On the Anniversary of September 11
Step Up the Fight for Rights! Organize to Change the World!

Salute to All Lending a Hand in Hurricane Relief Efforts
Reject the Failed U.S. State! The People Are the Only Reliable Force!

The People Are the Only Reliable Force
Rise Up to Help
Hurricane Katrina Mutual Aid Relief

Food Not Bombs Needs Help Feeding The Victims of Katrina
“Rescue — Not Repression!”

Direct Action to Aid Victims of Hurricane Katrina Now!

New Orleans Population has the Right of Return
Justice for the Victims of Hurricane Katrina: Protest at Federal Buildings Across the Country

Government Failure In Katrina Aftermath
News Briefs and Commentary

International Support
Cuba Offers to Send Medical Brigade


 

On the Anniversary of September 11

Step Up the Fight for Rights! Organize to Change the World!

On the fourth anniversary of September 11, Americans once again find themselves grieving for thousands killed and millions left homeless and jobless in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. And this time, there is no doubt that government refusal to act and provide for the security of the people is the main cause of the deaths and continuing suffering and devastation.

The U.S. Marxist-Leninist Organization extends its condolences to all those who lost loved ones September 11 and to all those grieving and struggling today in the aftermath of Katrina. We condemn the U.S. war on terrorism, which has shown itself to be a war of terror against the peoples. We extend our condolences to all the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, Palestine, Korea, all those who have suffered at the hands of U.S. imperialism. We salute all those organizing resistance.

While the sense of grief and outrage may in some ways be similar for many, the stand of Americans toward government is very different today. The outrage today is with the crimes of the government, its violence and racism against the people of New Orleans and the entire region, its refusal to take social responsibility and in anyway provide for the security of the people. There is rejection of the war against Iraq and growing unity with all the world's people as they rise in defense of their rights. And perhaps most significantly, the spirit of the people is one that says "We will not take no for an answer. We demand our rights. We demand an end to the war. We demand change and we will not take no for an answer! This spirit was readily seen in the Crawford, Texas, Camp Casey, that began with a few military families camping on the roadside out of the backs of cars, and grew to a highly organized, circus-tent sized encampment, joined by Camp Caseys across the country. It is seen in the many organizations working together to get food, medical care and assistance to the people of New Orleans and the region, despite being repeatedly stopped, often at gunpoint, by the government. It is seen in the growing mobilization for actions September 24th in Washington D.C., with a stand that is both anti-war and anti-government.

There is also growing recognition that it is the organized people themselves that can and are solving problems, whether it is getting food and medics to New Orleans or organizing buses for D.C. or fighting the growing repression and attacks on rights in cities and towns across the country. While the U.S. has shown itself to be a failed state, offering only more disasters, repression and military rule, Americans are coming forward in the best traditions of the slave rebellions, the fight for the eight hour-day, for May Day and Women's Day. They are empowering themselves by taking matters into their own hands and building up their organized resistance, at the local regional, national and international levels. The necessity to change the world is what is in people's minds this September 11, and the reality that it is the people themselves, here and worldwide, who are and will bring this change about has never been clearer.

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Salute to All Lending a Hand in Hurricane Relief Efforts

Reject the Failed U.S. State! The People Are the Only Reliable Force!

Voice of Revolution salutes all the organizations, affinity groups and individuals coming forward to lend a hand to the people of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama devastated by government failure to provide the assistance, resources and organization needed in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. People are bringing to bear all their organizing experience of the many struggles for rights and against imperialist war. They are rejecting the utter anarchy and violence the state has delivered and demonstrating that it is the organized people who are the only reliable force to provide relief. They represent the best of the American people, united to defend the rights of all

Medics trained for demonstrations are heading to New Orleans and the surrounding communities. Food Not Bombs, well known for feeding demonstrators and communities, is setting up kitchens in the region and training local people to do the same. The many military families and others involved in the Crawford Camp Casey at Bush’s ranch have sent supplies, a bus equipped with satellite for communications and medicine, and are setting up a new Camp Casey in Covington, Louisiana.

People across the country are outraged that a country where workers have produced tremendous wealth and a high level of production and technology is saddled with a failed government that refuses to take up its social responsibility to human beings both here at home and abroad — while refusing to get out of the way so the people themselves can solve these problems.

There is complete rejection of the government’s shoot-to-kill orders in New Orleans. How dare they! How dare they allow even one more person to die by their hands. How dare they brand people organizing to secure food and water and cooking it for families in need as looters. And how dare President George W. Bush choose to meet with segregationist Trent Lott, Senator from Mississippi. Lott was forced to resign as the Senate’s Majority Leader for publicly defending segregation, with its long history of state terrorism.

It is the thorough-going racist character of the U.S. state that guaranteed the blatant government brutality and racism witnessed in New Orleans and the region. It is this same racism that permitted Bush to stand with Lott. It is this racism that is also being rejected.

Through their actions, everyone is showing their rejection of the failed U.S. state and coming forward to show that they are the representatives of the people, they are the new, emerging in the face of this failure. Many have brought out, for example, that the massive efforts to get tens of thousands of people to Washington D.C. by bus for September 24 anti-war actions, with organized pick up points and known destinations, to set up tents and water and bathroom facilities, show the abilities of the people to organize to solve such problems. There is no doubt that, given the opportunity, transit workers could have organized the evacuations before the hurricane hit. Schools, universities, churches and nearby communities, like Algiers in New Orleans, could and can provide housing, and so forth.

