Anti-choice bills advance in Oklahoma, other states

The National Partnership for Women & Families: has the sad details.

Malalai Joya allowed visa, calls for US withdrawal

Recently, the US government refused a visa to Afghan activist Malalai Joya for a trip to the US to promote the sescond edition of her autobiography, A Woman Among Warlords. Following a public outcry, the Obama administration has relented and allowed Joya into our country. Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! interviewed Joya on Monday morning. Part I of the interview describes the recent situation in Afghanistan and why the US government initially denied Joya entrance into the US. In Part II of the interview, Joya calls for the end of the US occupation of Afghanistan.

Even abortion rights opponents agree THIS is unconstitutional...

...according to the National Partnership for Women & Families.

Egypt faces possible counter-revolution

Blogger Mark Levine on Opinion - Al Jazeera English interviews Egyptian pro-democracy activists who fear for the future of their revolution. One of these activists, Ramy Essam, was arrested and tortured by Egyptian security forces last week.

Ramy: What most people who have heard of what happened to me do not realise is that I was not there protesting that day. I was actually on my way to a concert downtown, but while I was on my way, I heard sounds and attacks coming from Tahrir, so I rushed there to see what is going on. I saw the army attacking the people on one hand, and on the other hand there was that group of thugs, pointing out certain people to the army officers so they would arrest them, and they pointed me out too, so I got arrested.

I decided to stay calm and not react in any violent way and see what happens when I meet the higher rank officers and talk to them to see what is going on. But as soon as we entered the museum, for 4 hours they kept beating us constantly, stripped us, shocked us with teaser guns, and even cut my pony tail. They were beating me so hard; at one point they held me on the floor and one of the officers jumped up in the air and then landed with his both feet right on my face.

Supporting one dictator while bombing another

Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman discusses the US government's covert support for the dictatorship in Yemen with author and journalist Jeremy Scahill. On Friday, the forces of President Ali Abudullah Saleh killed 45 people and wounded 350 when they fired into a peaceful demonstration in the capital of Sana’a. This massacre prompted the resignation of a dozen of Yemen's top military leaders on Monday. Jeremy Scahill describes how President Saleh, a master manipulator, cooperated with the US "War on Terror" in order to defuse the hostility of George W. Bush--and used US aid to attack his own internal opponents. The clip takes about nine minutes to watch, and it's fascinating:

Look at this way cool Web site

I'm talking about the Web site of MADRE :: Demanding Rights, Resources & Results for Women Worldwide. When I visited the site, they had excellent analyses of the US war in Afghanistan, a shelter for rape survivors in Haiti, the situation of women in Guatemala, the pro-democracy movement in Iraq, and the work of the Zenab women's organization in Sudan.

I discovered this website by following a link to this thoughtful post about the situation in Libya, posted on Facebook by Feminist Peace Network.

The Libya Dilemma

Once again, a US president has launched military action against a brutal tyrant that our government previously courted as a friend. The contradictory history of the US government's relationship with Libya raises serious questions about whether the US can be trusted to intervene in Libya in a helpful way. As a feminist, I wonder why macho strategies involving missiles and bombs are promoted as the most effective way of dealing with foreign dictatorships?

The editors of The Nation pointed out recently that creating a "no-fly zone" is far from a foolproof plan for helping Libya's pro-democracy rebels. There is a serious risk of civilian casualties, and military action can divert attention from other, more effective means of pressure:

Financially strangling the regime by cutting off all sources of money from abroad, sharing real-time intelligence with the rebels, working with others to facilitate the flow of assistance to them while stopping the flow of pro-Qaddafi mercenaries into the country, if done in cooperation with the Arab League, all have as much or more promise with less risk than does the far more dramatic gesture of a no-fly zone.

Veteran journalist Robert Fisk argues that the motive for these military strikes is racist and imperialist rather than benevolent:

Yes, Gaddafi is completely bonkers, flaky, a crackpot on the level of Ahmadinejad of Iran and Lieberman of Israel – who once, by the way, drivelled on about how Mubarak could "go to hell" yet quaked with fear when Mubarak was indeed hurtled in that direction. And there is a racist element in all this.

