Thinking About Iraq

Note (September 20, 2014): With the U.S. putting forward a plan of intervention in Iraq and Syria, I've been trying to think more about this issue. The question for me is how activists in the U.S. should respond in solidarity with people under attack by ISIS in Iraq while keeping in mind the possibility that U.S. air and drone strikes against ISIS could win the group more recruits and lead to more violence. I'll likely write more on this in the near future.

Iraq, never truly stable since the U.S. invasion of 2003, is now under threat of falling apart at the seams. The central, US-backed government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is made up almost exclusively by, and is working almost exclusively in the interests of, the country's Shia Muslim majority. Iraq's Kurdish population, massacred under former dictator Sadaam Hussein and shunned by Maliki's government, have claimed more land for their semi-autonomous region, and militant Sunnis, backed by the military might of the violent extremist group ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria), have claimed cities such as Mosul (Iraq's second largest) and Tikrit in the country's North, expanding their already large presence in Eastern Iraq. ISIS is already claiming that they have massacred thousands, and have announced that they will indiscriminately slaughter Shias along their warpath. 

The sectarian divisions plaguing the country are in large part the bitter fruits of America's imperial strategy while occupying the country. According to senior Algerian diplomat Lakdhar Brahimi, "the impression one had was that the people that were preferred by the occupying powers [the U.S.] were the most sectarian Shia." Now, the only way to both preserve the central government and stop even greater bloodshed would be to have the country's leadership reflect and represent all of the Iraqi people---Shias, Sunnis, and Kurds. Since promoting sectarianism no longer behooves the United States, the Obama administration is appealing to Maliki to incorporate a larger cross section of the Iraqi population into his government.The problem is that Maliki, one of "the most sectarian Shia[s]," whom the U.S. helped to choose to lead Iraq, is not interested in inclusivity. His first response to the Sunni insurgency was a military one, rallying an almost entirely Shia army to fight. Further, in an act of retaliation, Iraqi forces slaughtered 44 Sunni prisoners earlier this week.  

More recently, Iraqi officials have softened. An article posted June 20th on aljazeera.com said:

On Friday, Iraq's highest Shia authority, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, echoed Obama's call for the newly elected president to form the country's next government as soon as possible. Sistani's statement, read out by a representative at Friday's prayers in the Shia holy city of Karbala, urged the new government to 'open new horizons toward a better future for all Iraqis.'

Maliki had gone on a diplomatic offensive Wednesday, reaching out in a televised address to try to regain support from the nation's disaffected Sunnis and Kurds. His conciliatory words coupled with a vow to teach the ISIL insurgents a 'lesson,' came as almost all of Iraq's main communities have been drawn into violence not seen since the dark days of sectarian killings following the 2003 U.S. invasion of the country.

It has yet to be seen whether reality will match Maliki's rhetoric, but his history doesn't make things look promising. The Prime Minister's systematic discrimination against Sunnis and Sunni areas sparked a protest movement which he responded to using brute force. In an article for Socialist Worker, Ashley Smith looks at the rise of ISIS within this larger context of Sunni protest:

Contrary to the conventional wisdom of the ignorant corporate media, ISIS's victory did not come out of nowhere. The dynamics that enabled its fights to seize Mosul and other cities have been developing for several years.

Over the last year and a half, the Sunni population of Iraq has been conducting a mass campaign of mostly nonviolent resistance against Iraq's central government. This is the result of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki increasingly transforming the government into a Shia one. Maliki has refused to integrate the Sunni Awakening Councils into the Army; maintained the anti-Baathist law, implemented after the U.S. invasion for use against remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime, to target all Sunni political forces; and went after Sunni politicians and leaders with accusations that they support terrorism.

The Sunni population across Iraq responded by fighting for their rights with mass demonstrations and sit-ins throughout 2013. At one point, important Shia leaders like Moqtada al-Sadr, who have their own grievances against the Maliki regime, expressed solidarity with these Sunni protests and threatened to organize demonstrations of their own. But this hopeful moment of solidarity proved fleeting, just as similar developments have in the past.

Maliki responded to the wave of protests--what some called the Iraqi Spring--with a brutal campaign of repression. He turned to tactics learned from the U.S. occupation--neighborhoods sweeps, mass arrests and torture. Thus, the overwhelming majority of the Sunni population was driven into desperate opposition by the actions of the Maliki government.

With the repression intensifying, forces among Sunnis like ISIS, which opposed the regime on sectarian grounds, gained increasing prominence and leadership because of their willingness to confront security forces. Maliki in turn used the threat of ISIS's sectarianism to convince Sadr to stage demonstrations in support of the Iraqi state. This further consolidated Maliki's hold on an increasingly exclusive Shia autocracy, defended by a Shia-led and -staffed army.

Against this backdrop, should it be surprising that an organization such as ISIS has been able to gain ground?

The situation in Iraq is complex, but it's not impossible to understand the forces which led to the present moment. Iraq's problems in the contemporary period go back to the stifling of democratic possibilities under the colonial British occupation. This was followed by 35 years of unstable autocracies and then another 35 years of dictatorial rule by Saddam Hussein, who emerged as the strongest strongman. Finally, instead of helping to usher in a new age of democracy and self-determination, the U.S. stoked sectarian differences after the fall of Hussein, and the American puppet Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has waged a war on non-Shias. 

Despite Maliki's recent gestures toward inclusivity, he's pinned his hopes on the ability of his sectarian Shia military to defeat the sectarian Sunni insurgency. According to Vijay Prashad, a scholar on Middle a Eastern affairs:

[f]rom the South, the various Shia militias are being formed again...[t]hey are going to have a very large demonstration of military force against the ISIS advance and Naashbandi Army advance. The danger in all these on-the-ground military defenses, on the one side the Kurds, on the other the Shia, is it's making this a deeply sectarian war, when much evidence suggests the general public in Iraq is not interested in going down the road of a full-scale sectarian war.

Prashad says that a large U.S. aerial bombing campaign would not make matters any better: 

You know, this thought that Mr. Kerry has been talking about of aerial strikes is delusion. I mean, you know, the Iraq War began with shock and awe. It was unable to pacify and make Iraq submit to Western authority. It's very unlikely that a massive aerial bombing campaign against ISIS will do anything more than put off the situation that ISIS thinks is inevitable, which is taking all of Iraq, or at least a substantial part of northern Iraq.

But while Iraq's past was bleak, its future is not pre-determined. For Prashad, the answer to Iraq's crisis will come from the bottom-up:"[p]eople inside Iraq need to feel empowered to fight against ISIS." 

I can't imagine that anything but a popular, multi-ethnic, and multi-religious movement of the Iraqi people could succeed in pushing back the sectarians, whether from ISIS or Iraq's central government. Clearly, workers' struggle would be one component of this movement. Falah Alwan of the Federation of Workers' Councils and Unions in Iraq writes:

The working class in Iraq is the common force that exists across the county, from the north of Kurdistan to the furthest points south. It is this force whose very existence and survival depends on the eradication of discrimination and the unification of the Iraqi people. This is the only force that can end fragmentation and division.

I think that the United States, with its military might and great wealth, should in fact take a side in Iraq. In many ways, we have an obligation to do so. But that side should not be that of Maliki or ISIS but of the popular movements and oppressed communities which have been silenced for so long. 

What if, instead of pursuing our imperial agenda or propping up a sectarian central government, our soldiers were to act under the commands of village councils, unions, and other structures that form the backbone of popular Iraqi society? What if we used our resources to send humanitarian supplies like food and medicine instead of focusing on trying to secure oil fields? What if instead of mounting an aerial bombing campaign that will kill civilians and likely lead more people to seek refuge in ISIS, we used our forces to assist in the self-defense of villages and areas under attack from either sectarian force? 