It is clear that the only way forward is for the people to utilize all their experience, guided by their principles of defending rights, and organize to themselves govern. The failed U.S. state has only repression and military force in store. Now is the time to step up the work for political empowerment and strengthen all the many efforts to govern ourselves.

Top left: September 6 rally demanding justice for the victims of Katrina in New York City; Top Right:: Banner from September 6 rally in Oakland, California; Bottom left: Banner from the September 8th rally in San Francisco, California; Bottom middle: Family in Oakland, California targets Bush at September 6 rally; Bottom right: International Longshore and Warehouse Union President Clarence Thomas speaks at September 7 rally in San Francisco, California.

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Rise Up to Help

In the wake of the horrific devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, further compounded by the Bush Administration’s disastrous response, the women and men of CODEPINK are fully mobilized to be of service in every way possible. It is heart-wrenching to see the disconsolate faces of our brothers and sisters begging their nation for help. Most tragic are the anguished images of unsheltered mothers, clutching hungry babies while searching for food. All this, while our critically needed National Guard, the homeland’s primary protectors, are deployed to battle an illegal, unjustifiable war. Tragically, the misdeeds of the Federal Government have shredded America’s ability to take care of its own. Nearly 40% of our National Guard and Army reservists are currently fighting in Iraq. And while the National Guard of each state serves under authority of the Governor, the Bush Administration has commandeered their critical services, forced them overseas, and depleted America’s own strength at home.

These atrocious policies, which have severely weakened our nation, increase the urgent need for the women and men of CODEPINK, and the rest of America, to rise up to help. Please do whatever you can. CODEPINK has compiled the following ways you can contribute to help alleviate this unprecedented tragedy.

1. Donate Blood, Blood for Life and Not for Oil. Contact the Red Cross at www.givelife.org or call 1-800-GIVELIFE. You can make your own individual appointment or go as a group. San Diego CODEPINK is organizing a group donation on Sunday.

2. Support our CODEPINK Austin and Houston efforts to aid victims flooding into their cities. This includes support for housing, clothing and food needs, and special needs of women and infant children.

3. Send much needed supplies to Camp Casey III, in Covington Louisiana. Veterans and other Camp Casey Alumni have set up a relief station at Reverend Peter Atkins Park on the corner of 28th and Tyler in Covington, Louisiana. Today we sent 2 huge boxes of medical supplies.

4. Create a visible presence at your Federal Building to demand full funding for Katrina relief efforts and to demand the National Guard return home from Iraq to support the relief efforts. Bay Area CODEPINK will be in front of the San Francisco and Oakland Federal Buildings from 4:30pm-6pm on Tuesday. You can pick Tuesday or any day of your choosing for your local action. Let us know what you have planned. (Contact: dana@codepinkalert.org and put Katrina in the subject.)

We are one nation. We are one people. And we will help!

With outrage, sadness and compassion,

[Code Pink members]

P.S. Join us in D.C., September 24-26, for a historic weekend of mass mobilization against the war in Iraq. Learn more about how you can volunteer (codepink4peace.org). If you can’t join us, don’t forget to visit onemillionreasons.org so we can take your reason to get out of Iraq to the White House. Encourage your friends to submit their reasons as well. And don’t forget to forward this email to your friends!

As students and parents are gearing up for the new school year, CODEPINK and friends from the Leave My Child Alone coalition will be working towards the end of militarization of our youth! This week (starting September 7th) a national month of opt-out will begin with events all over the country. Join us in this action to spread the word about opting out students from military databases. For more information visit www.leavemychildalone.org and CODEPINK’s Back-to-School webpage.

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Hurricane Katrina Mutual Aid Relief

Want to help out the people affected by Hurricane Katrina? Are you interested in supporting grassroots efforts to help people, instead of religious or corporate charities like the Starvation Army and the Red Cross? There is a growing number of grassroots efforts around the country which are providing direct aid and assistance to folks affected by the hurricane and the conditions of capitalism and racism that existed prior to the hurricane’s arrival on the Gulf Coast.

Mayday DC, Infoshop News and other activists are teaming up to send one such caravan to the affected areas. Our goal is to put crucial resources such as water filters and vitamins into the hands of people affected by the storm. We are sending one of our volunteers, Jamie “Bork” Loughner, along with several street medics, down to the Gulf Coast with a truck full of food, supplies and information. She is currently planning the logistics of the trip and plans to leave Washington, D.C. on Labor Day. She also will be doing reporting for Infoshop News and Indymedia. If you’d like to help provide mutual aid to residents of the Gulf Coast affected by Hurricane Katrina, please consider helping out with this project.

If you’d like to contribute money to this effort, please donate via one of the following methods:

1)Directly to Bork via PayPal (contact her at: jamieandjoe@mutualaid.org.

2) Via Infoshop.org (Look for the donate button at http://news.infoshop.org/)

3) Check or money order, made out to “Alternative Media Project”, sent to AMP, PO Box 7171, Shawnee Mission, KS 66207. Please note on the check that your donation is for “Hurricane Katrina Relief.”

