People Before Profit blog

Letters

Fri, 31 May 2002 06:01:00 +0000

A two-state peace

I am an avid reader and supporter of your newspaper. Your reporting on the events taking place in the West Bank is truly appreciated for its honest stand on the actual happenings.

I am a Palestinian-American. What is disturbing to be is the one-sided stand of the U.S. for Israel.

The notion that all Palestinians are terrorists is definitely erroneous. I know of many Palestinians who are hard-working, honest and peaceful individuals. I personally have no heartfelt hate for the Jews or the Israelis, as the picture is usually presented to the world scene.

I am also in support of Israel living in peace with its neighbors. I do not condone the killing of innocent civilians by the extremists, whether Israelis or Palestinians. However, I do admit that the action of some Palestinians is understandable under the living conditions they have been subjected to for the last 35 years and in particular the last 18 months.

Let us all pray for peace.

Jad A. GhanemTucson AZ

More by Party leaders

Just wanted to thank you for Sam Webb’s recent article on the only way to defeat the ultra right (5/18). It was very insightful and informative!

I always enjoy reading such articles by Party leaders and hope to see more of the same from Webb. His knowledge and experience are invaluable and show through in his writings.

Rick Knaubvia e-mail

Disappointed by review

I was disappointed in your somewhat one-sided review of Michael Moore’s best-selling anti-Bush book, Stupid White Men ... and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation. Your review concentrated on his support of Ralph Nader, repeating the line that this campaign – rather than Bush’s thievery in Florida – was the prime reason for the 2000 election results.

I could accept this argument if your paper were similarly critical of Gore’s lackluster pro-death penalty, pro-rise in military spending campaign in 2000 or Democrats’ current shameful support for Israeli militarism. I assume you do not dwell on this in the name of “left-center” unity.

I think that is unwise, since bashing the Green campaign is intended by some to derail all third party challenges – including challenges by those to the left of the Greens, e.g. the Communist Party. Of course, the Green campaign was deeply flawed – but what does one expect after the U.S. Left has been battered for decades by the ruling class; this has hampered the development of mature progressivism.

I could more easily accept the criticisms in your review if you were similarly critical of other real and imagined members of this “left-center” coalition, e.g. those in power in the U.S. Senate.

Gerald HorneChapel Hill NC

Editor’s note: The review in question was reprinted from Real Change, a Seattle publication.

Great articles

I have been very pleased with your various current articles. Sadly, there is too often scant follow-up.

I have also been very impressed by Judith Le Blanc’s Mideast coverage.

Also, I was impressed with Nick Bart’s Darwinian paean (4/13). Like Bart, I had just been to the “Southern Cone” in May 2001.

Thank you also for the excellent article about French politics, interview with Henri Alleg (5/4), By Fred Gaboury and Susan Webb.

A readerEstes Park CO

Techno-Haiku

I got the following from a friend and thought I would pass it on:

In Japan, they reportedly have replaced the impersonal Microsoft Error messages with Haiku poetry messages, like:

Having been erased,

The document you’re seeking

Must now be retyped.

Or:

Serious error.

All shortcuts have disappeared.

Screen. Mind. Both are blank

Maybe your readers can put some of these next to their computer or make up their own.

Mary LyonsMilwaukee WI

Editorials

Fri, 31 May 2002 05:45:00 +0000

Women are the target

Hate crimes, especially those perpetrated by pro-life zealots, are on the rise, buoyed by the militant, anti-abortion stance of President George W. Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft.

They’ve developed new tactics in which anti-abortion hardliners no longer limit their targets to the health care professionals who perform abortions, but also target women seeking abortions. Their weapons: the digital camera and the internet.

A network of these fanatics takes pictures of women entering abortion clinics and sends them to one of several web sites where the woman’s picture, name, address – and even her medical records – are posted on the web. Another site carries pictures of abortion providers with their names and addresses and crosses out their picture when they have been killed.

Planned Parenthood says that posting these pictures adds additional stress to women seeking abortions. The group likens the practice to that of “drawing a bull’s eye on the backs of these women and inviting those who are irrationally zealous to take action.”

And take action they do: Recent years have seen seven abortion providers murdered, attempts on the lives of 17 others, the bombing of 41 abortion clinics and 165 cases of arson.

Federal courts have issued conflicting opinions of whether posting these pictures on the net is protected by the First Amendment. The most recent, handed down by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, said since this activity was meant to intimidate doctors, it was “reasonable” for physicians who work in abortion clinics to conclude that the protester’s action “amounted to a true threat, not protected speech.”

It has been said that the Supreme Court reads the election returns. We think that still holds, despite what happened in Florida in 2000. All of which means the surest way to win the right decision is to win the 2002 elections.

****************************************************************** Bush war erodes rights

Amnesty International’s 2002 report came to one conclusion: the war on terrorism is eroding human rights. “What happened on Sept. 11 was a crime against humanity, a gross human rights violation of thousands of people,” said Amnesty’s secretary-general, Irene Khan. However, she said, “in the days, weeks and months that followed, governments around the world eroded human rights in the name of security and anti-terrorism.”

