World People’s Blog

• 2008-04-01: Brian Moore - USA;
• 2008-04-02: Ishbel Maria Aberdeen - England (1857 - 1939);
• 2008-04-03: Robert Louis Heilbroner - USA (1919 - 2005);
• 2008-04-04: 5 peacewomen: Isabel Crook, Jinming Zhang, Fengxiang Xu, Jiyue Li and Shuqin Zhang - China;
• 2008-04-05: Irma Leticia Silva Rodríguez de Oyuela - Honduras;
• 2008-04-06: Richard C. Cook - USA;
• 2008-04-07: Necla Kelek - Turkey and Germany;
• 2008-04-08: Benazir Hotaki - Afghanistan;
• 2008-04-09: Sandra Nyaira - Zimbabwe;
• 2008-04-10: Gregory T. Nojeim - USA;
• 2008-04-11: James Forman - USA (1928 - 2005);
• 2008-04-12: Creuza Maria Oliveira - Brazil;
• 2008-04-13: Raoul Wallenberg - Sweden (1912 - 1947 ?);
• 2008-04-14: Nicolasa Machaca Alejandro - Bolivia;
• 2008-04-15: Todd Gitlin - USA;
• 2008-04-16: Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. - USA;
• 2008-04-17: Carla del Ponte - Switzerland;
• 2008-04-18: Violet Chavula - Malawi;
• 2008-04-19: Rose Chiwambo (Chibambo) - Malawi;
• 2008-04-20: Seyran Ates - Turkey;
• 2008-04-21: Stephen Lendman - USA;
• 2008-04-22: Concita Maia - Brazil;
• 2008-04-23: 5 peacewomen: Xiaoliang Li, Sihai Long, Lihong Shi, Zhongxun Liu and Xiuyun Shang - China;
• 2008-04-24: Michael Edwards - USA;
• 2008-04-25: Bruno Manser - Switzerland (1954 - 2000?);
• 2008-04-26: Collin Greer - USA;
• 2008-04-27: Tony Mazzocchi - USA;
• 2008-04-28: Karen Silkwood - USA (1946 - 1974);
• 2008-04-29: Rani Bang - India;
• 2008-04-30: Rafael C. Lopa - Philippines.

Linked with The Resource Alliance.org.

Rafael C. Lopa looks at emerging social enterprises and how to engage the business sector in building social capital at grassroots level. Introduction by Mal Warwick (Newsletter of the Resource Alliance.org).

World Forum, Introduction and essential information … in Edinburgh, Scotland from September 2nd to 5th 2008. (full text).

Billionaire venture capitalist Sir Tom Hunter is to be a keynote speaker at the UK’s first annual social investment conference, Good Deals, in London on Tuesday 6th May, 2008. Presented by the Office of the Third Sector (OTS) in partnership with NESTA, Good Deals will bring together a wide range of high profile contributors to debate and learn about new opportunities for financing social change … (full text).

ASA Philippines Foundation/about.

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Rafael C. Lopa - Philippines

Employment and skills for disadvantaged people, Social Firms: a solution. Conference 23 - 24 June 2008, Reading University - Background and event objectives: This conference is relevant for Social Firms, social enterprises and service providers who have an interest and active involvement in helping people furthest away from the labour market into employment and training opportunities … (full text Social Firms.uk).

What is the future of social enterprise in ethical markets? By Dr Alex Nicholls MBA, a social enterprise think piece for the Office of the Third Sector, November 2007, 26 pages.

Rafael is currently involved in promoting Social Entrepreneurship in the Philippines. Concretely, he sits on the board of ASA Philippines Foundation, a Non-governmental Organization involved in Micro-Financing for poor enterprising women. He is also on the Board of the PINOYME Foundation, a foundation that is in the process of setting up a Social Investment Banking Operation geared to further strengthen the Micro-Finance Institutions in the Philippines. Rafael serves as Chairman of MicroVentures, Inc. MVI, a Social Business Enterprise geared to be the leading business partner of MicroEntrepreneurs. To date, MVI has pioneered the establishment of a network of small village /community based stores (or what we refer to as “Sari-sari Stores) owned by women micro-entrepreneurs catering to the Bottom of the Pyramid Market. He will be a featured speaker at the International Workshop on Resource Mobilisation (IWRM) in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 22-25 May 2008 … (full text).

