CIA Sponsored Terror, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power
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Lynne Stewart Heard A Death Sentence Today
As many listeners know Judge John G Koeltl sentenced defendant, Lynne Stewart: 120 months incarceration in the Danbury Federal Correctional Institution Connecticut on five counts to be served concurrently. Lynne Stewart is 70 years old, she’s a breast cancer survivor with other pending health issues. We’re joined by Vinie Burrows today, she is the UN representative for the Women’s International Democratic Federation and the founding member of the Granny Peace Bridgade. Vinie Burrows made powerful statements in her article titled Lynne Stewart Heard A Death Sentence Today that calls terrorism by its real name under the draconian Patriot Act.
Vinie writes, “over and over again in his remarks leading up to the sentencing, Judge Koeltl used the term “terrorist enhancement.” Those warning words bring up the specter of some of the nastiest aspects of the Cold War and its present re-incarnation in the Patriot Act which by expanding law enforcement’s surveillance and investigative powers represents a significant threat to civil liberties. Read the official text… “Uniting and Strengthening America by providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism. The Sentencing of Lynne Stewart by Michael Steven Smith.
Vinie Burrows:
- Being at Lynne Stewart’s court hearing was useful to see the judge, to see the players, the 2 prosecuting lawyers and to see Lynne Stewart who made a marvelous opening statement. It was one of the great speeches before the bar
- I felt as he was reading, Judge Koeltl was responding to each dictate of the appellate court.
- We have to define terror. We can’t go by what the legislative, judicial and now executive define as terror. We’re looking in the wrong places for terror. A single mother with 3 children living in a shelter, she knows terror. When she doesn’t know where her next meal is coming from, that’s terror.
- When her home is foreclosed on, that’s terror, and of course our banks are the biggest terror of all.
- We can’t even think of Lynne Stewart when we talk of terror, she is a human rights defender. She’s been deprived of the ability to defend human rights.
- I think we have to go to “who are the terrorists?” who are the victims of terror?
- We have to talk about the state, the state usually the perpetrator of human rights violations.
- The state must recognize that poverty is a weapon of mass destruction.
- I think we need to talk about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a legal basis to mount some sort of appeal.
- Michael Ratner: This is the Time of the Toad (A Study of Inquisition In America)
- Lynne Stewart has another appeal against this severe sentence.
Guest – Vinie Burrows is an award-winning Broadway actress. She has been active at the United Nations Economic and Social Council on the issues of the status of women and Southern Africa. Burrows won the Paul Robeson Award in 1986. She was to appear in a show titled Sister! Sister! at the University of Delaware in Newark in November 1991. She was to be a panelist in the 2000-2001 African Diaspora lecture series at the Center for Ideas and Society in Riverside, California.
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Mountain Top Removal Activists Arrested For Direct Action In Virginia (Updated)
Last week 4 activists with Climate Ground Zero and Mountain Justice were arrested for using direct action to shut down a coal mining mountaintop removal effort in Virginia. Two of the 4 activists locked themselves to heavy machinery in the coal mining pit and were later arrested. The activists say they are drawing public attention to the dangers associated with the Brushy Fork Sludge Impoundment, which contain up to 8 billion gallons of toxic coal waste. The area is unstable, Brushy Fork’s foundation is built on a honeycomb of abandoned underground mines. If the foundation were to collapse, as others have, the toxic slurry could engulf communities nearly 14 miles away, according to Marfork Coal Co.’s emergency warning plan. Meanwhile, one of the activists, Jimmy Tobias was still in jail during this interview and is now released.
Dea Goblirsch:
- Mountain top removal is a destruction form of coal mining that uses explosives, that blow up the tops of mountains to get to the coal seams beneath. It’s cheaper and more efficient than underground mining, it also employs fewer miners.
- So far there have more than 800 miles of peaks flattened. They also take the rubble from the tops of mountains and dump it into nearby valleys. They are called valley fills. The creation of the valley fills cover up the headwater streams.
- A lot of these valleys feed into water systems that supply water to the Eastern United States.
- Brushy Fork is the largest earthen dam in the Western Hemisphere.
- Coal River Mountain was the highest elevation in the area that hadn’t been mountaintop removal mined.
- You can’t always see mountain top mining from the roadside, they tend to keep a veil of trees.
- The work we’re doing is primarily civil disobedience and direct action. Tree sits within the blast range. Bails and sentencing are widely uneven.
- Community groups to start sustainable energy initiatives in Appalachia, we see this happening in Kentucky, and Virginia and other parts of the coal mining region.