That would include the U.S. government, too. Amnesty criticized the U.S. government’s sweeping new powers to search, detain and spy on citizens and residents, the authorization of military tribunals and the refusal to grant those captured in Afghanistan prisoners of war status. Amnesty cited that more than 1,100 people, mostly Arab or Muslim men, were detained in U.S. prisons.

But other governments around the world as well have used the war on terrorism to settle old scores and erode human rights and stifle political dissent. The report highlighted the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Colombia and Afghanistan.

What the report didn’t say was that many of these governments, including the U.S., are right-wing governments that are doing the bidding of mainly U.S.-based monopoly corporations, of which oil, energy and arms corporations top the list. These interests are in direct conflict with human rights. In pursuit of capitalist domination of the world’s labor and natural resources anything goes: war, terrorism, racism, anti-Semitism, religious fanaticism, poverty and oppression.

While the competing corporate and right-wing interests around the world, led by the U.S., coalesce around the war, the world’s workers and peoples, youth and women, environmentalists and democrats, oppressed and disabled, communist and faith-based people all have common interests to do the same – against this war and terrorism.

Whether you call it the struggle for international human rights or the class struggle, international unity and action, are the only hope for a safer, democratic and peaceful world.

And the American people can make a significant contribution to this process by mobilizing and defeating the ultra-right, Bush candidates this November.

Enron entangles Bush, Cheney

Fri, 31 May 2002 02:48:00 +0000

The Bush administration faces growing, angry questions from Capitol Hill on its close ties to Enron last year while the Houston energy trader was “gaming” the California electricity market fleecing ratepayers of as much as $30 billion in overcharges.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, has called for the appointment of an independent counsel to investigate Enron’s practices in California, with code names like “Death Star,” “Fat Boy,” “Get Shorty” and “Load Shift.”

“It is disgusting corporate behavior without a moral base and does represent a culture of corruption,” Dorgan said May 15. He announced he would summon U.S. Army Secretary Thomas White, a former Enron Vice President who sold off his $50 million in Enron stock before it collapsed, to testify.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) fired off a letter to Vice President Richard Cheney recently demanding an explanation for a May 4, 2001, e-mail from Karen Knutson, deputy director of Cheney’s Energy Policy Task Force (EPTF), pleading with a colleague to avoid discussion of California’s energy problems in the EPTF’s final report.

“We are desperately trying to avoid California in this report as much as possible,” said Knutson’s e-mail, which was addressed to Jacob Moss at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Waxman, a ranking member of the House Committee on Government Reform, told Cheney that the e-mail had been forwarded to him by EPA.

Waxman protested the heavy redactions making it impossible to determine the context of Knutson’s comments. In fact, the final report from Cheney’s Task Force was widely criticized for hardly mentioning the California energy crisis except to blame it on “inadequate electricity supplies.”

Writes Waxman, “The report makes no mention, however, of the role of energy traders like Enron or market manipulation in the crisis.”

These revelations are troubling, Waxman writes, in light of the memoranda released by Enron a few weeks ago laying bare the manipulation of the California electricity market by Enron, Duke Power, Dynegy, Reliant and other energy traders.

“For much of the first half of 2001, public officials in California and Congress – myself included – urged the administration to take some action to investigate serious allegations of market manipulation by power sellers out West,” Waxman wrote to the Vice President. “These urgent requests were consistently rebuffed.”

Waxman adds, “Congress and the public – and Californians in particular – are entitled to a complete explanation of the administration’s failure to take prompt and effective action to protect Western consumers from price gouging and market manipulation.”

A Cheney spokeswoman, attempting to explain the report’s silence on California claimed that its aim was to lay out a “strategic, long-term energy policy for the country … not to focus on short-term problems specific to a state.”

Waxman told Cheney he had obtained an earlier draft which included a section titled “Regional Energy Dislocations.” The text reads, “California’s energy/electricity problems are to be an area of specific focus in discussing the Southwest region’s energy problems.” But that was deleted from the final report.

Waxman’s letter continues, “I continue to find it puzzling that the administration would have abandoned its plans to address the most pressing energy crisis facing the country. I would therefore appreciate your … explaining why the final task force report deleted the discussion of California’s energy problems.”

Waxman adds, “The appearance created by these documents is that the administration was indifferent to the plight of millions of Californians facing rolling blackouts and inflated natural gas prices.”

Waxman also sent a letter to Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), chair of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, accusing the Bush administration of lying about its contact with Enron officials. In response to Waxman’s inquiries, Cheney admitted only six contacts between White House officials and Enron. But Cheney wrote to Lieberman May 22 admitting “at least 24 contacts between Enron and White House officials.”

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) released a memo sent to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) by Southern California Edison last August 17. It described in detail the conspiracy by Enron, Duke Power and other energy traders to “game” California’s electricity market. Kept secret by FERC, the memo was leaked to Feinstein by Edison.