The Middle East seems to produce these ravers – as opposed to Europe, which in the past 100 years has only produced Berlusconi, Mussolini, Stalin and the little chap who used to be a corporal in the 16th List Bavarian reserve infantry, but who went really crackers when he got elected in 1933 – but now we are cleaning up the Middle East again and can forget our own colonial past in this sandpit. And why not, when Gaddafi tells the people of Benghazi that "we will come, 'zenga, zenga' (alley by alley), house by house, room by room." Surely this is a humanitarian intervention that really, really, really is a good idea. After all, there will be no "boots on the ground".

Of course, if this revolution was being violently suppressed in, say, Mauritania, I don't think we would be demanding no-fly zones. Nor in Ivory Coast, come to think of it. Nor anywhere else in Africa that didn't have oil, gas or mineral deposits or wasn't of importance in our protection of Israel, the latter being the real reason we care so much about Egypt.

Fisk's analysis rings true to me. As horrified as I am by Qaddafi's atrocities, when I think back over the history of US military intervention in my lifetime, from Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan (to mention a very few instances), it has not gone well. Before this weekend, my country was already immersed in two undeclared wars. Now, as John Nichols points out, we've got a third. Nichols says that the results are as corrosive to our own democracy as they are destructive to the people we are purporting to help. I agree with him.

Finally, this morning Democracy Now! broadcast an interesting analysis of how the US government has orchestrated the war against Qaddafi under the cloak of a UN Security Council Resolution.

US government censors Afghan woman activist

Can it happen here? reports that the US government has refused to allow Afghani feminist and peace activist Malalai Joya to enter the US to promote her book A Woman among Warlords. As blogger Janinsanfran notes:

Apparently the current State Department doesn't want people in this country to hear from a distinctive Afghan voice -- a woman's voice at that -- opposing our war in Afghanistan. Several Congress members are pushing for a reversal of the denial of Joya's visa.

Now that we live in age of YouTube, visa deniers have a harder time keeping us from hearing people they wish they could silence. Here's a clip of Malalai Joya taking on some folks who are a lot more dangerous than the average US consular flunky. At Afghanistan's Constitutional Assembly nearly a decade ago, she denounced war lords who intended to keep their power by becoming politicians under the newly imposed regime. Her daring act was electrifying; the response was ugly.

Here is the video Janinsanfran posted so you can judge for yourself:

Who's afraid of radical feminism?

Jonathan Dean has an interesting analysis of radical feminism in the context of the case of Julian Assange, the Wikileaks founder who faces sexual assault charges in Sweden. Dean questions the idea that Assange couldn't get a fair trial because Sweden's chief prosecutor is allegedly a "malicious radical feminist."

So what is radical feminism? Historically, radical feminism was a specific strand of the feminist movement that emerged in Europe and North America in the late 1960s. Distinctive to this strand was its emphasis on the role of male violence against women in the creation and maintenance of gender inequality (as argued by the likes of Susan Brownmiller, Andrea Dworkin and Catherine MacKinnon). And while a minority of radical feminists – most infamously Valerie Solanas – were hostile to men, radical feminism was much more instrumental in generating widespread support for campaigns around issues such as rape, domestic violence and sexual harassment.

However, in Britain at least, radical feminism has never been particularly dominant, partly because – in the eyes of many socialist and postcolonial feminists – it has been insufficiently attentive to the intersections between gender inequality and other categories, such as race and class. So Rod Liddle's peddling of the tiresome rightwing idea that radical feminism has destroyed the family, along with Dominic Raab's assault on "feminist bigotry" and the Vatican's efforts to address "distortions" caused by radical feminism, rest on at least two implausible assumptions. First, they reduce feminism to a horrifying caricature that never really existed and second, they make the frankly bizarre suggestion that radical feminism is the dominant ideology of our times. It would seem that not only do these radical feminists commit the outrage of not wearing makeup, but they use the time this frees up to consolidate their world domination. Or an alternative explanation might be that these are the paranoid anxieties of fearful anti-feminists.