Mayday DC is collecting supplies in Asheville, North Carolina [things can be sent there]. Materials need to arrive in Asheville by Saturday, September 10. Preferred items: Water filters, B & C vitamins, socks, underwear, beans and rice in 20lb bags, and nutritional yeast.

Address/contact

Ken “Suncere” Thompkins
20 Merdock Ave
Asheville NC 28801
Phone: 828-215-2337
Email: bigblackafrica2000@yahoo.com

Bork can be reached at: 202-246-7665

Please bookmark Infoshop’s page on Hurricane Katrina relief:
http://www.infoshop.org/hurricanekatrina.html

This page will be updated with information on other relief efforts, including Food Not Bombs.

Other useful links:

Grassroots/Low-income/People of Color-led Hurricane Katrina Relief, http://www.sparkplugfoundation.org/katrinarelief.html

New Orleans Indymedia, http://neworleans.indymedia.org/

Mayday DC, http://maydaydc.mahost.org/ maydaydc@hotmail.com - 202-246-7665

Let’s put our mutual aid where our mouths are and show that people can help each other out without government help.

Chuck Munson for Infoshop.org and the Alternative Media Project
www.infoshop.org/hurricanekatrina.html

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Food Not Bombs Needs Help Feeding The Victims of Katrina

Food Not Bombs groups all across the southern United States are feeding families displaced by Katrina. Help us get food and supplies past FEMA. We need clothes, cooking equipment, food, cooks and money to provide for thousands of hungry homeless people. We have no overhead, rent or salaries so every donation goes directly to helping people. Many affected by Katrina are familiar with Food Not Bombs because we have been sharing free food in communities throughout the area for many years. Because we are independent we can take food and supplies to areas where no other agency can reach.

Dozens of people all over America have been calling Food Not Bombs asking what they can do to help the people made homeless by Hurricane Katrina. Food Not Bombs has started organizing buses, vans and truckloads of food, kitchen equipment and clothing to the people fleeing the disaster. It’s a real honor that so many people are looking to Food Not Bombs to help. We will try to get food and clothing past FEMA. So far we have busloads of material support and volunteers from Oberlin, Boulder, Madison, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Dayton, Hartford, Tucson, and Saint Petersburg. Volunteers from the west are meeting in Houston and people from the east are meeting in Baton Rouge and Covington, Louisiana. Our new kitchen is located at Corner of 28th and Tyler in Covington. The Baton Rouge kitchen will be set up shortly. The first Food Not Bombs kitchen is outside the Houston Convention Center. Volunteers with Houston Food Not Bombs are setting up an FM radio station in the Astrodome and they are handing out radios to 10,000 people. Please let us know if you can help.

Because this disaster may last 6 months to a year or more we intend to set up Food Not Bombs field kitchens throughout the region. Food Not Bombs is encouraging the refugees to participate in cooking, serving and collecting the food. Their participation may be one of the most therapeutic things we can provide. It is possible that as many as a million people will be homeless for the next 6 months as a result of this disaster. Even if you can’t go to the disaster area we need lots of help in your community. The number of people we need to feed is growing all across America as people are taken away from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. We are trying to share food every day in your community. Please call to see how you can help in your area.

In a few weeks many of these people will be considered regular members of America’s homeless population. In 1989, Food Not Bombs fed the people made homeless by the earthquake and after a few weeks the working class victims were forgotten and faced the same problems as those who were homeless before the earthquake. Because this could be such a long crisis it may be better for us to teach people how to organize their own local Food Not Bombs group so they can provide long-term support.

There are some things you can do that can help us respond effectively to this disaster.

Organize a meeting this week — calling, emailing and posting flyers about the need for people to help and the day, time and location of the meeting.

At the meeting organize groups to call for food donations, another group to call for propane stoves, tanks of gas, tables and cooking equipment. Ask another group to get more volunteers.

Choose a time date and location of where your vehicles will gather to take the trip to the disaster area.

Collect 25 and 50 pound bags of rice, beans, 25 and 50-pound bags of rice, beans, black-eyed peas, lentils and any other large amounts of dry goods, pasta or non perishable food. We can also use propane stoves, kitchen equipment, toothpaste, soap, shampoo and other personal items.

Stay in touch by emailing Katrina@foodnotbombs.net or calling 1-800-884-1136.

The Houston Kitchen can be called at 713-802-9642

Volunteer to feed the hungry and help the victims of Katrina, Katrina@foodnotbombs.net

Print out a flyer to copy and post in your community. Print out a letter you can copy to help you collect donations of food and supplies (see their website:www.foodnotbombs.net/katrina.html).

Help feed the victims of Katrina, please donate!

A Food Not Bombs Menu
PO Box 744
Tucson, AZ 85702-0744
1-800-884-1136

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“Rescue — Not Repression!”

New York City, September 6, 2005 - Youth in the lead demanding that the victims of Katrina be assisted instead of attacked by the government.

“The World Can’t Wait! New Orleans Can’t Wait! Drive Out the Bush Regime!” Many thousands of people supported and cheered — and some joined — a funeral procession in the streets of NYC yesterday (September 3). We delivered a powerful indictment of the murder of thousands of people by the criminal negligence of the Bush Regime. People of conscience everywhere should do this!

