Law and Disorder January 23, 2012

Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Torture, Truth to Power

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Updates:

  • Heidi Boghosian: Mumia Abu-Jamal Update
  • Support Mumia Here
  • Michael Smith: Occupy Chicago Tribune Lawsuit Is On
  • Michael Ratner: Tenth Anniversary of Guantanamo Prison: Cage Prisoners
  • Movie: Death In Camp Delta
  • Iranian Scientist Murdered: Mossad, CIA, ISI
  • Covert War Against Iran
  • Michael Ratner Speaks At Occupy London About Bradley Manning Case
  • Julian Assange Extradition
  • Judge Goes Forward With Investigation Of Guantanamo Torture Cases
  • UK Transferring People To Qaddafi To Be Tortured

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Newly Launched Whistle Blower Site – Honest Appalachia

Activists in Virginia have launched a website appealing to whistleblowers wanting to reveal evidence of corporate and government wrongdoing. The site is called honestappalachia.org, it uses a security technology to protect citizens who upload documents and it keeps their identity hidden if there’s legal action. Inspired by Wikileaks, honestapplachia is a low cost model that can be adapted by others worldwide.

Jimmy Tobias:

  • The site is meant to be a resource for whistle blowers, that allows them to anonymously upload documents to our site. We will take those documents and vet them, and distribute them to journalists.
  • SOPA is definitely a risk to transparency and whistle blower resources on the web.
  • You go on our site, and you read our submission guide which is a step by step.
  • The guide will tell you to download TOR. A simple piece of software which routes your activity through servers across the world, which essentially makes your activity anonymous.
  • Your IP address basically gets lost in the crowd. We will never know who you are uploading to our site.
  • We also encrypt the documents we receive.
  • We have information on our site where others can take our open source software and use 80 percent of it.
  • Our project is focusing outreach in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, also includes Georgia and South Carolina.
  • We’re really hoping to receive documents about wrongdoing at the state and local level of government, from corporations in the region.
  • Appalachia is a very industrialized region but its also very rural.
  • We were funded with a grant from the Sunlight Foundation.
  • Generally there’s a lot of cozy relationships in the states, between industry and government.
  • We’re focusing on a broad array whether they’re coal or gas companies, banks, zoning boards, state and local governments, anything that could engage in corruption at the expense of the public.

Guest – Jim Tobias, activist and direct action protester.

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Law and Disorder January 9, 2012

Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Gaza, Guantanamo, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Prosecution of the Bush Administration, Supreme Court, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Torture, Truth to Power, War Resister

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Ten Year Anniversary of Guantanamo Bay Prison

Co-host Michael Ratner and president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights gives listeners an overview of the habeas corpus legal battles to close Guantanamo Bay prison and an in depth look at the corrosive effect the offshore prison has had on civil rights, and the U.S. Constitution. Despite the fact that the U.S. government has itself cleared more than half of these men for release, and despite President Obama’s promise on his second day in office to close Guantánamo within a year, it has been almost twelve months since anyone has been released.

This is the longest period of time that has elapsed since the prison’s opening without a single person being set free.The Obama administration has also extended some of the worst aspects of the Guantánamo system by continuing indefinite detentions without charge or trial, employing illegitimate military commissions to try some suspects, and blocking accountability for torture.

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International People’s Tribunal on “War Crimes and Other Violations of International Law

International People’s Tribunal on “War Crimes and Other Violations of International Law” to be held on January 14, 2012 at 12 pm at Columbia Law School.  The event will provide an excellent opportunity for students interested in  gaining an understanding the theory and the practical application of international law in the real world.