“What happened to this memo?” Feinstein demanded. “Who was the highest authority who reviewed it? And what action did FERC take?”

The author can be reached at greenerpastures21212@yahoo.com

Letters

Sat, 25 May 2002 05:38:00 +0000

Protesters arrested

Five activists were arrested by the Albuquerque police for utilizing their constitutional right of free speech at the Crown Plaza Hotel against Enron and Bush’s war and domestic policies during President Bush’s visit to Albuquerque on April 29.

More than 200 Albuquerque citizens were on hand to peacefully voice their concerns about the Enron disaster and its impact on lost jobs and massive losses to retirement funds throughout the country, to call for an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine, and to oppose privatizing Social Security.

Some $20 million of teacher retirement funds were lost in New Mexico alone because of the Enron scam.

Both Bush and New Mexico Rep. Heather Wilson received sizable donations from Enron during the last carnpaign. Bush was hosting a fundraiser for Wilson during his visit on April 29.

The Albuquerque police used excessive force when several mounted police herded citizens like cattle on San Francisco St., across from the Crown Plaza Hotel.

They practically ran Steve Drake, a disabled iron worker, and myself, a former NM AFL-CIO COPE director, over with their horses. When Drake expressed dismay at the action, he was arrested. Both Drake and I are employed by Re-Visioning New Mexico, a community-based organization.

The N.M. Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is looking into the matter.

Mike ShaeAlbuquerque NM

Save the ABM Treaty

I just sent a fax to my Senators about Bush breaking the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and thought others might want to, too.

On June 13, the United States will become the first major power to withdraw from an established arms control treaty, the ABM Treaty. In doing so, the president of the United States is demonstrating his leadership for international anarchy, for unilateral executive action that disregards the Congress on critical foreign policy decisions, and for placing the law of force over the force of law in international relations.

To send a fax to senators asking them to block this action and to get more information, go to www.truemajority.org/action/.

Tina WheelerBaltimore MD

ADAPT protest

Thanks for the picture showing members of ADAPT protesting in front of the White House (5/18).

I live in the D.C. area, and while I was driving home one evening, the radio traffic report mentioned that some wheelchair protesters had caused a downtown traffic jam. The radio station never mentioned the reason for the protest.

Later, I searched some of our local major media sources and could not find a reference to the protest.

If it had not been for the People’s Weekly World, I would never have found out what the protest was about.

Greg LaMottaAnnandale VA

18,000 young adults killed

You didn’t see this headline? Of course not. That’s merely the number of young adults that die each year because they don’t have health insurance.

And besides, if we emphasized this tragedy, we would probably have to report the follow-up stories that demonstrate that these young adults (and everyone else) could have had life-saving insurance at no net additional cost to us.

Instead, bland stories on the policy issues are the order of the day (not to mention that the media wouldn’t want to risk losing advertising revenue from the private health plans).

Then the administration wouldn’t be pressured to renew its protest that it’s un-American to have the government interfere with the health insurance marketplace. And we won’t have to see our administration’s typical rhetoric that “18,000 young Americans gave their lives for a free America, protecting the principles that make America the great nation that it is.”

Since Sept. 11, our government is turning the world upside down because of the tragic loss of life that day. Yet just since Sept. 11, four times as many young adults have died because of the lack of insurance. Each two months of inaction duplicates the loss of that tragic day. And our government remains silent. Our leaders won’t even discuss real solutions because, “We don’t want ‘the government’ involved in our health insurance.”

Why does America tolerate this rhetoric? It’s sick! Our health care system is sick! And our political leaders are doing nothing to cure the problems! It’s time to grab the placards and take to the streets! Let’s go!

A readerVia e-mail

Editorials

Sat, 25 May 2002 05:30:00 +0000

How to stop terrorism

The Bush administration is resorting to reckless actions to escalate its increasingly unpopular “war on terrorism.” The State Department released an apparent hit list of states it claims are sponsoring terrorism, with flimsy evidence or no evidence to back it up.

The administration was forced to back peddle on its unsubstantiated charges that Cuba is engaged in bioterrorism. The Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld gang is continuing its drumbeat of war against Iraq. It is moving to expand its global military reach.

As revealed in its Nuclear Posture Review, the Pentagon is threatening use of nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, the White House is bombarding the American public with terrorism warnings to divert attention from an investigation of what it knew about terrroist threats before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Ironically, the avalanche of terrorism warnings underscores the administration’s failure to truly protect the American people. Here and around the world, people are questioning the effectiveness and the motivations of Bush’s endless war.

Last October, eight Nobel Peace Prize laureates called on the U.S. to refrain from military retaliation for Sept. 11, saying the best response is to reaffirm democracy and the rule of law.

Terrorism doesn’t spring from poverty and oppression. Terrorism has to be organized and funded, and it finds converts where mass democratic, working class, progressive and communist alternatives are crushed.