Welcome to the Social Enterprise Network.

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Linked with SEARCH.org.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Rani Bang’s work in the Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra has changed the face of the tribal pockets in the area. Where healthcare was once nonexistent, there are now a friendly hospital, experienced healthworkers, and trained traditional birth attendants. Rani also worked actively towards reviving traditional medicine, realizing that community mobilization combined with the optimum use of existing facilities is the only way to solve the crises in the interior areas, largely overlooked by policy and planners alike. (1000peacewomen).

She says: “Rani Bang’s forte is her responsiveness to what the people identify as priority areas of concern. She uses research to understand their needs, and then uses community-based solutions to solve them”.

National Award for Women’s Development through application of Science & Technology Conferred on Dr. Rani Bang.

Like many great medical breakthroughs, Drs. Abhay and Rani Bang’s discovery of how to reduce child deaths in the developing world as much as 75% came from a deceptively simple premise … (full text).

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Abhay and Rani Bang - India

She works for the Society for Education, Action and Research in Community Health (Search).

Two hundred kilometers to the south of Nagpur lies Gadchiroli district in Maharashtra. It is located on the borders of Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh. This area is known to be one of the most backward regions of Maharashtra. In this forlorn place, a brilliant doctor couple, in their fifties, has been working for over two decades, taking medical care to the poor people … (full text).

Her profile on Ashoka.
Dr. Rani Bang comes from a family with strong commitment to medical and public service. She is also the daughter-in-law of well-known Gandhian Takurdas Bang. She completed her medical degree in India with several gold medals, and went on to Johns Hopkins University in the US for a Masters in Public Health.

Having obtained the degree, Rani returned to India. In the early 1980s, she and her husband, Dr. Abhay Bang, decided to relocate to the internal tribal pockets of Maharashtra. Abhay and Rani set up the Society for Education, Action and Research in Community Health (SEARCH) to provide community healthcare to the tribes in Gadchiroli district.

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Linked with Tony Mazzocchi - USA, and with List of Trade Unions worldwide.

Karen Silkwood (February 19, 1946 – November 13, 1974) was an American labor union activist and chemical technician at the Kerr-McGee plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, United States. Silkwood’s job was making plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods. She died under mysterious circumstances after investigating claims of irregularities and wrongdoing at the Kerr-McGee plant … (wikipedia).

Her Union activities.

Karen Silkwood (1946-1974), a nuclear plant laborer who died while investigating safety violations made by her employer, is viewed as a martyr by anti-nuclear activists. Her story was made into a film, Silkwood, in 1983 … (Encyclopedia of World Biography, on Karen Silkwood, About 5 pages / 1364 words - FREE).

Karen Silkwood was a co-founder of the (US) Labor Party.

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Karen Silkwood - USA (1946 - 1974)

She worked for the Kerr-McGee plant, Oklahoma.

Was Karen Silkwood Murdered?

• Controversy Was Karen Silkwood Murdered Part 1;
• Controversy Was Karen Silkwood Murdered Part 2:
• Controversy Was Karen Silkwood Murdered Part 3.

Karen Silkwood, Campaigner.

Silkwood said she had assembled a stack of documentation for her claims. She now decided to go public with this evidence, and made contact with a New York Times journalist prepared to print the story. On November 13, 1974 she left a union meeting at the Hub Cafe in Crescent. Another attendee of that meeting later testified that she did have a binder and a packet of documents at the cafe. Silkwood got into her car and headed alone for Oklahoma City, about 30 miles away, to meet with New York Times reporter David Burnham and Steve Wodka, an official of her union’s national office. She never arrived. (wikipedia).

From the New York Times: The Karen Silkwood Story, An Unexpected Twist At The End - HERE IS THE STORY that answers the basic question underlying the Karen Silkwood controversy, 1985.

In the book: No Nukes, everyone’s guide to nuclear power, page 103.

… Karen Silkwood, who died at age 28, was buried in Danville Cemetery in Kilgore, Texas … (full text).

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Linked with Karen Silkwood - USA (1946 - 1974), with List of Trade Unions worldwide, and with The Man Who Hated Work and Loved Labor.