- A woman publicly slapped Judy Bonds, the director of Coal River Mountain Watch.
- A strip miner threatened to slit the throat of a child
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Katie Huscsza:
- We attached ourselves to the high wall miner (equipment) for 4 hours.
- Me and Colin were charged with trespassing, conspiracy and obstruction.
- There are around 30 people this summer actively working to stop mountain top removal.
- We I first learned about it (MTR) I almost didn’t believe that something so awful and destructive could be taking place
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Guest – Dea Goblirsch with Climate Ground Zero and Katie Huscsza, also with CGZ had locked herself to highwall coal mining machines, arrested and released on bail.
Music interludes in this segment by Canton Becker
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Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Iraq War, Supreme Court, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power
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Natsu Saito, Meeting the Enemy: American Exceptionalism and International Law
Meeting the Enemy: American Exceptionalism and International Law is the title of Natsu Saito’s recent book, Natsu is an attorney and professor of Law at Georgia State University’s College of Law in Atlanta. The book boldly points out how the United States violated international law since its declaration of independence. As often discussed here on Law and Disorder, international courts and institutions have been at the forefront of holding the torture conspirators accountable. Meeting the Enemy gives disturbing insight into the origins of American exceptionalism.
Natsu Saito:
- The duality is that the US does exempt itself (from international law) very consistently and very frequently and yet promotes international law very strongly and relies upon it.
- It has relied upon certain premises that are fundamental to the whole outlook and paradigm of colonialism – which is that there is a higher good, a more civilized approach the US embodies.
- The law doesn’t apply because we have a higher aim of civilization and that justifies not playing by the rules.
- The United States making others comply with human rights standards while exempting itself.
- Moving humanity toward this higher goal is so critical because if you strip that away and you look at the realities on the ground, you see what has been termed Western civilization has been incredibly barbaric.
- In order to get around that analysis, you have to say it was for a higher good.
- I think the “left” tends to accept the general framework, and to make particular criticisms of policies and practices that are obviously problematic. The US government engaging in torture for example, but each instant is accepted as anomalous instead of the larger picture.
- It is too frightening even for the people on the left to deal with the reality that this is a country that sits on occupied land, illegally occupied by its own rules. People on the left want to make it a kinder, gentler colonialism.
- I started out thinking I was writing a book about the failure of the United States failure to comply with international law, as I got into it, the more interesting questions were the push / pull dynamics between reliance on international law
- The current system of international law evolved from the international law which was the agreement between the European colonial powers of how they were not going to destroy each other in the process of taking over the rest of the world.
Guest – Natsu Taylor Saito teaches international law and human rights, race and the law, immigration, criminal procedure, and professional responsibility, and is an advisor to the Asian American Law Student Association and the Hispanic Student Bar Association. Professor Saito’s scholarship focuses on the legal history of race in the United States, the plenary power doctrine as applied to immigrants, American Indians, and U.S. territorial possessions, and the human rights implications of U.S. governmental policies, particularly with regard to the suppression of political dissent. Read more.
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Elena Kagan and the Supremes – Brecht Forum
We hear excerpts from a discussion on the confirmation hearings of Elena Kagan, and how her position may influence the direction of the Supreme Court.
Panelists:
Martin Garbus – one of the country’s leading trial lawyers. Mr. Garbus aggressively represents his clients in the courts and in the media. He has appeared before the United States Supreme Court as well as the highest state and federal courts in the nation. His devotion to ethics, justice and the law has earned him respect among the legal community and beyond as well as prominent awards. Time Magazine has named him “legendary . . . one of the best trial lawyers in the country,” while Newsweek , the National Law Journal and other media agree that Mr. Garbus is America’s “most prominent First Amendment lawyer,” with an “extraordinarily diverse practice.” The National Law Journal named him one of the country’s top ten litigators.
Margaret Ratner Kunstler – former Educational Director at the Center for Constitutional Rights. She’s an attorney and leads the New York City chapter of the National Lawyers Guild and heads the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice.
Anand Swaminathan – an associate at Vladeck, Waldman, Elias & Engelhard, P.C. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin in 2001 and the Harvard Law School in 2006. Prior to joining Vladeck he was a law clerk for the Honorable Theodore H. Katz of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Michael Steven Smith – Law and Disorder co-host, author and New York attorney. Michael Steven Smith is the author, editor, and co-editor of six books, including “The Emerging Police State,” by William M. Kunstler. He has testified before committees of the United States Congress and the United Nations on human rights issues. Mr. Smith lives and practices law in New York City with his wife Debby, where on behalf of seriously injured persons he sues insurance companies and occasionally the New York City Police Department.