Such a task is America's worst nightmare—and its moral imperative. 

Exploring Buddhist Anarchism pt.3: For the Welfare of All

This video features a really fantastic conversation about engaged Buddhism with Joanna Macy, Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi, Venerable Pannavati Karuna. While anti-capitalist politics is not explicitly addressed, this "trialogue" nevertheless seems like a fitting way to end our three-part series on Buddhist Anarchism. Enjoy!

Exploring Buddhist Anarchism, pt. 2: Challenging Ignorant Mindfulness

After the first article in this series discussed the theoretical foundations of Buddhist anarchism, this is an example of the theory in action (though I don't know whether the protestors would describe themselves using that label). It also delves into the split in the Buddhist and non-Buddhist "mindfulness" community between those who are interested in social engagement and those who tend, consciously or otherwise, to look the other way.

Why Google Protestors Were Right to Disrupt Mindfulness 2.0
by Katie Loncke, Buddhist Peace Fellowship

They Say You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train. So Can You be Mindful on a Google Bus?

Confrontation

This weekend, as three Google presenters took the stage to discuss mindfulness and tech at the annual Wisdom 2.0 conference, they found themselves interrupted by a handful of protesters unfurling a large banner.

EVICTION FREE SAN FRANCISCO, the canvas said.

Shouting into a bullhorn, one protester (conspicuously less mellow than the others) began to chant:
“Wisdom means stop displacement!”
“Wisdom means stop surveillance!”
“San Francisco’s not for sale!”

Recentering

After the protesters were yanked off stage by security, the Google presenters tried to recenter. “Check in with your body and see what’s happening. What it’s like to be around conflict with people with heartfelt ideas, that may be different than what we’re thinking.”
Sound advice, yes — very wise. And yet, something is missing.

What’s Not Present?

Something similar was missing, too, back in 2010 when I attended the first Wisdom 2.0 conference. All the talk about kindness, happiness, and well being (with twin values of creativity, productivity, and profitability) focused on the users and innovators of technology. There was never any mention of the people who manufacture the gadgets that techies then outfit with meditation bell apps. What about the mindfulness, happiness, and well being of the people mining coltan in the DRC, or the people assembling iPhones at the infamous Foxconn sweatshops?

I mean, if we exclude them from the picture, then yes, we can calmly check in with our bodies. Things look very mindful and peaceful. Very reasonable, polite, and progressive.
But such deep exclusion invites deep delusion. Something important is missing. Entire groups of relevant people are cut out of the conversation altogether.

The fact is that waves of gentrification have pushed thousands of low-income, disproportionately Black & Brown residents out of San Francisco, and now the city is courting wealthy tech companies (like the ones at Wisdom 2.0) to move in.
 Are we just going to ignore the people who are being displaced? Act like we don’t know about this history?
Are we going to pretend that there’s nothing we can do about it?
Hopefully, our friends with the banners won’t let us.

The Tech Bubble On one hand, of course you can be mindful on a Google bus. You can be mindful anywhere — that’s the point. It’s uber-portable spiritual technology.
And you might be mindful of your sensations, your stress levels, your breath. But are you mindful of the ways in which your presence is changing a neighborhood, a region?
I agree with critics who maintain that the tech buses and their riders are not the cause of gentrification, but more of a symptom. Ultimate accountability lies elsewhere. As Al Jazeera America writer Alexandra Goldman notes, the larger issue is that “many of San Francisco’s policy makers are more invested in pandering to the tech industry than in protecting low-income San Franciscans.”

Still, the buses as vehicles also reinforce the insulation and isolation of their passengers. As Allison Arieff pointed out in the New York Times, the overall Google-dome approach to urban planning tends to reinforce the shielding mechanism that allows a blank-slate mentality to flourish among techie newcomers. As though nothing significant were here before you arrived. As though all that matters is what you are creating afresh. (Or discovering on Yelp.)
This is not true mindfulness. It’s selective awareness, optimized for pleasure.
In other words, ignorance.

And the problem is not just ignorance itself (though of course the irony of Oblivious Geniuses is part of what’s making this story go global). The problem is the consequences of this ignorance on the lives of working-class people. Because, like a transit version of the observer effect, these buses transform the city even as they traverse it. Research indicates that “rents within the walkable zones [of Google shuttle stops] rose up to 20 percent more rapidly than rents outside the walkable zones.” (And the median rent rose 12.3% in the past year.)

The Google buses may be sparing the air, but they’re also raising the rent — to prices that many long-time residents simply can’t afford. Hence the banner, the chants, the insistent disturbance. San Francisco is not for sale.

At least, we do not have to conceive of it that way. We have some choices here.
And that’s why I’m grateful to these protesters for disrupting the status quo, offering us the opportunity to rethink, reframe, and re-center. Especially re-centering the people excluded and minimized from the picture.

What if SF tech workers actually took up the challenge of the Wisdom 2.0 protesters, and redefined wisdom to include social justice?

What if wisdom did mean stopping evictions: from joining eviction protests & blockades to strengthening rent control policies? (For beautiful data renderings of an ugly history of displacement, check out this map and timeline of the Ellis Act.)

What if wisdom meant donating all income after $80,000 to a strike fund for victims of wage theft — a problem rampant in the service economy? (Seattle’s new Socialist city councilmember provides a ready example, giving away HALF her income to strengthen local struggles and live more like the average worker.)

What if wisdom meant organizing your co-workers to demand that your company pay in to SF’s public services,  refusing tax breaks and instead investing in the well-being of all city residents — especially queer youth, folks on the street, and other oppressed and marginalized groups?

What if wisdom meant using some of your $100,000-a-year, intellectual-worker salary to keep Marcus Books, the nation’s oldest Black bookstore, from being priced out of its own space in the historic Fillmore District?

What if wisdom meant stopping deportations of the undocumented and increasingly unafraid immigrant community (some members of which are almost certainly cooking your food and cleaning your buildings)?

What if wisdom meant countering capitalist-driven gentrification with a demand for the collective Right to the City, and democratic forms of community development?

What if tech wisdom had less to do with sparkle…

…and more to do with redistributing wealth & power in one of the nation’s most expensive cities?

What if mindfulness enhanced not only our personal well being…

…but also our attunement to the collective well-being?

I see from the Wisdom 2.0 web site that they also had some sessions on corporate responsibility, social change, etc. So who knows — maybe someone at the conference proposed the above ideas, or similar ones. (Let me know!)

Where I am certain is that you BPFers have other, brilliant ideas for re-centering wisdom to include social justice: in San Francisco, or in your own town. And some may have disagreements or corrections on what I got wrong.

Regardless, let’s hear ‘em! And let’s keep up the compassionate confrontation.

Exploring Buddhist Anarchism, pt. 1

First of all, I would like to apologize for failing to update this blog in recent months. With the formation of the Anti-Oppression Forum, my attention has been focused on our new blog, Until Victory. However, It do want to make sure that I keep this space for more personal and philosophical writings. Along with radical politics, the philosophy and practice of Buddhism has been a cornerstone of my personal beliefs for a long time. Since the 1960's, the movement of engaged Buddhism has attempted to bring Buddhist lessons into the radical political sphere and radical political lessons into Buddhist practice. I believe that engaged Buddhism and Buddhist anarchism are schools of thought with tremendous power and possibility. Today, I'll feature the first in a series of posts exploring the subject, beginning with Gary Snyder's 1961 text entitled, "Buddhist Anarchism."

Buddhist Anarchism by Gary Snyder

First written in 1961, edited in 1967

Buddhism holds that the universe and all creatures in it are intrinsically in a state of complete wisdom, love and compassion; acting in natural response and mutual interdependence. The personal realization of this from-the-beginning state cannot be had for and by one-“self” — because it is not fully realized unless one has given the self up; and away.