Last October, Clean Water Action – and all who care about a safer and more just world – lost a close friend and visionary partner to cancer. Tony Mazzocchi was a leader in the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union (OCAW, which merged with the paperworkers in 1999 to form a union called PACE). He was one of the first to call attention to the injustices of an industrial system that endangers workers’ health both on the job and in the community. He believed – and acted effectively on the belief – that the path to solutions lies in building alliances between workers, environmentalists and community residents to transform conditions that ultimately threaten all of humanity. His tireless advocacy over five decades spurred creation of the modern workplace health and safety movement, sparked environmental groups’ increased emphasis on health harm from toxic chemicals, and forged labor-environmental partnerships that produced many of those movements’ most important victories … (full text).

Union Scrapper about: A Review of The Man Who Hated Work and Loved Labor.

He said: “We’re the only industrial nation in the world where if you strike the employer can replace you with scabs—permanently. That’s not a right to strike. That’s a right to commit suicide. (on ‘We Want to Redefine What Society Is All About’: An Interview With Tony Mazzocchi on the Birth of the Labor Party,” Z-Magazine, February 01, 1997″).

Download the audio-Interview with Les Leopold.

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Tony Mazzocchi - USA (1926 - 2002)

at left/above the book - at right/down honoring Karen Silkwood

Tony Mazzocchi, A Video Tribute, 8.12 min, Nov. 13, 2007.

The book telling the life and times of Tony Mazzocchi, same also on labor notes.

He said also: “When you build a big movement from down below, regardless of who’s in the White House, you can bring about change”. (on Anthony Mazzocchi, 76, Dies,” New York Times, October 9, 2000).

Occupational Safety and Health Act.

Anthony Mazzocchi (June 13, 1926 – October 5, 2002) was an American labor leader. He was a high elected official of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union OCAW, serving as vice president from 1977 to 1988, and as secretary-treasurer from 1988 to 1991. He was a mentor to Karen Silkwood, a co-founder of the Labor Party, and credited by President Richard Nixon as being the primary force behind enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. For his efforts, he was called the “Rachel Carson of the American workplace” … (wikipedia).

And he said: Movements grow in desperate times. We are being born, (on Tony Mazzocchi, 76; Workplace Safety Advocate, Political Activist,” Los Angeles Times, October 8 2002).

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Linked with The New World Foundation NWF, with Social justice philanthropy from the bottom up.

Colin Greer is president of the New World Foundation in New York. He was a founding editor of Change and Social Policy magazines, a professor for many years in the CUNY system, and has written several award-winning books on education and public policy. His best selling book A Call to Character (HarperCollins, 1995) is a progressive response to William Bennett’s Book of Virtues.

He says: “The Democratic party isn’t a live political party in most places outside Washington. It’s basically a message and money machine at the national level that organises itself every four years for a presidential election. Without long-term and serious attention to the local and state, it was not ready tactically to do most of the things you need to do to win an election. By tactical, I mean that you can win elections by winning just enough votes to win the Electoral College, and if you’re really careful you can get enough votes to legitimate the victory with a popular vote. The Republicans have been deeply engaged in the tactics of doing that. Democrats haven’t and didn’t. In the Democratic party there’s virtually no relationship between local candidates and the national party, and no relationship between the electoral campaign structure and local multi-issue organisations … (full interview text, Dec. 22, 2004).

… But if we DO want to engage new audiences, we must, as Colin Greer told us today, approach our new allies with a spirit of humility, listening deeply and harvesting what we hear as a prelude to action … (full long text of TCG National Conference 2006 - Building Future Audience).

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Colin Greer - USA

A Call to Character is a unique family reader that brings together a liberal assortment of voices from novels, short stories, plays and poetry - both the well loved and the obscure - to enrich and enliven a child’s imagination. The unusual breadth of readings illustrates lives defined by hign standards of personal character, such as courage, honesty, fairness, responsibility, compassion, empathy, generosity and love. (BAMM.com).

His book A Call to Charakter.

