issuance of this directive" which he ultimately reversed by September 28, 2004 - resulted in serious confusion and chaos among the counties and voters.

"My objection points to the need to implement across this nation standards that apply to all states. We need to enact legislation that will:

* Allow all voters to vote early - so that obligations of employment and family will not interfere with the ability to cast a vote.

* Establish a national holiday - Election Day - to bring attention to the importance of the vote.

* Require those who work in the voting booth to be fairly compensated, adequately educated and sufficiently supported such that the job importance will be elevated.

* That will provide equipment - whether it is the traditional punch card or the more modern electronic machines - that are properly calibrated, fully tested for accuracy and provide a paper trail to ensure a verifiable audit of every vote.

"What happened in Ohio may well have been repeated in counties across this country. Yet that is no excuse for us to push the irregularities behind us and go on with the business of the day. These incidents are a call for us to clean up, clear up and implement policies and procedures that will protect each citizen's
precious right to vote.

"If in fact we see it is our obligation to secure democracy around the world to monitor and oversee free and fair elections in other countries surely we must ensure, protect and guarantee the right to vote right here at home."

(text from River Wolfe, Columbus OH, Buddhists for Obama)

The first blog I read this morning has a story about how Disney in America is cutting workers' benefits. I went searching for protesters in Tinkerbell costumes and also found Parisian Disney protesters (animator layoffs while keeping a fake animation studio), Mexican Disney protesters (racism in hiring, putting a European in role of Zapata), Hong Kong protesters(for using sweatshop labor) and British protesters, (for selling musical underpants for little girls that say "Dive In" on them.) They are also relaxing their rules about employees bringing guns.

I have been to Disney Land in Anaheim - once. My son was twelve and I thought he'd like it (he preferred Universal Studios) and my convention (Speech & Hearing) was held there. Disney builds theme parks all over the world. They aim for the "clean cut" image and make tons of money with spinoffs for their films. This Guardian article questioned some of their intentions and allies and I will leave you to draw your own conclusions. Suffice to say, there are probably plenty of Disney boycotters on both sides of both ponds.

Walt Disney was a Republican and a conservative. Throughout his career, he opposed Communist/lefty influence within the motion picture industry. Disney was a major donor to the Republican National Committee. It's still remarkably easy to find listings on the internet for big fundraisers held right on the property and affiliated big donors.

(excerpted from "a href=CNN's article on the latest protest)

Cinderella, Snow White, Tinkerbell and other fictional fixtures of modern-day childhood were handcuffed, frisked and loaded into police vans Thursday at the culmination of a labor protest that brought a touch of reality to the Happiest Place on Earth.

(snip)

Those who were arrested sat in a circle on a busy intersection outside the park holding hands until they were placed in plastic handcuffs and led to two police vans while hundreds of hotel workers cheered and chanted.

(snip)

Bewildered tourists in Disney T-shirts and caps, some pushing strollers, filed past the commotion and gawked at the costumed picketers getting hauled away. The protest shut down a major thoroughfare outside Disneyland and California Adventure for nearly an hour.

"It's changing my opinion of Disneyland," said tourist Amanda Kosato, who was visiting from north of Melbourne, Australia. "Taking away entitlements stinks."

The dispute involves about 2,300 maids, bell hops, cooks and dishwashers at three Disney-owned hotels: the Paradise Pier, the Grand Californian and the Disneyland Hotel. The workers' contract expired in February and their union says Disney's latest proposal makes health care unaffordable for hundreds of employees and creates an unfair two-tier wage system. The union also says Disney wants to create a new category of part-time employees who would receive greatly reduced benefits.

"The other hotels around the area all have health care that is provided by the boss and have been able to get wage increases," said Ada Briceno, president of Unite Here Local 681, which represents the workers.
"At the other hotels in the same classification, for the same work, the workers get paid $2 to $3 an hour more."

(snip)
The company also wants to increase the number of hours full-time employees must work before qualifying for the health plan, she said.

Yes, I have a few good memories of Peter Pan and the Lost Boys, Fantasia and Snow White and I may wax nostalic if I watch them on YouTube, but anything else calls for a permanent and general boycott on my part. Nowdays, if you take a kid to one of these movies, they want the video, the electronic game, the sneakers, the lunchbox, the costume, the cereal, the lunchbox - the entire lifestyle - and that is exactly what they get. Disney is the one who spawns the Britneys and the Mileys of the world and freaks out when they reach puberty and rebel from their wholesome marketed image. There are plenty of creative options with much more positive politics. It would be great to collect a listing all in one place.

I love research and here are two of the latest studies which may have implications for the election in the fall. I have broken them down and added graphics for easy consumption and tried to keep them short. The original sources are there if you want to delve deeper.

PART I: News Preference & Voting Patterns (Rasmussen Group)

Rasmussen's lates report on news consumption patterns finds a strong correlation with voting patterns.