In the Buddhist view, that which obstructs the effortless manifestation of this is Ignorance, which projects into fear and needless craving. Historically, Buddhist philosophers have failed to analyze out the degree to which ignorance and suffering are caused or encouraged by social factors, considering fear-and-desire to be given facts of the human condition. Consequently the major concern of Buddhist philosophy is epistemology and “psychology” with no attention paid to historical or sociological problems. Although Mahayana Buddhism has a grand vision of universal salvation, the actual achievement of Buddhism has been the development of practical systems of meditation toward the end of liberating a few dedicated individuals from psychological hangups and cultural conditionings. Institutional Buddhism has been conspicuously ready to accept or ignore the inequalities and tyrannies of whatever political system it found itself under. This can be death to Buddhism, because it is death to any meaningful function of compassion. Wisdom without compassion feels no pain.

No one today can afford to be innocent, or indulge himself in ignorance of the nature of contemporary governments, politics and social orders. The national polities of the modern world maintain their existence by deliberately fostered craving and fear: monstrous protection rackets. The “free world” has become economically dependent on a fantastic system of stimulation of greed which cannot be fulfilled, sexual desire which cannot be satiated and hatred which has no outlet except against oneself, the persons one is supposed to love, or the revolutionary aspirations of pitiful, poverty-stricken marginal societies like Cuba or Vietnam. The conditions of the Cold War have turned all modern societies — Communist included — into vicious distorters of man’s true potential. They create populations of “preta” — hungry ghosts, with giant appetites and throats no bigger than needles. The soil, the forests and all animal life are being consumed by these cancerous collectivities; the air and water of the planet is being fouled by them.

There is nothing in human nature or the requirements of human social organization which intrinsically requires that a culture be contradictory, repressive and productive of violent and frustrated personalities. Recent findings in anthropology and psychology make this more and more evident. One can prove it for himself by taking a good look at his own nature through meditation. Once a person has this much faith and insight, he must be led to a deep concern with the need for radical social change through a variety of hopefully non-violent means.

The joyous and voluntary poverty of Buddhism becomes a positive force. The traditional harmlessness and refusal to take life in any form has nation-shaking implications. The practice of meditation, for which one needs only “the ground beneath one’s feet,” wipes out mountains of junk being pumped into the mind by the mass media and supermarket universities. The belief in a serene and generous fulfillment of natural loving desires destroys ideologies which blind, maim and repress — and points the way to a kind of community which would amaze “moralists” and transform armies of men who are fighters because they cannot be lovers.

Avatamsaka (Kegon) Buddhist philosophy sees the world as a vast interrelated network in which all objects and creatures are necessary and illuminated. From one standpoint, governments, wars, or all that we consider “evil” are uncompromisingly contained in this totalistic realm. The hawk, the swoop and the hare are one. From the “human” standpoint we cannot live in those terms unless all beings see with the same enlightened eye. The Bodhisattva lives by the sufferer’s standard, and he must be effective in aiding those who suffer.

The mercy of the West has been social revolution; the mercy of the East has been individual insight into the basic self/void. We need both. They are both contained in the traditional three aspects of the Dharma path: wisdom (prajna), meditation (dhyana), and morality (sila). Wisdom is intuitive knowledge of the mind of love and clarity that lies beneath one’s ego-driven anxieties and aggressions. Meditation is going into the mind to see this for yourself — over and over again, until it becomes the mind you live in. Morality is bringing it back out in the way you live, through personal example and responsible action, ultimately toward the true community (sangha) of “all beings.”

This last aspect means, for me, supporting any cultural and economic revolution that moves clearly toward a free, international, classless world. It means using such means as civil disobedience, outspoken criticism, protest, pacifism, voluntary poverty and even gentle violence if it comes to a matter of restraining some impetuous redneck. It means affirming the widest possible spectrum of non-harmful individual behavior — defending the right of individuals to smoke hemp, eat peyote, be polygynous, polyandrous or homosexual. Worlds of behavior and custom long banned by the Judaeo-Capitalist-Christian-Marxist West. It means respecting intelligence and learning, but not as greed or means to personal power. Working on one’s own responsibility, but willing to work with a group. “Forming the new society within the shell of the old” — the IWW slogan of fifty years ago.


The traditional cultures are in any case doomed, and rather than cling to their good aspects hopelessly it should be remembered that whatever is or ever was in any other culture can be reconstructed from the unconscious, through meditation. In fact, it is my own view that the coming revolution will close the circle and link us in many ways with the most creative aspects of our archaic past. If we are lucky we may eventually arrive at a totally integrated world culture with matrilineal descent, free-form marriage, natural-credit communist economy, less industry, far less population and lots more national parks.

Hello, Anti-Oppression Forum!

For the year and a half, this blog has served as many different things. It started as a news site for the Unite Left organization, a group which never truly got off the ground. Then, I used it as tool for my local activism while I participated as a member of the Freedom Socialist Party. Finally, for the past several months after I stopped participating in the party, this blog and its corresponding Facebook page & e-mail list has acted as something like a micro-organization in and of itself. 

As you might imagine, an organization with a membership of two (me and Cameron, the co-editor) doesn’t work out so well. Not only has the requirements of updating this blog put a large amount of stress on me, it has also been ineffectual for building a radicalized group of people in the Hudson Valley.

That’s why I’m really happy to say that I’ve been working with several other activists in the area to form a leftist collective. We've been meeting Fridays @7:00 PM in the African Roots Library at the Family Partnership Center in Poughkeepsie. Our agreed statement of purpose says simply:

“We are a forum for activists to gather. We oppose hierarchy, social oppression, and capitalism.”

We’re only a month and a day old and still very small. A couple weeks ago, we organized a small protest against U.S. intervention in Syria by City Hall in Poughkeepsie. Last week, we passed out 30+ fliers around the same area with the dual intent of expressing our disapproval of jail expansion and getting the word out about our new organization. 

Last Friday, we decided on a name: Anti-Oppression Forum. We like it because it includes our goal of combating all forms of oppression—and because its initials (AOF) make us sound like some kind of badass Greek anarcho-syndicalists. Which might be true if you go back a few generations in family history...

Since the Occupy movement began to lose steam, there has been a vacuum in the Hudson Valley for anti-capitalists interested in non-hierarchical forms of organization. Our area lacked an anarchist collective, and that’s precisely what we’re trying to form.

If you think that "time's up!" for capitalism, social oppression, and environmental destruction, I think you should consider getting involved in this group.

Although a major part of the collective’s goal is to provide support for radicals marginalized by our system, we’ve already acted as much more than a social club. The AOF was formed to take action.

As I’ll be shifting the majority of my attention to the new group, the Hudson Valley Radical Facebook page and e-mail list will be put into the hands of the collective. Also, from now on this blog will stop functioning as a leftist news site. Instead, it'll simply be a place for my personal rants—and the writing of anyone who'd like to contribute!

Toward Collective Liberation,

Schuyler

The Anti-Oppression Forum meets Fridays @6:00 PM at the Sadie Peterson Delaney African Roots Library in the Family Partnership Center, 29 N. Hamilton Street, Poughkeepsie. All are welcome. You can visit our website here

Why We Must Stop the U.S. Attack On Syria

Note (September 20, 2014): My thoughts on the issue of U.S. intervention in Syria has changed in the past year, largely because of what I've read by some Syrian activists on Twitter and other online platforms. While I am certainly opposed to U.S. imperialism, I think that the U.S. military actually has an obligation to support popular uprisings, including the Syrian Revolution, in defending themselves against dictators like Assad. The U.S. also has an obligation to ensure that it doesn't contribute to human rights abuses, and in preventing that the U.S. could work with Syrian revolutionary councils to monitor groups like the Free Syrian Army (an idea I took from this article about Syrian revolutionary Razan Zaitouneh). I think activists in the United States have to do more than reflexively oppose U.S. intervention when it might, if only accidentally, do something right. So while I say throughout this piece that the Syrian "revolution deserves better," it also deserved a better analysis than I gave it.
 