… Formerly, he was Professor at Brooklyn College, CUNY. He is the author (with Herbert Kohl) of The Plain Truth of Things and A Call to Character, Harper Collins. Other books include: What Nixon is doing to Us; The Solution is Part of the Problem; After Reagan What? and The Divided Society. He is best known for The Great School Legend and Choosing Equality: The Case for Democratic Schooling (which won the American Library Association’s Eli M. Oboler Intellectual Freedom Award). He was a founding editor of Change Magazine and Social Policy Magazine. He is a contributing editor to Parade Magazine. Dr. Greer participated in and directed several studies of US Immigration and urban schooling policy and history (at Columbia University and CUNY). He wrote briefing papers on philanthropy and government for First Lady, Mrs. Clinton, and on education policy for Senator Paul Wellstone. He chaired the President’s White House Fellows Program (1992-4) and chaired the Funders Committee for Citizen Participation for ten years. He currently chairs Healthcare without Harm (Boston), The LARK Theatre Company (NYC), and The Culture Project (NYC). He serves on the Boards of the Teachers and Writers Collaborative (NYC), NY City Interfaith Center, Tikkun (California), Open Democracy (London, UK), and the American Institute for Mental Imagery. He is currently working on studies of philanthropy and social justice under Ford Foundation grants. (theatre communications group tcg).

Social justice philanthropy: roots and prospect, March 2006.

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Linked with The Bruno Manser Fonds BMF, with The Borneo Project, and with Bruno Manser, Land Rights.

Bruno Manser (born August 25, 1954 in Basel, Switzerland) was an environmental activist. He was well-known in Switzerland for his public activism for rainforest preservation and the protection of indigenous peoples. Manser created richly illustrated notebooks during his stay in 1984 to 1990 with the Penan people, in the jungle of the Eastern Malaysian state of Sarawak, on the island of Borneo, near the Indonesian border of Kalimanta. He stayed with the nomadic band of Along Sega, who became the Penan figurehead for their struggle. He also visited many other settled Penan communities in the Upper Baram district. These notebooks were later published, with some success, by the Christoph Merian press in Basel. Manser, however, was declared persona non grata in Malaysia and had to leave the country with a bounty of $40,000 on his head … (full text).

Bruno Manser’s 1000 photos archive: search in english, (en Francais, auf deutsch). Click on the three pictures, a hidden search tool behind each appears, to help you to select by key words between the 1000 (small) photos. Click on them to enlarge.

See all articles about Bruno Manser (and mainly this photo archive) on Google-News-Bruno-Manser.

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Bruno Manser - Switzerland (1954 - 2000?)

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Bruno Manser – Laki Penan

The engagement and commitment of Bruno Manser in favor of the indigenous people of the tropical forests continues with the work of the Bruno Manser Fund BMF, who resides in Basel. The most important project is at present time the support of the Penan with a “Community Mapping” project, whereby especially trained Penan teams map their homeland and traditional use areas in the forest. The resulting maps serve i.a. as basis and evidence for various land right cases pending before the local courts … (full text).

Rainforest dwellers successfully maintain logging road blockade in one of Malaysia’s last virgin jungle areas, Aug. 14, 2006. (BMW).

So, what did Rio achieve? Well, at that time we were truly able to build on the upsurge, on the recognition by people and governments who wanted to do something about the state of the planet and the state of the human person. I am not being over-dramatic. It is true; you could feel it in the air at that time. Bruno Manser wanted to protest about deforestation. He had had an operation on his leg, because he had broken it in Switzerland. But in Rio he jumped from a parachute, riding piggy-back on somebody else, just to make his point. So people do go to extremities. You could really feel this atmosphere in 1992, and everybody believed that governments and people were sincerely committed to the issues and commitments that came out of Rio … (full text).

En présence des cinéastes.

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Disambiguation: your search tool will bring you out several Michael Edwards.

Linked with Alliance, with the Resource Alliance, and with The 21st Century Trust.

Michael Edwards is the Director of the Ford Foundation’s Governance and Civil Society Unit in New York, having worked in international development for the last twenty years, including periods spent living and travelling in Latin America, Southern Africa and South Asia. After a series of senior management positions with Oxfam and Save the Children, he moved to Washington DC to work as a Senior Civil Society Specialist in the NGO Unit of the World Bank. His writings have helped to shape a more critical appreciation of the global role of civil society, and to break down barriers between researchers and activists across the world. Michael was educated in England at the universities of Oxford and London, and now lives with his wife in the center of Manhattan. (Future Positive.org).