The World Can’t Wait took to the streets of New York City Sunday, September 3, in a New Orleans Jazz Funeral March. Starting with 100 people and swelling as hundreds more joined in, the procession snaked for 6 hours through Manhattan, clearing two lanes of traffic going up Broadway, with people in cars and buses cheering as they got out of the way. The procession ended up in Times Square, and crowds confronted each other in a charged atmosphere. As the marchers chanted “Rescue, Mot Repression!” the New York police came in and repressed — attacking and arresting marchers. Two are still in NYC jail cells.

News reports of the march and World Can’t Wait were seen on six local TV stations throughout the night. In the last 24 hours, we have been on Pacifica, and Air America radio, in the New York Times, and reports continue to come in. [ATTN!: People in cities across the country should hold your own New Orleans Jazz Funeral March This Week. Call all the horn players and musicians you know. Bring black umbrellas, coffins, drums.]

As the death toll rises and the monumental criminality of how the Bush regime is handling this disaster is laid bare minute-by-minute to millions worldwide, The World Can’t Wait — Drive Out the Bush Regime is emerging to hold this regime accountable for mass murder. Sunsara Taylor, a leader of the World Can’t Wait said: “We are pledging to the people in New Orleans and nationwide that we will take responsibility for leading millions to drive this criminal regime from power!” And we have begun. The World Can’t Wait — Drive Out the Bush Regime, which held its first national meeting on September 3 in New York City, is planning responses nationwide demanding that all the people in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast be immediately rescued, that people be housed in decent places, that the government stop shooting people, and start meeting people’s basic needs for survival. Volunteer rescuers should be assisted and supported, and not repressed by government agencies, police, and National Guard. The full truth must be made known and those responsible up to the very highest levels must be held accountable.

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Pastors for Peace Organizes Aid Caravan for Louisiana and Mississippi

Direct Action to Aid Victims of Hurricane Katrina Now!

Pastors for Peace has moved quickly to mobilize a Gulf Coast caravan. We are collecting tons of bottled water, powdered milk, diapers, food and personal hygiene items for southern Louisiana and Mississippi. The aid will be delivered to local community and church groups who are feeding and caring for their neighbors. If you can organize a collection drop off point call: John Waller (718) 810-8426. For donations and other information: IFCO/Pastors voicemail (212) 926-5757 Or email: P4P@igc.org

We cannot simply stand by and not act in the face of this monstrous disaster. The incompetence and callousness of government officials is unspeakable. We are moved to direct action because the racism and inaction of those who should be caring for ALL the people victimized by Hurricane Katrina have not done so.

The aid is being collected at drop off centers in ten states in the Northeast and Midwest and South. What we need now are volunteers to organize drop off points in those areas. The caravan convoy, made up of busses, box trucks and other vehicles will take a limited number of volunteers in order to maximize space for humanitarian aid.

Urgently needed financial donations for those who want to contribute funds and to offset the fuel costs of this caravan, can be sent to IFCO/Pastors for Peace, 402 W. 145th St. New York, NY 10031. Those wishing to make credit card donations can call IFCO Pastors communications -director Lucia Bruno at (347) 423-4330.

Speaking with supporters this week, Rev. Lucius Walker, executive Director of IFCO/Pastors for Peace said “Despite the urgent campaign to free the seized computers bound for disabled Cuban children we must respond to the needs of families hurt by Hurricane Katrina right now”.

For more than two decades, Pastors for Peace has delivered humanitarian aid to families in Chiapas, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Cuba. These Friendshipment Caravans have focused on aiding victims of US foreign policy. Today, we extend this work to the domestic frontier. Families on the Gulf coast have been victimized twice over — by Hurricane Katrina and again by the callous disregard of a system that was responsible for protecting them and did not.

We must do our part to demonstrate the love and concern that exists in communities throughout the U.S. for our brothers and sisters torn apart by this tragedy.

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New Orleans Population has the Right of Return

September 8, 2005 — The people of New Orleans have a right to return. It is not too early to say so. In fact, it is imperative that we demand the Right of Return now, before the circumstances of the displacement of this population create facts on the ground that cannot be reversed. We have seen, elsewhere in the world, how those who have been displaced are effectively shut out from returning to their origins, and how quickly the public says, well, that’s just water under the bridge — or over the levee. Others, newcomers, will benefit from the tragedy of the previous population’s displacement. This cannot be allowed to occur in New Orleans.

Not only does the Black two-thirds of the city have the right to return, but the federal government has an obligation to direct every resource to making it possible and practical for them to return, and to live productive lives in the city from which they were driven.

The circumstances of displacement are clear. The Bush regime set New Orleans up for a fall, cutting back on funding for the levees in every year of George Bush’s administration. The scenario for precisely the catastrophe that Hurricane Katrina wrought was played out in a regional and federal computerized hurricane war game, just last year, involving a hypothetical Hurricane called “Pam.” The Bush men chose to ignore the data. In legal terms, they showed a depraved indifference to human life — or worse.

After the deluge, this official depravity was compounded by the Bush men’s indifference — or worse — to the plight of those who had no choice but to stay in New Orleans. The facts of federal depravity are so manifest, there is no need to elaborate in this commentary. But the New Orleans diaspora is spreading, uncharted, with no paper trail, and only an ad hoc, improvised charitable money trail. The displaced persons of New Orleans, like the Blanche DuBois character in the Tennessee Williams play, “Streetcar Named Desire,” are now largely dependent on “the kindness of strangers.” That is nothing to celebrate about.

