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July 3: Denounce Government Seizure of Computers Bound for Cuba
End the Blockade Against Cuba • • |
Welcome Back Cuba Brigadistas and Caravanistas! On Monday July 14, Americans who traveled to Cuba, defying the U.S. travel ban and blockade, will be returning home. Many will be crossing the border from Canada into the U.S. at the Peace Bridge in Buffalo, New York. People on both sides of the border are organizing rallies to welcome the members of the Venceremos Brigade — Brigadistas — home. Members of the Pastors for Peace Caravan, which delivered more than 100 tons of medical and educational supplies to Cuba, will also be returning home July 14. They will be organizing to demand that the U.S. return the 32 computers seized at the Texas-Mexico border (see article below). In making the trip and openly returning home in defiance of the travel ban, and providing materials without a license, the Brigadistas and Caravanistas risk fines and jail. But as one, these Americans, including many youth, affirm their joy in visiting Cuba, their commitment to develop people to people ties, and their enthusiasm for calling on others to make the trip. The U.S. Brigadistas and Caravanistas, who come form across the country, will report back on life in Cuba, on her accomplishments in health and education, on conditions for the youth and the elderly. Some saw Cuba for the first time, others have traveled there before. But all come home with the same message — End the Blockade! Open travel and tourism to Cuba Now! The Venceremos Brigade (Venceremos means “We shall overcome”) said in their statement that, "…We oppose the Bush Administration's warlike actions toward Cuba and its relentless pursuit of "regime change" in Cuba — a country where people have free health care and education, where they do not suffer homelessness and hunger and where racism is actively combated, and whose largest export to the poor countries of the world is medical assistance. We support the Cuban people's sovereign right to have the social system of their choosing — and we want to learn more about it." Supporters will be coming from near and far to welcome the Brigadistas and Caravanistas home and join them in opposing the travel ban. Many will also demand that the U.S. Free the Cuban Five political prisoners, unjustly jailed in the U.S. for fighting against terrorism. Voice of Revolution joins in welcoming the Brigadistas and Caravanistas home and encourages all to speak with these travelers to Cuba and to find out more about Cuba. Brigadistas and Caravanistas welcomed home, at Peace Bridge, Buffalo, New York, 2005 [TOP] Pastors for Peace Caravanistas Arrive in Cuba Caravanistas from the Pastors for Peace Caravan reached Havana, Cuba, Saturday, July 5, after resisting efforts by the U.S. government to prevent their arrival. The Reverend Lucius Walker led the delegation that is bringing solidarity aid to Cuba, resisting the U.S. blockade and the challenges faced crossing the border into Mexican territory via the Pharr Bridge near Reynosa. At the border crossing between Texas and Tamaulipas, Mexico, U.S. agents confiscated 32 computers, part of the large shipment of materials gathered from across the U.S. and Canada for the Cuba Friendshipment. The shipment also included five buses, each one named for one of the Cuban Five anti-terrorist heroes, unjustly jailed in the U.S. When the U.S. border agents tried to stop the shipment, Caravanistas demonstrated, occupying one lane of traffic at the Pharr border crossing station for half an hour, until their entrance into Mexico was authorized. The group then traveled to the port of Tampico to ship their humanitarian contribution to Cuba. In Tampico, they participated, as they do every year, in a solidarity event in the Plaza de la Libertad. Then the one hundred caravanistas flew to Cuba to deliver the donations. In arriving in Cuba, they were greeted by Caridad Diego Bello, head of the Communist Party of Cuba’s Central Committee religious affairs office, leaders of the Cuban People’s Friendship Institute and Cuban religious leaders. [TOP] Denounce Government Seizure of Computers Federal agents seized 32 computers from Pastors for Peace July 3, as they attempted to cross the Pharr International Bridge at the US-Mexico border. [VOR: As of July 10, the government continues to hold the computers and refuses to return them.] “The U.S. government has forced the issue by going back on previous actions and understandings” said Reverend Lucius Walker, Executive Director of IFCO/Pastors for Peace. “They have intentionally provoked and harassed us,” he continued. “We will not be intimidated. We have made every effort to be cooperative and they have responded with aggression. These computers are the same type as the hundreds we have taken in the past,” said Rev. Walker. Members of the Pastors for Peace caravan quickly launched an emergency outreach campaign to their elected representatives, local community networks, and local media. They demonstrated in the Customs compound, chanting, “Si se puede” and “Cuba si, bloqueo no.” A demonstration at the border is being maintained. Pastors for Peace is also urging all to immediately call, fax or email the government to protest the outrageous confiscation of humanitarian materials. They ask people to demand the immediate release of all items belonging to the Pastors for Peace Caravan, seized at the U.S.