The Bluemel Reader

In a White Room on Fire

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 19:17:00 +0000

“I’ll wait in this place where the sun never shines | Wait in this place where the shadows run from themselves.” – Cream, “White Room”

We sat on his white sofa, Brian and me ...

It was an evening of board games and booze. The party was for people to drink and have silly fun playing. However the relationship was never based on equality. The booze was dominant, a top to our bottoms, a large, muscled-bruiser to our frail, yielding sobriety.

And we, Brian and me, were stoned, stoned, stoned ...

The living room where we sat was a creamy haze of off-white carpeting and walls. Dim lights obscured the bright color. A cloud of smoke hung over the room, stinging eyes and attacking lungs like a Beijing smog.

We sat with hands resting on our thighs, sinking into ivory cushions, looking straight ahead. In the peripheral I could see Brian. His dark skin reflecting defiantly against the milky couch. Tall, willowy, his form a pencil-thin apparition – a gentle Tahitian vanilla bean taking a respite on a waft of Alabama cotton.

In our forward line of vision were girls buzzing like manic bumble bees, frantically spewing gibberish too fast for even the psychotic to follow. Board games and their tiny pieces littered the floor, but no one played. They bounced from booze bottle to booze bottle, hovering over them like flowers, sucking out the last bits of the throat-burning nectar and vibrating ever faster.

And we, Brian and me, were stoned, stoned, stoned ...

“Oh my God! The room is on fire,” said one of the bumbles.

And so it was. An adjacent room was becoming engulfed in flames. The bumbles buzzed louder.

“We need to do something,” said another bumble.

Good idea, I thought, why don’t you get to that.

The bumbles ignored us, to busy with the profane. Brian didn’t move. The man was a statue with his third eye wide open. Deep into a cosmic download of matter, energy, space and time, he uttered no words. If he could, no mortal could keep up with whatever crazed wisdom his pineal gland was squirting out and greasing his synapses with.

I reached for the telephone on the end table next to me. (Sweet ice-cold Christ, does everything in this house need to be white – even the phone? I thought.) I dialed 9-1-1.

“9-1-1?”

“I’m in a white room, and it is on fire.”

Brian slowly nodded his head. He agreed, his head bobbing like an oil derrick in Long Beach, rusty and forgotten.

I hung up the phone. There was nothing more to say.

While Brian and I meditated, waiting for the fire department to arrive, the bumbles managed to quell the flames of destruction. They weren’t graceful about it. What with all the screaming, jumping and running, it was almost impossible to think. However, they were effective.

“Well, that’s taken care of,” I said.

Brian agreed with another oil-pumping nod.

“Brian, you need to clean up,” said his mom.

Without my noticing, she had apparently been in the room the entire time. She sat in the corner, serene as a summer breeze, in a bleached Victorian-era chair, with all the presence of the hookah-smoking caterpillar from “Alice in Wonderland.”

“Who are YOU?” said the caterpillar.

Where the hell did that woman come from? I wondered. She wasn’t there moments ago. Was she supernatural? And was she stoned too? I was afraid to ask. It wasn’t the questions I feared, but the answers. Let’s be honest, things were strange enough as they were.

Brian came back from the kitchen, rags in one hand, a spray-bottle in the other. I grabbed a rag too, feeling the need to help a friend.

The fire had left a fine soot on everything. As we began dusting, Brian spraying the dinning room table, and us wiping it down, I saw through the living room window a large, flashing ruby park in front of the house. Firefighters poured out, grabbing equipment and running to the door.

Someone should have called and told them the fire was out, I thought. But Brian and I continued to dust. We couldn’t be bothered. We were stoned, stoned, stoned, and each wipe with a dust rag was an eternity of physics lessons to be learned.

Someone had let the ruby-riders in – probably a bumble. Men burdened by heavy equipment poured into the house. Oxygen tanks, axes, helmets, two-way radios. Heavy boots laden with ash from five-alarms past punched the white carpet with each step. Brian’s momma ain’t gonna like that, I thought. Now there is more cleaning to do.

And we, Brian and me, were stoned, stoned, stoned ...

On marketing

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 05:06:00 +0000

[Editor’s Note: The following was written in December 2010 as part of the author’s final assignment in his communications class. He got an A.]

I am a little hard-pressed to think of examples where advertising has had a positive affect on the American public. In fact, I would go so far as to say that advertising only has a negative impact. Although, let me make clear, there is a difference between a local business advertising a sale or service versus a multi-national corporation twisting the social sciences to manipulate people into buying their product. Small businesses lack the resources to hire “the best and the brightest.” Their advertising is largely an announcement of their existence or a sale on their products. Ads such as “Eat at Joe’s” or “Grapes now only 99 cents per pound” are harmless. However, the kind of advertising we get from Chevron, Nike or Coke-a-Cola is a different story.

In his 1928 book “Propaganda,” the father of public relations, Edward Bernays, elucidated the intentions of the marketing and public relations industries. “The minority has discovered a powerful help in influencing majorities,” he wrote. “It has been found possible so to mold the mind of the masses that they will throw their newly gained strength in the desired direction.” At this point we ceased being people and became consumers. We entered the age of propaganda. Bernays’ penchant was in subverting our democracy, as is evidenced by his work in the U.S. Committee on Public Information where he sold World War I to a pacific American population. Johnny got his gun and Edward Bernays got his paycheck.

The same principles are now used to sell products. As a result, we live in an age of illusion where people believe they are attaining an identity, community and culture through the products corporations sell them. In a recent holiday ad for Kohl’s, we are told “Give, save and be merry.” It’s not clothing they are selling, but happiness. Similarly, AT&T offers a holiday gift guide saying, “Thoughtful gifts make you more thoughtful.” Antonyms for “thoughtful” are: selfish, boorish and inconsiderate. Instead of phones, AT&T is offering me the opportunity to be a kind, comforting person who anticipates the needs of others. That’s quite a product!

We are so convinced by advertising that tells us something is missing from our lives, that we now buy to “become” something. In his book “Democracy Incorporated,” political philosopher Sheldon Wolin likened advertisers to evangelists. “Almost every product promises to change your life: it will make you more beautiful, cleaner, more sexually alluring, and more successful,” he writes. “Born again, as it were.” As any advertising agency or church can tell you, there is no profit in contentment. Advertising convinces the beautiful to feel ugly, the healthy to feel sick and the cheerful to feel anxious and depressed. If that were not bad enough, they in turn, like con men, sell us their snake oil.

Advertising is the art of deception and manipulation. It is difficult to imagine any good coming from such a thing. Capitalism has no morality. Profit is its only guiding principle. Therefore, advertisers have no limit to the depths they will go to extract another dime from the people who manufacture the goods they sell. They are the “little Eichmanns” of the corporate state. Not suggesting that consumer’s are without responsibility, but advertisers convince us to buy food that is poisonous, drink spring water that is no better than tap and drive sport utility vehicles that are dangerous to drivers and pedestrians. If our laws supported it, an advertiser would sell arsenic as a cure for insomnia. By no means are individual advertisers bad people though. Their jobs are merely the outcrop of a profoundly sick society. Inner and outer peace is impossible when we are being inundated by manipulative messages that tell us we are not complete. As Charles Bowden wrote in his book “Blood Orchid,” “The problem is that we cannot imagine a future where we possess less but are more.”

Obey the market, build a mosque

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 06:07:00 +0000

Dear Republicans,

Recently your ilk has been much bothered about the construction of a mosque at “ground zero.” I know how much this sort of thing upsets you. Muslims, they are not Christians. Enough said.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) spoke of this issue on Fox News. I assume he, to a greater or lesser degree, speaks for your people. “It's unwise to build a mosque at the site where 3,000 Americans lost their lives as a result of a terrorist attack,” he said.

Does that sound about right?

And Republican campaign consultant Ed Rollins stressed the debate over the mosque is not about the law, but emotion, which should take precedent over the Constitution.

“Intellectually, the president may be right,” he said, “but this is an emotional issue, and people who lost kids, brothers, sisters, fathers, what have you, do not want that mosque in New York ...”

Okay, so you’re not very fond of the Bill of Rights. That’s cool. Neither is the Democratic Party. However, I must contend, you are violating a core principle of your party by trying to stop the construction of this mosque at “ground zero.”

You are violating your most sacred cow, the thing you care about more than anything else – the free market. You see, you are implying the government should intervene and stop business from taking place. However, such government intervention goes against your core belief in having an unregulated market place.

Your God, the market, has decided that a mosque shall be built near your holy site, “ground zero.” The market is demanding money be exchanged for the delivery of goods and services. But you are disobeying your God by trying to stop this.

And in a time when the economy is slow! How dare you? Building mosques creates jobs and makes wealthy people even richer.

Yes, I know, you say you’re not opposed to the construction of the mosque, you just don’t want it on “hallowed ground.” You would like the mosque to be built somewhere else less offensive to you.

Well, you can’t let your emotions get in the way of free-market economics. Right? After all, you have been convincing Americans for decades to push their emotions aside and not give a damn about their fellow countrymen, because such government programs, like welfare, were not economically feasible.

Now, too, is not the time for emotions.

Creating a government agency to thwart business based upon your collective emotions is no way to run an economy. Though I’m more of a Marxist, I think Milton Friedman would agree with me on this one.

Oh, and property rights. You people love property rights. I think you should reconsider telling people what they can or cannot build on their own land based off of your hurt feelings. It’s kind of hard to run a capitalist society that way.

So, lay off the mosque. Stop interfering with the free exchange of goods and services. Stop violating property rights. Obey the market. And shut up.

Israeli-Palestinian conflict comes to Los Angeles

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 18:12:00 +0000

Los Angeles became embroiled in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Friday when activists, protesting Israel’s Monday attack on a flotilla carrying humanitarian aid destined for Gaza, were met by pro-Israel demonstrators.

The two factions gathered in front of the Israeli consulate on Wilshire Boulevard with the pro-Palestinian group on the south side of the street and the pro-Israel group on the north side.

The event was fraught with emotion and occasional clashes. Demonstrators on both sides taunted one another with insults and threats. On a few occasions, pro-Israel demonstrators would cross Wilshire Boulevard and engage the other crowd. Minor skirmishes of pushing and shoving would ensue, prompting LAPD to break up the crowd.

According to LAPD Capt. Eric Davis, neither group of demonstrators possessed a permit. However, police did not make an issue of it. Instead, LAPD chose to keep the two groups separated by Wilshire Boulevard as best as possible and allow the demonstrations to continue.

The event centered around Israel’s handling of a six-ship flotilla that attempted to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza by delivering humanitarian aid. The lead ship, a Turkish vessel called the Mavi Marmara, was boarded by Israeli commandos.

What happened next is still a point of contention.

Passengers aboard the Mavi Marmara claim the soldiers began shooting at them while rappelling onto the ship from helicopters. The Israelis argue their soldiers were defending themselves from attack.

The violence resulted in nine Turkish passengers being killed – one a U.S. citizen of Turkish decent. According to the Guardian, an autopsy revealed the victims were “peppered with 9mm bullets, many fired at close range” to the head. [1] Forty-eight other passengers were also shot.

The incident has resulted in international condemnation of the violence with Turkey withdrawing its ambassador from Israel.

As of today, the Los Angeles Times reported that Israel intercepted the Rachel Corrie, another humanitarian relief ship attempting to break the blockade. [2] It is reported that the event occurred without incident.

The U.N. reports that “the food security of [Gaza’s] 1.5 million people has been steadily deteriorating since Israeli sanctions in June 2007 including a suspension of all exports, a decrease of imports and tight restrictions on the type of goods permitted to enter through crossings...” [3]

According to the U.N.’s World Food Programme, 16 percent of Gaza’s residents are undernourished. [4]

However, Roz Rothstein, co-founder and CEO of StandWithUs, a pro-Israel advocacy group that helped organize Friday’s counter-demonstration, disagrees with the U.N.’s assessments.

“The Palestinians have the food they need,” she said. “There is a glut. The price of food is dropping.”