Iowa woman jailed for thinking about abortion

Thanks to Feminist Peace Network for a link to this story about an Iowa woman who was thrown in jail after confiding some of her thoughts and fears about her pregnancy to an emergency room nurse. Christine Taylor had become light-headed and fallen down a flight of stairs in her home. As blogger fiver explains:

Yes, as if Ms. Taylor's existing problems weren't enough, the anti-choice zealots got her jailed for 2 days for thinking of having an abortion, even though she voluntarily went to the ER to assure the health of her fetus. Funny how "pro-lifers" have never met a victim they don't want to punish. After three weeks, the District Attorney declined to prosecute, but not because of the obvious encroachment on a woman's right to choose (similar laws for which this woman was held exist in 37 states), but because she was only in her second trimester, and not third when she fell.

Fiver provides a link to the original story on change.org.

Register NOW to vote in OKC council runoff April 5

If you live in Oklahoma City Council Ward 2, you'll have the opportunity to vote in a runoff election April 5. The candidates will be BancFirst Senior Vice President Charlie Swinton and Dr. Ed Shadid. If you're not already registered to vote, you need to have your voter registration form postmarked by tomorrow, March 11, if you want to vote in this run-off.  According to the Oklahoma Elections Board "Voter registration applications are available at your County Election Board, post offices, tag agencies, libraries and many other public locations."  Or you can download a voter registration form right here.

How can you tell if you're in Ward 2?  In general, Ward 2 is bounded on the north by Northwest 122nd Street, on the south by Northwest 23rd Street. For the most part, the eastern boundary is I-235, and the western boundary is Portland Avenue. If you want to be sure, you can consult this handy map.

Why does OKC have so little citizen involvement?

Last week's Oklahoma City election for city council members was, by local standards, a high-profile event. The Sooner Tea Party and the firefighter's union jointly supported two candidates. The local business elite had its own de facto slate of candidates, funded in part by the shadowy Committee for Oklahoma City Momentum.

All this excitement drew droves of voters to the polls March 1, according to NewsOK.com. In this case, "droves of voters" translates into oh, eleven or twelve percent of registered voters.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Oklahoma City has less citizen involvement in local government than any place I've ever lived. Is it because ordinary people who want to be politically involved use their limited time to work on state and national issues? It is because of a lack of high-quality journalism covering local political issues?

I moved here from western Oregon nine years ago, and frankly, I don't get nostalgic for the place very often. It rained eight months out of the year, and despite its liberal reputation, it was infested with neo-Nazis and the anti-gay, anti-woman Oregon Citizens Alliance. But one thing Oregon did have--at least in Eugene, where I lived--was widespread citizen involvement in local issues. The business elite usually triumphed in the end, but at least we put up a fight.

As far as I can tell, there were two concrete differences between Oklahoma City and Eugene.

First, in Eugene, city council meetings were held in the evening. When controversial issues came up, those meetings were sometimes very well attended. In Oklahoma City, by contrast, city council meetings take place on Tuesday mornings. In all the years I've been here, I've never been to a city council meeting. Have you?

Second, in Eugene, city council elections are held in even years, when voters are also voting for statewide and national elected offices. In Oklahoma City, city council members are elected in off-year elections when fewer voters are likely to head to the polls.

But are these two things causes of low citizen participation, or are they an effect?  I would sure appreciate any comments from anyone who has some insight into this situation.

Mainstream Politics 101

Rachel Maddow actually makes a good case that the two mainstream political parties are not exactly like. Who would have thunk it?