President Obama has declared that he will seek approval for a U.S. military strike on Syria when congress gets back in session on September 9th. This gives activists just under a week to organize against a further escalation of U.S. imperialism in the Middle East. Yet, it's not enough just to oppose the war—we have to be clear why.

Demonstration in Homs, before Assad turned violent and the Syrian protest movement became a civil war

As I have said in the past, I am strongly supportive of the Syrian Revolution. It is because, and not in spite of this, that I oppose U.S. military intervention. The United States has never entered a foreign country without attempting to open markets and broaden our sphere of power and influence.

The Syrian Revolution was begun by grassroots citizens councils calling for democracy and a more equitable economy. However, with U.S. military intervention, the possibility of Syria's future actually resting in the hands of the Syrian people would be obliterated. 

The Revolution deserves better.

Unfortunately, most the American left simply doesn't get it. Groups like the Workers World Party and the Party for Socialism and Liberation have been actively supporting the Assad dictatorship since Day 1 of the revolution. The basic reasoning is that because Assad has occasionally stood up to the United States, his bloody regime is worthy of their full support. Nevermind the fact that Syria has worked hand in glove with the Israeli government, supported the U.S. invasion of Kuwait in the early '90's, and brutally suppressed its own people for 43 years. If the Assad regime wins out, the possibility of Syria's future resting in the hands of the Syrian people would be non-existent.

The Revolution deserves better.

Other sections of the left are justifying their opposition to U.S. intervention by bashing the Syrian rebels and, like the U.S. government in its War Against Terror, by spreading fear about Islamist influence among anti-Assad fighters. It is true that fundamentalist Islamists have jumped on the bandwagon of the Syrian Revolution, but they did not start it and there's no reason to believe that they'll finish it. Just because President Assad characterizes the revolution as an Islamist power grab doesn't mean that progressives should believe him!

Another common refrain is support of a "peace conference" to be held between both sides of the conflict, including the imperial powers using Syria as their proxy. To hope for ceasefire and a brokered peace is to reject the demands of the Syrian revolution. It is natural to wish for an end to the bloodshed, but if none of the Syrian people's demands are met, a new rebellion is sure to begin anew sometime not far down the road. If the fate of Syria is carved out by imperial powers, the possibility of Syria's future actually resting in the hands of the Syria people would still be crushed.

The Revolution deserves better.

I believe that those striving for freedom and liberty around the world should stand firmly in solidarity with the Syrian revolution. Practically, that means that we should consider the self-determination of the Syrian people to be our core demand for our activism throughout the week to come. Unlike the Assad, Obama, and Putin administrations, the anti-war movement should actually care what happens to the Syrian people.

-Schuyler Kempton

SYRIA: Will American Missiles Bring Freedom?

On August 21st, a chemical attack, likely the work of the Syrian government in an attempt to stifle the country's opposition, killed at least 1,300 people. With the United Nations deadlocked, the United States is preparing to launch cruise missiles into the country. To provide a perspective outside the frame of mainstream media conversation, we reprint the words of a small socialist organization in Syria reacting to the attack. 

by the Revolutionary Left Current in Syria (Damascus, August 21, 2013)

At dawn on August 21 2013 hundreds of Syrians have fallen, and among them a huge number of children and women, victims of deadly weapons: poisonous gases and explicit use of chemical weapons, in the regions of East Gouta in the countryside of Damascus, as part of a fierce military attack waged by the regime since this morning on these areas. The list of sufferings and sacrifices of the masses of our people has lengthened after more than two years, it is no longer possible to count the hundreds of thousands of martyrs and wounded, detainees and millions of displaced and refugees. The suffering of our people has continued and it became more unbearable. Cry goes unheeded, and lingers the death silence of the human conscience.

Killing and coercion of our people continue, perpetrated by the machine of death and destruction of a regime that exceeds fascism by its savagery. It is a tragedy that the world has not known for a long time, the tragedy of a people revolting for freedom and liberation from the clutches of a dictatorship, from its savage repression and from its savage exploitation of the oppressed in our country, serving the interests of a narrow bourgeois clique.

Our revolution has no sincere ally, except the popular revolutions of the region and of the world and of all the militants struggling against regimes of ignorance and servitude and exploitation. This  crime is part of the criminal and terrible actions of the ruling juntas against the masses of our people of unarmed civilians in shocking disregard for the human conscience and at a time when the forces of counter-revolution organized an offensive against the revolutions in the region, led by Saudi Arabia and its allies, the regime has found an opportunity to commit the heinous massacre. Yet our rebellious and determined people, proven by his injuries, will continue its resistance against the criminal tyrants, they will inflict a defeat and punishment they deserve for their crimes.

We bury our dead and will look after our wounded. We will only be more determined and resolute in our struggle for the fall of the murderous and destructive regime and the victory of our people’s revolution.

For the edification of Syria for freedom, justice, equality and social justice

No to Washington! No to Moscow!

No to Riyadh! No to Tehran!

Glory to the martyrs and healing for the wounded and victory of the popular revolution all the power and wealth of the people

#CAHungerStrike: Isolation and Retaliation

Strike Leaders Have Not Eaten for 52 DAYS
Get involved in supporting the strike with the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition

California prisoner hungers strike advocates and supporters continue their efforts to compel state decision makers to negotiate with hunger strikers as they endure their 52nd day without food.  Meanwhile legal observers at Corcoran State Prison say that the 70 people are still on strike at that facility are facing harsh relation by prison officials including the denial of medical care—even for those coming off strike—and the confiscation of personal property.  At Pelican Bay, the four main representatives of the Short Corridor Collective—the interracial group in that facility’s Security Housing Unit (SHU) that initially encouraged their fellow prisoners to take up the peaceful protest—have been totally isolated in a single cell block in the prison’s stand-alone Administrative Segregation Unit.  Late last week 51 prisoners being held in the same area were summarily and forcibly removed to other prisons.   Meanwhile the CDCR’s own numbers show a steady uptick in strike participation over the past several days.

“They presently have us four main reps on ‘G row’ by ourselves for now. No telling how long we’ll be staying here,” Said Pelican Bay striker and Short Corridor representative Aurturo Castellanos in a statement yesterday.  The outspoken Castellanos has borne the brunt of a viscious California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s (CDCR) smear campaign that has desperately attempted to vilify his participation in the massive protest as a “gang power play.”  Of the Department’s attacks on the peaceful protest, Castellanos said, “They fail to see the writing on the wall…CDCR is going to change whether they like it or not.  This only motivates us more.”

Castellanos and his fellow Short Corridor Representatives have just issued the following statement:

Greetings.  We begin this update on where things stand with our struggle to force an end to long-term solitary confinement and additional major reforms to the prison system with a shout-out of solidarity, love, and respect to all of our supporters and people of conscience worldwide.

As many are aware today marks the 51st day of our peaceful hunger strike. We continue to protest decades of solitary confinement; torture for the purposes of coercion.  This is the third hunger strike in two years and yet nothing of real substance has changed for the majority of us.

We are now at a critical stage, where each minute that passes is extremely taxing mentally and physically.  Many of us participating since day one are suffering what may be irreversible damage, and are facing a very real possibility of death.  It is a fact that a major cause of death during long fasts is heart attack.  This may come at any moment for us... When it does, we're done for.

That said, you may all rest assured that our commitment to this worthy cause remains undaunted.  The world is now a witness, as Gov. Brown and his appointee [California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Secretary] Beard demonstrate callous and deliberate indifference to the extreme forms of inexcusable suffering our loved ones and ourselves are subjected to in our fight for humane treatment of the prisoner class of human beings...