Rothstein says she does not find the U.N. to be a credible source due to heavy Islamic influence. “Fifty-six Islamic countries control the U.N.,” she said. “They have ceased to be a credible institution.”

The Israeli consulate’s Web site also claims there is sufficient food getting into Gaza, saying tons of milk powder, baby food, rice and wheat are getting to the people of the occupied territory.

“There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” states the the consulate’s Web site. “Since January 2009, more than 1 million tons of humanitarian aid have been transferred. That is approximately one ton of aid for each man, woman and child in Gaza.” [5]

Mazen Almoukdad, a member of Al-Awda, a Palestinian rights organization, backed the U.N.’s statements. “Gaza is under siege,” he said. “For someone to claim they have enough food is racist.”

ANSWER Coalition organizer Michael Prysner says that Gaza is in dire straights because of the blockade.

“Eighty percent of Gaza receives aid in food,” he said. “The Israelis don’t let in medicine and construction supplies. The blockade makes Gaza a giant concentration camp.”

Friday’s demonstration began at 4 p.m. and ended around 7:45 p.m. Despite short tempers and some scuffles instigated by both sides, no injuries or arrests were reported. LAPD briefly detained one individual for throwing a water bottle from a car at an opposing group of demonstrators. No arrest was made.

NOTES:
1. Booth, Robert. “Gaza flotilla activists were shot in head at close range.” Guardian. 4 June 2010. 5 June 2010. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/04/gaza-flotilla-activists-autopsy-results
2. Sanders, Edmund. “Israelis intercept aid ship without bloodshed.” Los Angeles Times. 5 June 2010. 5 June 2010. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/middleeast/la-fg-gaza-flotilla-20100606,0,7822910.story
3. “Occupied Palestinian Territory.” U.N. World Food Programme. 5 June 2010. http://www.wfp.org/countries/occupied-palestinian-territory
4. Ibid.
5. “FACTS: The Gaza Flotilla And The Maritime Blockad Of Gaza.” Consulate General of Israel, Los Angeles. 31 May 2010. 5 June 2010. http://www.israella.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=468:the-gaza-flotilla-and-the-maritime-blockade-of-gaza&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=198&lang=en

Photos by Dan Bluemel

Texas sanitizes history, further dumbing-down America

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 28 May 2010 03:05:00 +0000

The Texas State Board of Education recently approved new guidelines for social studies and history classes. The board, made up of social conservatives, had an agenda, which was the elimination of a perceived liberal bias in textbooks.

Their decision guarantees to make an already dumb nation, even dumber.

Among some of the changes to textbooks, the Texas “curriculum plays down the role of Thomas Jefferson among the founding fathers, questions the separation of church and state, and claims that the U.S. government was infiltrated by Communists during the Cold War,” according to the Washington Post. [1]

The boards decision is significant. Texas is the largest buyer of textbooks and sets the tone for publishers across the country, thus affecting how subjects are taught.

According to The Nation, “...the state's 4.7 million students often move to the top of the market, presenting economy of scale discounts, which tempt other school systems to buy the same materials.” [2]

Daniel Czitrom, a professor of history at Mount Holyoke College, argued that conservatives are out of step with how history is taught today.

“They want an American history that ignores or marginalizes African-Americans, women, Latinos, immigrants and popular culture,” he wrote in an article for CNN. [3] “Rather than genuinely engaging the fundamental conflicts that have shaped our past, they prefer a celebratory history that denies those fundamental conflicts.”

But this is really nothing new. According to James W. Loewen’s book “Lies My Teacher Told Me,” as far back as 1925 the American Legion had elucidated what an ideal textbook should be like. [4]

They said such a textbook must “inspire the children with patriotism,” “be careful to the tell the truth optimistically” and “speak chiefly of success.”

Inspiring patriotism is important. How else is our ruling elite going to find cannon fodder for the next war?

But you need to brainwash children with a highly sanitized version of history before they can say, “God bless America” with a straight face. And our right-wing brothers and sisters are all too willing to facilitate this propaganda system that keeps so many of our wonderful wars going.

Thus it should be of no surprise that the Texas State Board of “Educational Destruction” would want President Ronald Reagan to have more textbook attention. Here is where “telling the truth optimistically” goes into high gear.

Ronald Reagan is a man who definitely should be in America’s textbooks – not as a venerated leader, but as a war criminal, just another psychopath in a long line of murderous U.S. presidents.

Under Reagan, the CIA and U.S. military led bloody operations in Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua and El Salvador to oppress progressive social and economic policies. There was murder, rape, torture and disappearings. U.S. trained death squads terrorized populations. [5]

Social justice activist and KPFK radio host Blase Bonpane has said, “Unnecessary war is the legacy of the Reagan Administration.” [6]

But that version of history will never get into our textbooks. It might inspire you to think critically and ask tough questions. In other words, be a savvy citizen.

Instead of educating us, conservatives are engaging in a “terrible trivialization of history, contributing to the dumbing-down of what students learn,” according to Czitrom. [7]

They praise capitalism like they praise Jesus and they want us not to think any differently.

In the eyes of these dingbats, Thomas Jefferson is less of an American because he wasn’t a Bible-thumper, but a logical secularist. They want to blur the lines between church and state, because, let’s face it, there is a segment of the population that would love nothing more than an American-style Ayatollah in the White House making sure we pray to Jesus five times a day.

And sadly, for these miserable sods, the Cold War is not over. To them, commies still exist, waiting in the shadows to subvert Wall Street and our precious, soulless consumer culture.

But conservatives and the Texas State Board of Education must realize that American history is messy. It is a hodgepodge of beautiful and ugly truths. To teach our children a sanitized version of U.S. history is doing them a great disservice.

In the end, their textbooks are simply propaganda. Its result is a brainwashed citizenry that does not question, for they have no accurate historical context with which to think.

For the sake of the republic they claim to love so much, the Texas State Board of Education must rescind its decision.

NOTES:
1. Birnbaum, Michael. “Historians speak out against proposed Texas textbook changes.” Washington Post. 18 Mar. 2010. 26 May 2010. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/17/AR2010031700560.html
2. Rothberg, Peter. “Texas Revises History.” The Nation. 22 Mar. 2010. 27 May 2010. http://www.thenation.com/blog/texas-revises-history
3. Czitrom, Daniel. “Texas school board whitewashes history.” CNN. 22 Mar. 2010. 27 May 2010. http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/03/18/czitrom.texas.textbooks/index.html
4. Loewen, James W. “Lies My Teacher Told Me.” New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. Pg. 272.
5. Blum, William. “Rogue State.” Monroe, Maine: Common Courage, 2005.
6. Bonpane, Blase. “Civilization is Possible.” Los Angeles: Red Hen, 2008. Pg. 18.
7. Czitrom.
*Image taken from The Atlantic Wire, 27 May 2010. http://atlanticwire.theatlantic.com/opinions/view/opinion/Cartoon-Texas-Textbooks-Revisit-the-Alamo-2896

CIA drone attacks are criminal

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 15 May 2010 04:34:00 +0000

Last week, the Los Angeles Times reported that, since 2008, the CIA received "secret permission" to kill "suspected militants whose names are not known, as part of a dramatic expansion of its campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan's border region." [1]

It should be deeply troubling to us all that the CIA has been given permission to murder unidentified people who are merely "suspected" of militancy.

CIA spokesperson George Little declined to comment to the Santa Monica College Corsair on what criteria the agency employs to determine if someone is a militant. However, to assuage any fear of wrongdoing, he did address the agency's behavior in drone attacks.

“The CIA’s counterterrorism operations are conducted with extreme precision and in strict accord with the law,” he said.

The agency's assertion they are following the law is not enough to provide solace. The CIA has a checkered history of coups d’état (Iran 1953, Congo 1965, Chile 1973, among others); subverting democratic elections (in Italy, Greece and Central America, for example); and human experimentation like Project MK-ULTRA, where the CIA covertly influenced the mental state of American and Canadian test subjects.

In short, the CIA is a criminal organization that should have been disbanded years ago. It is the antithesis of democracy, human rights and morality. And it should never be trusted.

The House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs has recently debated the legality of the CIA participating in such attacks, considering the agency is a civilian, rather than a military, organization.

However, they are missing a very important point. It is wrong to murder people for "suspecting" them of something. The CIA's activity opens the door wide-open to killing innocent human beings, something that has already been well documented in America's war on the people of Afghanistan.

Human rights activist and Office of the Americas Director Blase Bonpane says CIA drone attacks work against the U.S.'s stated goals in the region. "It's creating tremendous opposition with the Taliban and other groups," he said. "It's counter-productive."

So much for winning "hearts and minds," but that really never was their intention. The CIA has an objective all its own, and legality, morality and human life have nothing to do with it.

NOTES:
1. Cloud, David S. “CIA drones have broader list of targets.” Los Angeles Times. 5 May 2010. 14 May 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/may/05/world/la-fg-drone-targets-20100506
*Image taken from Eideard, 14 May 2010. http://eideard.wordpress.com/2009/12/04/c-i-a-continues-to-expand-drone-attacks-inside-pakistan/

BP picketed over Gulf oil spill

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 15 May 2010 04:15:00 +0000

Demonstrators picketed a British Petroleum gas station in Los Angeles Wednesday, May 12, to demand the U.S. government seize the company's assets to pay for clean-up and provide compensation for those affected by the ongoing oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

Activists chose BP's signature "green" Arco gas station, located at the corner of Olympic Blvd. and Robertson Blvd., as the site of their protest.

The "Seize BP" campaign was initiated by the ANSWER Coalition, an anti-war and social justice organization. According to the group, over 10,000 people have signed the Seize BP petition calling for the confiscation and reinvestment of assets.

The demonstration occurred on the second day BP America executives, along with Transocean, Halliburton and Cameron executives, were questioned by a Congressional subcommittee over the Deepwater Horizon oil rig leak. Responsibility was a point of debate amongst company executives during the questioning, which President Obama has since called “finger-pointing” and a “ridiculous spectacle.”

Los Angeles Valley College student Abel Gamboa attended the demonstration because of his anger over the Congressional hearings.

"It's ridiculous," he said. "It's their equipment. How can it not be their mess? I mean, we're taught when you make a mess, you clean it up, right?"

Santa Monica College Students for Social Justice President Cameron Quinn released a statement backing the “Seize BP” campaign.

“I support this demand and further insist that the government use the seized assets to fund a comprehensive energy plan that ends investment in and subsidies for fossil fuels, and starts building the green energy infrastructure we desperately need,” he said. “Our planet, our people, and our politics can no longer bear the odious burden of fossil fuels.”

ANSWER organizer Ian Thompson was dismayed by BP's reluctance to answer questions related to compensation. "They said they would pay for everything, but then they hedged," he said. "It comes from an insatiable desire for profits. I think people want to be greener, but I don't think BP does."

The "Seize BP" campaign comes at a time when BP's profits doubled to $6.1 billion in the first quarter of 2010 compared to the same quarter in 2009. The Obama administration has asked Congress for $118 million to assist with clean-up efforts in the Gulf. The White House expects to be reimbursed by BP.

Santa Monica College student and ANSWER member Seth Braslow attended the demonstration to demand that BP pay their share of reparations. "There is no reason tax payers should have to pay for the oil spill," he said.

Braslow, a history major, took issue with BP America chairman and president Lamar McKay, who qualified his companies pledge to pay for damages from the oil leak. McKay told the subcommittee his company would pay only "legitimate" claims, but did not explain exactly what such a claim would be.

"[BP] are in no position to define legitimacy," said Braslow.

ANSWER organizer Cory Esguerra cited BP's profits as an impetus for the campaign. "These companies make billions of dollars in pure profit and you can see how much they are leaving the little guy out," she said.

The gas station was shut down for two hours while activists picketed. Called the “Green Curve" gas station, it features solar panels, a rainwater-catching canopy to irrigate plants, among other eco-friendly aspects.

According to BP's Web site, the gas station was built to showcase their "commitment to balancing society's need for energy with a responsible approach to the environment." It remains the only gas station of its kind built by the oil company.