Bush’s war on terrorism continues U.S. imperialism’s long record of destroying democracy – propping up reactionary regimes like Saudi Arabia, promoting destruction of popular democratic movements such as the Palestinian movement, and plotting to overthrow popularly elected governments as in Venezuela. The “war on terrorism” is destabilizing the world. It is feeding violence and terror.

The Nobel laureates appealed to the world to develop a “culture of peace and nonviolence,” and called for “a renewed determination to work for a peaceful and just world.” We agree. This is the only way to eradicate terrorism.

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

Lift curtain of secrecy

Not since Richard Nixon’s Watergate presidency have we seen a chief executive as obsessed with secrecy as George W. Bush. Like Nixon, he and his aides use spurious claims of “national security” and “executive privilege” to hide information from the people.

In the most sinister case, Bush, Vice President Richard Cheney, Attorney General John Ashcroft and other administration officials have refused to release records on what they knew about the terrorist threats before Sept. 11.

They also refuse to release records of White House contacts with oil and gas executives, including Ken Lay and other Enron officials. There is no credible basis for claiming that “national security” would be compromised by releasing these records.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) wrote a letter to Cheney May 15, citing a leaked Environmental Protection Agency memo which urges Cheney’s Energy Policy Task Force to avoid mentioning the California energy crisis in its final report.

The EPA memo stated, “We are desperately trying to avoid California in this report …” What are they hiding?

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) released an equally incriminating memo sent to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) by Southern California Edison last Aug. 17. It spells out in detail a conspiracy by Enron, Duke Power and other energy traders to “game” California’s energy market, a scam that cost ratepayers $30 billion. Kept secret by FERC, the memo was sent to Feinstein by Edison.

Feinstein demanded that the Bush administration explain “what happened to this memo? Who was the highest authority who reviewed it? And what actions did FERC take ... ?”

Not even a non-elected president has the authority to conceal White House records that may contain evidence of criminal wrongdoing. It is called “obstruction of justice” and Nixon was forced to resign because of it. We demand a halt to the stonewalling. The people have a right to know.

Letters

Sat, 18 May 2002 06:05:00 +0000

Not a bad word

With reference to Michael Feldman's story on Marymount College (4/27), how did 'cowboy' become a pejorative? Most of the cowboys I have known have been honest but badly exploited working men. Let's not allow the word to become a synonym for reactionary.

Jack Blawis Tucson AZ

Workers Memorial Day

On April 28, several hundred workers attended a rally at Elizabeth Park here to honor the 213 Michigan workers who lost their lives in workplace fatalities in the year 2001. This Workers Memorial Day rally, which was sponsored by United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 3000, also reminded us of the national toll of 60,000 plus workers who die and the 6 million who are injured annualy from work related injuries and illnesses.

Speakers included UAW Health and Safety Director Frank Mirer, United Steelworkers of America (USWA) District 2 Director Harry Lester, Michigan State AFL-CIO Director of Safety and Health Derrick Quinney, several state representatives, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), Gubernatorial candidate Rep. David Bonior (D-Mich.) and PACE International Representative Al Cholger, who all asked us to remember those who were killed on Sept. 11.

The rally, which was endorsed by the UAW International, the USWA, Region 1 UAW, PACE, Michigan AFL-CIO and several UAW locals, emphasized the need to strengthen health and safety laws to protect all workers, union and non-union alike from this annual slaughter and to elect pro-labor candidates.

The ceremony ended with several of the speakers calling on those assembled to 'Remember the dead and fight like hell for the living,' a reading of the names of the 213 deceased workers and the bagpipes playing 'Amazing Grace.'

Jim Gallo Trenton MI

Activism begets activism

I was at the San Francisco march on April 20 and the 40,000 people were a power to be reckoned with.

I read Joelle Fishman's ('We can defeat the ultra-right in Nov.') and Terrie Albano's ('Another world is possible but what is it called?') pieces in the People's Weekly World (both 4/20). These articles touched a nerve.

I am writing a general note for advice. Back home, the activism of mine needs some bolstering. I am in the Screen Actors' Guild and Actor's Equity. These being two unions, I am curious if I could create a committee that is in touch with the workers of the world, and union-busting that governments participate in? Could you please give me some advice?

Philip Watt Los Angeles CA

Uplifting It's uplifiting to know that there are still people fighting for the poor and oppressed of the world, trying to bring justice and denouncing the corruption of the majority and powerful groups that enjoy opulence at the expense of millions of honest people.

Jose Cordolina Westbrook CT

A new movement

Karim Lopez' article 'A New Peace Movement is Born' (4/27) was excellent. I wasn't able to go to the demonstrations in Washington, D.C., and his article gave me a feel for how great it was.

I was also glad to read that the March to Stop the War at Home and Abroad is just the beginning for this new movement.

A reader New York NY

Battle for education

The front page photo on your May 11 issue showing a huge rally in Nashville, Tennessee, on the issue of demanding more financial support for public education is truly worth one thousand words. Public education is a bread-and-butter issue that motivates and affects millions of working people around the country.