Gov. Brown's response to our peaceful action has not been silence, as so many presume—rather, it has been loud and clear via the propaganda and rhetoric being spewed by his mouth piece Dr. Beard [AKA Dr. Mengele].  The fascist police state prisoncrats have attempted to misdirect the attention and the growing condemnation of their human rights abuses.  They have tried to disrupt public support by dredging up 20-40 year old histories that are for the most part portrayed in a false light.  They have desperately tried to justify and further their diabolical agenda, and indeed expand the numbers of prisoners (and loved ones outside) being tortured—to the point of death, insanity, and false confessions.   They have the audacity to claim our push for reform is a “gang power play,” and that many prisoners have been “coerced into participation.”  This is another tactic aimed at misleading the public so as to maintain the status quo with impunity.  They have tried to ignore the fact that our collective peaceful efforts, and our call to “end group hostilities,” are contrary to their propaganda.  CDCR's decades of human rights violations is the catalyst for thousands coming together and taking up this protest...

Another clear demonstration of where Brown, Beard, et al stand is their response to this peaceful action.  They have directed their subordinates to subject participants, and non-participants alike, to systematic retaliation including, but not limited to:  additional isolation and sensory deprivation via placement in the Administrative Segregation stand-alone building; withholding mail and visits; blasting cold air into SHU and Ad-Seg cells; confiscating property; fabricating rule violations and alleging gang activity; cell-extractions; threats and intimidation; and mass relocation.  They have rescinded so-called privileges granted in 2011-2013.  And they have cut the number of allowable books from 10 (which has been a right for 23 years), down to 5.  The above are only a few examples.

We are calling on all people of conscience to make their opposition heard.  We urge the people to demand that the powers that be end this abuse now.  Today.  Before it it is too late for some of us.  On Friday August 16, CDCR transferred 51 people on hunger strike from this Ad-Seg Unit down south to a medical facility in preparation for force feeding.  This is where we’ll all be soon.  Some of us are considering a challenge to such feeding.  What’s going on in this nation that it has come to such a point?  The people have the power to change things now.  Know this: Our spirit and resolve remain strong and we know we can count on you all! Together we are making it happen, not only for ourselves, but, more importantly, for the generations to come.

With the Utmost Solidarity, Love, and Respect—Onward in Struggle,

Pelican Bay State Prison Short Corridor Collective
Todd Ashker, C-58191, PBSP-SHU
Arturo Castellanos, C-17275, PBSP-SHU
Antonio Guillen, P-81948, PBSP-SHU
Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa (Dewberry), C-35671, PBSP-SHU

#CAHungerStrike Hits 50 Day Mark

Strike Leaders Have Not Eaten for 50 DAYS

Learn how to take action with the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition

As a member of the Mediation Team, never did I think I would be a part of a Hunger Strike that would enter into its 50th day. Never did I think that, as a member of the Mediation Team, I would be denied access to the face to face meetings that have taken place within the CDCR because I am a family member. And never did I think that CDCR would refuse on all grounds to meet even the most reasonable demands of the prisoners.

As I reflect on the past 50 days, I have often asked myself, "What is my role in all this?" How can I be heard if there is no one to listen? And even more... no one that even seems to care? I now sit and wonder if there is not even one, just out of sheer human nature, motivated by heartfelt compassion of the suffering of the families and the strength and dignity of the prisoners left starving to death... There must be some that are losing sleep at night...There must be someone in CDCR who can no longer play the role they have been assigned. Or have the prisoners lives become such a replaceable commodity that hearts are calloused towards the thought of the prisoners’ starvation and suffering?

Every statistic and study from animal research to human research has proven the harmful effects of solitary confinement. And CDCR’s solution is to say that solitary confinement simply does not exist. Problem solved right? In a sense, I feel as if I might not exist because that is how we continue to be treated as family members on the Mediation Team. Like maybe if we are ignored long enough the problem will simply go away. Or maybe if we are ignored long enough we will just quit?

But on the 50th day, I am filled with absolute awe of the strength and character of these individuals who have endured decades-long isolation. And I think it must be hope that fills them with such a determination... hope for long overdue change, hope in a system that has kept them in isolation for decades. And I think of great changes in history that only took place when people did not give up and when the awakening of a moral consciousness was stirred within the heart and soul of the public.

So as we enter into the 50th day, a historical moment in the longest and largest prisoner hunger strike in United States history, I hold on to hope for the greatest changes within our system to come. For the efforts of humanity to be restored to the prisoners and for rehabilitation to honestly begin taking place within our prison system.

50 days into this strike I can’t help but wonder – will change only come at the cost of human lives? But CDCR has an answer for that one too. The state of California is going to force feed the prisoners, no loss of lives, hunger strike over, problem solved? Perhaps this is my role on the Mediation Team – to see what I've never seen before, to witness CDCR at its very best when it comes to problem solving?

Since the CDCR will not enter into meaningful negotiations I can only hold on to Hope, that the awakening has begun and that the problems will truly be solved, as we anxiously wait for change to come.

On behalf of the Mediation Team,

Dolores Canales, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC)

Hunger Strike Mediation Team

Dr. Ronald Ahnen, California Prison Focus and St. Mary’s College of California

Barbara Becnel, Occupy4Prisoners.org

Irene Huerta, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC)

Laura Magnani, American Friends Service Committee

Marilyn McMahon, California Prison Focus

Carol Strickman, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children

Azadeh Zohrabi, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children

Dr. King's "Born Again" America

Saturday, around 100,000 marched on Washington to honor the 50th anniversary of the 1963 march, where Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed a dream that would resonate ever since. This blog will be posting much more on the march and the anniversary throughout the week. Here, we reprint one of Dr. King's later and arguably radical speeches, from the 1967 Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)'s Presidential address. In the speech, King condemns both Soviet communism and American capitalism, asserting that the "kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis." In concrete terms, King proposes either full employment or a substantial yearly income provided by the government for all. Though King was shot dead within a year of this speech, his words bear great weight even today. -HV Radical

Martin Luther King, Jr: SCLC Presidential Address, 1967 (link found here)

Now, in order to answer the question, Where do we go from here? which is our theme, we must first honestly recognize where we are now. When the Constitution was written, a strange formula to determine taxes and representation declared that the Negro was sixty percent of a person. Today another curious formula seems to declare that he is fifty percent of a person. Of the good things in life, the Negro has approximately one half those of whites. of the bad things of life, he has twice those of whites. Thus half of all Negroes live in substandard housing. And Negroes have half the income of whites. When we view the negative experiences of life, the Negro has a double share. There are twice as many unemployed. The rate of infant mortality among Negroes is double that of whites and there are twice as many Negroes dying in Vietnam as whites in proportion to their size in the population.

In other spheres, the figures are equally alarming. In elementary schools, Negroes lag one to three years behind whites, and their segregated schools receive substantially less money per student than the white schools. One-twentieth as many Negroes as whites attend college. Of employed Negroes, seventy-five percent hold menial jobs.

This is where we are. Where do we go from here? First, we must massively assert our dignity and worth. We must stand up amidst a systemthat still oppresses us and develop an unassailable and majestic sense of values. We must no longer be ashamed of being black. The job of arousing manhood within a people that have been taught for so many centuries that they are nobody is not easy.

Even semantics have conspired to make that which is black seem ugly and degrading. In Roget's Thesaurus there are 120 synonyms for blackness and at least sixty of them are offensive, as for example, blot, soot, grim, devil and foul. And there are some 134 synoyms for whiteness and all are favorable, expressed in such words as purity, cleanliness, chastity and innocence. A white lie is better than a black lie. The most degenerate member of a family is a black sheep. Ossie Davis has suggested that maybe the English language should be reconstructed so that teachers will not be forced to teach the Negro child sixty ways to despise himself, and thereby perpetuate his false sense of inferiority, and the white child 134 ways to adore himself, and thereby perpetuate his false sense of superiority.