The people of New Orleans have the right to be made whole, again. They are citizens, wounded by their own government. The rights of citizens cannot be privatized, or churched-out, or Salvation-Armyed out. All help is appreciated, but we must also focus on rights — the right to not be permanently displaced by depraved government policies or the corporate greed that will certainly try to swallow New Orleans whole — just as whole as did the waters of Lake Pontchartrain.

Displacement based on race is a form of genocide, as recognized under the Geneva Conventions. Destruction of a people’s culture, by official action or depraved inaction, is an offense against humanity, under international law. New Orleans — the whole city, and its people — is an indispensable component of African American culture and history. It is clear that the displaced people of New Orleans are being outsourced — to everywhere, and nowhere. They are not nowhere people. They are citizens of the United States, which is obligated to right the wrongs of the Bush regime, and it’s unnatural disaster. Charity is fine. Rights are better. The people of New Orleans have the Right to Return — on Uncle Sam’s tab.

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Justice for the Victims of Hurricane Katrina
Protest at Federal Buildings Across the Country

It is a crime for the Government to allow people to die because of their race and class — to treat people like they are the enemy because they are black and poor; to spend billions on war and cut budgets at home, resulting in death and destruction.

By now it is clear who is dying on the streets of New Orleans and throughout the area hit by Hurricane Katrina. Those with the money and resources were able to flee the city in plenty of time, while the poor were left behind to face flooding, and lack of water, food, and medicine. Now they are facing the prospect of being shot down in the street by troops sent in by the government to “restore order.”

The difference between those who got out and those who were abandoned to die is a difference of class and race.

Hurricane Katrina is not the cause of the thousands of deaths in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. The system that says poor people and black people are expendable is responsible. The government refused to prepare for the hurricane they knew was coming. They made no provision to evacuate the poor, the elderly, and the handicapped, knowing that more than 100,000 would be left behind. They made no effort to get food, water, or medicine to survivors, while dead bodies piled up on the streets on New Orleans. FEMA actually turned back aid trucks as they attempted to get into New Orleans.

Rather than mobilizing to provide the aid that should have been in place a week ago, the Bush Administration has sent troops into the streets with orders to “shoot to kill.” Brigadier General Gary Jones told the Army Times that “[New Orleans] is going to look like Little Somalia … We’re going to go out and take this city back. This will be a combat operation to get this city under control.”

We must unite on September 12 to demand:

* Immediate relief — food, medicine, water, clothing, and emergency shelter for the people of the region.

* Extended unemployment benefits for all who have lost jobs, with a massive jobs and housing program for the near future.

* Money for Hurricane Relief, Not War!

* End the military occupation of New Orleans! People trying to feed their families are not looters!

* An independent international investigation of the criminal negligence that caused this disaster.

Some of the cities where protests are already planned include: New York City, Buffalo, Rochester, Amherst, New Haven, Charleston, SC, Jackson, MS, Miami, FL, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Boston, Detroit, Jersey City, Los Angeles, Houston, Raleigh, Washington D.Cc, San Francisco, Chicago, Cleveland, Baltimore, Philadelphia, San Diego, Seattle, St Louis, Kansas City, Memphis, Milwaukee, Atlanta, and hundreds of other cities and towns of all sizes, in every region of the country.

See the Troops Out Now website for the latest updates on local actions.

Initiating endorsers include the Million Worker March Movement; Troops Out Now Coalition; Saladin Muhammed, Black Workers For Justice; Harlem Tenants Council; Chris Silvera, Chair, Teamsters National Black Caucus; International Action Center; Cuba Solidarity New York; Rev. Lucius Walker, Pastors for Peace; Rev. Luis Barrios, Iglesia San Romero de Las Américas; and local leaders and activists from around the country.

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Government Failure In Katrina Aftermath: News Briefs and Commentary

Government Blocking People’s Efforts to Assist

The government, using the military, continues to block efforts by the people to lend a hand. They refused to allow aid trucks to enter New Orleans. They have essentially quarantined medical personal at the airport and turned away thousands of healthcare professionals, both before the hurricane hit and after. Most recently a group of African American healthcare workers, along with much needed medicine, were turned away from the Algiers community, which was not demolished by the storm. They have also refused offers from Cuba to send 1586 doctors trained and equipped for hurricane relief. Venezuela has offered funds, fuel and equipment and many other countries, such as Brazil, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, and others have also offered assistance — all refused.

Will More than One Million Homeless be Sent to Concentration Camps?

The government is treating the human beings of the region as if they were slaves and prisoners — ripping families apart, separating mothers from babies, holding people trying to get water at gunpoint, imprisoning people in so-called “evacuation” points and “temporary” shelters. People are being kept prisoner wherever they end up, even when they have family homes to go to. There are as yet no plans for reuniting and housing everyone, for rebuilding their homes and ensuring their return. There is talk of opening closed military bases to house people. Many of the at least 1.3 million now homeless are rightly concerned that they will not be allowed to return home but instead will be forced into government-run concentration camps, perhaps on these same military bases. The reality that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the military have long had plans to put African Americans into designated camps has not been lost on the people of the region, who have a rich history of struggle for their rights.