Attorney Roger Wareham:

  • The genesis of the tribunal began during the intervention in Libya.
  • Back in May the December 12th movement always has a celebration of Malcolm X’s birthday, May 19.
  • This is part an ongoing campaign to re-colonize the African continent.
  • Libya was important to that for a number reasons. Libya has some of the best crude oil in the world that requires the least amount of production in terms of transforming it into gasoline.
  • Col. Gaddafi stood for the proposition that there would be a United States of Africa.
  • Libya had the highest standard of living on the African continent.
  • What we hope to come out of this is fashion a petition to take before the International Criminal Court.
  • The plan is we’ll going to take at least a 400 people strong delegation to the Hague in June to present a petition to the prosecutor, requesting they prosecute the heads of NATO, Britain, Canada, Italy, for war crimes.
  • Saturday January 14, 2012 / Columbia University Law School / 435 West 116th Street / 718-398-1766 / iptribunal2012@gmail.com

Guest – Roger Wareham, lawyer and political activist of over four decades. He is a member of the December 12th Movement, an organization of African people which organizes in the Black and Latino community around human rights violations, particularly police terror. Wareham is also the International Secretary-General of the International Association Against Torture (AICT), a non-governmental organization that has consultative status before the United Nations.

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Cornell and The Technion of Israel To Build Campus On Governor’s Island

As many listeners may know, Cornell University is joining with Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in a plan to build a campus in New York City.  Critics however, point out Technion’s involvement with the Israeli Defense Force in the development of repressive technology that would further perpetuate crimes against Palestinians. Through cooperative research with Israeli defense companies such as Elbit, Rafael, McGill and Concordia, Technion is involved in asymmetrical robotic warfare with faceless human targets who can be killed by remote control.

To talk more about this, we’re joined today by David Klein,  a professor at California State University in Northridge and a member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.

Professor David Klein:

  • It is a collaboration between Cornell University and Technion which is like Israel’s MIT.
  • There’s a 350 million dollar grant from a philanthropist, which has been supplemented with 100 million dollars in public money.
  • I’m a member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. 
  • The demands that we have are ending the occupation and colonization all Arab lands and dismantling the apartheid wall.
  • Recognizing the fundamental rights of Arab / Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality.
  • Respecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and property as stipulated in UN resolution 194.
  • Technion is deeply complicit with Israel’s military and provides the military with technology to carry out ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
  • Participants in a joint military and university program for science students, who will later be integrated into the Army’s research and development units, wear uniforms throughout their years of study.
  • It’s particularly strong in developing robotic weapons systems, which include aerial drones, and unmanned combat vehicle technology.
  • I think Bloomberg is supportive of the apartheid system in Israel. He wouldn’t view this as a problem like much of the rest of the world does.
  • The crime of apartheid is an international crime against humanity.
  • In addition to aerial drones, Technion makes the Black D9 Bulldozer, it makes the Stealth UVA Drone, which is a drone that can fly almost 3000km without refueling.
  • It’s making something called the Dragonfly UVA mini-drone, which is a tiny drone with a 9 inch wingspan. It can fly into people’s bedroom windows and kill em.
  • Technion is involved in asymmetrical robotic warfare with faceless human targets who can be killed by remote control.
  • Israel is arguably the most racist country at this time, due to the apartheid system that it has.

Guest – David Klein, member of the Organizing Committee of the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (www.usacbi.org), and is a professor of mathematics at California State University, Northridge (CSUN).  He received  his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Cornell University. His professional interests include mathematical physics, climate science, and mathematics education in the public schools.  He is the faculty advisor for the campus student groups, Students for Justice in Palestine and the CSUN Green Party.  David Klein’s website

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CCR Lawsuit: Stop and Frisk NYC

Last year, a federal judge rejected a move by the City of New York to stop a lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights challenging the New York City Police Department’s Stop and Frisk policy. Judge Shir Scheindlin pointed out the seriousness of numerous claims that the NYPD disproportionately and illegally targeting communities of color.   In 2009 New York City, a record 576,394 people were stopped, 84 percent of whom were Black and Latino residents — although they comprise only about 26 percent and 27 percent of New York City’s total population respectively. The year 2009 was not an anomaly. Ten years of raw data obtained by court order from the New York City Police Department (NYPD) show that stop-and-frisks result in a minimal yield of weapons and contraband.

