Warring over Woodstock

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Woodstock May Have Saved Sen. McCain’s Life
by Sheldon Richman

John McCain scored a standing ovation at the last Republican presidential debate when he attacked Sen. Hillary Clinton for proposing – unsuccessfully – to spend a million taxpayer dollars on a museum commemorating the 1969 Woodstock festival, saying,

“Now, my friends, I wasn’t there. I’m sure it was a cultural and pharmaceutical event. I was tied up at the time. But the fact is, my friends, no one can be president of the United States that supports projects such as these.”

It would be easy to criticize McCain for politically exploiting his five-and-half years of suffering as a captive of the North Vietnamese during the Vietnam war. But there’s a more important point to be made.

Had McCain simply attacked Clinton’s attempt at pork-barrel spending – the museum is set to open next year in Bethel, New York – that would have been fine (although McCain, too, has some pork-barreling on his record). Taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to support any kind of museum.

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Ban cluster bombs

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Monday, Nov. 5: National Day to Call the Senate to ban use/export of cluster bombs, which kill and harm civilians. (Over 98% victims are civilians.)

Call your Senators today. Urge them to cosponsor S.594 – the Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act.

Take action now! Call: 1-800-352-1897 (a toll free number just for Monday)

Cluster bombs are indiscriminate killers that spew deadly shrapnel over large swathes of land, and leave behind fields of landmines. Over the last 40 years 98% of cluster bomb casualties have been civilians.

More than 80 governments have agreed to negotiate a ban on these killers in the coming year. The U.S. government is not one of them; they say that the military’s need overrides humanitarian concerns. However, these weapons are a liability for the military as well: unexploded bomblets impede troop movement and kill our own troops (dozens of them in Iraq).

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Cops try to sanitize view during Bush visit

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Police Intimidation Threatens Peaceful Protest of Fund-raiser
Wade Fulmer, Columbia

On Friday, Nov. 2, activists had arrived by 10:30 on the sidewalk across the street from the entrance to the plantation on Garners Ferry Road where the Republican barbecue fund-raiser was being held. Participants ranged from college students to an 80-year-old WWII veteran, and were citizens or representatives of various peace groups. Activists and protesters were orderly, quiet, and held signs in protest of the Iraq War, to advocate for the care of our troops, and to insist that Bush-Graham politicians do not rush to still another war with Iran.  

At about 10:45, Columbia police suddenly demanded that all protesters were to move down the hill to the far end of Woodhill Mall, which would take us and signs out of the view of traffic and politicians entering the barbecue. Upon asking an officer why, he said that the order was given to officers this morning by their captain. As an organizer of the demonstration, I asked why was such an order given. I reminded officers that Columbia city police have agreed and cooperated with us for four years in the exercise of our right to assemble and protest as long as there is no disturbance or interference with traffic. I asked to speak to the officer in charge. He approached and spoke angrily that we must move. He then told me that I had 10 seconds to move to the bottom of the hill. 

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Exploitation all year long

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Today at a press event in Charleston, plastic surgeons masquerading as humanitarians announced the launch of a calendar featuring topless women in what they call a “bold visual approach to education about post-mastectomy options.”

Here’s their press release:

Women with Heriditary Predisposition for Breast Cancer Pose Topless in Unique Educational Calendar Launch

WHAT: Launch of a unique calendar of women who are members of FORCE (Facing Our Risk of Cancer Empowered), the nation’s largest community of women who carry a BRCA mutation or other high-risk factors for breast cancer. In the calendar, titled “Life is a Carnival,” 14 women whose faces are festively masked, pose topless in a bold visual approach to education about post-mastectomy options.

Meet some of these brave women, most of whom have the BRCA gene mutation, and learn about the options they chose; meet the founder of FORCE, which has 11,000 members and whose website gets 1.5 million hits/month; meet prominent reconstructive surgeons and a geneticist; and, obtain a free copy of calendar. 

This event provides an opportunity for editors, reporters, producers, on-air hosts and writers to, in an informal setting, meet the women, the founder and director of FORCE, and surgeons who perform microsurgical breast reconstruction. Refreshments, hors d’oeuvres. The event is open to the public, RSVP to 843-513-1010.

WHEN: Thursday, November 1, 5:30 – 7:30 PM

WHERE: The Historic Rice Mill Building, 17 Lockwood Drive -Charleston, S.C

WHO: Sue Friedman, DVM, Executive Director / Founder of FORCE / Calendar model (Born and raised in NY, lives in FL)

FORCE members and Women With BRCA gene (from South Carolina and, elsewhere), some of whom had mastectomy and reconstructive surgery.

James E.Craigie, M and; Richard M. Kline Jr, MD of The Center for Natural Breast Reconstruction;  members of a breast reconstruction team in SC who use microsurgery to transfer live, soft tissue from the abdomen to shape a live breast mound; a procedure growing in popularity as an alternative to breast implants.