The tendency to ignore the Negro's contribution to American life and to strip him of his personhood is as old as the earliest history books and as contemporary as the morning's newspaper. To upset this cultural homicide, the Negro must rise up with an affirmation of his own Olympian manhood. Any movement for the Negro's freedom that overlooks this necessity is only waiting to be buried. As long as the mind is enslaved, the body can never be free. Psychological freedom, a firm sense of self-esteem, is the most powerful weapon against the long night of physical slavery. No Lincolnian emancipation proclamation or Johnsonian civil rights bill can totally bring this kind of freedom. The negro will only be free when he reaches down to the inner depths of his own being and signs with the pen and ink of assertive manhood his own emancipation proclamation. And, with a spirit straining toward true self-esteem, the Negro must boldly throw off the manacles of self-abegnation and say to himself and to the world, I am somebody. I am a person. I am a man with dignity and honor. I have a rich and noble history. How painful and exploited that history has been. Yes, I was a slave through my foreparents and I am not ashamed of that. I'm ashamed of the people who were so sinful to make me a slave. Yes, we must stand up and say, I'm black and I'm beautiful, and this self-affirmation is the black man's need, made compelling by the white man's crimes against him.

Another basic challenge is to discover how to organize our strength in terms of economic and political power. No one can deny that the Negro is in dire need of this kind of legitimate power. Indeed, one of the great problems that the Negro confronts is his lack of power. From old plantations of the South to newer ghettoes of the North, the Negro has been confined to a life of voicelessness and powerlessness. Stripped of the right to make decisions concerning his life and destiny he has been subject to the authoritarian and sometimes whimsical decisions of this white power structure. The plantation and ghetto were created by those who had power, both to confine those who had no power and to perpetuate their powerlessness. The problem of transforming the ghetto, therefore, is a problem of power—confrontation of the forces of power demanding change and the forces of power dedicated to the preserving of the status quo. Now power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achievepurpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political and economic change. Walter Reuther defined power one day. He said, Power is the ability of a labor union like the UAW to make the most powerful corporation in the world, General Motors, say, ‘Yes’ when it wants to say ‘No.’ That's power.

Now a lot of us are preachers, and all of us have our moral convictions and concerns, and so often have problems with power. There is nothing wrong with power if power is used correctly. You see, what happened is that some of our philosophers got off base. And one of the great problems of history is that the concepts of love and power have usually been constrasted as opposites—polar opposites—so that love is identified with a resignation of power, and power with a denial of love.

It was this misinterpretation that caused Nietzsche, who was a philosopher of the will to power, to reject the Christian concept of love. It was this same misinterpretation which induced Christian theologians to reject the Nietzschean philosophy of the will to power in the name of the Christian idea of love. Now, we've got to get this thing right. What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love. And this is what we must see as we move on. What has happened is that we have had it wrong and confused in our own country, and this has led Negro Americans in the past to seek their goals through power devoid of love and conscience.

This is leading a few extremists today to advocate for Negroes the same destructive and conscienceless power that they have justly abhorred in whites. It is precisely this collision of immoral power with powerless morality which constitutes the major crisis of our times.

We must develop a program that will drive the nation to a guaranteed annual income. Now, early in this century this proposal would have been greeted with ridicule and denunciation, as destructive of initiative and responsibility. At that time economic status was considered the measure of the individual's ability and talents. And, in the thinking of that day, the absence of worldly goods indicated a want of industrious habits and moral fiber. We've come a long way in our understanding of human motivation and of the blind operation of our economic system. Now we realize that dislocations in the market operations of our economy and the prevalence of discrimination thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will. Today the poor are less often dismissed, I hope, from our consciences by being branded as inferior or incompetent. We also know that no matter how dynamically the economy develops and expands, it does not eliminate all poverty.

The problem indicates that our emphasis must be twofold. We must create full employment or we must create incomes. People must be made consumers by one method or the other. Once they are placed in this position we need to be concerned that the potential of the individual is not wasted. New forms of work that enhance the social good will have to be devised for those for whom traditional jobs are not available. In 1879 Henry George anticipated this state of affairs when he wrote in Progress and Poverty:

The fact is that the work which improves the condition of mankind, the work which extends knowledge and increases power and enriches literature and elevates thought, is not done to secure a living. It is not the work of slaves driven to their tasks either by the task, by the taskmaster, or by animal necessity. It is the work of men who somehow find a form of work that brings a security for its own sake and a state of society where want is abolished.

Work of this sort could be enormously increased, and we are likely to find that the problems of housing and education, instead of preceding the elimination of poverty, will themselves be affected if poverty is first abolished. The poor transformed into purchasers will doa great deal on their own to alter housing decay. Negroes who have a double disability will have a greater effect on discrimination when they have the additional weapon of cash to use in their struggle.

Beyond these advantages, a host of positive psychological changes inevitably will result from widespread economic security. The dignity of the individual will flourish when the decisions concerning his life are in his own hands, when he has the means to seek self-improvement. Personal conflicts among husbands, wives and children will diminish when the unjust measurement of human worth on the scale of dollars is eliminated.

Now our country can do this. John Kenneth Galbraith said that a guaranteed annual income could be done for about twenty billion dollars a year. And I say to you today, that if our nation can spend thirty-five billion dollars a year to fight an unjust, evil war in Vietnam, and twenty billion dollars to put a man on the moon, it can spend billions of dollars to put God's children on their own two feet right here on earth.

Now, let me say briefly that we must reaffirm our commitment to nonviolence. I want to stress this. The futility of violence in the struggle for racial justice has been tragically etched in all the recent Negro riots. Yesterday, I tried to analyze the riots and deal with theircauses. Today I want to give the other side. There is certainly something painfully sad about a riot. One sees screaming youngsters and angry adults fighting hopelessly and aimlessly against impossible odds. And deep down within them, you can see a desire for self-destruction, a kind of suicidal longing.

Occasionally Negroes contend that the 1965 Watts riot and the other riots in various cities represented effective civil rights action. But those who express this view always end up with stumbling words when asked what concrete gains have been won as a result. At best, the riots have produced a little additional antipoverty money allotted by frightened government officials, and a few water-sprinklers to cool the children of the ghettoes. It is something like improving the food in prison while the people remain securely incarcerated behind bars. Nowhere have the riots won any concrete improvement such as have the organized protest demonstrations. When one tries to pin down advocates of violence as to what acts would be effective, the answers are blatantly illogical. Sometimes they talk of overthrowing racist state and local governments and they talk about guerrilla warfare. They fail to see that no internal revolution has ever succeeded in overthrowing a government by violence unless the government had already lost the allegiance and effective control of its armed forces. Anyone in his right mind knows that this will not happen in the United States. In a violent racial situation, the power structure has the local police, the state troopers, the National Guard and, finally, the army to call on—all of which are predominantly white. Furthermore, few if any violent revolutions have been successful unless the violent minority had the sympathy and support of the nonresistant majority. Castro may have had only a few Cubans actually fighting with him up in the hills, but he could never have overthrown the Batista regime unless he had the sympathy of the vast majority of Cuban people.

It is perfectly clear that a violent revolution on the part of American blacks would find no sympathy and support from the white population and very little from the majority of Negroes themselves. This is no time for romantic illusions and empty philosophical debates about freedom. This is a time for action. What is needed is a strategy for change, a tactical program that will bring the Negro into the mainstream of American life as quickly as possible. So far, this has only been offered by the nonviolent movement. Without recognizing this we will end up with solutions that don't solve, answers that don't answer and explanations that don't explain.