Attorney Darius Charney:

  • Stop and Frisk is a city wide epidemic.  We’ve gone from 90 thousand in 2002 to 700 thousand this year. They’re stopping 2000 people a day, primarily young males of color but also females of color.
  • There are really know criteria as far as we can tell. There are guidelines that have been laid out by the courts in the last forty years. The police don’t follow those guidelines. They’re suppose to reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.
  • They’re stopping people for what’s called “furtive movements” whatever that means.
  • The other one is “high crime neighborhood.” The court had ruled that this is unconstitional, you can’t use the basis of a high crime neighborhood to stop and search them.
  • Yet again, the police are doing that hundreds of thousands of times a year.
  • The two allegations we made is that the NYPD has a widespread policy and practice of stopping and frisking New Yorkers without reasonable suspicion which violates the fourth Amendment of the Constitution and then on the basis of race which violates the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
  • The blacker or browner that neighborhood is, the more stops that are going to be done in that neighborhood.
  • The other part is the weapon recovery rate, the police department justifies this program by saying, we’re trying to get guns off the street.
  • Last year in 2010, they stopped over 600 thousand people. The number of guns recovered in those 600 thousand stops was 1200 guns.
  • Relief sought in class action suit: Outside independent oversight of the police department.

Guest –  Darius Charney,  senior staff attorney in the Racial Justice/Government Misconduct Docket.  He is currently lead counsel on Floyd v. City of New York, a federal civil rights class action lawsuit challenging the New York Police Department’s unconstitutional and racially discriminatory stop-and-frisk practices, and Vulcan Society Inc. v. the City of New York, a Title VII class action lawsuit on behalf of African-American applicants to the New York City Fire Department which challenges the racially discriminatory hiring practices of the FDNY.

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Law and Disorder January 2, 2012

Afghanistan War, Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, Habeas Corpus, Human Rights, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power

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Updates:

  • Michael Smith: Obama Balance Sheet 2011

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Year End Look Back 2011 – Jim Lafferty

Looking back on 2011, amid the colossal economic failure and compounded erosion of civil liberties, there were slivers of bright light to note, such as the wonderful activism and momentum of the Occupy Wall Street movement.  The subsequent pulling together of activists, unions and lawyers marked this year in launching the foundation of a vital movement. Will this emerging movement continue to build and hold together to counter and restructure a corrupt and crumbling edifice of democracy?

Attorney Jim Lafferty:

  • I’m now 73, I’ve not been as excited and optimistic about a movement since the sixties as I am around the occupation movement.
  • It’s very exciting, it’s very broad and a lot deeper than the 1 percent would like to acknowledge.
  • We don’t have a great sense of history in this country, we certainly don’t learn it in our high schools.
  • Many of the young people that are at the heart and soul of this new movement are not the beneficiaries of a historical context of which to organize ourselves.
  • It’s proven that you don’t need that to make a splash.
  • When you go to the heart of capitalism itself which is what this movement does, its not surprising that they were met with fierce and brutal police reaction.
  • They were ignored by the press in the first week or two, much of the press has been a distortion of it since.
  • Reading the picket signs alone would tell you damn well what they want.
  • This is an economic injustice movement. Capitalism can’t produce the type of economic justice that these tens of thousands are demanding.
  • When Bonnie and I were arrested in New York at OWS, we even had cops saying to us, we’re part of the 99 percent.
  • People aren’t making it and can’t make it in this country given the skewed and unjust economic system that capitalism represents.
  • The US Census Bureau acknowledges that 100 million people are living in poverty or are in danger of slipping into poverty.
  • When a presidential election cycle comes up, anti-war movements, civil rights movements, womens’ rights movements, tend to leave the streets.
  • Don’t fall for the trap of electoral politics.
  • Phase 2: I don’t know if that (encampments) are a sustainable way of operating a movement in this country.
  • Here in L.A., one of the unions SIEU offered an indoor space to the movement where they can organize.
  • Last week we shut down a number of home foreclosure auction sales.