-Mexico border. Let officials know that you stand with the Caravan members who are currently protesting at the border and that you oppose the blockade of Cuba. Take action right now! Contact: 1) The Border Patrol, under the Department of Homeland Security, which can be reached at 877-227-5511 2) The Office of Foreign Assets Control, which regulates the U.S. blockade of Cuba, which can be reached at 1-800-540-6322 or ofac_feedback@do.treas.gov 3) Your House representative, who can be reached at the Congressional switchboard at 202-225-3121. The computers confiscated were donated by a Japanese-American group from the Bay Area of California. They were so impressed with Cuba’s educational system that they collected PCs in their community to contribute to the 19th Pastors for Peace US-Cuba Friendshipment Caravan. As a result of this U.S. seizure, 32 Cuban classrooms will not have a computer from this caravan. In addition to the computers, participants are taking 100 tons of humanitarian aid across the U.S.-Mexico border and on to Cuba. The aid includes wheelchairs, medicine, medical equipment, musical instruments, sports equipment, six brightly painted school buses and a bookmobile to be donated to the people of Cuba. The caravanistas are challenging an inhumane U.S. law by delivering aid and traveling to Cuba without a license. They range in age from 8 to 86, and include Irish, British, German, and Canadian citizens as well as U.S. citizens. Seven members of the caravan are Cuban-Americans. The Caravan also includes a contingent of hip-hop and spoken word artists who will be meeting up with their fellow artists in Cuba. Although they come from a broad variety of ages and backgrounds, the caravanistas are united in their determination to bring an end to the immoral and unjust blockade against Cuba. Explaining why they are participating in this year’s Friendshipment Caravan, caravanistas said: “A person does not need an ancestral connection with Cuba in order to believe that what America has done and continues to do is not only immoral but denies us our right to travel as Americans.” “It is our obligation as citizens to be informed about what is happening 90 miles off our shores; I am addressing this by witnessing it with my own eyes.” Pastors for Peace is a project of the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO), an ecumenical agency with a 40-year history of work for social justice. More information and photo images of the caravan are available at www.pastorsforpeace.org. For more information contact: [TOP] 19th Pastors for Peace Caravan to Cuba Demands Freedom for the Cuban Five On July 3rd, more than 100 Pastors for Peace volunteers crossed the U.S.-Mexico border with nearly 100 tons of humanitarian aid destined for Cuba. Participants in the 19th U.S./Cuba Friendshipment Caravan are demanding an end to the 47-year-old U.S. blockade against Cuba. The 19th Pastors for Peace Caravan to Cuba is also demanding the immediate release of the ‘Cuban Five’ – five Cubans who are being held in US jails for protecting their people against US-government-sponsored terrorism. In the mid 1990s, the Cuban Five were sent unarmed to Miami to investigate terrorist organizations that have carried out attacks against Cuba that have included hotel bombings, poisoning of livestock and water, and the 1976 bombing of Cubana Flight 455 which killed 73 people. These attacks have killed more than 3,500 Cubans to date. In 1998, the Cuban Five – Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, René González, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando González – uncovered a deadly plot masterminded by the infamous Luis Posada Carriles. (See below for more information about Posada.) Concerned about saving lives, they took the information to the FBI. Instead of pursuing the case against Posada, the Five were arrested and falsely charged with “conspiracy to commit espionage” and “conspiracy to commit murder”. They have remained in US super-max prisons for nearly 10 years, sometimes being held in solitary confinement for up to 17 months. (For more information on the case, please visit: www.freethefive.org or www.thecuban5.org) Over the past two weeks, the Pastors for Peace Caravan has stopped in over 120 cities across the US and Canada, gathering humanitarian aid and raising awareness about the US blockade on Cuba, as well as the case of the Cuban Five. Aid being donated to Cuba includes medical equipment, musical instruments and school supplies, as well as five brightly-painted buses, each painted in honor of one of the Cuban Five. The work of Pastors for Peace to raise awareness about the case of the Cuban Five is even more important in light of a recent decision by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta to uphold the charges against the Five. The cases of three of the Five will be remanded for re-sentencing to the same Miami court that first convicted them. “The imprisonment of the Cuban Five is a clear violation of the rule of law,” said Rev. Lucius Walker, Executive Director of IFCO/Pastors for Peace. “In light of the US Supreme Court’s recent decision concerning habeas corpus - that it cannot hold persons indefinitely in prison without hard evidence – we should be encouraged to redouble our efforts to win freedom for the Cuban Five, who have been held contrary to US principles of jurisprudence for nearly ten years.” Luis Posada Carriles: • Was responsible, along with Orlando Bosch, for the explosion in mid-air of a Cubana passenger airliner in 1976. 