Civil Rights

Community Leaders in Virginia Join Together to Push for Quality, Affordable Health Care for Every American

Today, in Richmond and in 52 other cities across the country, including 37 state capitals, a new national campaign is bringing together millions of Americans to demand quality, affordable health care for all. Health Care for America Now (HCAN) is being launched by 95 national and local groups that represent labor, community organizations, doctors, nurses, women, small businesses, faith-based organizations, people of color, netroots activists, and think tanks. Health Care for America Now is organizing to assure that the first order of business of the next President and Congress is to pass legislation in 2009 that guarantees quality, affordable health care for all.

Health Care for America Now is an unprecedented coalition including ACORN, AFSCME, American Academy of Pediatricians, American Nurses Association, Americans United for Change, Campaign for America's Future, Center for American Progress Action Fund, Center for Community Change, MoveOn, National Alliance on Mental Illness, National Education Association, National Women's Law Center, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, SEIU, United Food and Commercial Workers, and USAction.

I am always confused by free speech advocates that refuse to allow those who disagree with them to speak or for that matter allow others to hear that speech. I of course am referring to the ceremony this past 4th at Monticello. I was in the crowd with my family and had waited hours to hear the President’s speech and was denied that right by a small but very disruptive group of protesters.

By David Swanson

Congressman Virgil Goode recently responded to a statement I'd blogged about him. Here's what I wrote and his response:

Virginia's 100th Execution Scheduled for June 10th

On May 27th, Kevin Green was executed. He was the 99th person to be executed in the state of Virginia since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. With an IQ below 70, he was borderline mentally retarded. While we keep Mr. Green in our thoughts, we must continue our work to stop the death penalty in Virginia and continue to stand up for
death row inmates.

Percy Levar Walton, who suffers from serious mental illness, and has been described as "floridly psychotic", is scheduled on June 10th to become the 100th person executed in Virginia. He was sentenced to death in 1997 for the murders of Elizabeth and Jesse Hendrick, and Archie Moore. Urge Virginia Governor Tim Kaine to halt the execution of this
severely mentally ill man.

Virginia is 2nd only to Texas in number of executions, and they are now poised to top 100 executions by June. Get involved today - help to end the death penalty in Virginia!

To sign a petition calling on Governor Kaine to commute this death sentence visit: http://tinyurl.com/6rkn2a

To take part in the week of action to stop the execution email maintern5@aiusa.org or visit THIS PAGE.

By David Swanson

Have you ever met one of those remaining 15 or 20 percent of Americans who have the kool-aid IV in their arms, and they ask you "Well, what would you DO then?" meaning "If you're so opposed to recklessly wasting our grandchildren's money slaughtering innocent people around the world, what exactly would you do instead? What would you do to make sure we bombed the evil people who need bombing, other than bombing them?" The question also takes a more directly answerable form when someone asks "Why are you so negative, criticizing our Commander in Chief all the time? What will you do when you don't have Bush and Cheney around to attack anymore?"

By Jeremy Borden, Daily Progress

It sounded like approaching thunder.

By Stephen Lendman

For regular readers of this site, Al-Arian needs no introduction. For others, here's a brief snapshot of his case before updating his current status:

-- Al-Arian is a Kuwaiti-born son of Palestinian refugees who fled during the 1947-49 Nakba catastrophe;

-- he came to America in 1975 and was denied citizenship because of his faith and ethnicity; ever since, he's been an award-winning scholar, community leader and civil activist;

-- he was a distinguished University of South Florida (USF) computer science professor until being unjustly fired for his human rights efforts for Arabs and Muslims;

-- now he's one of hundreds of political prisoners doing hard time in US prisons and treated no differently than others like him at Guantanamo;

By David Swanson

The guards at Guantanamo are terrified. Even a man with no legs (amputated after being intentionally exposed to extreme cold by American guards in Afghanistan) is treated as a horrifying threat:

"The bandages wrapped around Abdul's stumps were never changed. When he took them off himself, they were full of blood and pus. He showed the bandage to the guards and pointed to his open wounds. The guards ignored him. Later I saw how he tried to wash the bandages in his bucket of drinking water. But he could hardly move his hands, so he wasn't able to. And even if he had, where would he have hung them up to dry? He wasn't allowed to touch the fence. He wrapped his stumps back up in the dirty bandages.