When Bush ran for president he tried to say he was the education president. The question is, education for who?

Clearly his agenda on education goes to more privatization, segregation and inequality, which will all lead to leaving millions of children behind.

I hope the PWW/Nuestro Mundo does more coverage on this pressing issue and the fightback which is occuring around the country, like your front page photo showed.

Michelle Lerner Jacksonville FL

Editorials

Sat, 18 May 2002 05:58:00 +0000

GOP to poor: 'Let them eat missiles'

Without a day of hearings, the House leadership attached to the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) reauthorization bill an amendment that could open the way for wrecking the Food Stamp program. The rider would permit five states to opt out of the federal Food Stamp program in exchange for a nutrition block grant.

Michigan's Republican Governor John Engler, an advocate of the measure, and other well-fed officials would be granted authority to decide who is hungry and malnourished. States could seek waivers from federal regulations so they could combine various benefit programs, adding to one and cutting another.

Rep. Eva Clayton (D-N.C.), senior Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, lambasted this sneak attack on a program that has reduced hunger that once plagued over 30 million people in the U.S., saying this is tantamount to taking food out of the mouths of babes and the elderly. She might have added that the savings in the Food Stamp program will help pay for smart bombs and Star Wars in George W. Bush's near $400 billion military budget.

George W. Bush weighed in by attacking the 'administrative costs' of Food Stamps, sounding like his soulmate Ronald Reagan who once said the cost of nutrition programs could be cut if ketchup and relish were defined as 'vegetables.'

The House has turned thumbs down on a bill by Rep. Patsy Mink (D-Hawaii) that would end the five-year lifetime limit on welfare benefits and lift people out of poverty through higher education and job training.

Contact your Representative and Senators and demand they vote down this attack on food stamps. Demand they support the Mink version of TANF reauthorization. Tell them you will judge them on this issue if they seek reelection this fall.

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

Nuke treaty is hoax

The Bush administration is crowing about a treaty Russia has agreed to sign which purports to reduce nuclear warheads by two-thirds in the next 10 years.

Does this deal reduce the risk of nuclear war? On the contrary it makes a nuclear holocaust more likely because it advances the agenda of U.S. global military supremacy.

Look at the fine print: The treaty permits the signers to stockpile nuclear warheads rather than dismantle them. Russia is in such a state of collapse it cannot maintain such stockpiles. That job was handed over to monopoly corporations like Halliburton and Raytheon.

The Pentagon will allocate as many of our tax dollars as needed to keep these weapons in full readiness. They can be reactivated quickly. The treaty expires in 2012. It is 'flexible,' permitting the U.S. to increase some types of warheads.

This treaty dovetails with the administration's drive, exposed in its recent Nuclear Posture Review, to develop and deploy a new generation of so-called 'mini-nukes' for actual use in combat, crossing a nuclear threshold that has stood since the U.S. dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It also goes hand-in-hand with the administration's plan next month to abrogate the 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty (ABM), the first step toward deploying a ballistic missile defense and ultimately a full-fledged Star Wars weapons in space system that would clearly give the U.S. first-strike nuclear capability.

More than 300 peace and justice organizations have sent a joint message to Senators supporting their lawsuit against Bush seeking to block the U.S. pullout from the ABM Treaty. As for the new treaty with Russia, the Senate should send it back to be renegotiated so as to abolish all weapons of mass destruction.

We urge our readers to bombard their Senators with this same message and get your friends, neighbors, family and co-workers to do the same.

Letters

Fri, 10 May 2002 05:13:00 +0000

I quit! I smoked cigarettes for 60 years, but when I read in the PWW that more people died from smoking than from all the wars we’ve been in, I quit cold turkey.

Betty DumovichGreat Falls MT

Rogue White House Bush has now “unsigned” the International Criminal Court Treaty, trashing the entire Vienna Convention protocol, just as he imperiously dismissed the ABM Treaty, undermining global arms control.

Too aware of America’s inability to restore the shining moment of U.S. triumphalism experienced only ten years ago, G.W.’s rogue White House plows ahead with its Le Pen-like contempt for international consensus. To top it off, Bush brashly threatens aggressive war, months in advance, against Iraq for its not respecting some disputed U.N. resolutions!

Somewhat desperately, Bush insists on spending the Treasury surplus created under Clinton on an outrageous, illegal scheme to weaponize the heavens above, avowedly to dominate all countries by means of laser-armed orbiting war satellites. It seems as if the whole world is now our presumptive enemy.

Cord MacGuireBoulder CO

More on Ivens Diane Mason’s fine article (4/13) on the Lincoln Center retrospective on Joris Ivens, one of the 20th century’s most influential documentary filmmakers, neglects to mention his central role in the filming of This Spanish Earth, the documentary narrated by the young Orson Welles and used widely in the United States by CPUSA activists and the broad anti-Fascist movement to mobilize support for the Spanish Republic against Franco’s fascist forces and their Nazi and Italian Fascist backers.