The LA demonstration was part of a nationally coordinated action. Protests against the oil company occurred in several cities, including New York and Washington, D.C.

LA Valley College Students for Global Justice President Andrea Barrera attended the picket to give her support to the campaign. She was not surprised by oil-drilling executives’ unwillingness to own up to the oil spill figuring it is the nature of capitalism.

“They don’t want to take responsibility for something that will cost them,” she said. “I just want someone to clean up the spill and not put the burden on the tax payer.”

Photos by Dan Bluemel.

Lecture on Obama’s foreign policy raises debate

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 15 May 2010 04:08:00 +0000

Speaking to over 60 people at Santa Monica College on Friday, May 7, former KCRW talk show host and retired SMC history professor Harvey Stromberg gave a lecture on Barack Obama’s foreign policy.

Stromberg took an unusual approach in his lecture. He explained U.S.-international relations through the eyes of Barack Obama – even speaking in first person as the president. “I will tell you, speaking as Obama, what I’ve done in office for a year and a half,” he said. “I want you to understand from his point of view.”

The lecture’s central argument was that Obama has ushered in a new foreign policy that differs from George W. Bush’s go-it-alone, unilateral approach. He cited instances such as Obama shaking the hand of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, making overtures to Cuba and sending an ambassador to Syria as evidence of this.

The lecture, which was hosted by the SMC Associates, ended with a brief Q-and-A and a reception where attendees could socialize. In attendance at the lecture were AS President Cameron Henton and AS President-elect Tiffany Inabu. Henton, who had Stromberg as a professor for History 11, says he always enjoyed Stromberg’s teaching style.

“He was great,” said Henton. “He always played the devil’s advocate in class.”

Students for Social Justice President Cameron Quinn, questions Stromberg's assertion on Obama. “I don’t think it’s a new foreign policy,” he said. “It’s hard to have a new foreign policy when you are fighting all the old wars.”

Quinn cited U.S. belligerence toward Iran and the escalation of the Afghanistan war as evidence that Obama has not structurally changed U.S. foreign relations.

When it came to the issue of Iraq, Stromberg argued that Obama will make good on his campaign promise to remove U.S. soldiers from the country by the end of 2011. “The pressure on Obama to leave is going to be tremendous,” he said. “Obama wants to leave. He sees it as Bush’s war.”

But Quinn feels that is a difficult argument to make, considering the United States still has soldiers in Germany and Japan 65 years after WWII and has built what many say are permanent military bases in Iraq. And then there is the issue of military contractors and mercenaries, such as Xe Services, formerly known as Blackwater, who are not part of the withdrawal equation.

“If you take out all the combat troops, what’s left?” he said. “Plenty of non-combat troops and military bases. That really doesn’t sound to me like a withdrawal from Iraq.”

Stromberg also spent time discussing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He says Israeli settlements and the Palestinian right of return are holding up the peace process. The Palestinian right of return refers to U.N. General Assembly resolution 194, which states that refugees should be allowed to return to their homes as soon as possible and compensated for losses.

Stromberg feels the U.S. has a legitimate role to play in the Middle East peace process despite the U.S. subsidizing the Israeli military and the Israeli lobby’s significant influence in Washington, D.C. He cited Obama’s first trip to the Middle East where he purposely did not visit Israel to send a message to Arab nations.

“He is trying to be more even-handed,” he said.

SMC Political Science Professor Christina Caldwell says it is too early to make any pronouncements about Obama’s foreign policy. Since taking office, she says, Obama has focused more on domestic issues than international relations.

“The examples of some overtures toward Cuba, a new ambassador, shaking hands with Hugo Chavez aren’t in my opinion anything that is a major change,” said Caldwell. “They are sort of symbolic more than anything else.”

Photo by Dan Bluemel.

One week in April: A brief media analysis

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Mon, 10 May 2010 03:13:00 +0000

Although many argue the news media is biased, they generally miss how their news is slanted. For instance, conservatives will contend there is liberal prejudice, whereas liberals will see a conservative one. Although these things exist, they are not nearly as relevant as many make them out to be. Actual media bias runs much deeper than mere party favoritism.

The following is a one-week media analysis. It focuses on the coverage of President Barack Obama and foreign policy from Monday, April 5 to Monday, April 12, 2010. It is based primarily off the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. Though the papers are different publications, separated by a great distance, their predispositions are very much the same – a bias designed to uphold the prevailing wisdom of American society.

During the week mentioned above, the media focused on Obama’s effort to finalize the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or New START. The coverage was mostly friendly. On Monday, the Los Angeles Times reported there was “wide agreement that the treaty is a positive step in strained U.S.-Russian relations” despite an anticipated arms reduction being less than half of what was projected. [1]

However, media bias is not in what they do say, but in what they do not say. Despite reporting New START as being the “cornerstone of the world’s effort to keep nuclear weapons from spreading”, the Los Angeles Times failed to mention that Washington, D.C. turns a blind eye toward nuclear powers Pakistan and India. [2] According to a February article published by the online Russian newspaper, Pravda, both countries “have declined to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.” [3] However, Washington does not call for an investigation or sanctions against these countries like it does with Iran. The Times stays clear from reporting on the hypocrisy of U.S. foreign policy.

This was further reflected by a Wednesday Los Angeles Times editorial entitled “Setting nuclear limits.” It too does not question how Washington censures Iran and North Korea and yet allows Pakistan and India to operate without condemnation. Nor does the editorial bring up Washington’s indifference toward Israel’s possession of nuclear weapons. Instead, the editorial simply states the Obama administration “seeks to isolate” rogue “nations that pursue [nuclear] weapons.” [4]

On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times turned to the Arms Control Association to provide some balance to Obama’s “Nuclear Posture Review,” a document outlining his position on reducing nuclear weapons. [5] However, the Arms Control Association is hardly a dissenting voice. On their Web site, the ACA endorsed New START, saying the treaty “will reduce Russian and U.S. strategic forces while allowing the United States to maintain a robust nuclear deterrent.” [6] A better voice of dissent would have been Greenpeace, or perhaps the remaining survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

This bias is clearer in who appears and who does not appear on the op-ed page. On Wednesday, Vice President Joe Biden was given roughly 17 column inches in the Los Angeles Times to praise New START and explain how he and the president have “no higher obligation” than protecting Americans “from nuclear threats.” [7] Sunday’s New York Times included an op-ed from former Defense Secretary William J. Perry and former Secretary of State George P. Shultz. Perry and Shultz argue that Obama must consider Russian security concerns, stating that “Russia has neighbors that have such missiles directed at its borders.” [8] Both op-eds offer very cautious, measured and “responsible” statements that preserve the status quo. Neither the Los Angeles Times or New York Times offered a voice that highlighted the insane danger of nuclear weapons and demanded their elimination.

Again, the bias is not in whose voice they put in print, but in whose voice they leave out of print. In this instance, as is typical, only establishment elites are allowed to tell us how to think. Serious issues about nuclear weapons, such as environmental hazards, charred flesh, radiation sickness and the safety of the human race, are politely withheld from discussion. The attention is solely placed on U.S. security, as though U.S. security is the only aspect to nuclear arms reduction to be considered.

Another noted bias, was in the coverage of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Dutifully mirroring the State Department, on Wednesday, the Los Angeles Times wrote that Karzai was making “anti-Western” and “anti-American” statements. [9] However, the Times did not clarify what it meant by anti-Western or anti-American. The article is very polite to U.S. foreign policy and legitimizes it. It avoids any reflection of the fact that Karzai is a puppet-governor for the U.S.’s hegemonic empire who is rightfully criticizing foreign meddling within his borders.

On Saturday, the New York Times highlighted the Obama administration’s failures in dealing with Karzai. The Times stated that “after more than a year of watching America’s ability to influence President Hamid Karzai ebb,” the Obama administration’s “tough-love approach...may have been a big mistake.” [10] The Times assumes it is acceptable to “influence” Karzai, which is a bias that stems from the ethos of “American exceptionalism,” something that few Americans question about their foreign policy.

The Times’ article mentions the Afghan president’s crimes against the empire as “publicly lash[ing] out against Western governments, host[ing] the president of Iran” and saying he would “join the Taliban if the international community kept pressuring him.” [11] Apparently, we can only assume, it is unacceptable for U.S. puppet-leaders to criticize U.S. allies, meet with leaders the State Department disapproves of and make crude points that express sovereignty.

Overall, President Obama was treated very well by the media. In its weekend edition, The Wall Street Journal aired former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin’s criticisms of Obama’s nuclear strategy. Since being president, Obama still has “no accomplishment to date with North Korea and Iran,” she said. [12] But Palin’s comments are hardly critical. She parrots the State Department’s assertion that something must be “accomplished” with Iran and North Korea, without bringing up Pakistan, India or Israel. Palin markets herself as “going rogue,” but in truth, preserves the status quo and challenges Obama on mere minutia.

In light of these observations it becomes clear there is a bias in the media, but not the party-affiliated inclinations most Americans believe. U.S. media is biased towards the United States. Period. Pitted against foreign nations, American news media sets forth a narrative to its consumers that paints a favorable, benign view of U.S. foreign policy and its president. Self-criticism is cast aside. Only status quo elites are presented and given a voice. The news, ultimately, is written by American conformists, for American conformists. It does not challenge or question our dominant institutions or the prevailing wisdom of our society, but instead, mirrors them.

NOTES:
1. Richter, Paul. “Obama’s nuclear agenda, front and center.” Los Angeles Times. 5 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/05/world/la-fg-obama-nuclear-qa5-2010apr05
2. Ibid.
3. Sommer, Eric. “USA’s Global Military Dominance: Real Reason for Sanctions Against Iran.” Pravda. 15 Feb. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/15-02-2010/112215-dominance_iran-0
4. “Setting nuclear limits.” Editorial. Los Angeles Times. 6 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/06/opinion/la-ed-nuclear7-2010apr07
5. Richter, Paul. “Obama nuclear arms manifesto is detailed.” Los Angeles Times. 5 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/05/world/la-fg-obama-nuclear6-2010apr06
6. Pifer, Steven. “New START: Good News for U.S. Security.” Arms Control Association. May 2010. 7 May 2010. http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2010_05/Pifer
7. Biden, Joe. “A comprehensive nuclear arms strategy.” Los Angeles Times. 7 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/apr/07/opinion/la-oe-biden7-2010apr07
8. Perry, William J. and George P. Shultz. “How to Build on the Start Treaty.” New York Times. 10 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/11/opinion/11shultz.html
9. King, Laura. “Afghan President Karzai’s anti-Western remarks leave many guessing sincerity.” Los Angeles Times. 7 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/asia/la-fg-karzai7-2010apr07,0,4223228.story
10. Cooper, Helene and Mark Landler. “U.S. Now Trying Softer Approach Toward Karzai.” New York Times. 9 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/10/world/asia/10prexy.html
11. Ibid.
12. Davis, Susan. “Palin, at GOP Conference, Hits Obama Nuclear Policy.” The Wall Street Journal. 9 Apr. 2010. 9 May 2010. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304222504575173900575476896.html

Demonstrators in Los Angeles march for immigration reform

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sun, 02 May 2010 20:22:00 +0000

Tens of thousands gathered in downtown Los Angeles Saturday to demand federal immigration reform.

Carrying mostly American flags, crowds marched from W. Olympic Boulevard to W. First Street along S. Broadway. Among the many issues of immigrant rights, foremost on demonstrator’s minds was Arizona’s recent immigration law, which critics say will lead to racial profiling and civil liberties violations.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa gave a bilingual speech at the rally. “I’m going to speak in English and Spanish today, because we are all equal,” he said to cheering demonstrators. “We want change, we want reform and we want it now.”

Villaraigosa criticized current immigration policies. He called them “outdated and ineffective” laws that fail to meet the needs of a global economy and recognize America’s immigrant history. “Today’s immigrants are no different and we should not treat them any differently,” he said.

The Mayor highlighted immigrant contributions to the country, pointing out that many children of immigrants are currently serving in the armed forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also addressed the need to fight immigration laws that did not respect people’s civil rights.