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Economic Justice 101

I like this post that commondreams.org picked up from the Guardian. Richard D. Wolff, an emeritus economics professor form the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, explains how lower taxes on the ultra-rich have made life worse for the rest of us. For instance:

the richest Americans take the money they don't pay in taxes and invest it in hedge funds and with stockbrokers to make profitable investments. These days, that often means speculating in oil and food, which drives up their prices, undermines economic recovery for the mass of Americans, and produces acute suffering around the globe. Those hedge funds and brokers likewise use part of the money rich people save from taxes to speculate in the US stock markets. That has recently driven stock prices higher: hence, the stock market recovery. And that mostly helps – you guessed it – the richest Americans who own most of the stocks.

The one kind of significant wealth average Americans own, if they own any, is their individual home. And home values remain deeply depressed: no recovery there.

Cutting the taxes on the rich in no way guarantees social benefits from what they may choose to do with their money. Indeed, their choices can worsen economic conditions for the mass of people. These days, that is exactly what they are doing.

The whole post is well worth reading. Professor Wolff also has an interesting web site.

In midst of OKC council election weirdness, I'm voting for Ed Shadid

Time flies when you're trying to get used to grad school, so I almost forgot that the Oklahoma City Council election is coming up on Tuesday. Council races come on a rotating schedule. This year seats are up for grabs in Wards 2, 5, 6, and 8. You can find a ward map here.

This year's city council race is bizarre, even by Oklahoma standards. In most of the races, voters are getting the moral equivalent of a choice between Lord Voldemort and Count Dracula.

Fortunately, in Ward 2 I've got a better choice. I'll be voting for Ed Shadid. Last fall, Shadid was an independent candidate for the Oklahoma State legislature, running with the endorsement of the Green Party. While Shadid isn't playing up his Green Party ties in the nonpartisan Oklahoma City Council election, I expect him to follow a similar progressive agenda. One or two of the other candidates in the crowded Ward 2 race also seem appealing, but Shadid seems to have the most resources and the best chance of defeating corporate candidate Charlie Swinton.

Meanwhile, in Wards 6 and 8, Sooner Tea Party supporters Adrian Van Manen and Cliff Hearron from Windsor Hills Baptist Church are challenging the incumbents. In Ward 5, incumbent Brian Walters is also an ultraconservative with Tea Party sympathies.(You may remember Walters's vote last year to oppose granting a permit for the gay pride parade.) According to newsok.com, the right-wing candidates in Wards 6 and 8 are supported by a PAC that was established by Oklahoma City firefighters. Is anyone else having a WTF moment here? The firefighters union is apparently supporting these guys because of their opposition to MAPS3. Okay, but the Tea Party isn't exactly a pro-union organization. Haven't the firefighters kept track of what's going on in Wisconsin?

So on one side, you have the populist right wing trying to win control of the City Council, and on the other side, you've got the the city's business elite lining up behind its own slate of candidates. This would be BancFirst Senior Vice President Charlie Swinton in Ward 2,  accountant David Greenwell in Ward 5, employment agency owner Meg Salyer in Ward 6 and retired OG&E Vice Chairman Pat Ryan in Ward 8. According to the Oklahoma Gazette (see ward links in this paragraph), all four of these candidates have received $5,000 donations from Chesapeake Energy's PAC and Chesapeake CEO Aubrey McClendon. There is also a shadowy PAC called Committee for Oklahoma City Momentum that is sending out campaign materials supporting the election of all four candidates. The Chamber of Commerce has denied contributing money to Oklahoma City Momentum. I finally found the group's web site, but two days before the election it is still "under construction." You can see ads the group has placed on newsok.com here and here.

If I lived in Ward 6, I would most likely vote for Jessica Holstein, who unfortunately doesn't seem to be running a very well-organized campaign. The big news of  her campaign is that the Gazette decided to post some old and embarrassing photos of the candidate. Just when I thought the Gazette was trying to be an actual newspaper.

A great reason to get out on Saturday night

 It's been fun, but Snowpocalypse 2011 seems to be almost over. By Saturday, roads should be open and life should be almost back to normal (at least for a little while). If you're in Oklahoma City, or can get to Oklahoma City, here's a great way to celebrate: OKC's own Lauren Zuniga will be the featured performer at a poetry cafe at Church of the Open Arms on Saturday night (that's Feb. 5th) from 7-9 p.m. The poetry cafe is a benefit for the Oklahoma Coalition For Reproductive Justice.