His two books:

• Future Positive, International cooperation in the 21st century;
• Civil Society;

find their publishing informations on Future Positive.org.

Global Civil Society: Expectations, Capacities and the Accountability of International NGOs, Oxford 28 March - 5 April 2003.

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Michael Edwards - USA

“Just another Emperor? The myths and realities of philanthrocapitalism”, by Michael Edwards, published simultaneously in London and New York, 10th March 2008.

He says: “To me that means three things that I’ll leave you with that in the hope that they provoke some initial questions for our conversation:

• Bringing social and economic democracy back into the conversation. Democracy requires both freedom and equality, yet (perhaps as a result of US dominance in this debate), freedom gets the lion’s share of the attention;
• Thinking in terms of participatory and deliberative democracy and not just representation – that’s where some of the most interesting innovations lie, like participatory budgeting and citizens forums;
• And being open to learning from non-Western experience where many of these innovations are strongest, like Brazil and India (e.g, importing participation in the local budget process by Labor government into the UK last year).

These changes would lay the basis for a different kind of conversation that sees democracy as something we co-create together, learning as we go, not something that is exported from one part of the world to another against a standard template or end point in time. And that I think would be a conversation with a lot more intellectual excitement, practical influence, ethical integrity and real purchase on the ground to which all of us as grant-makers could make a central contribution … (full conference text).

CIVIL SOCIETY: Field Statement of Current Programming (October 2003, 7 pages).

GOVERNANCE: Field Statement of Current Programming (October 2003, 7 pages).

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Linked with my today’s comment on the China-Occident/France relation: China versus Occident/France = the WE versus the I.

And, to increase the awarness of the big variation of all chinese people, please go also to the China country’s sumary of this blog (scroll down to China).

All five chinese women are a part of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005. Unfortuntely there were provided only some few lines about their work and biography. Regardless here the few we may know:

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1. Xiaoliang Li - China

She says: “Only by understanding why people do certain things, and with their genuine needs as the point of departure, can we change behavior and thinking, and effectively contain the spread of Aids”.

.. Click on picture for greater size.

She works for the Yunnan Medical University.

Li Xiaoliang is Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine at Junming Medical College, and a specialist at the Yunnan Health and Development Research Center. From 1989 she has been giving extensive training on the prevention and control of Aids. Not only has she worked on training materials for teachers, she has also developed peer training for young people, and aroused much public concern on issues of health and sexuality. Such work represents is a breakthrough in a society where sex and Aids are taboo subjects. (1000PeaceWomen).

any links:

HIV/AIDS Epidemic in Yunnan, 26 pages;

There are links with this name for Machine Intelligence, specific Software, chinese language, maternal health, music … etc.

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2. Sihai Long - China

She says: “I believe what I have done has changed the way many women and children look at themselves and the world … We can not only master our own fate, we can also change the environment in which we live … ”.

.. Click on picture for greater size.

She works in the Bureau of Justice in Yunnan province.

Her work on advocacy of legal rights led her to set up a support center for women and children of ethnic minorities – particularly those who are abducted or suffering from Aids in southwest China. Long Sihai also organizes touring programs aimed at working to prevent abduction. These involve not only the support center, but also the Bureau of Justice, education departments, the Office of Legal Advocacy, provincial television stations, and arts troupes of the Dai national minority. (1000PeaceWomen).

any links: no, beside being mentioned in the 1000 peacewomen-project.

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3. Lihong Shi - China

She says: “All people have ideals. Daring or not daring to realize their ideals is the vital difference between idealists and idle dreamers. In this sense, I am an idealist daring to realize my own ideal”.

.. Click on picture for greater size.

She works for the Global Environment Institute,
and for the Green Plateau Institute.

Shi Lihong, an environmental activist, is responsible for the Global Environment Institute and is executive director of Wild China. She is very active in nongovernmental environmental protection. One of the ways she contributes to the campaign for environmental protection is by making documentary films on the subject. (1000PeaceWomen).

Any Links:

Festival of Nature.org, 2007;

wild screen festival 2008;

There are many texts with the name Lihong Shi, but none seems to fit with our peacewomen.

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4. Zhongxun Liu - China

She says: “If we do not fight for our rights, we can never get them”.

.. sorry, there exists no photo of Zhongxun Liu, China. Click on the rose for greater size.