And so I say to you today that I still stand by nonviolence. And I am still convinced that it is the most potent weapon available to the Negro in his struggle for justice in this country. And the other thing is that I am concerned about a better world. I'm concerned about justice. I'm concerned about brotherhood. I'm concerned about truth. And when one is concerned about these, he can never advocate violence. For through violence you may murder a murderer but you can't murder murder. Through violence you may murder a liar but you can't establish truth. Through violence you may murder a hater, but you can't murder hate. Darkness cannot put out darkness. Only light can do that.

And I say to you, I have also decided to stick to love. For I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind's problems. And I'm going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn't popular to talk about it in some circles today. I'm not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love, I'm talking about a strong, demanding love. And I have seen too much hate. I've seen to much hate on the faces of sheriffs in the South. I've seen hate on the faces of too many Klansmen and too many White Citizens Councilors in the South to want to hate myself, because every time I see it, I know that it does something to their faces and their personalities and I say to myself that hate is too great a burden to bear. I have decided to love. If you are seeking the highest good, I think you can find it through love. And the beautiful thing is that we are moving against wrong when we do it, because John was right, God is love. He who hates does not know God, but he who has love has the key that unlocks the door to the meaning of ultimate reality.

I want to say to you as I move to my conclusion, as we talk about Where do we go from here, that we honestly face the fact that the movement must address itself to the question of restructuring the whole of American society. There are forty million poor people here. And one day we must ask the question, Why are there forty million poor people in America? And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising questions about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I'm simply saying that more and more, we've got to begin to ask questions about the whole society. We are called upon to help the discouraged beggars in life's marketplace. But one day we must come to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. It means that questions must be raised. You see, my friends, when you deal with this, you begin to ask the question, Who owns the oil? You begin to ask the question, Who owns the iron ore? You begin to ask the question, Why is it that people have to pay water bills in a world that is two-thirds water? These are questions that must be asked.

Now, don't think that you have me in a bind today. I'm not talkingabout communism.

What I'm saying to you this morning is that communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines the truths of both. Now, when I say question the whole society, it means ultimately coming to see that the problem of racism, the problem of exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated.

If you will let me be a preacher just a little bit—One night, a juror came to Jesus and he wanted to know what he could do to be saved. Jesus didn't get bogged down in the kind of isolated approach of what he shouldn't do. Jesus didn't say, Now Nicodemus, you must stop lying. He didn't say, Nicodemus, you must stop cheating if you are doing that. He didn't say, Nicodemus, you must not commit adultery. He didn't say, Nicodemus, now you must stop drinking liquor if you are doing that excessively. He said something altogether different, because Jesus realized something basic—that if a man will lie, he will steal. And if a man will steal, he will kill. So instead of just getting bogged down in one thing, Jesus looked at him and said, Nicodemus, you must be born again.

He said, in other words, Your whole structure must be changed. A nation that will keep people in slavery for 244 years will thingify them—make them things. Therefore they will exploit them, and poor people generally, economically. And a nation that will exploit economically will have foreign investments and everything else, and will ahve to use its military to protect them. All of these problems are tied together.

What I am saying today is that we must go from this convention and say, America, you must be born again!

So, I conclude by saying again today that we have a task and let us go out with a divine dissatisfaction. Let us be dissatisfied until America will no longer have a high blood pressure of creeds and an anemia of deeds. Let us be dissatisfied until the tragic walls that separate the outer city of wealth and comfort and the inner city of poverty and despair shall be crushed by the battering rams of the forces of justice. Let us be dissatisfied until those that live on the outskirts of hope are brought into the metropolis of daily security. Let us be dissatisfied until slums are cast into the junk heaps of history, and every family is living in adecent sanitary home. Let us be dissatisfied until the dark yesterdays of segregated schools will be transformed into bright tomorrows of quality,integrated education. Let us be dissatisfied until integration is not seen as a problem but as an opportunity to participate in the beauty of diversity. Let us be dissatisfied until men and women, however black they may be, will be judged on the basis of the content of their character and not on the basis of the color of their skin. Let us be dissatisfied.

Let us be dissatisfied until every state capitol houses a governor who will do justly, who will love mercy and who will walk humbly with his God. Let us be dissatisfied until from every city hall, justice will roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream. Let us be dissatisfied until that day when the lion and the lamb shall lie down together, and every man will sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid. Let us be dissatisfied. And men will recognize that out of one blood God made all men to dwell upon the face of the earth. Let us be dissatisfied until that day when nobody will shout White Power! -- when nobody will shout Black Power!—but everybody will talk about God's power and human power.

I must confess, my friends, the road ahead will not always be smooth. There will be still rocky places of frustration and meandering points of bewilderment. There will be inevitable setbacks here and there. There will be those moments when the buoyancy of hope will be transformed into the fatigue of despair. Our dreams will sometimes be shattered and our ethereal hopes blasted. We may again with tear-drenched eyes have to stand before the bier of some courageous civil rights worker whose life will be snuffed out by the dastardly acts of bloodthirsty mobs. Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. And as we continue our chartered course, we may gain consolation in the words so nobly left by that great black bard who was also a great freedom fighter of yesterday, James Weldon Johnson:

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod
Felt in the days
When hope unborn had died.

Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place
For which our fathers sighed?

We have come over the way
That with tears hath been watered.
We have come treading our paths
Through the blood of the slaughtered,

Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the bright gleam
Of our bright star is cast.

Let this affirmation be our ringing cry. It will give us the courage to face the uncertainties of the future. It will give our tired feet new strength as we continue our forward stride toward the city of freedom. When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of now way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.

Let us realize that William Cullen Bryant is right: Truth crushed to earth will rise again. Let us go out realizing that the Bible is right:

Be not deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. This is for hope for the future, and with this faith we will be able to sing in some not too distant tomorrow with a cosmic past tense, We have overcome, we have overcome, deep in my heart, I did believe we would overcome.

#CAHungerStrike: Strike is Further Criminalized

Strike Leaders Have Not Eaten for 47 DAYS

Learn how to support the strike at the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition website

CDCR has issued notification of a “serious rules violation” to thousands of prisoners for participating in the present hunger strike. The evidence demonstrates, however, that CDCR--not the prisoners--is guilty of serious moral and legal violations against the prisoners' humanity in their various responses to the strike. Let's review.

A hunger strike is a special kind of protest. First, it is voluntary. From the outset, the representatives of different racial and geographical groups housed in Pelican Bay have stated and restated that no one should continue on the hunger strike longer than they voluntarily are able to. They cautioned elderly or ill prisoners to refrain from participating in the strike for long periods of time, if at all. In addition, dozens of prisoners have explained clearly and coherently in their letters why they have willfully taken on this extreme form of protest--to reclaim their humanity. Despite these truths, CDCR has spread the lie that prisoners are being coerced on the hunger strike through gang orders by the Pelican Bay representatives. Next, they have used these lies to obtain a legal order to force feed any prisoner on the hunger strike, including those who have willfully and consciously signed a "Do Not Resuscitate" order. The order represents a serious violation of a person's right to make their own life choices.

Second, hunger strikes are peaceful and non-violent. Twenty hunger striking prisoners and group representatives achieved a written agreement in August of 2012 to cease hostilities among themselves. Instead of welcoming this unilateral move, however, CDCR has painted this protest as the opposite of its true nature, falsely claiming that gang leaders are using the hunger strike as a way to bring more violence into the general population. In addition, guards have used a series of violent retaliatory methods against prisoners including physically assaulting prisoners, provoking others to violence through taunting, using handcuffs very tightly to cut into their wrists, putting prisoners in extra heavy shackles, shoving weakened hunger strikers as they walk, and threatening passive prisoners with violent chemical-based cell extractions. One prisoner reported guards offering non-striking prisoners the opportunity to throw feces at the hunger strikers. CDCR is the one employing and spreading violence in its own institution--not the prisoners.