January 22nd marked the 38th anniversary of the 1973 US Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, which for the first time guaranteed women in the early months of pregnancy the right to obtain an abortion. Both nationally and in Oklahoma, that right is under increasing attack. In 2010, the Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice formed to defend abortion rights, and met with a surprising degree of success. The poetry cafe is free, (and there will be refreshments), but if you can make a donation, 100 percent of all money collected will go to support the work of OCRJ.

In the interests of full disclosure, I ought to say that I am one of the poets who will be reading that evening.

Hope to see you there.

Thoughts on WikiLeaks

This started out as something I did for an online class assignment, and with some minor modifications, I thought it was worth re-posting:

As citizens of a democracy, we have responsibility to supervise the government bodies that act in our name. One of the major difficulties with official secrecy is that it transforms the relationship between citizens and government. When the government keeps secrets, I am no longer able to fulfill my responsibility as a citizen. Secrecy might allow government officials to perform necessary tasks -- but it might also allow them to support foreign dictatorships or collude in the murder of civilians. Without transparency, I simply have to trust them to do the right thing. Secrecy allows the government to become my master rather than my servant.

But it seems to me that this is a question of fact as well as of theory. In other words, what are the actual effects of the WikiLeaks disclosure?  Have catastrophes resulted from this release of classified information, or has it enhanced the functioning of democracy? I suspect that some of you will disagree with me, but so far I think the results have been encouraging.

For instance, documents found on Wikileaks may have helped inspire the overthrow of the corrupt and authoritarian government of Tunisia. In a sort of chain reaction, the uprising in Tunisia seems to have inspired pro-democracy demonstrations in Egypt. It looks to me as if the controversy surrounding WikiLeaks inspired the Guardian in the UK to collaborate with al Jazeera TV to release the Palestine Papers. (Controversy is good business for journalists. It increases readership.) The Palestine Papers, in turn, have offered important new information about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and inspired new hope for resolution of that conflict. Finally, the WikiLeaks controversy has opened up much needed discussion of the issue of government secrecy, as evidenced by this Time magazine article and also by this thoughtful post.

Julian Assange may not be an admirable person, (and I think that the rape charges against him are worthy of investigation) but on the whole, it seems to me that WikiLeaks has done good work.

Unions help counter corporate power

Ellen Dannin persuasively demonstrates the need for workers to have unions in this post on Truthout. Dannin points out that

Today, we are reliving the dynamics of unchecked corporate power that led to the Great Depression. The Great Recession could not have been a surprise to anyone who was paying attention to the erosion of pay and working conditions and to the steady increase in poverty and unemployment.

We make a grave mistake when we blame unions for doing their job - for being a counterbalance to corporate power. Unions have a legal obligation to be the disloyal opposition. When there is no check on the steady growth of corporate power, we lose the balance and equality necessary to democracy. In fact, unions promote citizenship in the workplace and in their communities. Unions give workers rights of due process and equal protection in their workplaces.

The whole post is well worth reading.

Think globally, act locally March 1

 Some of my best friends don't vote as a matter of principle. They say they that voting merely decorates an oppressive system with the illusion of popular consent. If you have a philosophical objection to voting, well then, don't vote. I have no argument with you. In fact, about 47 percent of the time, I'm inclined to agree with you.

On the other hand, I have other friends who would read the paragraph above and disagree with it so strongly that they would jump up and down in frustration. They would cite the history of people of color and women who fought difficult and dangerous battles to gain the right to cast a ballot. Friends, I have no argument with you, either. In fact, if you live in Oklahoma City, I am writing this post specifically for you, to let you know about the City Council elections scheduled for March 1.