Guest – Jim Lafferty, Executive director of the National Lawyers Guild in Los Angeles and host of The Lawyers Guild Show on Pacifica’s KPFK 90. 7 FM to reflect back on 2011 and a look ahead.

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Occupy Wall St and the Brecht Forum

Kazembe Balagun,  an activist and cultural organizer from the Bronx discusses the activism within the Occupy Wall Street movement through the Education and Empowerment Committee.  Kazembe is also the program director at the Brecht Forum.

 Kazembe Balagun:

  • When I went down to Zuccotti, what I found was a vibrant community that had already started.
  • It did really speak to the frustration of the current economic and political climate.
  • As a public educator at the Brecht Forum you want to provide a context for these demonstrations.
  • You want to have a conversation with them, in that this is not the first time this happened.
  • We brought our comrade, Rick Wolff down there, and had a talk with almost 300 people.  All great movements have great literacies.
  • We have a movement where people are not only learning to speak in public but we’re all listening to each other.
  • Wall Street has been the site of oppression for all people. Primarily because the wall that was built outside Wall Street was built to keep the Native Americans outside the business district.
  • Black and brown communities have been the hardest hit in terms of foreclosure rates, stop and frisk. So what we have now is Occupy the Bronx, Occupy Sunset Park.
  • We can occupy ourselves, that we can step into a new way of public life.

Guest – Kazembe Balagun, program director at the Brecht Forum.

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Unrelenting Global Economic Crisis: A Doomsday View of 2012

Continuing the look back and now ahead to 2012, we’re glad to have back with us, Jim Petras,  author and former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York to discuss his latest article published on Global Research   Unrelenting Global Economic Crisis: A Doomsday View of 2012.  In this article Petras enumerates key events that will inevitably shape the next 12 months. He starts with – The Collapse of the European Union, then the recession deepens in United States, new wars erupt in the midst of this crisis.

These events, will lead to coming wars that will end America as we know it, meanwhile Europe sinks deep into austerity and class warfare intensifies.  Petras says, that in response mass movements will continue to build, recede and re-emerge. Protests and rebellions, social revolutions and political power across the globe will be important catalysts.

Jim Petras:

  • The economy has never really recovered from the recession. All the trends from the early Spring have been on the negative side. Instead of take off in 2012, we see the opposite taking place, slow down in investment, slow down in overall exports, slow down in financing the employment.
  • What we do see is a big profit for the speculators. The speculators are back with a vengence. Carlyle has reported over 12 billion dollars in profits for the first 11 months.
  • The speculators are working, the housing market is terrible.
  • The debt has skyrocketed so much, so much was thrown at the bank bailouts, that there arent’ enough resources to pull us out of this recession.
  • The Democrats are making deals with the Republicans to actually cut back on federal spending because of the deficit. I see us moving into recession by the end of Spring and heading toward worse a depression by the end of the year.
  • This is all going to be exacerbated by a move toward a war with Iran, which will push oil prices up over 150 USD/barrel. The powers that are moving toward that war particularly, the Zionist power configuration.
  • The consequences will be very very catastrophic for the economy of the United States.
  • Speculators are back in power, the housing market is negative, the job employment is negative, 2011 trends are moving down toward recession, I don’t see any counter moves.
  • Cumulative debt payments are negative, I don’t see any possibility of a injection of major public spending of which would turn this around or at least ameliorate it. Keep it at zero growth.
  • Keep us at stagnation, rather then negative territory.
  • Obama did nothing to stimulate a new structure in America which could take government support and move forward. What he did is pour the money into the people who caused the crisis on Wall Street.
  • After Obama gets elected you’re going to see the most horrendous attack on the social security programs, medicaid, medicare. He’s holding back because he wants to get elected.
  • He’s looking to slash and burn the only social programs that sustain American living standards for millions of workers who paid into this fund.
  • This isn’t an entitlement program, this social insurance that has been paid for by American workers.
  • He’s going to go into Iran, because he told the reformed Jews, all options are on the table, and he stationed an armada of Air Force smack facing Tehran. That’s a move toward war.
  • Read Netanyahu and Barack, the defense minister of Israel and the Prime Minister of Israel, then the message gets transmitted to the New York Times, then it gets transmitted to Washington, you get a third hand.
  • Why not look at the press releases coming out of Tel Aviv, if you want to know what tomorrow’s news is going to be.
  • I think we’re going to see something new coming out of this great discontent.