“We must show that bigotry and close-mindedness have no place in the United States of America,” he said.

Several labor unions attended the march and rally to show their support for immigrant workers. Teamsters Local 396 member Jose Amaya says his union helps undocumented workers become legal. “Some of these people have been here for 20 years,” he said. “They are not taking anybody’s jobs.”

Also represented at the rally were Teamster union chapters 42 and 872. Both chapters featured tractor-trailers that drove alongside demonstrators as they marched toward W. First Street.

Rally attendee Veronica Terriquez felt the rights of workers were not being addressed with current laws. “If we create a pathway to legalization we can get fair wages for workers,” she said. “It will raise wages for everyone, including low-wage workers.”

Terriquez is an assistant professor of Sociology at USC. She sympathizes with immigrant students saying that many live in fear of deportation. “These students have the potential to contribute to our society,” she said. “Immigration laws don’t allow that.”

Aside from labor, student organizations were also in attendance on Saturday.

Pasadena City College Students for Social Justice lent their support for immigration reform by participating in the demonstration. PCC History Major Mayra Jaimes felt Arizona’s recent anti-immigration law is racist. “We need a law that is fair,” she said. “Grabbing anyone off the streets is not right.”

Dressed in caps and gowns, advocates for the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, were also present. The DREAM act is a proposed federal legislation that would provide a means for children of illegal aliens who graduate high school to obtain conditional permanent residency.

DREAM act advocate Yessenia Velasquez is a UCLA political science major. She feels that current laws are unfair to immigrant students, saying they must pay costly out-of-state tuition fees despite living in the state their whole lives.

“Then they go through the trouble to get a degree and they can’t work,” she said.

Activists also argue that immigration laws break up families. Former Airman Eduardo Gutierrez marched in his fatigues carrying a sign that called attention to the deportation of military family members.

“There were people in Afghanistan and Iraq whose wives were deported,” he said. “If you serve your country and put your life on the line, then your wife should be afforded citizenship too.”

Los Angeles resident Anna Duran also attended the demonstration for familial reasons. “I’m a citizen and my husband is illegal,” she said. “I’m here for him and I want him here, in this country, with me.”

The rally occurred peacefully, with the mood of the crowd being more celebratory than angry or hostile. Vendors sold hot dogs and ice cream while demonstrators shouted “Si se puede!” and listened to speakers talk about reform.

LAPD reported only two arrests connected to the demonstration, one for minor vandalism and the other for public drunkenness.

*Photos by Dan Bluemel.

Arizona turns ugly and cruel to stop illegal immigration

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 04:24:00 +0000

Last week, the State of Arizona passed and signed into law SB 1070, which gives police the power to verify a persons’ immigration status whom they “suspect” are illegal. By all accounts, this law is nothing more than legal racism, just another opportunity for Americans to pick on a minority that cannot defend themselves.

SB 1070 is a sign of the times we live in. America’s mood is getting foul and with it comes intolerance and scapegoating. The message is clear from Arizona. If you are swarthy and speak with an accent you better have your papers in order, otherwise Officer Jim Bob is going to show you the power of his badge, and baton.

If it is not already obvious who SB 1070 targets, the fact that the law targets street-corner day laborers should clarify things. So much for a poor immigrant trying to make an honest buck.

Nationalist, right-wing, law-and-order geeks have won this battle, casting aside any sense of empathy or compassion for their fellow human beings. In a recent interview with Truthdig columnist Chris Hedges, MIT professor Noam Chomsky expressed concern about the current far right-wing mood in the country.

“[In Germany] it was the Jews,” he said. “Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. If the polls are accurate it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election.” [1]

And so, before Americans start donning brown shirts and jackboots, it is time for a reality check.

America is a concept. It exists in our heads, on maps and in legal documents. But, it is not real; it does not occur in the physical universe. Look at a satellite image of the planet. Mother Earth has no borders.

Furthermore, we are no more American than Mexican or Chinese. “American,” is a man-made, legal title. Let us not confuse our culture or societal propaganda with who we are. “American” is not wired into our DNA. Instead, we are all human beings of the same blood and bone, born to this planet and thus, equally have a right to it.

Nationalism is an ideology that only divides us from our fellows. It inevitably inflicts some horrible injustice upon another group. It creates anger and resentment, helping only to perpetuate the cycle of violence that has plagued this planet for so long.

Despite what the evangelists of hatred say on AM radio and Fox News, illegal immigrants are not the problem to America’s woes. White-collar, Wall Street crime and capitalism’s greedy, unregulated, profit-over-people ethos has more to do with our suffering economy than someone washing dishes for sub-standard wages.

It is no secret that capitalism goes through boom and bust cycles. The Communist Manifesto was very clear about this. After each boom, it states, “society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence.” [2] And that was written in 1848.

It is not illegal immigrants, but unregulated, rapacious capitalism and poorly conceived economic policies that bring about recessions, depressions and subsequent high crime rates.

Let us not give in to reactionary hatred and legalize cruelty like Arizona. It is, frankly, old. America has tried this tactic many times prior. The Irish and the Chinese of the 1800s and the eastern and southern Europeans of the 1920s are examples of such instances in U.S. history. Howard Zinn summarized this habit of ours well enough in his book A People’s History of the United States.

“Immigrants were a convenient object of attack, because as nonvoters their interests could be safely ignored,” he wrote. “It was easy for politicians to play upon the xenophobia that has erupted from time to time in American history.” [3]

So, we’ve been down the nationalistic, xenophobic path before with no positive results, only injustice. It is time for a truly 21st century solution toward immigration.

Journalist I.F. Stone wrote in 1963 that the world’s problems were becoming so interconnected that “the nation-state system is obsolete” and that “the problems of security and peace have grown too complex to be solved within it.” [4] This is even more evident in 2010 than in 1963.

We must forgo petty, bloody allegiances of nationalism and embrace our planetary identity. A sane solution where we view humanity as our one, true family and target the economic/financial policies responsible for commercial collapse is desperately required. Anything less would be scapegoating and punishing innocent people for simply trying to eke out a better life.

NOTES:
1. Hedges, Chris. “Noam Chomsky Has ‘Never Seen Anything Like This.’” Truthdig. 19 Apr. 2010. 24 Apr. 2010. http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/noam_chomsky_has_never_seen_anything_like_this_20100419/
2. Marx, Karl and Frederick Engles. The Communist Manifesto. Ed. by Phill Gasper. Chicago: Haymarket, 2005. pg. 48.
3. Zinn, Howard. A People’s History of the United States. New York: HarperCollins, 2003. pg. 647.
4. Stone, I.F. In a Time of Torment. New York: First Vintage, 1968. pg. 77.
*Photo taken from The Portland Press Herald, 25 Apr. 2010. http://www.pressherald.com/news/nationworld/governor-signs-arizona-immigration-bill_2010-04-24.html

The Hashbury: threatened, but still kicking

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 03:30:00 +0000

Attempting to bring a keffiyeh, a type of Arabic scarf, and cannabis on board a plane is generally not a good idea. Having a nonchalant attitude toward metal detectors and strip searches, while possessing clothing that “terrorists” wear and an herb that causes one to philosophize, measures up to one heavy threat to national security. To boot, Homeland Security’s national threat advisory happened to be at orange that day, just one hair-line notch below all-out Armageddon.

Being stoned doesn’t help the situation either. Outbursts of laughter or paranoia are equally punishable offenses in the eyes of federal agents. But after spending a few days in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district, such predicaments are to be expected.

In 1967, Hunter S. Thompson wrote about the “Hashbury” for The New York Times Magazine. The cultural revolution that began in 1965 in Berkley had emigrated to the Haight. Thompson called the Hashbury “the new capital of what is rapidly becoming a drug culture.” [1]

“Its denizens are not called radicals or beatniks, but ‘hippies’ – and perhaps as many as half are refugees from Berkley and the old North Beach scene, the cradle and the casket of the so-called Beat Generation,” he wrote. [2]

From Thompson’s descriptions, not much has changed in the Hashbury. The closer one gets to Golden Gate Park, the more one is offered to buy something with which to see pretty colors. “Hey buddy, need some trees?...some acid?” the sales representatives say. To this day the park remains a place to “turn on, tune in and drop out.”

Throngs of young, street people inhabit the park along with tourists and mothers with strollers. It’s a peaceful scene, but that doesn’t stop the SFPD from trying to collect some cheap, unproductive arrests. Homeless people describe a police force that will find any reason to search or ticket them.

And soon, Haight’s street urchins may have to endure another form of harassment. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom is trying to get an ordinance passed that will prohibit anyone from sitting or lying on public sidewalks.

Herman Marshall says that some merchants on Haight support the sit/lie ordinance. Marshall is a homeless man who sells the Street Sheet, a paper that is published by the Coalition on Homelessness in San Francisco.

“That’s why people come here, to sit and hang out,” he said. “If the Haight becomes only for rich folk, then you’ve lost the spirit of the neighborhood.”

The homeless are the last minority in America that is safe to pick on. Similar to the Jim Crow era, the legal system is employed to harass and punish them for simply being there. Darian, a homeless man from Colorado, distilled the issue of sit/lie to its perhaps truer essence. “Most people chase off the homeless because they are not pretty,” he said.

Society loves to harass and terrorize people who don’t fit its suffocating mold, but for the sake of peace and harmony Henry David Thoreau had something to offer on the issue. “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer,” he wrote. “Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.” [3]

Thompson wrote that the hippie-scene had changed from politics and activism to living “on the far perimeter of a world that might have been – perhaps should have been – and [striking] a bargain for survival on purely personal terms.” [4] That still remains today. The Hashbury has its anarchist bookstore which provides an ideological fuel for the neighborhood, but the general attitude is not about changing the system, but getting the hell away from it.

For the most part, the hippies interviewed identified themselves as being anti-capitalist, an American high-crime that is punishable by lifelong persecution. They are fully aware of what Thoreau termed as the “economical and moral tyrant” that we are enslaved to. [5]

Sitting on the corner of Haight and Ashbury is street musician Dave Czubin. Next to him is his dog Beaker, a former laboratory animal. Czubin, originally from Milwaukee, says he came out west for the experience and music.

He does not speak of capitalism, societal ills or ideology. “I’m just having a good time,” he said. Whether he knows it or not, Czubin embodies the ethos of the neighborhood.

It can be an infectious experience staying in the Haight, spending time with those who live “on the far perimeter of the world.” A chilled vibe and desire to thumb one’s nose at authority pervades. It is the kind of attitude that may prompt one to bring some “devil’s weed” and “terrorist memorabilia” through airport security. Which is fine, just keep the phone number to your local ACLU chapter on hand.

NOTES:
1. Thompson, Hunter S. “The ‘Hashbury’ Is the Capital of the Hippies.” The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1979. pg. 383.
2. Ibid.
3. Alexander, Samuel. “A Simpler, Freer Life.” Adbusters. April, 2010. 21 Apr. 2010. https://www.adbusters.org/magazine/89/simpler-freer-life.html
4. Thompson, pg. 394.
5. Alexander.
*Photos by Dan Bluemel.

Nazi rally in LA incites opposition

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 17:59:00 +0000

Tensions flared Saturday in downtown Los Angeles when, rallying in front of City Hall, a group of neo-Nazis were met by counter-demonstrators.

Flanked by a riot-ready LAPD, members of the National Socialist Movement (NSM), a white supremacist political party, spoke about their desire for a white-only nation. Speakers called for the removal of all immigrants and blamed failed immigration policies for current crime rates.

“Illegal aliens are draining our resources and taking our jobs,” Capt. Mike Schlayer said. “They are trying to breed us out of existence while they leech off Social Security and the welfare system.”

Counter-demonstrators arrived early and were cordoned off by police tape keeping them far from NSM members. A multitude of LAPD officers were on site forming several columns that protected the small number of neo-Nazis.

NSM members, dressed in black fatigues, helmets and combat boots, mostly taunted counter-demonstrators by shouting racially inflammatory language, calling AIDS an “anally inflicted death sentence” and tearing up and stepping on the flags of Israel and Mexico.