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Afghanistan War, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Guantanamo, Human Rights, Iraq Veterans, Iraq War, Torture, Truth to Power, War Resister
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C0-host Michael Smith talks with attorney Jim Lafferty about the upcoming anti-war conference in Albany, New York, July 23-25. Noam Chomsky, internationally renowned political activist, author, and critic of U.S. foreign and domestic policies; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Professor Emeritus of Linguistics is the keynote speaker. Click here for flyer (PDF) Groups sponsoring the event: After Downing Street, Arab American Union Members Council, Bail Out the People Movement, Black Agenda Report, Campus Antiwar Network, Campaign for Peace and Democracy, Citizen Soldier, Code Pink, Grandmothers Against the War, Granny Peace Brigade, International Action Center, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Military Families Speak Out, May 1st Workers and Immigrant Rights Coalition, National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations, National Lawyers Guild, Office of the Americas, Peace Action, Peace of the Action, Progressive Democrats of America, Project Salam, September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, The Fellowship of Reconciliation, U.S. Labor Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Voices for Creative Nonviolence, Voters for Peace,Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, The World Can’t Wait.
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Iraq War Veteran, Conscientious Objector and Musician Clifton Hicks
Clifton Hicks is an activist with the Iraqi Veterans Against the War. Hicks is disabled and enrolled as an Anthropology student at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. Appalachian State is a center for old-time music, and Hicks is also an accomplished musician and banjo player. Cliff Hicks is psychologically disabled and got out of the Army as a conscientious objector several years ago. In the Spring issue of The Veteran, published by Vietnam Veterans Against the War, there’s printed the following chant, that is repeated by soldiers in training to go to Iraq. “I went down to the market where all the people shop, I pulled out my machete, and I began to chop, I went down to the park where all the children play, I took out my machine gun and I began to spray.” This is the kind of psychological brutalization that our young men are forced to endure that turn them into creatures they never thought they’d become.
Clifton Hicks:
- I was in 9th grade when 9/11 happened. I called the recruiter when I was 16, to try and get in.
- I saw Muslim and Arabic people and thought they were all out to get us.
- I listened to a lot of daytime AM right-wing radio. I had the ole cliche patriotic notions going.
- I wanted to go combat arms from the start, I figured if I was going into the Army, I wanted to fight.
- My feet were on the ground in Iraq in October 2003. The guys I was with that had already been there for a while had gotten pretty nasty. Guys get nasty, because their friends get killed and you realized you can’t trust anybody.
- We were the first division in combat to be out there for more than 13 months.
- They would literally give us candy and toys to give out to Iraqi kids at schools, the next day you’re ridin’ around and you see a b unch of kids get shot.
- I became an anti-war activist while I was still in the Army. We started an IVAW chapter in Gainesville Florida
Guest – Clifton Hicks, Branch of service: United States Army (USA) / Unit: C Troop, 1st Squadron, 1st U.S. Cavalry Regiment / Rank: PFC / Home: North Carolina / Served in: Ft. Knox, OIF 1, Germany. Hicks a musician and is currently a student at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina.
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Civil Liberties, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power
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Mavi Marmara Survivors Have A Right To Be Heard
Last week, two eyewitnesses who were aboard the Turkish ship that was stormed by Israeli Naval Commandos told their stories at the Brooklyn’s historic House of the Lord Church. As many listeners know 9 unarmed passengers were murdered, the oldest, Ibrahim Bilgen, was 61, the youngest was 19, a U.S. citizen born in Troy , N.Y. This speaking event almost didn’t happen. Last Monday, June 14, City Council speaker Christine Quinn, Reps. Jerry Nadler, Anthony Weiner, Carolyn Mahoney, Charles Rangel and others, gathered in Times Square to demand the State Department investigate the invited speakers for “ties to terrorism.” They want to prevent or delay their entry the United States. Video
Bill Doares:
- U.S. filmmaker Iara Lee and British political organizer Kevin Ovenden, and Ahmet Unsal, a former Member of Turkey’s Parliament
- Their hands in my opinion are dripping with blood. Anthony Weiner actually called those on the ships “terrorists.” IHH Turkish Charity
- Every bullet fired by Israel is paid for by the United States.