73 people were killed, including the entire Cuban Olympic fencing team. This was the worst act of air terrorism in the Western Hemisphere until September 11, 2001. Both Posada and Bosch are currently walking free in Miami. • Worked in Honduras in the 1980s training the U.S.-backed contras who waged a brutal “low-intensity war” against the people of Nicaragua. [At that time, the U.S. ambassador to Honduras, also involved in training the contras, was John Negroponte – the current Deputy Secretary of State. • Bragged to the New York Times about hiring Central American mercenaries to plant bombs in hotel lobbies in Havana in the 1990s, in order to discourage the tourism that was needed to help improve the Cuban economy. This resulted in the death of an Italian citizen. • Was convicted of a plot to assassinate Cuban President Fidel Castro in Panama in 2001. He and his henchmen were convicted and jailed in Panama. On the next to last day of Panamanian President Moscoso’s term as president, she pardoned them all. Posada eventually turned up in Miami, was jailed on immigration charges for entering the U.S. illegally, and then was let free. On June 30, 2008, the Supreme Court of Panama reversed his criminal pardon. (Source: Pastors for Peace) [TOP]
Elections 2008: For Your Information Statement by Cynthia McKinney on the Nomination of Barack Obama As part of our on-going Elections 2008 coverage, Voice of Revolution is providing information, statements and views on the presidential candidates. In this issue we provide statements by two candidates, Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney and Independent Ralph Nader. We also are reprinting editorials from two of the main African American webpages, BlackAgendaReport.com and BlackCommentator.com, providing representative examples of views on the Democratic Party’s nomination of Obama. We encourage readers to join in discussion and send us your views. * * * Cynthia McKinney is running to be the candidate for the Green Party. The Green Party will hold their National Nominating Convention, in Chicago, July 10-13. Below is the statement issued by McKinney on the nomination of Senator Barack Obama. Additional information is available on her website runcynthiarun.org. * * * On Saturday, June 7, 2008, Hillary Clinton announced that her 2008 presidential bid is over, making Barack Obama the first-ever Black presidential nominee of a major party in the history of the United States. Congratulations to Senator Obama for achieving such a feat! When I was growing up in the U.S. South in the racially turbulent 1960s, it would have been impossible for a Black politician to become a viable presidential contender. Nothing a Black candidate could have done or said would have prevented him (or her) from being excluded on the basis of skin color alone. Many of us never thought we would see in our lifetime a Black person with a real possibility of becoming President of the United States. The fact that this is now possible is a sign of some racial progress in this country, more than 40 years after the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts. But it is also a sign of the deep discontent among the American people, and particularly among African Americans, with the corporate-dominated, business-as-usual politics that has prevailed in Washington for too many years. Coming from Barack Obama, the word "change" did not appear as just another empty campaign slogan. It galvanized millions of people — mostly young people — to register to vote and to get active in the political system. The U.S. political system needs the energy and vision of all is citizens participating in the political process. Citizen participation is always the answer. Senator Obama called for healing the wounds inflicted on working people and the poor in our country after eight years of a corrupt and criminal Bush-Cheney Administration. Just as in November 2006, people full of an expectation for change, including those the system has purposefully left out and left behind, flocked to the polls to vote for Senator Obama. Across a broad swath of the people of this country, and from those who are impacted by U.S. foreign policy, there is a real expectation, a real desire, for change. While congratulating Senator Obama for a feat well done, I would also like to bring home the very real need for change and a few of the issues that must be addressed for the change needed in this country to be real. First of all, a few of the more obvious facts: United for a Fair Economy (UFE) produces studies each year on the anniversary of the birth of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. entitled, “State of the Dream” reports. UFE has found that on some indices the racial disparities that exist today are worse than at the time of the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. For example, infant mortality, where the overall U.S. world ranking falls below Cuba, Israel, and Canada. They also have found that, without a public policy intervention, it would take over 5,000 years to close the home ownership gap between blacks and whites in this country, especially exacerbated because of the foreclosure crisis disproportionately facing Blacks and Latinos today. They have found that it would take 581 years, without a public policy intervention, to close the racial gap in income in this country. UFE has found unacceptable racial disparities extant on economic, justice, and security issues. After analyzing the impact of the Democratic Party's "First 100 Hours" agenda upon taking the Congressional