It also might be said explicitly that Ivens was a lifelong partisan of the Communist movement in its struggles for socialism and against fascism and imperialism, although many readers could imply that from Mason’s sensitive and insightful account.

Norman Markowitzvia e-mail

Ricky Johnson executed Today is a sad day. South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges has denied Ricky Johnson’s request for clemency based on questions about his guilt. On May 3 the U.S. Supreme Court turned down a last minute request to intervene. Johnson, very likely an innocent man, will be put to death by lethal injection.

Though we may not have been able to save Ricky Johnson’s life – we did not fail to expose yet one more case where the death penalty is being used in a questionable manner. You responded by sending over 3,600 faxes to Governor Hodges, the Lt. Governor and Attorney General (who is currently running for Gov. against Hodges and is a fervent death penalty supporter). Your e-Activism led to multiple media stories.

I ask that you never forget the anger and frustration that you feel right now at our justice system and elected officials. Channel that energy into the fight for a moratorium on executions, as we have much hard work ahead of us, but it is not hopeless work.

Robert Jones, manager of The Moratorium CampaignNew Orleans LA

Action needed now on Palestine In the next few weeks it is imperative for U.S. citizens concerned about the current situation in Palestine to join together. We must speak out against congressional bills and letters that are aimed at undermining U.S. relations with the Palestinian leadership and Arab countries and support legislation that advocates a balanced approach to the crisis. I urge you to lobby and call your congressional representatives to support humanitarian efforts in Palestine.

On May 13 and 14 in Washington, D.C., the Arab American Institute and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee will host a two-day conference and lobbying effort to help organize along these lines.

Speakers will include Nabil Shaath, Palestinian Authority Minister of Planning and International Cooperation, Michael Tarazi and Diana Buttu, legal advisors in the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Negotiations Affairs Department, Adam Shapiro, from the International Solidarity Movement, and John Zogby, from Zogby International, among others.

For more information please call (202)429-9210 or e-mail project3@aaiusa.org

Patricia Lee OlveirasBethesda MD

Editorials

Fri, 10 May 2002 05:07:00 +0000

Free the 9/11 detainees Nine months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, hundreds of detainees, mostly Arab or Muslim men, are still imprisoned by federal authorities despite no evidence of their connection with terrorism.

The issue came to a head when the General Accounting Office (GAO), a non-partisan investigative agency of Congress, obtained a list of the names of the detainees April 30 at the request of Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wisc.). The Justice Department and the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) demanded the immediate return of the list and GAO complied. Conyers angrily declared, “The INS’s refusal to trust the people’s representatives in Congress with such basic information on the detainees is an affront to democracy and due process.”

In its last public announcement about the detainees, the Justice Department said about 327 people are being held by federal authorities, but this does not include dozens more detained as “material witnesses.” Nor does it include the thousands of letters sent out, to mainly Arab or Muslim immigrants, “inviting” the recipient to “meet” with Justice Department officials.

What is the rationale of Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft in this mass detention and dragnet? It fits in with their aim of criminalizing immigrants, especially those of Arab, Asian or Muslim background.

If Bush and Ashcroft succeed in stirring racist hysteria that these communities are a haven for “terrorists” threatening “homeland security,” it makes it easier to whip up war hysteria for the administration’s military adventures in the Middle East and Central Asia. That was the rationale in the racist and unconstitutional mass detention of Japanese Americans during World War II.

A climate of fear and repression is also useful in the intimidation of opposition to Bush’s rightwing, pro-corporate agenda.

We demand that the government turn over this list to Congress, halt racial profiling and free the detainees immediately, in the name of democracy and decency, which are the real basis of public security.

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

Let Cuba live The ultra-right, and in particular the Bush administration, is intent on eliminating any obstacle to their unending war for total U.S. economic, military and political domination of the world.

They have tried to do this in the case of Yasir Arafat in the Mideast and Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and now they are going full-speed ahead with this tactic toward socialist Cuba and its president, Fidel Castro. They see Cuba as a thorn in their side that must be eliminated.

In a May 6 speech, Undersecretary of State John Bolton alleged “possible” Cuban involvement in producing biological weapons. This unsupported accusation was widely reported in the mainstream media, who should know better.

Starting with Monterrey, where Castro was pressured not to participate in the U.N. development conference, it is clear the Bush administration is accelerating efforts to isolate Cuba from the rest of Latin America and the world.

Remember, Bush operative Otto Reich, who is infamous for planting lies in the press and has been tied to the failed Venezuela coup, is a virulent anti-communist Cuban with links to anti-Castro terrorists.

What irony! While charging Cuba with terrorism, it is the U.S. that has supported terrorism against Cuba, including biological terrorism aimed at Cuban agriculture and food supplies, and at poisoning Castro himself. Five Cuban patriots sit in U.S. jails for fighting such illegal acts.