Victims are People and Citizens, not “Refugees”

The government and monopoly media have widely promoted use of the term refugees for the more than one million, perhaps two million, now homeless across Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Refugee commonly refers to someone forced to leave their homeland and reside in another country, where they are not citizens. Those in the region are largely African Americans and citizens. Why then use of the term refugee? Its use is very likely part of an effort to bring about the civil death of those who did not outright die from government failure. It is to again return African Americans to the status of non-citizens, without civil rights, as was the case during slavery.

Government Lies No Longer Fly

Government at all levels has continued to try and say that the source of problems is not their failure, but a storm that no one predicted. But the usual Big Lie technique no longer work. For example, Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff said, September 4, that planners did not expect the levees to fail. He claimed “We didn’t merely have an overflow. We actually had a break in the wall. And I will tell you that perfect storm of combination of catastrophes exceeded the foresight of the planners and maybe anybody’s foresight.” He added, “The way these catastrophes unfolded is unprecedented in anybody’s experience.”

However the people of the region know very well that in 2001, before September 11, the danger threatening the city was catastrophic. The local newspaper, the Times Picayune, carried a series on the problem. The Houston Chronicle directly quoted FEMA’s listing of the three most likely disasters to threaten the U.S. These were an earthquake in San Francisco, a terrorist attack in New York City and a hurricane hitting New Orleans. The paper reported, “The New Orleans hurricane scenario may be the deadliest of all. In the face of an approaching storm, scientists say, the city’s less than adequate evacuation routes would strand 250,000 people or more and probably kill one in ten left behinds as the city drowned under 20 feet of water. Thousands of refugees could land in Houston. Economically the toll would be shattering…If an Allison-type storm were to strike New Orleans, or a category three storm or greater with at least 111 mph winds, the results would be cataclysmic, New Orleans planners said.” Every year since 2001, government has slashed funding for levee building and repairs in New Orleans. The government knew Katrina was a category four and saw it coming for days in advance. The failure of government is such that the lies no longer fly.

Halliburton, Pat Robertson Get Katrina Funds

While President George W. Bush and the federal government remain AWOL in providing the needed resources and housing for people in Louisiana and Mississippi, the government was very quick to ensure that monopoly Halliburton got the contract to repair the damage to the naval facilities damaged by Katrina. The US Navy reported on September 2 that they ere giving the contract to KBR, a Halliburton subsidiary, that has also gotten giant contracts in Iraq. In March, former director of FEMA became a lobbyist for KBR.

In addition, FEMA, in its list of government recommended organizations for making Katrina relief contributions, listed Operation Blessing among the top groups, alongside the Red Cross. Operation Blessing is one of evangelist Pat Robertson’s organizations. Robertson, who ran for president in 1992 and has a weekly TV program broadcast to millions. He recently called, on the show, for the assassination of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez — a crime that has yet to be punished. Instead, he has again been rewarded. Robertson is also known to have received more than $25 million in federal public dollars through Bush’s “faith-based” programs.

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International Support

Cuba Offers to Send Medical Brigade

Remarks by Dr. Fidel Castro Ruz, President of the Republic of Cuba, meeting with the medical doctors assembled to offer assistance to the American people in areas affected by hurricane Katrina in the Havana Convention Center, September 4, 2005.

* * *

Dear members of the medical force assembled to offer assistance to those affected by hurricane Katrina in the South of the United States,

Distinguished guests;

Fellow Cubans:

Hardly 48 hours ago I concluded my remarks on the Round Table broadcast where I once again explicitly offered the United States to send a medical force with the necessary means to offer emergency assistance to the tens of thousands of Americans trapped in the flooded areas and the ruins Katrina left behind after lashing Louisiana and other southern states.

It was clear to us that those who faced the greatest danger were these huge numbers of poor, desperate people, many elderly citizens with health situations, pregnant women, mothers and children among them, all in urgent need of medical care. In such a situation, regardless of how rich a country may be, the number of scientists it has or how great its technical breakthroughs have been, what it needs are young, well-trained and experienced professionals, who have done medical work in anomalous circumstances, and that, with a minimum of resources, can be immediately transported by air or any other available means to specific facilities or sites where the lives of human beings are in danger.

Cuba, a short distance away from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, was in a position to offer assistance to the American people. At that moment, the billions of dollars the United States could receive from countries all over the world would not have saved a single life in New Orleans and other critical areas where people were in mortal danger. Cuba would be completely powerless to help the crew of a spaceship or a nuclear submarine in distress, but it could offer the victims of hurricane Katrina, facing imminent death, substantial and crucial assistance. And this is what it’s been doing since Tuesday, August 30, at 12:45 pm, when the winds and downpours had barely ceased. We don’t regret it in the least, even if Cuba was not mentioned in the long list of countries that offered their solidarity to the US people.