Guest – Bill Doars with New York Labor Against the War / Al-AWDA New York
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24 Anti-Torture Activists Acquitted
Last week, 24 anti-torture activists were acquitted in trial for protesting at the US Capitol, calling for Guantanamo’s closure and an investigation of deaths at the prisoner detention camp. The activists were aquitted of charges of (quote) unlawful entry with disorderly conduct which stemmed from demonstrations in January 21 of this year. The date President Obama promised to close Guantanamo prison. “With his decision, the judge validated the effort of the demonstrators to condemn the ongoing crime of indefinite detention at Guantanamo,” says Bill Quigley, legal adviser to the defendants and the Legal Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. FDL story
Bill Quigley:
- There was a big protest on the day that Guantanamo Bay prison was supposed to be closed by Witness Against Torture.
- Witness Against Torture started in 2005 by going to Cuba and marching to the gates of Guantanamo asking that the people there be released.
- In January this year they had a number of people who did a water-only fast for 11 days, it ended on January 21, 2010. They put 20 something people on the steps of the Capitol who were in orange jump suits and black hoods, unfurled a banner with rose petals in the rotunda.
- About 35 people were arrested that day. They were charged with unlawful assembly with intent to breach the peace. The trial was last week, and they were given the option of paying a 50.00 fine. Most wanted to go to court and put Guantanamo on trial in the superior court.
- I prepared and argued for a necessity defense, an international law defense and the importance of the first amendment to what they were doing. I analagized their conduct to the people who resisted in Germany, the illegal crimes of Hitler and the like, the responsibility of citizens to challenge the crimes of their government.
- I think the judge didn’t want to get involved with this (activist work globally to shut down Guantanamo)
- Maybe a sign for a chance to turn the tide.
Guest – Bill Quigley, Legal Director for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a national legal and educational organization dedicated to advancing and defending the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Bill joined CCR on sabbatical from his position as law professor and Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University New Orleans. He has been an active public interest lawyer since 1977.
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Seize British Petroleum Assets
As the blood red crude oil continues to gush from the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, many industries and communities are being hit hard economically and environmentally. Meanwhile British Petroleum, Haliburton and Trans-ocean sidestep compensation and trade blame. Organizers of the Seize BP campaign say their demand is straightforward, “Seize assets of BP sufficient to compensate the people they harm.” There are several paths to compensation says Carl Messineo, attorney with the Partnership for Civil Justice and organizer of the Seize BP group. First, the BP claims process whereby BP determines what to cover and how much to pay. On this road all power rests with BP. Second, through the courts, where people can file litigation and lawsuits against BP. Both BP and the Obama administration want to push everyone seeking compensation down these two paths, but these two paths lead nowhere.
Third, the seizure of BP’s assets in an amount commensurate with estimated damages and the delivery of immediate and ongoing compensation to all those who have suffered and will suffer lost jobs, wages and business for years to come.
Attorney Carl Messineo:
- Seize BP is a campaign that was started of course a few weeks ago, around a single, simple demand, which is the US government needs to seize assets of BP. Place them in trust and make them immediately available for people in the Gulf coast who are in severe desperation at this time.
- People can’t pay the mortgage with rhetoric, they can’t eat rhetoric. The Obama administration can choose to take action. They can seize assets of BP.
- The president of the United States needs to request that Tony Hayward to please set aside some money? The president has legal authority, the Congress has legal authority. They can compel action.
- That’s their responsibility. Obama has acted like the calm captain of corporate interest within his presidency.
- He funneled health care through the corporations. Instead of serving the people, he’s really been subservient to corporate interest. This is a defining moment for his presidency.
- BP was the responsible party, this was avoidable, why do we turn to BP and ask them “please?”
- Right now, we know that BP can put aside 20 billion dollars. This is the same corporation that chose not to put the 500 thousand dollar safety valve.
- The US government has decided over the years to be willingly incompetent. This is something that they admit. They are incompetent technologically and using government resources.
- Obama can’t say that this is inertia from the bad policy of George Bush. He made personal decisions to expand offshore oil drilling. His administration is no worse than the others. There’s no change.
- Accidents happen, that’s why there needs to be independent redundant systems to respond to catastrophes.
- BP is a profit maximizer. It’s goal is to make as much money as possible, to limit its expenditures in order to maximize its profits.
- These handful of individuals hold in their hand, the safety and the ecology of clearly between 5 and 10 coastal states. It can’t be left to the profit making decisions.
- The largest share and holder of BP is the Chase Bank.