“Speak English people or get out,” Capt. Schlayer said to the angry crowd of protesters.

The NSM announced at the rally their plans for this November’s elections. “We’re going to be running candidates soon to get seats,” said NSM Southern California Regional Director Sgt. Jeff Hall in a telephone interview. “That’s the way we’re going to reclaim the southwest.”

Hall elaborated on his party’s broader intentions. “Why can’t we whites make a white nation?” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with being white. There’s nothing wrong with having our own nation.”

Although counter-demonstrators acknowledged the NSM’s First Amendment rights, emotions still ran strong at what they considered hate-speech.

“They have the right to express whatever they want,” said Ceasar Galindo, a Latino protestor who heard about the NSM rally from a friend. “They don’t want us here, but I don’t know…I feel upset right now. They are against everyone. That’s totally wrong.”

Santa Monica College student Orlando Pardo was present at the demonstration. As a first-generation American he came to express his solidarity with immigrants. Pardo regards the NSM as a “backward movement” that is trying to scapegoat immigrants for America’s economic problems.

“There’s a lot of immigrant bashing going on right now,” he said. “People point out immigrants as the problem, but it’s really in things like the war machine that we pour billions of dollars into that is the problem.”

John Houy attended the demonstration over a personal matter. “My father got shot by the Nazis in World War II,” he said. “That’s a good enough reason.”

Even though he disapproves, Houy supports NSM’s right to peaceably assemble. “I believe in free speech, but I want them to understand there’s a lot of people who don’t like them,” he said.

Although the day’s event did not get out of hand, there were a few instances of violence. According to witnesses, prior to the NSM members arriving, an inebriated man revealed his swastika tattoo to the crowd of demonstrators causing an altercation. Several minutes passed before police responded. Assisted by some demonstrators, police led the man to safety behind the yellow tape.

After the rally, the neo-Nazis were escorted by the LAPD to a parking lot on the other side of N. Spring Street. Demonstrators gathered on the outside of the lot and began throwing bottles and rocks at the NSM members who used shields to protect themselves. No one was hurt in the incident, but one member’s car was damaged.

Jim Lafferty, Executive Director of the National Lawyers Guild, Los Angeles Chapter, acted as a legal observer for the demonstrators. He said there were a few instances of police using their batons and people getting trampled due to their pushing back crowds.

LAPD reported five arrests for minor vandalism due to throwing eggs and rocks.

John Stapleton IV and Carly Gillis contributed reporting.

*Photos by Dan Bluemel.

Women's health clinic prompts controversy

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 02:05:00 +0000

In the summer of 2008, Nina Lopez walked into the Westside Pregnancy Clinic located on Olympic Boulevard in Los Angeles and requested a pregnancy test. However, she wasn't pregnant.

Lopez, a Santa Monica College (SMC) student, posed as someone who thought she was pregnant and was seeking a test. She was working undercover for the Feminist Majority Foundation to investigate the clinic.

Westside Pregnancy Clinic is one of several clinics that SMC’s Health Services refers female students to. According to the clinic’s Web site, they are “empowering individuals to make informed pregnancy and sexual health choices.”

For Lopez, it wasn’t long before she felt something was unusual about the clinic. She said she was asked to fill out a form that asked for her religious affiliation and was told by a nurse that she “should consider not having sex because that’s reckless.”

Lopez suspected she might be in what is commonly referred to as a “CPC,” crisis pregnancy center. CPC’s are non-profit organizations set up by pro-life advocates to dissuade pregnant women from having abortions.

Abortion rights activists argue that CPC’s are quasi-clinics that pose as abortion providers and use misinformation to carry out an anti-abortion agenda.

As part of an independent investigation for this article, Jessica Thomas, a reporter for the SMC Corsair at the time, went undercover into the Westside Pregnancy Clinic. Her experience was much tamer than Lopez’s.

Thomas was happy with her experience at Westside. She described the receptionist as being “sweet, chipper and nice.” She said the clinic was “comfortably furnished, clean” and even “cozy.”

She was not challenged about her sexual behavior either.

Similar to Lopez however, Thomas was asked about her religious affiliation on the patient questionnaire. Westside considers this standard medical practice.

Sharon Dittrich, Nurse Manager at Westside’s Crenshaw clinic, said knowing a patient’s religious background is part of servicing the individual. “If you go into a hospital, you'll always be offered a chance to put down your religious affiliation, so that the hospital can be sensitive to your needs,” she said. “And as a nurse we were always taught that we had to not just expect people to come from where we're coming from, but to understand where they're coming from as well.”

However, three similar clinics recommended by SMC’s Health Services were questioned and none of them require a patient to disclose their religious affiliation. “We are not hospitals.” Patricia Kytlica, Executive Director for the Women’s Clinic and Family Counseling Center, said. “It’s certainly not a standard practice that I know of.”

Westside’s CEO Talitha Phillips felt Lopez’s claims of being accused of reckless sexual behavior were unfounded. “If I found out that one of my nurses said something like that, they wouldn't be working here,” she said. “That doesn't match any of our procedures in how we handle any of these issues with our clients.”

Westside’s Medical Director Dr. James Moran acknowledges the dubious behavior of CPC’s and stresses that Westside “deals with women in a non-threatening manner.”

“There are no Bibles or crucifixes laying around,” he said.

However, the issues pro-choice advocates have with Westside go beyond patient questionnaires or insulting comments. It’s about information.

Despite the safety afforded to women through legal abortions in the U.S., a woman going to Westside or perusing their Web site wouldn’t get that impression. A Westside staffer told Thomas the clinic doesn’t offer abortion services or refer women to abortion clinics because “they didn’t know if the other clinics were safe.”

Westside Pregnancy Clinic warns women of an unsubstantiated psychological illness connected to abortions, called Post Abortion Syndrome, on their Web site. Studies conducted by the American Psychological Association in 1990 and 2008, as well as a review of 250 scientific studies by Surgeon General C. Everett Koop in the late 1980s, concluded that there was no mental illness connected to having an abortion.

Although Westside Pregnancy Clinic acknowledges on their Web site that Post Abortion Syndrome “is not officially recognized,” they still assert that “many women often have long-lasting emotional problems following an abortion” and advise women to “be informed about the mental health risks that are associated” with the procedure.

Westside lists multiple side effects for Post Abortion Syndrome, such as suicidal thoughts, nightmares and eating disorders. “Some women have issues after having an abortion,” Westside’s Medical Director Dr. James Moran said. “We provide a place for them to discuss it.”

Connecting breast cancer to abortions is another side of the issue. The National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society and the World Health Organization have all determined there is no link between breast cancer and abortion. The National Cancer Institute’s Web site plainly states: “abortion or miscarriage does not increase a woman’s subsequent risk of developing breast cancer.”

But according to Westside’s Web site, Dr. Moran argues that “the current consensus is that the medical community is unsure about whether there is a connection between breast cancer and induced abortion.”

Westside offers ultrasounds, STD testing, pap smears, post-abortion counseling, parenting workshops, adoption counseling and sexual education to students. However, Westside is not an on-going, follow-up clinic and therefore do not give out medication, including birth control.

Professor Gloria Lopez (no relation to Nina), SMC’s Health Services Coordinator, said she vetted the Westside Pregnancy Clinic. According to Gloria Lopez, she verified the clinic was licensed, clean and able to deliver the services it advertises. Her primary concern was in making sure students weren’t being sent to a fly-by-night operation.

Beyond that, “it’s a student’s choice where they want to go,” Gloria Lopez said. “Our belief is that students come in for information and we give it to them.”

Pro-choice activists interviewed have no problem with Health Services making the Westside Pregnancy Clinic available to SMC students. However, they have an issue with how Westside is described by Health Services. As it stands, Health Services ambiguously designates Westside as an “options counseling clinic” on their list of approved medical facilities.

“We want [Health Services] to label it properly,” duVergne Gaines, the West Coast Campus Director for the Feminist Majority Foundation, said. “This facility does not provide abortions or referrals for abortions and it doesn’t provide birth control.”

Phillips has a different view on how her clinic is labeled by Health Services. “I think we should all be labeled the same,” she said. “I think there are a lot of clinics who don’t represent themselves properly. I know we are not like that.”

When asked if it would be better if Health Services labeled Westside as a “pro-pregnancy clinic,” Anna Koper, President of the SMC Feminist Alliance, thought that might be a more accurate designation.

“I would want the label to very, very clear,” she said. “It would be important to stress that this clinic is there to help women through their pregnancy.”

Gloria Lopez feels Health Services properly informs students on the nature of the various clinics, however she is open to changing how Westside is labeled. “I can certainly give it some thought and discussion,” she said.

*Image taken from Advance USA, 7 Apr. 2010. http://www.advanceusa.org/blog/PermaLink,guid,5f14f8af-c4f9-453e-90d5-2071d1442799.aspx

9-11 Truth: The Peace Movement’s Ugly Duckling

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 01:41:00 +0000

Last month’s anti-war rally and march in Los Angeles was a composite of many activist organizations uniting under a message of peace. They demanded an end to the occupations of Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine.

However, within their ranks was an ugly-duckling, an unwelcome kid on the playground of dissent. It was the 9-11 Truth movement.

Bruno Bruhwiler, legal organizer for We Are Change, a peace and social justice group that works “to reveal the truth behind the events of September 11,” [1] said that although his organization was allowed to join the march, they were assigned to the back of the line.

Happy to be a part of the demonstration, Bruhwiler was upset that his group had to occupy a less than conspicuous location.

“9-11 Truth is the greatest anti-war message,” he said. “What reason did Obama give for the wars? 9-11. If we can expose the lies, we can end the war.”

Afterward, I went home and wrote my article about the days event. When I finished writing it, I realized it did not mention the 9-11 Truth movement. They just weren’t part of the demonstration's narrative, which focused on veterans and active-duty soldiers resisting.

Still, Bruhwiler’s words stuck with me, “If we can expose the lies, we can end the war.”

***

A week after writing my story I came across a 2009 article by the U.K.’s Daily Mail that argued that Osama bin Laden died around mid-December, 2001. [2] The article further argued the U.S. and U.K. have been faking bin Laden video tapes to bolster the war effort.

This argument may seem shocking at first, but when one considers the information, it seems plausible. According to the Daily Mail, two months prior to 9-11, bin Laden was being treated at an American hospital in Dubai for a kidney disease related ailment. At that time he also ordered a mobile dialysis machine. Considering that fact alone, it seems unlikely he could survive for years living in snowy mountain caves on a dialysis machine, suffering from kidney disease.

Furthermore, if we entertain the theory that he died in late 2001, then bin Laden never claimed responsibility for 9-11. For three months, with two video taped messages in the interim, bin Laden never said, “I did it.”

In fact, bin Laden said he was not behind the attacks. Six days after 9-11 he released a statement countering the U.S.’s accusations. “I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons,” he said. [4]

Then three months later, a video tape was found by U.S. soldiers in Jalalabad featuring bin Laden confessing his involvement in 9-11. However, this tape's “bin Laden” had a broader nose and face, wrote with his right hand instead of his left and wore a ring on his finger even though it is against his Wahhabi faith to do so, the Daily Mail reported.

The tape also revealed inconsistencies in bin Laden’s understanding of 9-11. For instance, bin Laden referred to the Twin Towers as having structural supports being made of iron, reported the Daily Mail. However, he is/was an engineer and building contractor. He would have known that the buildings were supported by steel, not iron.

But nobody in the mainstream press questioned this “confession” tape. They were too eager for their Lee Harvey Oswald.

Lastly, The Muslim Observer reported in December of 2009 that U.S. Central Command could not find any documents, such as “action reports, logbook entries, e-mails, transcripts and etc.,” concerning the discovery of the bin Laden confession tape by U.S. soldiers. [3] It took a Freedom of Information Act request and three years to find that out.

***

Now consider the fact the FBI does not have enough evidence to indict bin Laden for 9-11. [5] I came across this information in 2006 and verified it with the FBI’s Office of Investigative Publicity.