Knowing that I could rely on men and women like you, I took the liberty of reiterating our offer three days later, promising that in less than 12 hours the first 100 doctors, carrying the necessary medical resources in their backpacks, could be in Houston; that an additional 500 could be there 10 hours later and that, within the next 36 hours, 500 more, for a total of 1100, could join them to save at least one of the many lives at risk from such dramatic events. Perhaps those unaware of our people’s sense of honor and spirit of solidarity thought this was some kind of bluff or a ridiculous exaggeration. But our country never toys with matters as serious as this, and it has never dishonored itself with demagogy or deceit. That is why we proudly gather in this hall, at Havana’s Convention Center where only three days ago we observed a minute of silence for the victims of the hurricane which battered the United States, and from where our heartfelt condolences were extended to that brotherly people.

Here we are, and not 1100 but 1586 doctors, including 300 additional doctors, in response to the increasingly alarming news that keep coming in. In fact, another 300 doctors, approximately, have joined this group at the last minute. They were called in and we’ve already announced that we are willing to send thousands more if it were necessary. But these 300 doctors are in other halls of the Convention Center, taking part in this function. In just 24 hours, all of the doctors summoned to carry out this mission, coming from all parts of the country, met in the capital. We have shown the utmost punctuality and precision.

You bring honor to the noble medical profession. With your quick, unwavering response to the call of duty and your willingness to work in unchartered and difficult conditions, you are writing a new page in the history of solidarity among the peoples and are showing a course of peace to the suffering and imperiled human species to which we all belong.

This medical force, I mean the 1586 initially mentioned, includes:

· 1097 specialists in Comprehensive General Medicine, 600 who are pursuing Masters degrees in Medical Sciences;

· 351 general practitioners and intensive care specialists;

· 72 healthcare professionals with two medical specialties, and

· 66 specialists in cardiology, pediatrics, gastroenterology, surgery, psychiatry, epidemiology and other specialties.

Of this medical force:

· 699 doctors have served in one or more international missions in 43 different countries, and some have even served in three missions, and

· 727 were ready and about to leave Cuba to serve in missions in Latin America, Africa and Asia; they joined this force in view of the dramatic situation unfolding in the southern United States, while other similar professionals will meet our internationalist commitment in other countries.

The average age of these health professionals is 32 years. Most of them had not yet been born when the revolution triumphed and some had not even been born 15 years after the triumph of the revolution, they are the product of these hard years. The average work experience is of no less than 10 years. Some have more experience, some less, most have more experience.

Of the total force, 729 are men and 857 are women.

The precarious sanitary conditions and dangers left in the United States by hurricane Katrina are powerfully described by international press agencies and the US press:

The EFE agency reports that in the Houston’s stadium, in Texas, presently sheltering more than 15 thousand people evacuated from New Orleans, hardly three thousand have received medical care. Highly infectious diseases have been reported there while outbreaks of diarrhea and vomiting threaten to quickly spread due to overcrowding. Yesterday’s edition of the Washington Post reports that, at the moment, Mississippi’s chief needs are fuel and medical assistance.

An AP press dispatch reports that two of the most severely affected hospitals in New Orleans were evacuated after its desperate doctors spent two days making the difficult decision of which patients should receive the scarce supplies of food, water and medicine. Three terminally ill patients died during the evacuation and the number of patients who perished before assistance finally arrived could not be determined. Several hospital employees administered themselves intravenous saline solutions while waiting to be rescued.

Fox News network emphasized yesterday that New Orleans health professionals are working around the clock, without rest, to treat patients in critical condition and to prevent a catastrophe in the already overcrowded medical facilities. These health professionals have been working without rest and their strength is running out; something must be done urgently.

Yesterday, a Louisiana Health and Hospitals Department spokesperson, Kyle Viator, declared “we have patients in dialysis, others with diabetes, people who require regular treatment and prescription drugs. Our resources are running out. At the moment, one third of the population is displaced, and this group of people includes our medical personnel”.

An article published in the Spanish newspaper El Mundo gathers the dramatic accounts of Nina Ferguson, a 46-year-old African American resident of New Orleans, who claims she could not suppress a feeling of nausea on getting off a military truck which took her to Houston, adding: “Seeing this, I’d rather stayed at the Convention Center where I saw dehydrated babies and several old people die without anyone looking after them”.

Another New Orleans resident, Rosanne Asuen, who suffers from diabetes and obesity, had to be reanimated by a volunteer nurse who was as desperate to get out of there as she was.

Evelyn Sander, a 23 years old mother, told the press how she wiped the sweat off Issaiah, her one-month-old baby’s forehead, with symptoms of dehydration and flies all over him.

The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) in a communiqué made public yesterday, Saturday, expressed its concern over the situation of children in the affected areas.

According to UNICEF, one third to one fourth of the one million two hundred thousand people left helpless in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama are children.

A spokesperson for the Center for Disease Control (CDC) headquartered in Atlanta told EFE that the stagnant waters create the ideal conditions for the spread of the Nile virus and for outbreaks of hepatitis A and E. Coli bacteria, a potentially deadly pathogen which can cause diarrhea and kidney failure, among other complications.

An AFP cable dated in Houston yesterday reports that Texas offered to take in the thousands of people who had been displaced, but that hotels in Houston begin to experience water shortages and that the ill must wait long to receive medical care. Steven Glonsky, a doctor with the Methodist Hospital in the city, who spent thirteen hours attending to dehydrated and traumatized survivors who suffer from chronic illness such as diabetes and hypertension, stated that this is an unprecedented crisis in US history.