Guest – Attorney Carl Messineo with the Partnership for Civil Justice and organizer of SeizeBP
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Afghanistan War, Civil Liberties, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power
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No End In Sight, Number One In War
What will you remember on Memorial Day? US law officially proclaims Memorial Day “as a day of prayer for permanent peace.” – However, the US is much closer to permanent war than permanent peace – writes Bill Quigley, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights in his recent article titled No End In Sight, Number One In War. The article outlines, the rising costs of war, the damage to country and who reaping massive profits. At what point do we begin to transition to permanent peace?
Bill Quigley:
- Yes, politicians are making hay from the permanent war, but there’s also a lot of people who are making an awful lot of money from the US military.
- We discount the role they’re playing, in keeping the US constantly fearful and preparing for and perpetrating war in every place across the globe.
- This is something that people are afraid to talk about.
- The “Axis of Evil” spends less than one percent of what the US spends. This coming year the US will spend 708 billion dollars on war and another $125 billion for Veterans Affairs.
- Al-Qaeda spends less than one percent of one percent of what the US spends.
- You have to ask yourself “why?” Why are people in the United States more afraid than anybody in the whole world? Fanning the flames of fear. Behind the scenes are huge corporations that are making billions of dollars.
- We talk about Blackwater, but there are a couple corporations that dwarf Blackwater.
- Lockheed Martin, a huge corporation that runs almost entirely on tax payer money. 140 thousand employees.
- A corporation totally reliant on the United States Congress. You spend 125 thousand lobbying Congress and Congress doesn’t get some benefit from that.
- The US is spending 10 times more on the military than China. Who is calling for accountability on this spending?
Guest – Bill Quigley. Bill is the Legal Director for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a national legal and educational organization dedicated to advancing and defending the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Bill joined CCR on sabbatical from his position as law professor and Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University New Orleans. He has been an active public interest lawyer since 1977.
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End The Korean War
Hosts get an update on the uneasy tensions between North and South Korea. A multinational investigation concluded last week that a North Korean submarine had torpedoed the 1200 ton warship called the Cheonan back in March killing 45 people. North Korea denies involvement in the sinking, South Korean defense ministry denies that any of its ships had crossed “Northern Limit Line.” Meanwhile, the threat of sanctions against the already oppressed North Korean population escalate. South Korea and the Obama administration have agreed to initiate joint anti-submarine military exercises near North Korean border. Right now, there are almost 29,000 U.S. troops in South Korea.
Eric Sirotkin:
- When you look into the history of the conflict, and we are still technically at war, as an armistice doesn’t technically end a war only stops the shooting.
- These kind of incidences occur because you don’t have a peace regimen to fall back on.
- There is a very conservative South Korean government. Very hawkish toward the North
- The intitial report of them torpedoing the boat, there are a lot of questions, there are people who are writing about Tonkin Bay, and thinking about.
- You have a choice to march toward war or go toward peace.
- The United States at this point is ramping up the rhetoric.
- Before this situation with the South and the North, we had a lot more exchanges and things were going in a positive direction. If you think there’s no exit strategy after Iraq, look at Korea, sixty years later.
- We’re working with a campaign to end the Korean War.
Guest – Attorney Eric Sirotkin, is a member of the National Lawyers Guild and helped found Korean Peace Project. Eric Sirotkin, the founder and Director of Ubuntuworks, LLC mixes his experience as a human rights lawyer, film producer, author and peacemaker. Over the years his peacemaking activities have taken him around the world, including India, Peru, Cuba, South Africa, Japan, North and South Korea, France, Netherlands, Canada and China. He contributed to dialogue on the new Constitution in South Africa, was a UN sponsored election observer at President Mandela’s election and coordinated an international monitoring Project of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
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Omar Khadr, First Military Commission Trial Under Obama
Last week the first military tribunal opened under the Obama administration. It is the case of Omar Khadr, the Canadian citizen, military prosecutors say that Omar Kadr threw a grenade that killed a US Special Forces medic in Afghanistan and helped build roadside bombs to use against American soldiers. We look at why the Obama Administration is putting a detainee on trial who was 15 when he was captured and whether the self – incriminating statements he has made can be used as evidence. Unless the Prime Minister acts to request repatriation, Khadr could face conviction by a jury of U.S. military officers based on evidence extracted by torture.
Attorney Jonathan Hafetz:
- International law is very clear on how you treat child soldiers. In 2001, military commissions were struck down by the Supreme Court, in 2006 in the Hamdan Case, Congress created them again.