Simply put, there is no hard evidence connecting Osama bin Laden to 9-11. That is why if you look at bin Laden’s FBI Wanted Poster there is no mention of the terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon. His poster states he is wanted for the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya, but says he is merely “a suspect in other terrorist attacks throughout the world.” [6]

It goes deeper than this. In September of 2001, ABC News reported that the Taliban felt the U.S. lacked evidence connecting bin Laden to 9-11. “We asked the world community to come forward with evidence,” said Taliban Deputy Foreign Minister Abdur Rahman Zahid. “We do have courts in our country, but so far we have not seen any tangible evidence.” [7]

A month later, CNN reported a similar request by the Taliban. “If Americans are convinced that they have solid evidence, we are ready for [bin Laden’s] trial in Afghanistan, and they have to produce that evidence,” said Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef. [8]

By this time the U.S. was already bombing Afghanistan. According to the Guardian, in an effort to stop the violence, a desperate Taliban offered the U.S. to send bin Laden to a neutral country for trial. [9] President George W. Bush rejected the offer.

It does send a chill down one’s spine to realize that bin Laden is more than likely dead and has been for some time. “All the evidence suggests Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama Bin Laden,” said Angelo M. Codevilla to the Daily Mail. [10] Codevilla is a former U.S. foreign intelligence officer and professor of international relations at Boston University.

***

The lack of acceptance for the 9-11 Truth movement is confusing when I consider that most Americans don’t believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating President John F. Kennedy. It is also further bewildering when I consider that most in the anti-war movement are painfully aware that their government has time and time again lied to them about its motives for war.

There is no reason to believe the 9-11 Commission any more than there is to believe the Warren Commission. We should learn from the past and entertain the fact that we are not being told everything we should be. “All governments lie,” as journalist I.F. Stone would say.

Blase Bonpane, KPFK radio host and Director of Office of the Americas, an international justice and peace organization, commented to me at the demonstration last month on the need for truth to end the war. “This is how the war in Vietnam ended,” he said. “Soldiers realized they were lied to and resisted.”

Indeed. There is no easier way to point out to people they are being lied to than through the 9-11 Truth movement, but Bonpane didn’t bring up 9-11 Truth while speaking to the crowd of demonstrators. Instead, he opted for the tried and true rhetoric of the peace movement.

The peace activists’ lack of ability to accept this fact last month could be hurting the anti-war movement. If the American people continue to believe their government and its excuses for the war on terror, which has everything to do with 9-11, there will be no chance for peace.

Just like Bruhwiler said, “If we can expose the lies, we can end the war.”

Bruhwiler argued that there is no better anti-war message than 9-11 Truth. I tend to think he is right. If the American people understood their government lacks evidence on bin Laden and that he probably died three months after the fact, the war effort would lose a lot of support.

So let us not disown that ugly duckling at the end of the line. Let’s nurture it, for it may become a beautiful swan of peace someday.

NOTES:
1. “About.” We Are Change. 29 Mar. 2010. http://www.wearechange.org/?page_id=5
2. Reid, Sue. “Has Osama Bin Laden Been Dead for Seven Years – and Are the U.S. and Britain Covering It Up to Continue War on Terror?” Daily Mail. 11 Sep. 2009. 2 Apr. 2010. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1212851/Has-Osama-Bin-Laden-dead-seven-years--U-S-Britain-covering-continue-war-terror.html
3. Haas, Edward F. “Afghanistan: Why It’s Impossible to Support the War.” The Muslim Observer. 3 Dec. 2009. 2 Apr. 2010. http://muslimmedianetwork.com/mmn/?tag=ed-haas
4. “Bin Laden Says He Wasn’t Behind Attacks.” CNN. 17 Sep. 2001. 2 Apr. 2010. http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/09/16/inv.binladen.denial/
5. Haas, Ed. “FBI says, ‘No Hard Evidence Connecting Bin Laden to 9/11.’” Project Censored. 2008. 2 Apr. 2010. http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/16-no-hard-evidence-connecting-bin-laden-to-9-11/
6. “Most Wanted Terrorists: Usama Bin Laden.” Federal Bureau of Investigation. 2 Apr. 2010. http://www.fbi.gov/wanted/terrorists/terbinladen.htm
7. Kambas, Michele. “Taliban Says Bin Laden is Its Guest.” ABC News. 21 Sep. 2001. 2 Apr. 2010. http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=82568&page=1
8. “U.S. Rejects Taliban Offer to Try Bin Laden.” CNN. 7 Oct. 2001. 2 Apr. 2010. http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/10/07/ret.us.taliban/
9. “Bush Rejects Taliban Offer to Hand Bin Laden Over.” Guardian. 14 Oct. 2001. 2 Apr. 2010. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.terrorism5
10. Reid.
*All photos by Dan Bluemel, except bin Laden photo, taken from The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 2 Apr. 2010. http://www.japanfocus.org/-Noor_Huda-Ismail/2318

A Ray of Hope for Liberty and Potheads

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 03:28:00 +0000

There are days when the news truly titillates one’s nerve endings, when a ray of hope, in an otherwise dismal world, crashes Satan’s never-ending party. And so it was for me this week when news came out that a California initiative to legalize cannabis will be on the state’s November ballot.

“The 10-page California initiative would allow anyone 21 or older to possess, share and transport up to an ounce for personal use and to grow up to 25 square feet per residence or parcel,” the Los Angeles Times reported. [1] “It would allow local governments, but not the state, to authorize the cultivation, transportation and sale of marijuana and to impose taxes to raise revenues.”

If passed, this initiative will be a blow to the law-and-order-types, the authoritarians who so willingly enforce their moral inclinations. They clamor for a tightly arranged society, where the Fourth Amendment, a police state and having more prisons than Starbucks means little to them.

Liberty is not popular among these people.

Unfortunately, I don’t foresee the coming debate about cannabis legalization being about liberty. In my crystal ball I see endless unprovable arguments about crime, health and public safety that will only confuse the citizenry.

Apparently, after 4,000 plus years of cannabis use, modern homoboobians can’t figure out how to co-exist with the mysterious weed. It is a fact that says more about human intelligence than the pros and cons of a smelly, little plant.

But the simple notion that what we put in our bodies is our business and not anyone else’s is lost on most Americans. We are surrounded by geeks who love to dictate how others should live and they’re willing to spend billions of dollars and enslave millions in prisons for it.

If liberty is not so important to them, then maybe they can get their wits around this fact. Drug dealers and police don’t want cannabis to be legalized. Legalization will stop a drug dealer’s ability to profit off cannabis. Obviously, they don’t want that. And let’s not forget, cops would lose funding too, as well as lose a powerful tool that enables them to harass poor people.

We really should question a law when both the police and the criminals are against its cancellation.

I don’t have my hopes up too high, considering how Californians voted on Prop 8, but I hope this time they will choose liberty over the ugly state of affairs we currently live with. It would be a breath of fresh air for freedom.

NOTES:
1. Hoeffel, John. “California May Vote on Legalizing Pot.” Los Angeles Times. 23 Mar. 2010. 25 Mar. 2010. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-marijuana-initiative24-2010mar24,0,3970255.story
*Image taken from Emerald Herb the Blog, 25 Mar. 2010: http://emeraldherb.net/blog/index.php/component/content/article/22-enlightenment-freedom-marijuana-and-objectivism

War Machine Finds Resistance in Los Angeles

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 15:18:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- Marking the seventh anniversary of the Iraq War, anti-war demonstrators marched on Hollywood Boulevard Saturday to protest the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Leading the march along Hollywood Boulevard from Vine Street to Grauman’s Chinese Theatre were veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. Holding hand-made flags representing Blackwater, Chase-Manhattan Bank, AIG, Exxon/Mobil, Chevron and Boeing, the veterans formed a sort of Wall Street Color Guard to call attention to corporate America’s role in U.S. foreign policy.

Iraq War veteran Michael Prysner, a Founding Member of March Forward, an anti-war organization that is made up of veterans and service members, spoke at the rally connecting a soldier’s service to their country as a service to corporate America.

“We are nothing more than muscle, thugs for the banks and Wall Street,” he said. “They don’t care about our lives, the lives of those overseas. They only care about profit.”

Long-time peace activist, Vietnam veteran and author of “Born on the Fourth of July” Ron Kovic joined the veterans in their march. “I think Iraq was a terrible mistake,” he said. “These young men and women deserve not to have their lives wasted. That’s why we are here today.”

Kovic was awarded the Bronze Star for his service in Vietnam, as well as the Purple Heart for an injury that left him paralyzed at the waist. “I’m very proud of my service to my country, and most proud of my commitment to non-violence,” he said.

Speaking of the veterans present at the demonstration, Kovic said they love their country despite their criticisms. “The people who came out today are proud and passionate,” he said. “This is the best of democracy. This is what my sacrifice was about, to assemble peacefully and non-violently.”

Blase Bonpane, KPFK radio host and Director of Office of the Americas, an international justice and peace organization, spoke at the demonstration encouraging soldiers to resist their orders to deploy. He said 50,000 soldiers have refused to go overseas, and though difficult, hundreds have gone public about it.

“This is how the war in Vietnam ended,” he said. “Soldiers realized they were lied to and resisted.”

For Bonpane, he sees the Iraq War as being 19 years old. “I was there in 1991,” he said. “It was a massacre and it hasn’t stopped.”

Kovic led the crowd in a sit-in where the demonstrators halted the march and sat in the street. He held two-minutes of silence in honor of those who died in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“This is a movement of compassion and caring that respects all life,” he said to the crowd. “We will continue to sit in greater and greater numbers in the streets until these wars are ended.”

Present in the demonstration were two candidates for public office that have aligned themselves with the anti-war movement.

Richard Castaldo is running against Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) for the Peace and Freedom Party. Castaldo, paralyzed at the waist from gunshot wounds suffered in the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, said he got involved in politics because of the war and Wall Street bailouts.

“I feel, as a nation, we could be doing a lot better,” he said.

If elected, Castaldo said, his first objective would be to work against corporate influence in Washington.

Long Beach Mayoral candidate Stevie Merino was also present at the demonstration. Merino, 21, is a student at Cerritos College. She is running against incumbent Mayor Bob Foster for the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

She finds the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan a hindrance to public education. “We need to stop funding wars and start funding people’s needs,” she said. “Education is a right, not a privilege for a select few.”

The demonstration began around noon and ended shortly after 3:30 p.m. LAPD on site said there was no trouble or arrests connected to the march and rally. LA’s demonstration was held in conjunction with protests in San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

Scientology Targets Student Journalist

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:01:00 +0000

It was my first day as opinion editor for Santa Monica College’s campus newspaper, the Corsair. I was in the newsroom getting oriented when the phone rang. The call was for me. By the time the receiver was handed to me the line was dead.

I wasn’t sure, but I suspected it was the Church of Scientology. I figured the phone call was to verify my media affiliation.

The game had begun.

I had just finished writing about three days of demonstrations against the church for The Bluemel Reader. I used to be a Scientologist myself, so this story was very interesting to me. Since leaving in 2007, I have used my knowledge base to write about the church online. Little did I know the story I wanted to write would end up becoming about me.

In my request for an interview with Scientology I was instructed by a church employee to submit my questions via email to Edie Reuveni, President of the Church of Scientology, Los Angeles. I did so and waited. Not expecting a response, I certainly got more than I bargained for.

Reuveni did her homework on me and found out the contact information of my journalism professor. She eventually emailed me back but copied him on the email in an attempt to discredit me as a journalist. Her intent was to squelch whatever I was planning to write about the church.

“I would like to ask you why you have not made it known that you were a trained Scientologist for over 10 years and are portraying yourself as a unbiased journalist when in actuality it is a misrepresentation of your intentions and falls under yellow journalism?” she wrote.

My journalism professor feels I had misrepresented myself as I was not on assignment for the Corsair. Which is true. I was using my media affiliation to get an interview with the church in the hope of writing about the protests and getting it published in the school newspaper. My exact communication to Reuveni was, “I am a journalism student at Santa Monica College and I report for the Corsair, the campus newspaper.”