Guest – James Petras, author and former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York.

Law and Disorder December 19, 2011

Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, FBI Intrusion, Human Rights, Political Prisoner, Prison Industry, Surveillance, Targeting Muslims, Truth to Power

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Updates:

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Appeal Denied In Holy Land Foundation Case

Last week, the Fifth Circuit dismissed the appeal for the Holy Land Foundation case. This decision affirmed the conviction of Ghassan Elashi, the co-founder of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. As many listeners may know, the Holy Land Foundation was considered the largest Muslim charity in the United States before the Bush administration shut it down after the September 11 attacks. In May 2009, a federal judge in Dallas handed down sentences ranging from 15 to 65 years in prison to five of the charity’s founders and former fundraisers. Over a year before, a federal jury returned guilty verdicts on all 108 counts against the Foundation and the five former officers on charges of providing material support to Hamas after the U.S. government designated it a foreign terrorist organization in 1995. During that trial, the prosecution used unrelated video of suicide bombers to emotionally sway the jury.

Ghassan Elashi was then sentenced to 65 years in prison for giving material support in the form of humanitarian aid to Zakat committees – Palestinian charities in the West Bank and Gaza, that prosecutors were alleging were fronts for Hamas. Ghassan is being held in the Communications Management Unit in Marion, Illinois.

Noor Elashi:

  • One of the arguments the defense lawyers made is that USAID, which is a government agency sent money to the same exact Zakat Committees which are these distribution centers in Palestine that the Holy Land Foundation sent charity to.
  • That was their main charge, they were charged with giving material support in the form of humanitarian aid to Zakat Committees which the prosecutors were claiming were fronts for Hamas.
  • In their appeal, one of their main arguments is that these Zakat Committees received money from many NGOs including an American agency.
  • Another argument in the appeal was for the first time in US history, an expert witness who was an Israeli intelligence officer who testified under a fake name was allowed to testify under a pseudonym.
  • My father recently had a phone call ban, because he put his name on a yoga mat, and it was considered destruction of government property.
  • Our defense attorneys are not going to quit. They will ask the entire panel of appellate judges to re-hear the case, if that is denied, they’ll take the case to the Supreme Court.
  • The foreign policy and politics of this country have been very favorable to Israel.
  • FreedomToGive.com

Guest – Noor Elashi – the daughter of Holy Land Foundation prisoner Ghassan Elashi. She is a writer based in Dallas, Texas. After receiving a Bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of North Texas, she worked for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. In July 2008, she won the 3rd place Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Award for her manuscript titled “Displaced,” which she plans to expand into a memoir about the displacement of three generations of Palestinians: her grandmother, father, and herself. She can be reached at noorelashi@gmail.com.

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Event In Philadelphia Marks 30 Years of  Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Incarceration

On December 7, the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office announced that it will not seek another death sentence for Mumia Abu-Jamal. Under Pennsylvania law, Mr. Abu-Jamal will now be sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas.   The National Lawyers Guild commented that while there is overwhelming doubt about what the state claims to be the facts in this case, even those allegations never supported a capital charge. That it has taken three decades to remove death from the table is astonishing.

The Guild has long maintained that Mr. Abu-Jamal is entitled to a new and fair trial. Procedural irregularities plagued his case from the outset, including blatant constitutional violations, from the judge allowing the prosecution to admit evidence of his affiliation with the Black Panther Party, in violation of the Supreme Court case Dawson v. Delaware, to the use of a faulty sentencing form that misled jurors during the penalty phase, in violation of the Supreme Court case Mills v. Maryland.