Socialist Cuba, because of its accomplishments for its people and services to the world, has drawn wide interest and support from around the world. Polls show a majority of Americans favor eliminating the U.S. embargo. Sections of U.S. business see a benefit from good relations with Cuba. The travel industry wants to promote travel to Cuba. The farm states want agricultural trade with Cuba. Former President Jimmy Carter will go there this month. Illinois Gov. George Ryan went there twice.

We must tell Bush and Congress: “Hands off Cuba, end the embargo.”

Special prosecutor to investigate police

Fri, 10 May 2002 05:00:00 +0000

CHICAGO – After decades of protests, Judge Paul Biebel, chief of the Cook County Criminal Courts, has ordered a full investigation of the use of torture by key members of the Chicago Police Department. Biebel announced his decision on April 29 and appointed Edward Egan and Robert Boyle, both well known former prosecutors, to head the investigation.

The charges date back to the early 1980s and center around former police commander John Burge, whose Area 2 police station became known as “the house of screams” because of the regular practice of officers using torture to extract confessions from African-American prisoners. Scores of men have accused Burge of using beatings, suffocation and electrical shocks to the genitals to get confessions.

At least ten people on Illinois’ death row charge they were convicted by means of such coerced confessions. In at least one case, Aaron Patterson, who refused to sign such a “confession,” was sentenced to death for a murder he says he never committed. Patterson, who enjoys the support of a broad coalition of social justice and civil rights groups, is seeking a new trial.

The Burge situation was exposed by Citizens’ Alert, a police watchdog group set up after Chicago police, egged on by the FBI, murdered Black Panther leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in 1969. Pressure by Citizens’ Alert and others eventually led to an internal police investigation.

As a result Burge was fired in 1993 but was not otherwise punished. Burge still draws a police pension and no subordinate officer was ever indicted for their role in the abuse and torture of prisoners.

In the years since, Cook County State’s Attorney Richard Devine has adamantly refused to conduct an investigation because, he claims, the statute of limitations has run out on the original crimes.

Citizens’ Alert and other organizations fighting against police brutality rejected that argument, saying that whether or not the statute of limitations has run out on the original crimes, the conspiracy to hide the truth, itself a crime, continues to this day, and merits investigation. They also argued that the public has a right to know what went on in the Area 2 interrogation room and the extent of the complicity by public officials such as Devine.

In fact, it was Devine’s conflict of interest that led Biebel to appoint the special prosecutors. Not only was Devine involved in the prosecution of Burge’s torture victims, but his law firm, and Devine himself, then out of office, handled part of Burge’s legal defense, with 24 hours of work billed to Devine personally.

In 1998, the Cook County prosecutor’s office closed some cases related to the torture, leading to accusations of a cover-up. More recently, Devine is alleged to have made offers of commutation of sentence to some death-row prisoners if they would drop their accusations of torture.

Retired Judge R. Eugene Pincham and Attorney Standish Willis, as well as Citizens’ Alert, hailed Biebel’s decision, but pointed out that a battle has been won but not the war, and that attention to the problem of racist police brutality is still a matter for the entire city.

Many of the men on death row and others who are serving prison terms on the basis of torture-induced confessions claim that they were innocent and only confessed to put an end to the torment. They have appeals pending, and if a special prosecutor were to rule that their confessions were invalid because they were extracted by torture, some of all of these men’s lives could be saved.

The author can be reached at pww@pww.org

Letters

Fri, 03 May 2002 03:59:00 +0000

Unlike any other The PWW is like no other newspaper in the world. Powerful on world news coverage, along with beautifully written, thoughtful readers’ reactions to topics as diverse as smoking. This publication, always personal, always meaningful, always unexpected every week.

A readerEly NV

Celebrating a life in labor April 24 was a night for affirmation of labor’s heritage and future – all in honor of Moe Foner. Foner was a seminal part of labor in New York; to many he was its very heart.

Moe and his brothers Philip, Henry, and Jack were among the preeminent organizers and historians of people’s culture.

Though Moe passed away in January, his associates in the larger movement, and in particular at my own union, 1199/SEIU, where Moe was an official since 1952, wanted to offer a celebration of his life.

Moe was not only an important part of 1199, he founded its Bread and Roses Cultural Program, which organized the tribute, Celebrate Moe!

Celebrate Moe! occurred at NYC’s historic Town Hall, which was filled to capacity for this special evening.

The Royal Bannah Band, a reggae band of 1199ers from Kingsbrook Jewish Hospital in Brooklyn warmed up the audience with songs of conscience and justice such as Bob Marley’s “Get Up, Stand Up.”

The evening’s emcee was actor Ossie Davis. Harry Belafonte, a long-term friend of Moe and 1199, took the stage to thunderous applause.

Other speakers included Moe’s bother Henry, UFW founder Dolores Huerta, Bill Serrin of the NY Times, Dennis Rivera and many others from the movement.

A film about Moe’s life was screened and performers offered two songs from a musical Moe wrote about hospital workers, Take Care.