majority, UFE concluded in its 2007 report that Blacks vote in the Blue (meaning, they support Democrats in the voting booth), but live in the Red (they do not get the public policy results that those votes merit). And UFE noted that Hurricane Katrina was not even mentioned at all in the Congressional Democratic majority's 2007 First 100 hours agenda. United for a Fair Economy is not the only organization to find such dismal statistics, reflecting life for far too many in this country. In a study not too long ago, Dr. David Satcher found that over 83,000 blacks died unnecessarily, due to racial disparities in access to healthcare and because of the disparate treatment blacks receive after access. A Hull House study found that the racial disparity in the quality of life of black Chicagoans and white Chicagoans would take 200 years to be eliminated without a public policy intervention. The National Urban League in its annual "State of Black America" publication basically concludes that the United States has not done enough to close long-existing and unacceptable racial disparities. The United Nations Rapporteur for Special Forms of Racism, Mr. Doudou Diene of Senegal, just left this country in an unprecedented fact-finding mission to monitor human rights violations in the United States. Dr. Jared Ball submitted to Diene on my behalf, my statement after the Sean Bell police verdict. The United Nations has already cited its concern for the treatment of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita survivors and the extrajudicial killings taking place across our country, that especially target Black and Latino males, and especially at the hands of law enforcement authorities. I hope it is clear that the desire for change is so deeply felt because it is deeply needed. Politics, through public policy, can address all these issues and more in the favor of the people. We do not have to accept or tolerate such glaring disparities in our society. We do not have to accept or tolerate bloated Pentagon spending, unfair tax cuts, attacks on our civil liberties, and on workers' rights to unionize. We don't have to accept or tolerate our children dropping out of high school, college education unreachable because tuition is so high, or our country steeped in debt. The 21st Century statistics for our country reflect a country that can still be characterized as Dr. King did so many years ago: the greatest purveyor of violence on the planet. It doesn't have to be that way. And the people know it. I have accepted as the platform of the Power to the People Campaign, the 10-Point Draft Manifesto of the Reconstruction Movement, a grouping of Black activists who came together in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to advocate for public policy initiatives that address the plight of Blacks and other oppressed peoples in this country. Among its many specific public policy planks, the Draft Manifesto calls for: • election integrity, if our vote is to mean anything at all, all political parties must defend the integrity of the votes cast by the American people, something neither of the major parties has done effectively in the past two presidential elections; • funding a massive infrastructure improvement program that is also a jobs program that greens our economy and puts people to work, and especially in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, Hurricane survivors, treated as internally displaced persons whose right to vote and right of return are protected, play a meaningful role in the rebuilding of their communities; • recognizing affordable housing as a fundamental human right, and putting a halt to the senseless destruction of public housing in New Orleans; • enacting Reparations for African Americans, so that the enduring racial disparities which reflect the U.S. government's failure to address the reality and the vestiges of slavery and unjust laws enacted can be ended and recognition of the plight of Black Farmers whose issues are still not being adequately addressed by USDA and court-appointed mediators despite a U.S. government admission of guilt for systematic discrimination; • acknowledging COINTELPRO and other government spying and destabilization programs from the 1960s to today and disclosing the role of the U.S. government in the harassment and false imprisonment of political activists in this country, including Mumia Abu-Jamal, the San Francisco 8, Leonard Peltier, including restitution to victims of government abuse and their families for the suffering they have long endured; • ending prisons for profit and the "war on drugs," which fuels the criminalization of Black and Latino youth at home and provides cover for U.S. military intervention in foreign countries, particularly to our south, which is used to put down all social protest movements in countries like Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and elsewhere; • creating a universal access, single-payer, healthcare system and enacting a livable wage, equal pay for equal work, repealing the Bush tax cuts, and making corporations and the rich pay their fair share of taxes; • establishing public funding for higher education — no student should graduate from college or university tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt; • ensuring workers' rights by 1) repealing Taft-Hartley to stop the unjust firing of union organizers, ban scabbing, and enable workers to exercise their voices at work and 2) enacting laws for U.S. corporations, which keep labor standards high at home and raise them abroad, which would require the repeal of NAFTA, CAFTA, the Caribbean FTA, and the U.S.