My professor also feels that since I am an ex-Scientologist I should not be allowed to report on Scientology. This was later extended to the opinion page when I attempted to publish a version of this article.

Journalistic ethics aside, foremost in my professors mind was his concern the Corsair would get sued for publishing my opinion article. He may not know much about Scientology, but he was very familiar with the church’s litigious nature. Rightfully so, he was worried.

I spoke to Tory Christman about the email. She was a Scientologist for 30 years and is a former volunteer for the Office of Special Affairs (OSA), the church’s legal affairs and public relations division that targets its “enemies.” She left the church in July 2000.

“That’s what they do,” she said. “They wrote to your professor, basically black PR’d what you are doing and stopped free speech once again.”

The church has a long history in trying to silence journalists by using various harassment techniques. The most notorious case was with journalist Paulette Cooper, who had written exposés and a book about the church. Scientology nearly succeeded in framing Cooper of bomb threats until the FBI raided the church under a separate investigation and discovered the documents concerning the plan.

Nancy Many is a former Scientologist who worked for OSA and its predecessor the Guardian’s Office. She says the church has teams of people working 24/7, maybe getting three to four hours of sleep a night, investigating supposed enemies of Scientology.

Many was not surprised by Reuveni’s email. “That was purposely done to pull your reigns in,” she said.

She warned me about what will happen if I continue writing about the church. “They already have your picture, they already have your name, they already have where you go to school,” she said. “Now they are going to want to know where you live. They are going to want to know your car; they are going to want to have pictures of that. They are going to want to know who you are connected with.”

Many explained that once the above is done and my weaknesses ascertained, then come the attacks.

Los Angeles Times journalist Robert W. Welkos wrote in 1991 what it is like to write about Scientology. “Whenever journalists ask critical questions about Scientology they can expect to endure intense personal scrutiny,” he wrote. “Over the years, various reporters have been sued, harassed, spied on, and even been subjected to dirty tricks.” [1]

Indeed, this is how the church operates. They perceive even a student journalist at a junior college as a threat to be silenced. They can’t tolerate me interviewing critics and ex-members or writing about my own experiences and opinions. “That is their intention...they are trying to get you to shut up,” Many said.

And as Christman said to me at one of the demonstrations last month: “They have to stop free speech, otherwise people are going to leave the church.”

I still have Reuveni’s email. It stands as a monument to pettiness, insincerity, meanness and thuggery. Her prose reminds me why I got into journalism, because there is oppression in the world and, in defense of the little guy, it needs to be exposed.

NOTES:
1. Welkos, Robert W. "Shudder Into Silence." Xenu-Directory. 12 Mar. 2010. http://www.xenu-directory.net/accounts/welkos199111.html (Originally published in The Quill.)
*Photo taken from The Week, 12 Mar. 2010: http://www.theweek.com/article/index/102131/The_end_of_Scientology

US Military Robs Fallujah of Future Generation

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 01:23:00 +0000

There was a time when the women of Fallujah, Iraq could have children without much concern for their baby’s health. Now, according to the BBC, some officials are simply telling women not to have kids. [1]

Fallujah, a city roughly 40 miles from Baghdad, is reporting high rates of infant mortality and deformities. In November, the U.K.’s Guardian reported that Fallujah doctors were “dealing with up to 15 times as many chronic deformities in infants, compared to a year ago, and a spike in early life cancers.” [2]

There are reports of babies with multiple tumors, nervous system problems, missing limbs, paralysis and even multiple heads. BBC journalist John Simpson reported he saw a “girl with a spinal condition so bad [he] asked [his] cameraman not to film her.” [3]

Cases like Fallujah’s are not new. They go as far back as the 1991 Gulf War, and it has everything to do with depleted uranium (DU).

DU is used on armor-piercing shells, bullets and missiles. It vaporizes upon impact and forms a radioactive dust cloud that contaminates the air, water and soil.

Nine days after the 2003 “Shock and Awe” campaign, the U.S. used so much DU that a radioactive cloud was recorded over England by the European Committee on Radiation Risk. It increased Europe’s atmospheric radiation four times over. As of 2006, the United States had dumped 3,000 tons of DU in Iraq. [4]

Though the Pentagon denies it, independent researchers have been documenting DU’s connection to birth defects, cancer and a host of other physical maladies for years.

To make matters worse for the people of Fallujah, the U.S. military used white phosphorus munitions on Fullujah in 2004. [5] White phosphorus is an incendiary weapon. It is highly toxic and when it comes in contact with skin it melts flesh away, down to the bone.

“I saw bodies that turned into bones and coal right after they were exposed to bombs that we learned later to be phosphorus,” Fallujah resident Ali Sarhan said to the Inter Press Service News Agency. [6]

According to the U.K.’s Sunday Mercury, white phosphorus has been used as a rat poison, can kill a human being with an amount comparable to “10 to 20 granules of white sugar,” and is responsible for making a hazardous waste site out of Rattlechain Lagoon in England. [7]

In short, Fallujah is a crime scene with Uncle Sam’s finger prints all over it.

Italy’s La Repubblica reported in 2005 on the U.S. military’s use of phosphorus. “The Americans are responsible for a massacre using unconventional weapons, the same charge of which must meet the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein,” the report stated. [8]

According to La Repubblica, the use of phosphorus on civilians was banned under the U.N. Convention of 1980 and chemical weapons were banned by a 1997 agreement that was signed by the United States.

It is amoral, underhanded and deplorable to dispose of our nuclear waste and toxic chemicals on an unsuspecting population. It is unforgivable to condemn a generation to disease and death. In a just world we would see our generals and politicos answering to war crimes charges in the Hague. Unfortunately, the world is not so.

DU and white phosphorous are weapons that target not only military personnel and civilians, but the unborn as well. To use these weapons is simply a crime against humanity.

No decent society would use such things, but we do.

NOTES:
1. Simpson, John. “Disturbing Story of Fallujah’s Birth Defects.” BBC. 4 Mar. 2010. 6 Mar. 2010. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8548961.stm
2. Chulov, Martin. “Huge Rise in Birth Defects in Falluja.” Guardian. 13 Nov. 2009. 6 Mar. 2010. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/13/falluja-cancer-children-birth-defects
3. Simpson.
4. Bluemel, Dan. “The Unknown Nuclear War.” The Bluemel Reader. 8 June 2009. 6 Mar. 2010. http://thebluemelreader.blogspot.com/2009/06/unknown-nuclear-war.html
5. al-Fadhily, Ali and Dahr Jamail. “‘Special Weapons’ Have a Fallout on Babies.” Inter Press Service News Agency. 6 Mar. 2010. http://ipsnews.net/text/news.asp?idnews=42762
6. Ibid.
7. Aspinall, Adam. “Oldbury Residents Fear Toxic Lake.” Sunday Mercury. 7 Feb. 2010. 6 Mar. 2010. http://www.sundaymercury.net/news/midlands-news/2010/02/07/oldbury-residents-fear-toxic-lake-66331-25777961/
8. “White Phosphorus Against Civilians.” La Repubblica. 7 Nov. 2005. 7 Mar. 2010. http://www.repubblica.it/2005/k/sezioni/esteri/iraq71/rainews/rainews.html (Used Google translation.)
*Photos taken from the Guardian, 11 Mar. 2010: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2009/nov/13/iraq-us-military?picture=355553421

Teachers, Students Say No To Budget Cuts

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 16:39:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- Teachers, students and concerned citizens came together Thursday in downtown Los Angeles to protest education funding cuts. Starting at Pershing Square, demonstrators marched and then rallied at the governor’s office on South Spring Street.

A broad coalition of organizations were present in what was called a “National Day of Action to Defend Education.” Central to their complaint was the disparity between the funding of education and the funding of war.

“If we stop the wars for one week, we can pay for the entire amount of cuts to education,” Cameron Quinn said, addressing the crowd of protesters. Quinn is the President of the Santa Monica College (SMC) Students for Social Justice. He said that community colleges are working-class campuses that bare the brunt of budget cuts.

Iraq war veteran and ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) Coalition organizer Michael Prysner also addressed the protesters. Prysner, who was part of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, said within a year he realized the U.S. government was not in Iraq for its stated, altruistic purposes. “Our enemy is not over there,” he told the crowd. “Our enemy is right here.”

Prysner said the amount of money California tax payers kick in for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could pay for 17 million four-year scholarships. “The wars only benefit defense contractors and industry moguls,” he said.

Also present at Thursday’s march and rally was SMC student Jung Gatoona. Helping hold up a banner for the LaRouche Political Action Committee, he says he is unhappy with the Obama administration and state budget cuts. “The money being spent on Iraq, Afghanistan and corporations could go to education,” he said. “We are not investing in infrastructure.”

Many protesters drew a connection between California’s education woes and America’s wars. It was evident in some of the protest signs and in what they said. When referring to the U.S. defense budget, high school teacher Sherwin Boucher said, “a fraction of that can solve all these problems.”

Boucher emigrated to the U.S. from Trinidad, a country, he said, where education funding is much different. “In Trinidad, all education is free, all the way up to Ph.D.,” he said. “And this country, with all its wealth, cannot give it to us.”

This understanding of war and education funding might exist in part because of someone like Andy Griggs, a social justice educator and progressive activist. “When we go to war with Afghanistan and Iraq, we are also going to war at home against social services programs, whether it’s for women, the disabled, the elderly, children in terms of education or healthcare, all of those suffer,” he said in a telephone interview. “I’ve been trying to make the connections...and that’s one of the reasons why I really got involved with the March fourth movement.”

Jim Lafferty, KPFK radio host and Executive Director of the National Lawyers Guild LA Chapter, put things in a historical context. He said the anti-war movement has always demanded money for jobs instead of war, but not since the Vietnam War has the disparity been so great.

“It’s more prominent now,” he said. “Social sacrifices have moved to front and center.”

Lafferty was present at the demonstration as part of a National Lawyers Guild effort to make sure the rights of protestors were not infringed upon by the LAPD. To which, he said, he had not observed or heard of any such incidents.

Aside from the arguments made against funding wars, there was a visible camaraderie between teachers and students as they united in a common cause. Los Angeles Community College professor Salvador Sanchez brought several of his political science students to the protest.

Sanchez despairs over the current state of education. “We have a class room capacity of 35,” he said. “I have to tell some students I don’t have room for them. We are destroying people’s lives.”

The march and rally occurred peacefully. LAPD Deputy Chief Sergio Diaz said there was only one arrest just prior to the demonstration after a person pushed a police officer. “I’m not even sure if that was related to the protest,” he said.

Diaz estimated the crowd size at 2,500. Thursday’s downtown demonstration was part of a larger coordinated effort to call attention to budget cuts, layoffs and tuition fee increases. The Los Angeles Times reported there were “generally peaceful rallies, walkouts and teach-ins at universities and high schools throughout California and the nation.”

Natalia Swader, one of Sanchez’s students, summed up in a few words what everyone’s purpose was at Thursday’s protest. “I’m fighting for better education,” she said.

12th Grader Exposes US Hypocrisy

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 03:07:00 +0000

A high school student put the State Department to shame this week by exposing an obvious hypocrisy in U.S. foreign policy. According to Australia's Herald Sun, twelfth grade student Mariyam Alavi, of the International Indian School in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, asked if Americans "so vehemently oppose Iran's nuclear program, then why isn't the US asking Israel to give up their nuclear weapons?'' [1]

According to the Sun, Clinton avoided the question, but did say that "we want not only a world free of nuclear weapons, we want a Middle East free of nuclear weapons, including everyone.'' [2] Of course, so why not Israel?

It may have something to do with American politics. According Rex B. Wingerter, writing for the Journal of Palestinian Studies, in 1948 State Department officials were not in favor of creating a Zionist state. President Truman told State Department representatives, "I am sorry gentlemen, but I have to answer to hundreds of thousands who are anxious for the success of Zionism. I do not have hundreds of thousands of Arabs among my constituents." [3]

And so modern U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East was born.