If elections really are important, local elections are possibly the most important elections we have. City governments deal with issues that affect the lives of ordinary people on a day-to-day basis. City governments are potentially easier to reach and to influence than governmental bodies on a state or national level. And in Oklahoma it seems--at least in Oklahoma City--the city government attracts very little attention and draws very little participation. For instance, the vote on the MAPS III tax proposal--which taxed the city's poorest citizens to benefit the most affluent citizens--drew 31 percent of the vote, according to NewsOk.com. This was about twice the usual turnout for a city election.

Business as usual in city government means government by the rich, for the rich. If we want that to change, we need to participate. And given the abysmally low number of people who vote in city elections, if progressives were to educate ourselves about local candidates and issues and make an effort to get ourselves to the polls, we would have a chance of creating real change.

So, here's a little bit of information to start out with. As I said, the next City Council election is March 1, with seats from wards 2, 5, 6, and 8 up for grabs. If you need to know which ward you live in, you can check out this handy ward map. If you would like to find out who your current City Council member is, you can check this page. If you think you might like to run for the City Council yourself, you can find the information about how to do so here. But you need to get cracking. The deadline is coming up very soon.

If you aren't already registered to vote at your current address, you will need to register by 24 days before the election. If I counted right, the deadline would be February 4. But don't trust my ability to count. Get it done as soon as you can. You can download a registration form here. If you're planning to be out of town on March 1, you can sign up for an absentee ballot.

I'll try to write more about this issue as the time approaches. But don't wait for me. Go find some stuff out and report back.

Thank you, and good night.

Is this 2011 or 1984?

The rulers of the dystopian society portrayed in George Orwell's 1984 had a talent for using language that turned reality on its head. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery, and so forth. We know that such unfortunate manipulation of meaning is not confined to the world of fiction. Today's electronic news brings two examples:

Spinifex Press has discovered an alarming blog post suggesting that Pope Benedict considers child sexual abuse to be "normal." The blog reposted a December 21 article from the Belfast Telegraph. “In the 1970s, paedophilia was theorised as something fully in conformity with man and even with children,” the Pope said, according to the Telegraph. “It was maintained — even within the realm of Catholic theology — that there is no such thing as evil in itself or good in itself. There is only a ‘better than' and a ‘worse than'. Nothing is good or bad in itself.” The Telegraph further reports that victims of sexual abuse by priests were outraged by these remarks. One can only imagine.

Meanwhile, the National Partnership for Women and Families reports that US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia doesn't believe that the 14th Amendment prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex. At least, that's what Scalia told California Lawyer magazine:

In 1868, when the 39th Congress was debating and ultimately proposing the 14th Amendment, I don't think anybody would have thought that equal protection applied to sex discrimination, or certainly not to sexual orientation. So does that mean that we've gone off in error by applying the 14th Amendment to both?
Yes, yes. Sorry, to tell you that. ... But, you know, if indeed the current society has come to different views, that's fine. You do not need the Constitution to reflect the wishes of the current society. Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't. Nobody ever thought that that's what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that. If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws. You don't need a constitution to keep things up-to-date. All you need is a legislature and a ballot box. You don't like the death penalty anymore, that's fine. You want a right to abortion? There's nothing in the Constitution about that. But that doesn't mean you cannot prohibit it. Persuade your fellow citizens it's a good idea and pass a law. That's what democracy is all about. It's not about nine superannuated judges who have been there too long, imposing these demands on society.

The NPWF notes that the New York Times found this view "jarring." The Times went on to note that

No less dismaying is his notion that women, gays and other emerging minorities should be left at the mercy of the prevailing political majority when it comes to ensuring fair treatment. It is an “originalist” approach wholly antithetical to the framers’ understanding that vital questions of people’s rights should not be left solely to the political process. It also disrespects the wording of the Equal Protection Clause, which is intentionally broad, and its purpose of ensuring a fairer society.

On the other hand, should Scalia's strange view of the 14th Amendment prevail, it would all of a sudden become crystal clear that we really do need the Equal Rights Amendment.