-Peru FTA; • justice for immigrant workers, including real immigration reform that provides amnesty for all undocumented immigrants; • creating a Department of Peace that would put forward projects for peace all over the world, deploying our diplomats to help resolve conflicts through peaceful means and overseeing the orderly withdrawal of U.S. troops from the more than 100 countries around the world where they are stationed, and an immediate end to all wars and occupations by U.S. forces, beginning in Iraq and Afghanistan, and slashing the budget for the Pentagon. The Power to the People Campaign has visited 24 states and I believe there is already broad support across our country for these policy positions. The people deserve an open and honest debate on these issues and more. I encourage the Democratic Party and its new presumptive nominee, Senator Obama, to embrace these important suggestions for policy initiatives.” [TOP] Statements by Ralph Nader Below we reprint statements from the Ralph Nader independent campaign for president. Nader’s vice presidential candidate is Matt Gonzalez. According to his webpage (votenader.org) the statements are based on those prepared for Nader’s 2004 campaign. They are being used again to “illustrate how little has changed in four years, other than conditions becoming worse.” Nader is running on the following platform: • Adopt a carbon pollution tax Below are statements concerning the military budget, ballot access and restoration and expansion of civil liberties and constitutional rights. * * * Military Budget Earlier this year, President Bush announced a military budget of over $600 billion. And that is not counting the full cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The proposed military budget represents 58 cents out of every dollar spent by the U.S. government on discretionary programs — the items that Congress gets to vote up or down on an annual basis. The Democrats and Republicans have been silent about this rapid escalation in military expenditures, despite many critical reports by the Government Accountability Office and Pentagon auditors. In fact, they want to increase them. Barack Obama, for example, has said that he wants to "bump up" the military budget. Hillary Clinton and Obama have committed themselves to increasing the armed forces by tens of thousands of troops. John McCain would outdo them both. As budget analyst William Hartung points out "the United States is already spending more for defense than all the other nations in the world combined." Hartung points out that tens of billions of dollars are being wasted on systems like the F-22 fighter plane, the V-22 Osprey (a helicopter that can be transformed into a conventional aircraft), the Virginia class submarine, and an unworkable and unnecessary missile defense system. Right now, the military budget is being used to fuel wasteful, reckless, destabilizing foreign interventions that violate constitutional and international law. Nader/Gonzalez would cut the military budget to a level needed to protect the country. Ballot Access Nader/Gonzalez favor one federal standard for federal ballot access in all of the states. Right now, each state sets its own standards and third party and independent candidates must spend hundreds of thousands of dollars and thousands of hours for a chance to get on the ballots of the various states. In some states, it is fairly simple to get on the ballot. For example, in Louisiana, Nader/Gonzalez writes a check for $500, line up electors — and we are on the ballot. But that is the exception. Check out the requirements in these nightmare states: (And remember, we need to collect double the number required in each state because many are arbitrarily invalidated.) Texas, requires 74,108 valid signatures between March 5 and May 8. Deplorably, anyone who has voted in the primary cannot sign the petition. Oklahoma, requires 43,913 by July 15. North Carolina requires 69,743 by June 12. In 2000, it cost Pat Buchanan $250,000 to collect enough signatures for ballot access in that state. Indiana requires 32,742 by June 20. Georgia requires 42,489 by July 8th Ballot access was much easier in the nineteenth century. Voters had more candidates and small parties to choose from. Ballot access is much, much easier in other Western democracies. As a result small parties were able to pioneer the great social justice movements such as abolition of slavery, women’s right to vote, and protections for workers and farmers. Currently, ballot obstruction can consume upwards of a quarter million dollars in a federal campaign’s budget to get on the ballot in one or more states. Without candidates’ rights to be on the ballot—in a country where ninety percent of House districts are one-party dominated heavily due to gerrymandering—voters are becoming further disenfranchised. Restoration and Expansion of Civil Liberties & Constitutional Rights Civil liberties and due process of law are eroding due to the "war on terrorism" and new technology that allows for easy invasion of privacy. Americans of Arab descent and Muslim-Americans are feeling the brunt of these dragnet, arbitrary practices. Mr. Nader supports the restoration of civil liberties and the repeal of the Patriot Act. He also supports an end to secret detentions, arrests without charges, restricting access to attorneys, the use of secret "evidence," military