Third, a hunger striker takes on 100% of the suffering of the protest in the form of self-starvation. The goal is to call attention to the horrific inhumanity of their conditions of incarceration. But instead of hearing that call and responding to it before the strike began, CDCR dialed up the inhumanity of their conditions. Prisoner representatives at Pelican Bay were put in deeper isolation units that are smaller with very little personal property and with cold air blowing on them. African-American prisoners report being put in cells with ethnic slurs written on the walls, including the n-word. CDCR prohibited non-nutritive liquids such as coffee, tea, or juice knowing that after three weeks on hunger strike, taste buds change and the water tastes terrible. That move pushes hunger striking prisoners needlessly toward greater dehydration, more rapid organ failure, and even death.

The evidence is clear: CDCR has committed the serious violations that have occurred in this peaceful hunger strike. The time is now for CDCR to negotiate with the prisoners, grant their very reasonable demands, refrain from further violence against them, and once and for all recognize the human dignity of these men!

On behalf of the Mediation Team,

Dr. Ronald Ahnen - Contact: (925) 381-5504

Hunger Strike Mediation Team

Dr. Ronald Ahnen, California Prison Focus and St. Mary’s College of California

Barbara Becnel, Occupy4Prisoners.org

Dolores Canales, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement

Irene Huerta, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement

Laura Magnani, American Friends Service Committee

Marilyn McMahon, California Prison Focus

Carol Strickman, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children

Azadeh Zohrabi, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children

People's Power and the Egyptian Massacre

There is no doubt now that the overthrow of Mohammad Morsi by the Egyptian military in early July was far from a popular revolution. At best, the military was simply exploiting popular discontent at Morsi's abysmal record on social and economic issues. Now in power, the military has done nothing to better the economic or social conditions in Egypt, instead using its perch in government to carry out the massacre of Muslim Brotherhood members. Just since Wednesday, over 500 Islamists have been killed in a brutal crackdown on the right of assembly.

Supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood are facing a brutal crackdown in Egypt

The international left probably should have seen this coming. Although at the time of Morsi's ouster, this blog expressed a lack of confidence in the Egyptian military, we should have emphasized the need for Egypt to respect freedom of assembly for the Muslim Brotherhood's rank-and-file (nevertheless, there have been reports of Muslim Brotherhood members terrorizing Coptic Christian communities, something which should be condemned in the strongest possible terms by progressives). Despite holding conservative views, like any mass organization, the vast majority of those in the Brotherhood are also members of the working class.

As it stands, all Egyptian workers are stuck between a swinging pendulum of power. While Morsi was in office, the pendulum swung to the Islamists. Now it has swung decisively to the military.

To avoid further humanitarian disaster, and to take back the Egyptian revolution from the hands of the military, the protest movement must trust no outside forces: not the military and not the Brotherhood. Instead, it must rely on and support all self-activity of the working and impoverished classes. It is this self-activity which will inevitably come into conflict with the ruling regime, posing the strongest threat to it.

While the situation is undeniably dark now, workers and the oppressed still have the power to turn the Egyptian status quo on its head. And in so doing, they have the power to fulfill the original demands of the revolution: Bread, Freedom, Social Justice, & Human Dignity.

All Power to the People!

-Schuyler Kempton

#CAHungerStrike Hits 40 Days, Strikers' Health Critical

Strike Leaders Have Not Eaten in 40 DAYS

Get involved in support of the strike with the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition

“These hard-earned accreditations are only awarded to the best of the best in corrections,” said CDCR Secretary Jeff Beard. “The ACA was aware of the class action litigation against California, so it sent its most experienced auditors to review these prisons. Their findings demonstrate these institutions are providing quality health care and inmate programs and are employing the proper use of segregation. These accreditations are a testament to the hard work and dedication of our staff.”

As the Hunger Strike now enters its 40th day, the words of Dr. Beard are almost hauntingly eerie, like being trapped in a sci-fi movie, not believing the reality of what is happening.  Dr. Beard coins the phrase regarding the recent ACA accreditations “best of the best” in corrections, just as easily as he coins the phrase “worst of the worst” in reference to the prisoners.

For those who have actually spent time within the California prison system, or who have a loved one within the prison walls, their experience is “worst of the worst.” Those who have been trapped within this system oftentimes will describe their experience as torture or inhumane, humiliating, a nightmare, but never “best of the best” in corrections.

Which now brings us to DAY 40! What would make a human being put their own bodies through such torture? What would make a man deny himself food for a week or month and now 40 days? According to Dr. Jeffrey Beard it is a “power play” by gangs to control prison yards. Dr. Beard, with his degrees in psychology, has worked hard in preparing the minds of society to believe that these prisoners are “violent gang members” and “murderers.” Could this be the result of a “power play?  Intending that in the event of any deaths Dr. Beard has so hardened the minds of society that no one will care? That there will be no investigation or public outcry, only continued use of solitary confinement that CDCR continues to insist “does not exist” in our prison system? It seems that Dr. Beard is the one who is “playing to win” by any means necessary.

An article was written regarding Todd Ashker, one of the hunger strike representatives, where he was referred to as a “violent murderer,” “notorious gang leader,” (key phrases used repeatedly by CDCR). Why is everyone ignoring the fact that Todd Ashker was in fact a troubled youth, and at the age of 19 enters into California prison system to serve a 6-year prison sentence, and he then becomes  a “convicted  murderer” where the court dismissed “gang” allegations.  If CDCR is in fact labeling Todd Ashker an “alleged” gang leader and a murderer, why isn’t anyone questioning the very place where this all started - the California Department of Corrections? What kind of system transforms a 19-year-old young man serving a 6-year prison sentence into a murderer serving a life sentence? Perhaps the same kind of system that can drive a man to risk his very own life just so that others will not have to endure their decades long torture, so that others will know what goes on within the prison walls, so that the truth is exposed.  Forty days, to suffer and endure such self-inflicted torture, knowing the chances of survival are shrinking at this point, does not seem to coincide with the message that is being put forth by Dr. Beard, who was hand-selected by Governor Brown and called out of retirement for this position.

Today, Day 40, imagine what the prisoners themselves are suffering… feel their pain that has been decades long…the pain of isolation, the pain of suffering and broken families, the pain of the  reality that society has come to be so hardened towards the prisoner, the only solution continues to be more prisons, more jails, longer sentences. The pain of the solitude that has been endured for decades while being held in isolation, suffering the most severe sensory deprivation….the pain that is stretching across the world as we watch and wait and wonder where the power is really coming from.

We have witnessed the power of the prisoners in Unity, the power of Unity that is giving them the inner strength to continue this hunger strike, to enter into the 40th day.

“According to medical guidelines created by foreign governments for monitoring hunger strikes in other countries, after a month without food, protesters can experience nerve damage that causes difficulty swallowing and vomiting. After 40 days, the expected effects include progressive confusion, incoherence, loss of vision and hearing, and bleeding.”

And we are also witnessing the power that has created a state with more prisons than any other place in the world. We witness the power that holds human beings in isolation for longer periods of time than any other place in the world. We witness the power to deny that solitary confinement even exists.

On behalf of the Mediation Team,
Dolores Canales, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC)

Hunger Strike Mediation Team
Dr. Ronald Ahnen, California Prison Focus and St. Mary’s College of California
Barbara Becnel, Occupy4Prisoners.org
Irene Huerta, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC)
Laura Magnani, American Friends Service Committee
Marilyn McMahon, California Prison Focus
Carol Strickman, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children
Azadeh Zohrabi, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children