"When the guards came to take him to be interrogated, they ordered him to sit with his back to the door and put his hands on his head. When they opened the door, they stormed in as they did with every other prisoner. They hit him on the back and pushed him to the ground. Then they handcuffed and bound him so he could no longer move. Abdul howled in pain."

I'm looking for folks who are either already involved in cross-disability rights activism or are interested in becoming involved in cross-disability rights activsims in the C'ville/Albemarle area. You can contact me at AlisonHymes@spamex.com

I have a blog that is mostly about psychiatric disability rights advocacy in Virginia here: http://hymes.wordpress.com

By David Swanson

I recently sent the following note to a friend. The note I was replying to is pasted in below it. You might want to skip down and read it first.

**

Thanks for raising an extremely important topic, one that I think we should all be examining closely and discussing in depth, especially with those who are starting from different positions, and even if we're afraid we may have to - in the end - agree to disagree.

CCPJ supports the efforts of the People United and their planned border crossing to highlight the struggles of immigrants to this country.

CCPJ supports the efforts of the Tibetan Association of Charlottesville to Stop the Killings and Oppression in Tibet. See:

http://www.tibetinfonet.org

http://www.tchrd.org

http://www.studentsforafreetibet.org

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?s=tibet

_______

Olympic torch protesters scale Golden Gate Bridge
By Mary Anne Ostrom, San Jose Mercury News

Three members of Students for Free Tibet have climbed the suspension cables of the Golden Gate Bridge as activists, drivers and tourists converge on the bridge now at the center of an advance protest to the coming Olympic torch relay.

The protesters are wearing helmets and one is carrying a suitcase with him. All three protesters are tethered together. Ginger Cassady, spokeswoman for the group, identified the climbers as Duane Martinez, Laurel Sutherlin, both men of Sausalito, and Hannah Strange, from Oakland.

Four other members of the group are providing support to the climbers on the bridge walkway. One of the climbers pulled out a Tibetan flag.

Other groups, including the Regional Tibetan Youth Congress, have also gathered on the bridge. But normal vehicle traffic, while slow, continues. Pedestrians and bicyclists are not being allowed to cross the bridge.

Bay Area News Service contributed to this report.

Slavery is not a thing of the past. It's alive and well for immigrant workers in south Florida who are brought into this country on false pretenses, put into debt, and beaten and threatened if they try to leave. CCPJ supports the efforts of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to improve their lot. Please SIGN THIS PETITION.

The Hook has the story. King came here in 1963 just before the Birmingham marches and before the March on Washington. It was a low point following Albany campaign. King, being black, couldn't eat in most restaurants in Charlottesville or sleep in most hotels. (He stayed at the motel on Emmett Street now called the Budget Inn.) After King spoke, local residents took nonviolent action aimed at integrating a restaurant. Charlottesvillians and cavaliers failed to fill Cabell Hall for King's speech. I guess that's understandable though, since he wasn't a dead guy with a Nobel prize and a national holiday, but rather an agitator who would be as disgusted with how we're behaving now as he was with how people behaved back then.

Please call Governor Tim Kaine and ask him to improve it

The Virginia legislature has just passed a payday lending bill that slightly improves the current law permitting predatory lending in Virginia.

Governor Kaine can offer amendments to the bill that could truly break the cycle of debt.

On Sunday, February 24th, Chief Billy "Red Wing" Tayac of the Piscataway Nation spoke at the University of Virginia at an event sponsored by the Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice (CCPJ), the American Indian Student Union, the National Native American Law Student Association, and the Office of the Dean of Students of UVA.