tribunals for civilians, misuse of non-combatant status, and the shredding of "probable cause" determinations. These policies represent a perilous diminishment of judicial authority in favor of concentrated power in the executive branch. Sloppy law enforcement and dragnet practices are wasteful and reduce the likelihood of apprehending violent criminals. Mr. Nader seeks to expand civil liberties to protect basic human rights in employment regardless of gender, sexual orientation, race or religion. The Nader Campaign urges the Department of Justice to take action regarding civil rights violations against Muslim and Arab Americans. According to a report released on March 3 by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), "The Status of Muslim Civil Rights in the United States 2004," Muslims in the United States experienced more than 1,000 incidents of asserted harassment, violence and discriminatory treatment in 2003, a jump of 70 percent over the previous year. The largest number of incidents had to do with employment and the refusal to accommodate religious practices. But there were, however, 93 reported hate crimes (i.e., incidents of anti-Muslim violence), more than double the total in 2002. And there were numerous cases in which Muslims alleged that laws were applied to them more harshly because of their ethnic or religious identity. The report also noted that the implementation of the USA PATRIOT Act has been associated with law enforcement abuses. The report points to a number of questionable national security policies including: The rounding up of Muslim Americans and Arab Americans by the government that blurred the clear distinction between immigration cases and terrorism investigations. CAIR cites a report by the Office of Inspector General of the Justice Department, which found that between September 11, 2001 and August 2002, the government arrested 738 Muslims and Arabs whose entry visas had expired. In doing so, government officials interfered with their access to lawyers, blocked communication with family members, and even denied their constitutional right of obtaining information about the charges filed against them. The Justice Department's Office of Inspector General also reported that many were held in inhumane conditions including being detained in jail cells for 23 hours a day, and taunted and abused by guards. Guards also allegedly slammed prisoners against walls. Security tapes of the Bureau of Prisons show 308 incidents of physical abuse perpetrated by staff of federal prisons. None of these hundreds of detainees were found to have links to terrorism. The singling out of Muslim visitors and immigrants by requiring them to report to government offices to be fingerprinted, photographed and assigned a registration number or be deported. Thirteen thousand of the people who complied were still subject to deportation for violation of minor immigration regulations. The CAIR report points to widespread incidents of prosecutorial and law enforcement bias against Muslims. Violations of local ordinances for minor offenses like failure to cut lawn, or leaving garbage cans outside, have increased as have discretionary criminal prosecutions. Enforcement of the PATRIOT Act has also led to harassment by banks and financial institutions. People with Muslim or Arab names are being arbitrarily requested to provide detailed documentation of their identities as well as financial and tax records. The Ralph Nader Campaign urges: • Passage of the End Racial Profiling Act, championed by Congressman John Conyers, Jr. in the House and Senator Russell Feingold in the Senate. The Act would dissuade law enforcement from engaging in profiling by requiring collection of race data, and providing legal options to victims of racial profiling. • The Department of Justice to implement regulatory and procedural reforms suggested by its own Office of Inspector General designed to restore constitutional protections in government investigations and handling of detainees. • Congressional hearings on post 9-11 rules and procedures enacted by the Bush Administration in order to examine their impact on security and civil liberties. • Opposition to the extension of provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act • Reinstatement of the Federal Communications Commission's "Fairness Doctrine" — an attempt to ensure that coverage of controversial public issues by a broadcast station be balanced and fair. In the spring of 1987, both houses of Congress voted to put the Fairness Doctrine into law but President Ronald Reagan vetoed the legislation. [TOP] Obama and the Essence of Critical Support So, I watched Senator Obama’s speech Tuesday night [June 3, in Minnesota, when he had secured the nomination] and thought to myself how, despite every reservation I have had about Senator Obama’s politics, I was moved by the moment. Deep inside me I had always expected that a conservative Black candidate could emerge at some point, but I thought that it was very unlikely that a liberal-to-progressive could, in the near future, emerge and win the nomination. The color line has not been shattered. It has been further bent. It has been rendered more complex by the rise of a nominee for the presidency of the United States of America who is of African descent. His emergence challenges the history of the U.S., even if his politics are not on the Left. The fact that he was forced, through events, to articulate the clearest and most eloquent analysis on race in the U.S. by