Steven Shapiro, M.S., D.M.D., M.D., medical geneticist who provides genetic counseling and testing for BRCA mutations.

Seeking justice for Sean

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From SC GLPM:

Our community has been rocked twice, first with the news of Sean Kennedy’s brutal murder, and second the shameful involuntary manslaughter indictment voted on by the Grand Jury. The Solicitor’s office acknowledged in its Oct. 22 press release the inadequacies of our state’s current statutes: “I hope the Kennedy family will join me to encourage the legislature to review their situation, and to modify our current statutory law so that we can address the present inadequacy in the law,” stated Robert Ariail, Solicitor of South Carolina’s 13th Judicial Circuit. 

We are aware of the outrage that many of you feel regarding the indictment last Tuesday and the indefinite postponement of the arraignment, and many of us feel the same way. Therefore, the South Carolina Gay and Lesbian Pride Movement has partnered with Sean’s Last Wish Foundation and the South Carolina Equality Coalition in order to foster awareness and educate the public at large of the need for hate crimes legislation in our fair state. We will continue to work closely with Elke Kennedy [Sean’s mother] as well as the staff and Board of SCEC, to determine our next course of action. These future actions may include coordinated press conferences with organizations throughout the state, forums to educate our local communities, and a vigil to be held the evening of sentencing for Sean Kennedy’s murderer.

Elke Kennedy has been brave these last few months, fighting a homophobic mindset ˆstatus quoˆ that has taken the life of her 20-year-old son. While Sean, a member of the gay community, was brutally murdered five months ago, she continues to travel across our state fighting for his dream of equality and inclusion. Do not let her fight alone; join us in helping to make Sean’s last wish a reality, and let not his death be in vain.  

For more information, or to be kept informed on the actions, please visit the following web sites:

Sean’s Last Wish
SC Equality Coalition
SC GLPM

To join our email listserv, and be kept up to date with all activities at the Harriet Hancock Community Center, and to be kept aware of what we are doing for Sean Kennedy and his family, please join the listserv by emailing scpridevols-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

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Elke Kennedy, left, remembers her son at a vigil at the State House in Columbia. Since her son’s death, she has since been working to pass hate crimes legislation in South Carolina.

Barack brouhaha

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Gay community will protest Obama’s Columbia fundraiser
By Becci Robbins

Our Co-Chair Rev. Bennie Colclough left a Progressive Network meeting last night to dial into a conference call with the Barack Obama campaign and a handful of SC gay rights activists to discuss the rising controversy over a “healed” gay minister headlining a fundraiser in Columbia this Sunday. From all accounts, the call got heated and ended with two more calls: the Obama camp’s call to stand firm and the activists’ call to arms.

The latter has called for a protest of the event on Sunday at 5pm at the Township in downtown Columbia.

Rev. Donnie McClurkin claims to be sexually reformed, and now preaches that homosexuality is a choice. For a flavor of the man, check out his web site. (Be patient while it loads all its bells and whistles.)

The last-minute inclusion of Rev. Andy Sidden, the openly gay Pastor of Garden of Grace United Church of Christ (a Network member) has done nothing to appease the gay community.

In a statement, Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese said he thanked Obama for including Sidden but said he was disappointed McClurkin will remain part of Obama’s program.

“There is no gospel in Donnie McClurkin’s message for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people and their allies,” he said. “That’s a message that certainly doesn’t belong on any presidential candidate’s stage.”

Obama is on record speaking against homophobia. He supports civil unions for same-sex couples but not gay marriage.

In a letter to the Obama campaign that was cc’d around, SC GLPM’s Tony Snell put it bluntly: “Adding a gay minister at the McClurkin concert is a weak attempt to appease the LGBT community. It’s like asking Julian Bond to speak at a Klan rally in order to ease the pain. I was told by a campaign staffer yesterday that your umbrella had to be expanded to cover many people with differing opinions. I say the Obama umbrella has a big hole in it – providing little to no refuge for gays and lesbians. It feels like we’re getting soaked wet and left out to dry!”

Today SCEC issued this press release:

According to the Obama campaign website, “With the help of many talented, spirit-filled supporters, Barack Obama’s campaign is hosting Gospel concerts throughout South Carolina on October 26, 27, and 28 to bring South Carolinians together for a few evenings of song and praise.”

While Senator Barack Obama may be committed to bringing people of all faiths together, he has chosen to ignore the concerns of the LGBT community and its allies in the clergy. Against the recommendations of South Carolina Equality Coalition (SCEC) to remove Donnie McClurkin, a self-proclaimed “ex-gay” from their upcoming gospel concert and fundraiser in Columbia, the Obama for America campaign is proceeding with the event as planned.