- The hope was that Obama was going to close this chapter and end military commissions.
- Obama suspended military commissions for 4 months and brought it back.
- You have huge issues in Khadr’s case. He was a child soldier. He was accused of killing an American soldier in a fire fight. Number one, the US doesn’t seem to have any credible evidence not derived from torture or other abuse that Khadr actually killed the serviceman.
- Even if they had evidence that Khadr was responsible for the death of this serviceman, it’s not a war crime. It’s part of war but not a war crime. The US government’s theory of war is totally distorted.
- On the day of the first war crimes trial of a juvenile in US history, the day its starts and new rules are handed out, I don’t think they had enough copies to give to all the council.
Guest – Jonathan Hafetz, attorney with the ACLU’s National Security Project.
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Civil Liberties, Extraordinary Rendition, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Supreme Court, Torture, Truth to Power
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Labor Relations at the American Red Cross and It’s Impact on Employee and Donor Safety (PDF)
Hosts look at a suprising report detailing the cost cutting efforts within America’s premier disaster relief and blood donor organization, the American Red Cross. Award winning Washington based reporter Philip Dine has put together an investigative summary titled – (PDF)Labor Relations at the American Red Cross and It’s Impact on Employee and Donor Safety that enumerates the effects of cut backs that have led to bad labor relations, bungled disaster relief, mishandled blood supplies and federal fines. The investigation examines a far less publicized issue that involves the treatment of Red Cross employees and the impact this has on the organization’s work, with high turnover, younger employees and lower wages.
Philip Dine:
- Over the years, the Feds saw that the Red Cross was not living up to its promises.
- Red Cross labor relations: For years the Red Cross has been intent on degrading the training and expertise of the employees.
- At one point you needed doctors on site for blood drives, then it became registered nurses, then it became nurses on call, and then non-medically trained supervisors.
- It seems that the Red Cross wants to have more management control and lower pay and that basically means a disposable work force.
- Management mess: 10 Executive directors in 12 years.
- High turnover at the top, a budget deficit, despite the main money maker – the blood supply which they get for free. It accounts for 2/3 of revenue. Calling for an audit
- Workers increasingly hired from fast food outlets with no experience, workers see co-workers improperly inserting needles into people. More articles
- I’ve been covering labor for 25 years/ Please contact Philip Dine directly at – philipmdine@aol.com
Guest – Philip Dine author of “State of the Unions: How Labor Can Strengthen the Middle Class, Improve Our Economy, and Regain Political Influence.” Philip Dine is teaching a labor-management course at the George Washington University School of Business this fall. State of the Unions has won honorable mention for best book about labor or work of the past five years from the United Association for Labor Education.
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Medical Students Advocate Against Health Professional Participation in Torture
Last year it was confirmed that doctors and psychologists were directly involved in the supervision, design and execution of torture at U.S. military and intelligence facilities. This is a violation of state laws and professional ethics. These “health professionals” that were involved in the torture still hold their professional licenses to practice. Legislation introduced in New York by Assemblyman Richard Gottfried and Senator Tom Duane would reinforce existing ethical and legal responsibilities by prohibiting state-licensed doctors and other health professionals from participating in such practices. The law would also call for legal protection to resist and report any involvement in acts of torture and abuse. Last week, medical students and health professionals descended on Albany to meet with law makers to advocate the passage of this historic legislation. Physicians For Human Rights / When Healers Harm
Dr.Allen Keller:
- If you’re a health professional that participated in torture, you can lose your license.
- Health professionals were front and center and complicit in this policy of torture.
- Medical professionals provided sanitizing and rationalization for those infamous torture memos.
- During water-boarding there would be a doctor there. This is clearly a breach of medical and professional ethics.
- Licenses issued by the state. Torturers relied heavily on medical opinion.
- The state chapter of the New York Psychological Association has endorsed this bill.
- What I believe is that the interrogator looks at the health professional and says, well, if it gets out of hand, the medical professional will stop me.
- Suvivorsoftorture.org – The Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture provides comprehensive medical and mental health care, as well as social and legal services to survivors of torture and war traumas and their family members. In the past year alone we provided these multidisciplinary services to more than 600 people from 70 countries.
Guest – Dr. Allen Keller, founder and director of the Bellevue/NYU Program for Survivors of Torture. In addition to serving as a primary care physician for many patients in the Program (Dr. Keller speaks French and Spanish). Dr. Keller oversees and coordinates the provision of medical services for Program patients, working with other primary care physicians and medical specialists affiliated with the program.
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