The finale included a chorus that sang “Bread and Roses” and then the gospel number, “May the Work That I Have Done Speak for Me.”

We need exhilarating experiences like this one to remember where we’ve been and where we need to go. John PietaroNew York NY

Imperfect author Many readers will remember the book The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger. It was a sensitive portrayal of commercial fisherpeople and the dangers they face.

Junger was recently a guest lecturer at Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn., where he spoke mostly from and about his new book, Fire. Here he unabashedly presented a pro-imperialist view, particularly of the USA variety, in support of the war in Afghanistan.

He heaped praise on the mujahidin, the very people who were pulling school teachers out of their buildings and killing them in the 1980s.

Junger feels that the U.S. military should stay in Afghanistan for five to 10 years or more. In so many words, he said we’re (U.S.) number one so who can do the job better! This man should be met with protests where ever he pedals this endless war position. Nick Bartvia e-mail

Stop the execution The following letter was faxed to South Carolina Gov. Hodges, through the moratorium campaign: www.moratoriumcampaign.org:

I strongly urge you to grant executive clemency to Richard Charles Johnson – who is scheduled to be executed on May 3.

There is strong evidence that Mr. Johnson is not guilty of the crime for which he has been sentenced to die. South Carolina can not afford to take the chance of executing an innocent man.

Mr. Johnson was sentenced to death solely on the basis of the testimony of two co-defendants who walked out of jail the day after they testified, and a career jailhouse snitch with a history of testifying falsely against inmates.

Mr. Johnson had no history of violence before this crime and has none since. In fact, his prison record does not contain one single disciplinary incident in the 16 years he has been on death row.

I ask that you grant Mr. Johnson’s request for clemency because there are serious questions about his guilt and because he poses no threat to those in or outside the prison walls.

This type of cases underscores the need for South Carolina to conduct a comprehensive bipartisan review of the application of the death penalty here before we continue to use it. Michelle LarabyDeKalb IL

Editorials

Fri, 03 May 2002 03:52:00 +0000

Another shot at unions

We started to say “they’re at it again.” But that misses the point: they are still at it.

'They' are the Bush administration, whose attacks on the labor movement began even before Inauguration Day with the nomination of Linda Chavez as Secretary of Labor and continued through April 10 when a Labor Department official told a Congressional committee the administration was going to tighten its oversight of union finances.

Although Deputy Labor Secretary D. Cameron Findlay was unclear on what steps were under consideration, he was very explicit when he told the committee the department planned to hire 40 additional full-time investigators to examine union financial reports.

The right wing has always fought to limit union activity in the political arena, primarily by placing restrictions on the use of union money to finance legislative and electoral activity. To that end we have seen “paycheck deception” legislation introduced in state legislatures or submitted as initiative measures in state after state.

So far they’ve been unsuccessful but, as we said, they’re still at it. In the last 16 months Bush has struck down numerous regulations governing workplace safety and health, used recess appointments to stack the National Labor Relations Board with pro-management representatives, stripped thousands of federal workers of their union and turned his back on rules requiring federal agencies examine a company’s record of complying with the laws designed to protect workers, the public and the environment before awarding contracts.

All of which is clear evidence of the need to build the strength necessary to defeat the right wing in this years election. Building that strength is the number one challenge facing all of us.

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

Congress must say no to U.S. war on Iraq

A shocking report in last Sunday’s New York Times spells out a cold-blooded Bush administration plan to overthrow the government of Iraq by means of a “major air campaign and ground invasion, with initial estimates contemplating the use of 70,000 to 250,000 troops.

Aside from Britain, the Times reports, “no significant contribution of allied forces is anticipated” in this latest scenario. But even in Britain there is strong opposition to such actions.

With U.S. moves against Iraq getting almost no international support, this invasion scenario is relying chiefly on behind-the-scenes support from reactionary feudal regimes in the Middle East and Persian Gulf that depend on the U.S. for survival. The brutal Israeli assault on the Palestinian people has made those regimes nervous about their U.S. ties. That’s one reason the U.S. is now trying to paper over the Israel-Palestine crisis.

According to the Times, the Bush administration has concluded that the Iraqi government is unlikely to be overthrown by its own people. So, if the Iraqi people themselves aren’t ready to change their government according to the wishes of the Bush administration and its corporate backers, the U.S. will launch an all-out invasion, spewing death and destruction, cavalierly risking biological and chemical war and even nuclear war.

All the techno-babble about “higher level of maneuver and airborne assault, dropping in vertically and enveloping targets,” “precision weapons” and “heavy deterrence,” can’t sanitize this terrifying Dr. Strangelove plan.

Increasingly, the American people are demonstrating that they don’t want Bush’s endless war. Now, the fanatical Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld gang and their ultra-right corporate backers have made it clear that they are ready to place the entire world in harm’s way in their pursuit of a global empire for U.S. transnationals.

We, the American people, can and must stop them.

It is time for the U.S. Congress to say no to this invasion plan. It’s time to stop the war hawks in their tracks. Our future is at stake.