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Breaking a suspect; breaking a system

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The FBI’s Right to Threaten Torture
by James Bovard

A federal appeals court has concluded that an FBI agent must go to trial on charges he coerced a false confession out of a prime suspect in the 9/11 attacks. But the FBI still insists that its agent did nothing wrong. And the feds swayed the court to suppress that portion of a recent decision detailing how the FBI agent used the threat of torture to break an innocent man.

Abdallah Higazy, a 30-year-old Egyptian student, arrived in New York City to study engineering at the Polytechnic University in Brooklyn on August 27, 2001. A U.S. foreign-aid program reserved and paid for his room at the Millennium Hilton Hotel, next to the World Trade Center. After the first plane crashed into the World Trade Center, Higazy hot-footed it out of the hotel. After the terrorist attack, the hotel was sealed.

Three months later, guests were allowed to retrieve their belongings. When Higazy went to the hotel on December 17, he was arrested and accused of possessing an aviation radio. (A hotel security guard reported finding the radio in a safe in his room.) Higazy denied owning the radio. He was arrested as a material witness and locked up in solitary confinement.

Higazy wanted to clear his name so he agreed to take a polygraph test. FBI agent Michael Templeton wired him up for the test but then proceeded to browbeat him for three hours until he finally admitted to owning the radio. Higazy said the FBI agent warned him, “If you don’t cooperate with us, the FBI will… make sure Egyptian security gives your family hell.” The FBI refused to permit Higazy’s attorney, Robert Dunn, to be in the room while he was given the polygraph. After the interrogation, Higazy was “trembling and sobbing uncontrollably,” according to Dunn.

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Creating Hell on Earth

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Climate Warming Causes Drought-Fueled Mega-Fires
By Tom Turnipseed
Published @ Common Dreams

Five years ago my wife and I discontinued using our lawn irrigation sprinkler system. Now we only water our small vegetable garden. Facing evidence of climate change, we are trying to do our part to save water.

With water supplies rapidly shrinking, Gov. Sonny Perdue of Georgia declared a state of emergency for 85 counties and asked President Bush to declare it a major disaster area on Oct. 20. A drought of historic proportions is affecting Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia, as well as parts of North and South Carolina, Kentucky and Virginia. Meanwhile, drought is feeding a fiery fiasco in California.

In the past five days, parts of southern California have become out-of-control, raging infernos as another hot dry summer turns dehydrated forests into combustible tinderboxes.

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Happy birthday, Ms.

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Reading Suzanne Levine’s account of her years at Ms., brought back fond memories of my own about the magazine that changed my life. My sister had a subscription in high school, and I became an avid reader of Ms. in 7th grade. It educated and inspired me, and started me on the path of political activism.

In college, I spent a week in New York City in search of a summer internship. My first stop was at Ms. Although the magazine wasn’t hiring, then-editor Pat Carbine spent a couple of hours with me talking about my aspirations and calling editor friends in the city to see about other job options. Looking back, it moves me that such a powerful woman would take time out of her busy day to help a kid with big dreams and no plan.

I ended up spending my summer in New York at McCall’s magazine. But I will never forget the kindness of the good people at Ms. I congratulate them on helping grow the feminist movement not just here but around the world.

Becci Robbins

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Ms. Memories
By Suzanne Braun Levine
The Women’s Media Center

It is always stunning to me to realize that an event that still lives in my contemporary memory actually took place decades ago; so when I was invited to a 35th anniversary celebration for Ms. Magazine (yes, it lives! The current publishers are the Feminist Majority Foundation), it was as though my life was flashing before my eyes. I joined the magazine in the summer of 1972 for the very first monthly issue. When we put Wonder Woman on the cover, we felt empowered and protected by her magic bracelets. But I had no idea what a life-changing and world-changing adventure I had signed up for.

At the time I was an only half-awake feminist. But I did have one bond with the magazine. When the Preview Issue came out the previous winter it featured a list of celebrities who admitted that they had had illegal abortions; amended to the article was a coupon for other women to add their names. I filled out the coupon, glad to step forward on an issue that mattered a lot to me. By the time those coupons were being compiled, I was on the job and actually found and opened my envelope.

The women I worked with came from a range of backgrounds – the civil rights movement, the feminist movement, and those like myself who were magazine types and somewhat less activist. I wore a pink silk blouse and matching cashmere skirt to my first day of work – only to discover that my “desk” was a pile of boxes in a small dusty room I shared with three others. It didn’t take long before I – along with many of the readers of Ms. – was becoming radicalized by the injustices toward women that we were encountering at every turn. I was also a little scandalized by some of the more way-out seeming discussions that I found myself editing. Back then, I found the idea of not shaving your legs, for example, almost unthinkable. And “Liberating Masturbation” … Well, you can imagine.

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