A great deal of relevant evidence has never been reviewed by any court, much less presented to a jury. This evidence includes several photographs of the crime scene which impeach the testimony of a police officer who was a key eyewitness and proof that another individual was present, and fled, the scene of the shooting.

Mr. Abu-Jamal was charged at a time when, it was later revealed, there was extensive corruption within the Philadelphia Police Department. In 1995, then-District Attorney Lynne Abraham promised the city that she would dismiss any case in which there was evidence of police perjury or purposeful misreporting of facts. Given the history of police misconduct in Philadelphia when Abu-Jamal was arrested, and the specific instances of police perjury in his case, the National Lawyers Guild has urged current District Attorney Seth Williams to act on his predecessor’s unfulfilled pledge.

Two days after the DA’s announcement, and commemorating International Human Rights Day, a free forum was held at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia to mark the 30th anniversary of Mumia Abu-Jamal’s incarceration, justice.  Twelve-hundred Mumia supporters met to reinvigorate the movement for justice for Abu-Jamal and to say no to life in prison for the political prisoner. “Because for 30 years Abu-Jamal has been unconstitutionally imprisoned in death row torture, justice for Mumia will not be served by life imprisonment, but by freedom,” said Dr. Johanna Fernandez, professor of history at Baruch College of the City University of New York and a co-producer of the forum. Fernandez wrote and produced a documentary, which debuted at the Constitution Center in 2010 on Abu-Jamal’s case. “Justice on Trial: The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal,” examines evidence pointing to Abu-Jamal’s innocence and exposes the inequities of the American justice system.

Speakers: 

The December 9 forum was co-sponsored by Educators for Mumia Abu-Jamal, the National Lawyers Guild and International Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal.

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Law and Disorder November 28, 2011

Civil Liberties, Criminalizing Dissent, FBI Intrusion, Human Rights, Truth to Power

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Updates:

  • New York Historical Society Recognizes Henry Kissinger, Co-host Michael Smith Resigns.
  • Wikileaks Cable: Assistant Secretary Posner Discusses Operation Cast Lead With IDF
  • Who Killed Che? How The CIA Got Away With Murder – Book Tour Continues
  • OWS Precursor: Resurrection City – Michael Ratner On Jesse Jackson’s Radio Show
  • Occupy Dartmouth: Heidi Boghosian

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Occupy Hudson Valley and Bard College Student Movement

Activist and senior at Bard College, Ana Ratner joins the discussion on Occupy Colleges student movement in the Hudson Valley. Ana,  Michael Ratner’s daughter, discusses the mistreatment of workers at the college, specifically employment contractors.

Ana Ratner:

  • I think people on their own (at Bard College) had been concerned about the Occupy movement. It was around that time when people found each other and wanted to do something, weekly teach ins, general assemblies.
  • At Bard we have a sub-contractor called Aramark .They treat their workers very badly.
  • Through the Occupy movement more kids on campus are becoming concerned about worker’s rights and financial transparency and where our money is going, how it effects and who it effects.
  • Occupy Poughkeepsie, a local movement, trying to connect the regions in the Hudson Valley. OccupyHudsonValley. They have tents and a kitchen.
  • At Bard College: until the Occupy movement, no one really came together. I’m learning about the whole community at Bard.
  • For the most part the workers are mostly invisible, they clean your dorm and campus. There’s a group called the Student Labor Dialogue.
  • Aramark was kicked off at Bard College, now they want to hire another contractor.

Guest – Ana Ratner, activist and senior at Bard College. Ana has been active with the Occupy Colleges student movement and Occupy Wall Street.
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Occupy Colleges Los Angeles and Beyond

Last week, hundreds of students walk out of class and assembled in Union Square Park to demonstrate continued support with the Occupy Wall Street movement. The protests in New York City was part of a full week of student organized action that culminated in a march to Baruch College.  This was where the CUNY Board of Trustees had met to vote on a possible tuition increase. Police and students clashed in the lobby in massive brawls, 15 people were arrested.