Chief Tayac has been an Indian activist for several decades, participating in many indigenous struggles, including Wounded Knee, Gankineh, Big Mountain, OK'a, Gustafson Lake, and the Salvadorian Indian and Ecuadorian Indian Movements. Chief Billy Tayac is currently working to assist Spanish speaking Indians who are suffering a new era of economic invasion resulting from NAFTA and the unregulated practices of many multinational corporations based in the United States. Once again Indian people are being forced off their land.

CCPJ produced a video of Chief Tayac's remarks: 3GP VIDEO.

On Thursday, February 21st, David Earnhardt, the writer, director, and producer of the best film yet released on election fraud, "Uncounted," showed the film and spoke about it in Charlottesville, Va., at an event hosted by the Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice (CCPJ). The week of the event, Charlottesville's daily newspaper and its two weekly newspapers wrote about the movie and the issue of election fraud: Daily Progress, The Hook, and C'ville Weekly.

CCPJ recorded a 50-minute video that includes Earnhardt's opening remarks prior to the screening of the film, and his remarks and question-and-answer session at the end. During the Q&A, Earnhardt is joined on stage by CCPJ board member David Swanson.

Small faster-loading 3gp video.
Large higher quality m4v video.

Published by Friends of Gerry Mitchell on Jan 11, 2008

On November 5, Ben Gathright and Hayword Johnson watched as an Albemarle police officer drove his cruiser into artist Gerry Mitchell at the corner of West Main and Fourth streets.

Witnesses heard the driver apologize to Gerry, and say that he failed to see him because he was looking down instead of at the road. The officer pulled Gerry back into his wheel chair rather than calling for paramedics or offering first aid.

The wheelchair-bound Mitchell is suffering severe arm and shoulder injuries incurred in the incident. And a doctor believes the stress caused by the accidents and police misconduct may have caused his renal failure and the painful gout in all of his joints.

The Charlottesville police department has not charged the driver, but they went to the hospital and issued tickets to Gerry.

For weeks following the accident, the police, including Chief Longo, claimed there were no witnesses in spite of their own video proving that there were.

It is imperative that Gerry Mitchell be treated with respect and dignity and that the police departments be held accountable for their actions.

We have no confidence in the police department's ability or intention to adequately investigate themselves.

Petition:
Therefore, we call upon the Charlottesville City Council and the Attorney General of the Commonwealth to hold investigations into police misconduct and suspected corruption in the city and county police departments.

Sign the petition!

In 2008 many of us understand that our nation - and even the entire planet - are in a state of crisis. The deep longing for positive, lasting change is the bedrock upon which this conference is based. How do we fix our country and our world? And how can we form one mass movement to address the crisis?

In Radford, Virginia on May 22-25, thousands of activists, academics, journalists, poets, musicians and policymakers will converge at the 2008 "Building a New World" Conference. If you want to participate in building a new world, sign up now. Hotel and dorm rooms are limited.

Learn more about First WPA Summit 2008.

Register now.

Cindy Sheehan, William Blum, Kathy Kelly, Mike Whitney, Alice Lovelace, David Swanson, Gareth Porter, Medea Benjamin, Farid Bitar, Rev. Lennox Yearwood, Robert Jensen, Kevin Zeese, Antonia Juhasz, Father Roy Bourgeois and many more leaders and luminaries will join thousands of people from across the country and from other lands as well, for a conference to lay the foundations for building a new world now.

Tomorrow, February 12, is the "Potomac Primary" -- the presidential primary contests for the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia. Please make sure to cast your vote.

We also ask that you help us ensure that voting rights are protected and that the election is administered fairly.

If you experience, see or hear about voting problems in your state (or district), please call the toll-free, nonpartisan Election Protection Hotline at 1-866-OUR-VOTE.