Their survey was done by telephone and they also run the Presidential Tracking Poll that keeps showing a close race. In a separate survery, just over half (52%) of Americans watch television news several times a week. 37% watch every day. Half watch cable news and 26% of that crowd watch daily.

Those who get information from local television (on campaigns) favor Obama over McCain 52% to 42% IF they watch daily. If they watch less frequently, they favor McCain by 50% to 43%. The cable watchers favor McCain and the newspaper readers are equally divided, unless the newspapers are mostly read on-line, in which case Obama is favored. Among those who go online daily for news, the vote is split. Those who go on less, down to once a week, favor McCain.

See the graphic above to see the blatant right bias of Fox News. 36% of Fox viewers are preoccupied with national security, but the economy follows closely at 32%. CNN watchers are concerned about the economy over national security, with 56% to 13% for CNN and 50% to 12% for MSNBC. Talk radio is McCain territory, as 60% of regular plan to vote for him, with half as many for Obama. Talk radio listeners are also extremely concerned about national security.

70% of Katie Couric viewers favor Obama, as do 71% of Charles Gibson viewers and 57% of Brian Williams viewers. The problem is that over half of Americans (myself among them) rarely or never watch those people. Just under half (49%) of voters believe most reporters are trying to help Obama, and only 14% feel the same about McCain. Most Americans felt that the three networks and two main cable networks were all biased - Fox for Bush, the other four for Kerry. It is as though Fox is the official propaganda arm of the conservative government, in a "free nation" with a "free press."

PART II: Cell Phones & the 2008 Vote (Pew Research Center)

The latest Pew Research Center national survey finds that the overall estimate of voter presidential preference is affected by whether or not the cell phone respondents are included, though not dramatically. Read the full article at Pew Research Center - it's a study a lot of people have been waiting for, since most surveys are conducted via land line phones yet many people are reachable only via cell phone. In late June, 2004 adults were sampled, including 503 on cell phone only. Obama held an 8% lead among cell only users and a 5% lead for land liners. The Congressional vote held to a similar pattern. An earlier study had shown a 3% lead for Hillary in a cell/landline sample vs a landline only sample, and the Congressional sample showed no effect.

Cell-Only and the "Cell-Mostly" proved to be an interesting comparison. 15% or so Americans have a cell phone only and 22% have land lines but hardly use them, receiving most calls via their cells. These two groups were different in the Pew Study. Both groups were significantly younger, with more males and more minorities. The cell-mostly group was more affluent, educated and likely to be married with kids and home owning, compared with the cell only group.

Cell only? Obama and Dem Congress this fall, and less likely to be registered to vote. Cell mostly? Not much different from the larger group of older people more tethered to their land lines. Land line only samples did tend to underestimate the effect of the young, so that the sample of under-30s turned out to be about half of what it actually should be. Those under-30s reached on land lines were not that dissimilar to the cell-only group, so the indication was that they should be weighted twice as heavily in such surveys. The other implication is that an effort should be made to register more of the "cell phone only" crowd and to get them energized. Where I live, we are really hitting the summer events, as there is the down-ticket to consider also, and we have had some historically close races where a percentage point difference certainly decided the outcome!

Former New York City Ballet Principal Dancer Damien Woetzel gives Mo Rocca a ballet lesson, and together they make a new ballet about WMD….. or cookies.

MR: “Do you think if our world leaders studied dance, there’d be greater peace in the world?”

DW: “I do think the ability to waltz, is very conducive to being even-tempered.”

Only in America. The Hiltons have made large donations to a candidate who then trivializes their daughter in a campaign ad some view as having a subliminal racist message. A follow-up may be sending a subliminal "dog whistle" message to fundamentalists that his opponent is the antiChrist.

Then it is reported that Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, has pressured its employees to vote against Democrats in November because of worries that a bill the party supports would make it easier for workers to unionize. The measure, called the Employee Free Choice Act, would allow labor organizations to unionize workplaces without secret ballot elections. It was co-sponsored by Barack Obama, the presumed Democratic presidential candidate, and opposed by John McCain, the presumed Republican nominee.

Huffington Post give more detail, and the newspaper that I originally read about it in was in Kentucky. It included a poll in which readers were asked if they belonged to a labor union. 15% of them did.

Now look at this graph:

It shows that we now have a "ruling class" in this country. Although they represent only 1-2%, they will understandably be alarmed by the prospect of anyone increasing their taxes or promoting ideas of justice, equality or fairness. The erosion of unions, mediocrity of goods, loss of manufacturing jobs and promotion of low-level service jobs that Walmart represents is an off-shoot of this skewed distribution of wealth that has developed in this country. Lack of insurance, poor regulation of food/drugs/toys, crumbling infrastructure and poor ability to compete for trade/R&D are other side effects. Then there is the human cost, as represented in this OpEd called "American Calcutta: The Living Dead of San Francisco", from which the photo at the top is taken.

I'll finish with a satirical take on Bush's tour of the disaster area that has been his Presidency (serving the top 1-2% of Americans.)