Natalie Abrams:

  • OccupyColleges.org is all of the facilitators, it helps inform college students about the occupy movement.
  • Ongoing occupy colleges action such as walk outs, teach ins, strikes, demonstrations
  • Monday November 28th – In solidarity with UC Davis , UC Berkeley, CUNY Schools and all students who are defending their right to protest against rising tuition cost and out of control student debt. We ask you to STRIKE! No work, no school.
  • We’re also circulating a pledge of non violence both for students and the UC Davis Presidents of all the eleven schools to commit to non-violence against students for a peaceful demonstration.
  • Its gets harder to enforce non violence as they continue to hurt us.
  • Non violence is our weapon.
  • We’ve noticed that its all different types of schools, its private schools, its public schools, its community colleges, state colleges, the higher university levels, we really see the whole gamut of students that are joining us.
  • Its horizontal, like the regular Occupy Wall St movement runs.
  • We’re fighting the rising cost of tuition, the student loan fiasco and the fact that we have a lack of opportunities after graduation.
  • Michael Ratner:  Hunter College had no tuition from 1874 to 1975. One hundred years without tuition, so we see the shift that’s going on.
  • It’s 3 times higher than it was in 1980.
  • One of my first points of action is that these administrators need to take pay cuts.
  • A lot of us got together from Occupy L.A. and from some past activist groups and we saw that New York schools were calling for a city wide walk out on October 5th and we noticed there wasn’t a national presence.
  • We called for a national walk out and had 100 schools participate, almost 8000 students walk out. The interest from all of the students compelled us to continue with this movement. We give ideas to schools on how to set up their occupation. We want to have a very large teach in in the early Spring.
  • When somebody else gets tired, somebody else is there to take their place.
  • There are always new school calling us and signing up.
  • I was called by the student tea party, who were horrified by the violence. The student tea party condemned the violence that happened at UC Davis.
  • When we’re a non-violent movement the only way we can lose is by giving up. – Gene Sharpe

Guest – Natalia Abrams, one of the full time facilitators with the OccupyColleges.org website.

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University Faculty, Staff and Students Disgusted At Direction Of California State University

Each year, the state of California makes cuts to the California State University system budget and each year students have responded with angry protests.  This year however the protests were much bigger partly because of the Occupy Wall Street movement and the ongoing police brutality against students and protesters.  The numbers are staggering, tuition has doubled in the last few years and the California State University Board of Trustees recently approved a 9 percent tuition increase in addition to cuts in courses and student services.  Next year, the California legislature is set to impose another 200 million in higher education cuts.  Meanwhile, college students from all over the nation have organized four nationwide acts of support with the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Lillian Taiz:

  • We have about 430 thousand students in the California State University system.
  • The number one struggle we’re having (faculty) is the defunding, the starvation of public higher education. That creates one set of problems.
  • Piled on top of that is what we consider, misplaced priorities. At a time when resources aren’t that available, you really have to be careful and targeted in how you use the resources you have.
  • The students, staff and faculty are disgusted on how the leadership has a focus on their one percent.
  • There’s an enormous resonance with the Occupy movement because these are good middle class jobs that are being destroyed.
  • Our students are watching their parents get shoved out of the middle class and hoping their education is a pathway into a decent life.
  • People have finally emerged from the shock of what’s been happening, and getting angrier and angrier and getting less tolerant of adjusting to it.
  • Demand: that the resources that are available be directed at the core mission of the university.
  • We’re all over the state and our faculty have been part of Occupy Oakland and everwhere.
  • We’ve got to take back more power and authority over our own destiny.
  • Student loans are crushing our students, the leadership of the CSU and the UC seems to think the answer to their problems is privatizing the university by shifting economic responsibility to students, faculty and staff.
  • They’re using us like ATM machines. We’re all being exploited and asked to be unwilling donors to the university.
  • Occupy Wall Street has opened up a door to a conversation that is so long overdue.

Guest – Lillian Taiz, President of the California Faculty Association, the union that represents the 23,000 faculty members of the California State University system and to clarify, this is (not the University of California system where the pepper spray incident took place).

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