Born in 1971, Liu Zhongxun grew up in a village beside the Yangtze river. She fights to protect her rights and dignity as a citizen. She resists the unreasonable rules and regulations made by local governments, and brings the local cadres who tyrannize peasants to court. She has no fear of threats, and with law and perseverance, she wins trials. She speaks from a sense of justice for the villagers, and does her best to disseminate knowledge about laws. (1000PeaceWomen).

any links: no.

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5. Xiuyun Shang - China

She says: “Transforming one more person means some more peace for society. This will benefit generations today and in the future. I must commit all my strength and my heart”.

.. Click on picture for greater size.

She works for the People’s Court of Haidian District, Beijing

Shang Xiuyun (62) is a communist party member and Deputy Presiding Judge of the second court in the People’s Court of Haidian District, Beijing. Known as ‘Mother Judge’, she has transformed a large number of juvenile delinquents, encouraging them to study and take part in ordinary activities. (1000PeaceWomen).

any links:

Juvenile delinquency sparks concern;

Judge Mother Shang Xiuyun;

Experts call for more Internet laws to protect teenagers.

Linked with Articles for Indigenous Peoples on our blogs, with UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Educator Concita Maia (1951) is the founder and president of the Articulated Movement of Women from the Amazon (Mama), a feminist and environmental NGO that unites and strengthens women from the Legal Amazon, a region formed by nine states and with an area of five million square kilometers. There are 117 indigenous, Afro-Brazilian and Caucasian groups with whom Concita discusses themes such as female health, education, violence, environment and income generation.

She says: “Working as a network strengthens us and gives us conditions to propose public policies that contemplate our reality, our Amazonic cultural diversity and our dreams”.

Concita Maia anda toda a razão de tanta satisfação é que esse mês ela é destaque na revista “Naturamov” como uma das 51 brasileira que estão concorrendo coletivamente, juntamente com mulheres de 152 paises, ao Nobel da Paz, o mais importante prêmio do mundo concedido a pessoas que se destacam nas áreas de economia, química, medicina, literatura, física e paz. (UOL.com).

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Concita Maia - Brazil

She works for the Movimento Articulado de Mulheres da Amazônia MAMA (named on Associação Brasileira de Organizações não Governamentais ABONG; on CIRADR; on Table of indigenous organizations in Brazil; on Especial Página 20 … and on many more).

Forbidden by her Caucasian mother of talking about her origins, Concita Maia silently held on to the history of her paternal grandmother. She was an indigenous who was hunted down and marked, on her arm, with the letters FC, which are the initials of the man who stole her freedom. Her grandmother was given as a present to another man with whom she had many children, including Concita’s father.

“My mom denied my indigenous background. It did not matter. It runs in my blood”. Popular education was the means that Concita found to take women like her grandmother away from “invisibility”. “Women who live in the depths of the forest and who are not even a part of the population data of the IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics)”. In the 80’s, as a graduate and postgraduate in pedagogy, Concita moved to a tribe located along the border with Peru, where she implanted Acre’s first indigenous school.

One year later, when she returned to the capital, Rio Branco, she widened the militancy for the fight for the rights of women from the Amazon.

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Linked with Lynne Stewart’s Long Struggle for Justice, with Updating Sami Al-Arian - His Ordeal Continues, with Sami Al-Arian - USA & Kuwait, and with BBC: Imperial Tool.

Stephen was born in 1934 in Boston, MA. Raised in a modest middle class family, attended public schools, received a BA from Harvard University in 1956 and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of PA in 1960, following 2 years of obligatory military service in the US Army. He spent the next 6 years as a marketing research analyst for several large US corporations before becoming part of a new small family business in 1967, remaining there until retiring at the end of 1999. Since then he has devoted his time and efforts to the progressive causes and organizations he supports, all involved in working for a more humane and just world for all people everywhere, but especially for the most needy, disadvantaged and oppressed. Stephen’s efforts only in the last 6 months have included some writing on the various issues of personal concern like war and peace; social, economic and political equity for all; and justice for all the oppressed peoples of the world like the long-suffering people of Haiti and the Palestinians. (The Populist Party).

The Rules of Imperial Management, UN Peacekeeping Paramilitarism, Feb 15, 2007.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached by e-mail. Also visit his blog site, and listen to The Global Research New Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Mondays from 11AM to 1PM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests.