While running for the Democratic party ticket in 2008, Hillary Clinton spoke to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a pro-Israeli lobby, in search of votes. According to Brian Cloughley of Counter Punch, Clinton said, "...we stand with Israel because of our shared values and our shared belief in the dignity of men and women and the right to live without fear or oppression." [4]

Similarly in 2008, Barack Obama made promises to AIPAC too. According to Counterpunch, Obama told the lobby: “Let me be clear. Israel’s security is sacrosanct. It is non-negotiable. The Palestinians need a state—the Palestinians need a state that is contiguous and cohesive and that allows them to prosper, but any agreement with the Palestinian people must preserve Israel’s identity as a Jewish state, with secure, recognized, defensible borders. And Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided.” [5]

Also, the Washington Times reported in 2009 that President Obama had ‘reaffirmed a 4-decade-old secret understanding that has allowed Israel to keep a nuclear arsenal without opening it to international inspections.” [6]

Thus it shouldn't be a surprise why Middle East peace is stalled and Israel's nukes goes unnoticed.

If the U.S. doesn't want Iran to have nuclear weapons they should insist Israel to dump their nukes. Hell, the U.S. should dump theirs. Double standards are unfair and tend to anger the international community. It also makes the U.S. government hypocritical and illegitimate as a broker for Middle East peace.

NOTES:
1. “Clinton Avoided Nuke Question - Student.” Herald Sun. 22 Feb. 2010. 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/clinton-avoided-nuke-question-student/story-e6frf7jx-1225832790510
2. Ibid.
3. Wingerter, Rex B. “The U.S. and the Destruction of Palestine.” Jstor. 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.jstor.org/pss/2536463
4. Cloughley, Brian. “Who Runs America?” Counterpunch. Jan. 2009. 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.counterpunch.org/cloughley01162009.html
5. Weir, Alison. “Should the U.S. End Aid to Israel?” Counterpunch 4 April 2008. 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.counterpunch.org/weir04042008.html
6. Lake, Eli. “Obama Agrees to Keep Israel’s Nukes Secret.” Washington Times. 2 Oct. 2009. 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/oct/02/president-obama-has-reaffirmed-a-4-decade-old-secr/
*Image taken from Salem News, 25 Feb. 2010. http://www.salem-news.com/articles/july062009/israel_pirates_7-6-09.php

Peace Activists Hopeful for March 20 Demonstration

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 16:53:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- On Saturday, Peace activists met to hash over plans for a demonstration that will mark the seven-year anniversary of the Iraq war.

The ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) Coalition hosted area organizers to discuss community outreach, logistics and fundraising. The event, scheduled for March 20, will coincide with a march on Washington, D.C. to demand an end to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

In a crowded room located in the United Teachers Los Angeles building on Wilshire Boulevard, ANSWER Coalition organizer Mike Prysner addressed the activists. Prysner, an Iraq war veteran, stressed the need for the anti-war movement to seize national attention. He said the political climate in favor of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars was low.

“Right now is the time to capitalize on the moment,” he said. “We are the one’s responsible for shifting public opinion.”

Since the beginning of hostilities the number of people attending anti-war demonstrations has dwindled. However, organizers feel that things are going to change.

“The people put a lot of hope in Obama. They saw him as a man of peace.” Jim Lafferty said. Lafferty is the host of The Lawyer's Guild, which airs on KPFK. He was at the meeting representing the international justice and peace organization Office of Americas.

“The fact that we are in a deeper war in Afghanistan is just beginning to register with the American people,” he said.

Prysner acknowledges that the anti-war movement was bigger in 2003, but feels that there were calculated moves by the media and White House to quell dissent. “Every single day is a catastrophe for the people of Afghanistan, Iraq and our soldiers,” he said. “That’s why the demonstrations are vital, so the people can push back.”

Also in attendance, representing the Party for Socialism and Liberation, was Santa Monica College student Orlando Pardo. He found out about the ANSWER Coalition when he was in high school and has over the years helped organize anti-war demonstrations.

When asked about Obama’s war record, Pardo said he was not happy with the president. “It’s ironic he was promoted as an anti-war candidate,” he said. “Now we are spending more on these wars.”

According to the ANSWER Coalition Web site, peace activists are demanding “the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan and Iraq.”

The event in Los Angeles is scheduled for March 20 at 12 p.m. on Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street.

*Photo obtained from ANSWER Coaltion, Los Angeles. http://www.pephost.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ANSWERLA

Internet Group Concludes Three Days of Scientology Protests

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 04:17:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- The internet group Anonymous concluded three days of demonstrations against the Church of Scientology today. Although Saturday’s protests centered around several Scientology sites, today Anonymous focused on the church’s Celebrity Center International on Franklin Avenue in Hollywood.

Today’s crowd of activists was smaller than yesterdays, but still garnered much attention. Throughout the three and a half hour demonstration people in passing cars would honk their horns in approval and give a thumbs-up.

However, not everyone shared in the protesters passion. Across the street form Scientology’s Celebrity Center is the heart of Franklin Village, one city block full of restaurants, boutiques and other small businesses. Some still harbor a bit of angst towards Anonymous from previous demonstrations.

Ann DeBello, a long-time resident of Franklin Village, says Anonymous demonstrators have been rude to people in the neighborhood. She cited examples of protesters blocking businesses and crowding in front of her apartment.

“They would shout at us saying, ‘How does it feel to live across from a cult?’” she said. “I know what Scientology is, but I have to live here.”

Jacqueline Koster, owner of the restaurant La Poubelle, expressed similar complaints. Anonymous protesters mistook her daughter’s boyfriend as a Scientology spy today because of his taking photographs of the demonstration. In front of Poubelle’s clientele, two people from Anonymous started a shouting match with Koster’s daughter who threatened to call police several times. “It’s always a problem with these people,” Koster said.

For Koster, Anonymous’ complaints about Scientology are bit foreign to her. “They really have helped us,” she said, referring to Celebrity Center’s 24-hour security patrol. “They cleaned up the neighborhood.”

Despite any negative attention, Anonymous demonstrators informed many about their cause today by speaking to passersby. A few, like Oliver Jones, who never heard of the internet group, joined the protest.

“I don’t like cults because they are authoritarian,” Jones said. “It’s just weak people being taken advantage of.”

Jones says he has been aware of the controversy surrounding Scientology for some time. He watched an online video of a Celebrity Center security guard shooting a sword-wielding man who came on church premises last year. Jones, who is a full-time security guard with a permit to carry a firearm, said in his opinion the use of force wasn’t warranted.

“They totally executed him,” he said.

Typical of this weekend’s events, two Scientologists were seen from across Franklin Avenue video taping demonstrators. When asked, no explanation was offered as to why they were video taping the group. “We’re video taping because we can,” one Scientologist said.

Both Scientologists turned down a request for an interview.

Internet Group Protests Scientology in Spite of Consequences

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 06:49:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- The internet group Anonymous conducted several demonstrations today in front of Scientology centers in the Hollywood area. Today’s events marks the groups second anniversary of Project Chanology, a protest movement which targets the Church of Scientology.

What began as a First Amendment-rights lark in response to the church pulling a leaked video of Tom Cruise in January, 2008 from You Tube has since become a movement dedicated to revealing what many argue are crimes committed by Scientology.

Tory Christman, a former member and critic of the church, who was present at today’s demonstrations, commented on the church's numerous attempts to squelch critics. “They have to stop free speech,” she said. “Otherwise people are going to leave the church.”

Since 2008, the mood of the movement has changed somewhat. “It started out as something funny,” Emily said, a demonstrator who wished her full name not be used. However, as she explained, things turned serious for many in Anonymous. Emily says several of them have been harassed by the church.

For instance, a woman at today’s protests, who goes by the name Noir, says after one protest she was followed on foot by church members for three miles and taunted. “They would say things like, ‘Why are you leaving? We know where you live,’” she said.

Noir says she and others have been chased on the freeway after demonstrations. People have visited their places of employment, sent letters to family members or bosses and even letters from law firms accusing them of terrorism and bigotry.

“My parents support me and my boss doesn’t care. So what can they do to me?” she said. “I haven’t done anything illegal.”

It is for this reason that many in Anonymous hide their identity with masks, typically a Guy Fawkes mask featured in the 2006 movie V for Vendetta.

Even in today’s demonstrations, church members would approach demonstrators with video cameras. Some would keep their distance and others would come near protesters, simply filming and never addressing the crowd.

One Scientologist did engage the crowd. Armed with a video camera, he argued with protesters. When asked for an interview, he said he would not talk to members of the news media.

Several attempts were made to get interviews with Scientologists at the scene, but all were turned down. When asked for an interview, one security guard on a bicycle began to peddle away. “Not right now. I’m kind of busy,” he said. However, five minutes later he was seen nearby chatting with another Scientologist.

One demonstrator, who goes by the name AnonOrange, is suing the church for assault and battery due to an incident that occurred while he was protesting at the Scientology headquarters near Hemet, California.

AnonOrange, as well as the other demonstrators today, want Scientology to be investigated because of numerous reports about the church involving incarcerations, violent physical assaults, coerced abortions, human trafficking, unsanitary and unsafe living and working conditions, denial of needed medical/dental care and medications, as well as sleep and food deprivation.

“It’s a horrible criminal organization and our governments won’t do anything about it,” he said.

Despite the serious nature and consequences of protesting the Church of Scientology, Anonymous still keeps a light-hearted mood. With a boom-box on site, demonstrators played a “confidential” Scientology lecture, played music that made fun of the church and often danced to the amusement of passersby.

Anonymous’ second anniversary demonstrations are scheduled to continue on Sunday at Scientology’s Celebrity Center in Hollywood.

Former Scientology Staff Accuse Church of Abuse

noreply@blogger.com (Dan Bluemel) — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:33:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- Six former members of Scientology’s paramilitary unit, the Sea Organization, spoke at a press conference today to discuss widespread abuse and human trafficking within the church.

The press conference marks the second anniversary of Project Chanology, a protest movement started by the internet-based group Anonymous. Today is the first of a three-day “megaraid,” of planned demonstrations at Los Angeles-area Scientology centers.

Creator of Xenu TV, a Web site that provides commentary on the church, and Emmy-winning journalist Mark Bunker moderated the event.

Marc Headley, author of Blown for Good, told how he was recruited into the Sea Org at the age of 16. He worked from 7:30 a.m. - 12 a.m. every day. According to Headley, after 15 years of working at Scientology's international base his average wage came out to 40 cents an hour.

He escaped in 2005. He says he was tailed by security who ran him and his motorcycle off the road. A witness called 9-1-1 and soon law enforcement arrived. “The only reason why I was able to leave is because I had police assistance,” Headley said.

Headley is currently suing the church for human trafficking.

Jeff Hawkins shared his experience of having suffered three months of interrogations by the church, being physically abused by church leader David Miscavige and being forced to sign a gag order preventing him from speaking to the media.

Hawkins was interviewed by the St. Petersburg Times as part of the paper’s several part series on Scientology called "The Truth Rundown."

Laura Decrescenzo told of how, at age 17, she was pressured by the church to have an abortion. It is Sea Org policy that members cannot have children. “I never agreed to have an abortion. I conceded,” she said. “Does it kill me every day? Yes it does.”

According to Decrescenzo, she finally managed to escape the Sea Org by swallowing bleach to convince the church she was suicidal and thus, should be let go.

Also in attendance were former members Will Fry, Maureen Bolstad and author of My Billion Year Contract, Nancy Many. Many's speech was spent addressing numerous Scientology related deaths.

In closing her speech, Maureen Bolstad seemed to capture the purpose of today’s press conference. “Scientology has a dark side and it needs to be faced,” she said.

Today’s protest was held in Hemet, the location of Scientology’s audio-visual unit Golden Era Productions. Saturday and Sunday will feature demonstrations in the Hollywood area. For the exact locations and time of the demonstrations, go to socalanon.com.

Top Photo: Mark Bunker
Middle Photo: Marc Headley
Bottom Photo: Jeff Hawkins