a mainstream politician, made this campaign particularly significant. What is even more significant is that Senator Obama is correct: this campaign is not actually about him, but it is about a very deep desire on the part of millions of people in the U.S. for change. How that “change” will be defined is not primarily a question for who gets elected in November. It is a question for those of us in the field who have contending visions for what the U.S. and the world should look like. I sat in front of the TV transfixed, knowing that this was an historic moment, irrespective of whether Senator Obama wins or loses in November. I, for one, will continue to critically support him. This means that I do think that there is a very significant difference between Senators Obama and McCain. This is not a tweedle-dee/tweedle-dumb juxtaposition, even given my differences with Senator Obama. Senator McCain wishes to continue the direction of George Bush and to advance the process of the consolidation of a neo-liberal authoritarian state. Senator Obama is looking for a politically liberal solution to the current crisis. I do not think that such a solution exists, but I do think that there is an opening for progressives to push for genuine alternative political and economic solutions to the crises afflicting the U.S. and the planet as a whole. This will inevitably mean challenging and pushing Senator Obama on matters such as foreign policy and healthcare. This is the essence of critical support; actively supporting his candidacy while at the same time not being shy concerning expressing our differences. Yes, this was and is an historic moment. There is, however, little time to relish in this moment because it will soon pass. If we are not thinking both about building for an Obama victory, but more importantly, laying the foundation for stronger social movements and a mass political organization that can advance a progressive direction, we will have misunderstood our challenge and fallen prey to illusions. Taking nothing away from Senator Obama’s own brilliance, he stands today as the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party because of a groundswell of anger and hope that exists across the U.S. It is up to progressives to do more than simply acknowledge this; we must help to gel it into a wave. Bill Fletcher, Jr., is a Senior Scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies, the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum and co-author of the just released book, Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice (University of California Press), which examines the crisis of organized labor in the U.S. [TOP] Obama Resigns from Black Nation Having this weekend severed a 16-year relationship with Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, Barack Obama might as well let the final shoe drop and resign once and for all from Black America, a polity he refuses to recognize or respect despite garnering 90 percent of Black electoral support. Never in African American history have Black people's collective affections been so callously rebuffed by an individual Black recipient. The fact that Black people's "love" for the Illinois Senator is wholly unrequited is obvious to everyone except wishful Obamites — a pitiful spectacle to behold. If there is a tie that binds more tightly and unthinkingly than the romantic urges of adolescents, it is the pull of nationalism. African Americans have the misfortune to be self-shackled to Obama by deep historical yearnings to wield power through their own racial representatives, as other "nations" of people do. The problem is, Black Americans find themselves trapped in a threesome, in which the object of their Black nationalist aspirations is hopelessly enamored of someone else: the mythical white American nation. "I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country," said Obama, in banishing Trinity's retiring senior pastor Jeremiah Wright from his inner circle, in April. Obama believes in One-Love - of the white fairy tale kind that despises the "use [of] incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation." Barack Obama is true-blue to the slaveholding forefathers and heroic blond mothers of the storybook U.S. of A. His intense (white) nationalist fealty to the Indian-killer and slave-whipper compels him to reject out of hand the African American version of U.S. and world history — to compulsively dismiss both the Black counter-narrative and narrators, like Reverend Wright. And if some stray white man in a clerical collar wanders in, assaulting white sensibilities with denunciations of white skin privilege and other unwelcome language, Obama can be counted on to slap the wayward priest down, forthwith. "I am deeply disappointed in Father [Michael] Pfleger's divisive, backward-looking rhetoric," said Obama, appalled at the effrontery of a man whose parishioners call a practitioner of "blue-eyed black soul," who mocked a Hillary Clinton character bawling that "a black man" was "stealing my show." Pfleger, pastor of predominantly Black St. Sabina Catholic Church since 1981, has been described in the corporate press as "Chicago's renegade priest." He was invited to Trinity Church specifically to expose "white entitlement and supremacy wherever it raises its head." Otis Moss III, the 37-year-old "hip-hop pastor" who took over from Reverend Wright, seemed thoroughly pleased with 59-year-old Father Pfleger's performance, as were the knee-slapping deacons arrayed behind