US Senate republican leader Bill Frist, presently in New Orleans, admitted that “doctors and nurses are doing a great job, but the distribution of medical assistance continues to be a serious problem” and “scores of people die every day”.

According to the Boston Globe, Louisiana and Mississippi are facing the worst public health care disaster the nation has known in decades.

The newspaper published declarations from Dr. Marshall Bouldin, Director for Diabetes and Metabolism at the University’s Medical Center in Jackson, Mississippi, who assistance: “We’re seeing things that we haven’t seen in many years: cholera, typhoid fever, tetanus, malaria. We hadn’t seen such conditions in 50 years. People are crammed together and wander around surrounded by excrement”. There is an endless list of health problems reported by virtually all the press and the specialized health care institutions.

Our doctors’ backpacks contain precisely those resources needed to address in the field problems relating to dehydration, high blood pressure, diabetes Mellitus and infections in all parts of the body--lungs, bones, skin, ears, urinary tract, reproductive system-- as they arise. They also carry medicine to suppress vomiting; painkillers and drugs to lower fever; medication for the immediate treatment of heart conditions, for allergies of any kind; for treating bronchial asthma and other similar complications, about forty products of proven efficiency in emergencies such as this one.

These professionals carry two backpacks containing these products; each backpack weighs 12 kilograms. Actually, this was determined when all of the backpacks were procured, since although they are quite large, only half of the supplies would fit in; it was then necessary to give each doctor two backpacks, and the small briefcase which carries diagnostic kits. These doctors have much clinical experience, this is one of their most outstanding characteristic, as they are used to offering their services in places where there isn’t even one X-ray machine, ultrasound equipment or instruments for analyzing fecal samples, blood, etc. With the increase in the number of doctors, the medications weigh a total of 36 tons. The initial figure was smaller.

Cuba has the moral authority to express its opinion on this matter and to make this offer. Today, it is the country with the highest number of doctors per capita in the world, and no other country cooperates with other nations in the field of healthcare as extensively as it does.

Of over 130 thousand healthcare professionals with a university education, 25,845 today serve in international missions in 66 different countries. They offer medical services to 85,154,748 people; 34,700,000 in Latin America and the Caribbean and 50,400,000 in Africa and Asia. Of these, 17,651 are doctors, 3,069 are dentists and 3,117 are healthcare technicians who work in optic services and other areas.

Today, more than 12 thousand young people from around the world, chiefly from Latin America and the Caribbean, are studying medicine in Cuba completely free of charge, and their numbers will continue to grow rapidly. Scores of young people from the United States study in the Latin American School of Medicine, whose doors have been opened, since the institution’s inception, to students from that country.

Today, I received a moving letter from graduates from that Center, which reads:

“Your Excellency Commander Fidel Castro Ruz;

“Dear Commander in Chief:

“We have followed the horrific events that have unfolded in New Orleans resulting from the devastation caused by hurricane Katrina and listened to your statement on the afternoon Round Table program and we, Hondurans and other graduates from the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM), are moved by the situation our brothers in the United States are enduring. Thus, as victims of a natural disaster (hurricane Mitch) ourselves, we want to express our solidarity with the American people at this tragic hour and join the doctors you have offered to send to this sister nation in response to this critical situation. You can be confident that we are ‘doctors willing to go where we are most needed’.

“We walk down the path you dream of.

“With infinite love and eternal -gratitude,

“The first graduates from ELAM.”

This letter is signed by 85 young, recent graduates from the Latin American School of Medicine, who tell us the signatures and names are those of comrades currently in Havana, and that there are more comrades willing to join the mission but who are overseas on vacation.

When our first war of independence broke out in 1868, a group of Americans joined the ranks of Cuba’s independence forces. One of them, a very young man, stood out for his exceptional courage and wrote pages of admirable heroism in Cuba’s history. It was Henry Reeve. His unforgettable name is forever etched in the heart of our people, and next to that of Lincoln and other illustrious Americans it is carved on the pillars of the Plaza built in the days of the struggle for the return of little Elián González, when the noble people of the United States played a decisive role so that justice would finally be done.

Henry Reeve, almost crippled by the wounds sustained in the course of 7 years of war, fell in combat on August 4, 1876, near Yaguaramas, today the province of Cienfuegos. I propose that this force of Cuban doctors who have volunteered to help save the lives of Americans bear the glorious name of “Henry Reeve.”

These doctors, I mean you, could already be there, offering their services. 48 hours have passed and we have not received any response to our reiterated offer. We shall patiently await a reply, for as many days as necessary. In the meantime, our doctors shall use the time to take intensive epidemiology courses and improving their English. If, ultimately, we do not receive any reply or our cooperation -your cooperation- is not needed, we shall not be demoralized, not you, not us, not any Cuban. On the contrary, we shall feel satisfied for having complied with our duty and extremely happy knowing that no other American, of the many that suffered the painful and perfidious scourge of hurricane Katrina, shall perish from lack of medical care, if that were the reason our doctors were not there.

The “Henry Reeve” Brigade has been created, and whatever tasks you undertake in any part of the world or our own homeland, you shall always bear the glorious distinction of having responded to the call to assistance our brothers and sisters in the United States, and that nation’s humblest children especially, with courage and dignity.

Let’s go forward, generous defenders of health and of life, winners over pain and death itself!

Thank you.

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Voice of Revolution
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