him. Nevertheless, Father Pfleger found it necessary to make a blanket apology for his joyful exuberance, and to specifically beg the pardon of Barack Obama for mixing the presidential frontrunner's name into the skit. "My words are inconsistent with Senator Obama's life and message," said Pfleger. He was right. Obama's life and message have nothing to do with Black liberation, of the theological or secular variety. Both Reverends Pfleger and Wright support in practice African American political self-determination and general Black nationalist aspirations — goals that are repugnant to Obama, who behaves as if on constant guard against perceived insults to white folks' (and America's) sacred honor. Reverend Wright was also correct a month ago in characterizing the shameless corporate media attacks on his liberationist teachings as an "attack on the Black church." Obama pulled his family out of the 8,000 member congregation because, in his words, "our relations with Trinity have been strained by the divisive statements of Reverend Wright, which sharply conflict with our own view." But Wright had already retired. Clearly, Obama is not comfortable with the youthful new minister, Reverend Moss, either, or with the congregation that supports him, or with Trinity's political ties to the radical Catholic priest, Reverend Pfleger — who until a few weeks ago was actively working on Obama's campaign. Obama is distraught with the whole Black church scene — which seems to attract trouble with white people. As the Washington Post reported on Sunday: "Obama acknowledged that joining another black church, where ‘there's a different religious tradition or a worshiping style' might be equally problematic as his membership in Trinity. He said he probably will not make a decision about a new church until January." By all rights, Obama ought to just keep on steppin' out of Black America entirely, since his real problem lies with the two-edged sword of Black nationalism. The great irony of the Obama phenomenon is, his fundamental strength in the Democratic primaries — near-universal Black support — is based on an ideology that is a nightmare to white voters and to Obama, himself: Black nationalism. As cunning and cynical as Obama may be, he cannot tame the nationalist impulses of his Black supporters and thus lives in terror that they will spoil his game among white voters. Of course, Obama constantly claims that most Black folks are as politically deracinated — rootless — as he is, but that's never been true. Black nationalism has always been pervasive in Black America, and Obama can no more wish it away than he can pretend white racism out of existence. As the late, great historian Herbert Aptheker noted in his 1971 volume Afro-American History: The Modern Era, in a chapter titled Consciousness of Afro-American Nationality: "No other people" express this concept of nationalism so consistently "over 200 years." Arch enemies Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois at the turn of the 20th Century both spoke in Black nationalist terms. Dubois referred to African Americans as "a nation," while Washington described southern Blacks as "a nation within a nation." Even the politically passive pre-Revolutionary poetess Phillis Wheatley remarked in 1772 how pleased she was that "so many of my nation" [Blacks] were embracing Christianity. Black nationalism is everywhere that African Americans exist. It's the bond that makes perfectly sane people collectively embarrassed by the antics of Michael Jackson. In 2008, it causes millions of normally sober African Americans to binge on Obama'laide, to drink constantly to the political health of a man who gives not a damn about them, and who actually flees from their presence like a plague. Black nationalism has scared Obama at least temporarily out of The Church! In his ceaseless attempts to meld Black realities and white illusions, Obama tries to marginalize Reverend Wright by calling Wright's belief system "generational" — another word for outdated — only to have Wright replaced in the pulpit by a "hip hop pastor" whose politics is perfectly compatible with Wright's, and with the radical white clerical elder, Reverend Pfleger. At that point, Obama must head for the door, family in tow, never to return. University of Chicago Black political scientist Michael Dawson writes that "the black movement that is developing in support of [Obama's] campaign has some of the markings of black nationalism." Specifically, Obama is buoyed by a "middle-class" type of Black nationalism — the kind that is more common in politicized Black Christian churches and professional groupings than Nation of Islam circles. Obama's lurching exit from Trinity Church shows that he cannot tolerate Black nationalism of any kind, if it gets in the way of white outreach. In the end, Black people's one-sided love affair with Barack Obama can never be consummated. He recoils at every stage, answering love with unconcealed revulsion. One day soon, we'll take the hint. Of course, the real deal is former Georgia congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, presidential candidate for the Green Party ticket. McKinney reports she's leading in the Greens' delegate count. Unlike Obama, whose politics is substantially to the Right of most Blacks, Cynthia McKinney loves you back. Glen Ford is executive editor of Black Agenda Report, blackagendareport.com, where this article was originally published. [TOP]
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