The audio: THE GEORGE TRYMAN SHOW, on Feb 20, 2008, 2 hours.

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Stephen Lendman - USA

Damming the Flood: Haiti, Aristide, and the Politics of Containment, Review of Peter Hallward’s book, by Stephen Lendman, Part I, April 14, 2008 … and: Peter Hallward’s Damming the Flood, Part II, 9 pages, April 17, 2008.

Dandelion Salad, by Stephen Lendman Global Research, April 18, 2008.

He writes: … Parenti’s latest book, and subject of this review, is the newly updated eighth edition of one of his most noted and popular earlier ones - Democracy For the Few. In it, he shows how democracy in the nation really works. It dispels the fiction Americans are practically weaned on from birth, taught in school to the highest levels, and get daily from the dominant media … This is Parenti’s dominant theme - of a government, since inception, serving the privileged few at the expense of the neglected or exploited many. That’s hardly a textbook definition of democracy, yet it’s the model one we’re taught to believe we have serving everyone equally. Parenti says his book is intended to show how vital it is for everyone to critically examine our society as a step toward improving it. He stresses a nation’s greatness is measured by its freedom from poverty, racism, sexism, exploitation, imperialism, environmental devastation, and a fundamental opposition to war and pursuit of peace everywhere. Benjamin Franklin also said There never was a good war or bad peace, a notion unimaginable to our leaders today. (full text, Sept. 10, 2007).

Media Disinformation and the BBC, April 10, 2008.

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Linked with Muslim Women in Europe caught between traditions and secular ethos, and with Necla Kelek - Turkey and Germany. Sorry, I found no militant turkish women NGO.

Seyran Ateş (born 1963) is a German lawyer born in Istanbul, Turkey. Her article Making multiculturalism work. Multiculturalism details how the far left in Germany tolerates sexism and violence against women when it is done in the name of Islam . In a judgement regarding whether an Islamic schoolgirl could be exempted from gym class on March 24, 1994 (InfAuslR 8/92, S. 269), she quotes the ruling of a higher administrative court in Bremen: “it is irrelevant that adolescent Muslim women are prevented by the demands of their religion from achieving equal status as women in Western society”. Her views, highly critical of an immigrant Muslim society that is often more conservative than its counterpart in Turkey, have put her at risk. In an interview in January 2008, Ateş stated that she is now in hiding and will not be working on Muslim women’s behalf publicly (including in court) due to the threats against her. In one particular incident, she and her client were attacked by a woman’s husband in a German courthouse in front of onlookers who did nothing … (en.wikipedia).

She warns: “Minority protection with respect to Islam can only be had at the cost of the equal rights of women” … (full text).

Listen her audio interview on a german radio, 9.58 min, Oct. 1, 2007.

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Seyran Ates - Turkey

Human rights activist and lawyer Seyran Ates, Turkey, was named Germany’s woman of the year in 2005 for her work in defense of Muslim women in immigrant communities … (full text).

She says: “I see left-wingers as particularly culpable for the mistakes made in current integration policy, because for a long time they hindered any debate. Despite all that left-wing thought aspires to, they did not look closely enough at what was actually happening in these communities, in the cultures that were settling in Germany” … (full interview text, 2007).

Her german website.

Seyran Ates opened a loose-leaf notebook in her fourth floor apartment in the center of Berlin and flipped through the pages of hate mail. She read the letters in a monotone. The 43-year-old Turkish-born attorney had the face of a weary warrior … (full text).

Seyran Ates on flickr’s photo sharing.

Each year, according to UN studies, more than one million people are forced into marriage – and for many years now, Berlin-based lawyer Seyran Ates has been fighting to increase the German public’s awareness of the issue. Sigrid Dethloff reports … (full text, 22.04.2004).

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(Seems the following statement concerns ‘our’ Rose Chiwambo, Malawi: … ‘last night they spelt veteran politician Rose Chibambo’s name as Chiwambo. Any editor worth his or her salt would know that is incorrect … Austin Madinga, Malawi, Oct. 9, 2007, on his blog … ‘.

This is correct: there are texts about Rose Chibambo in the internet).

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Rose Chiwambo (77) was born in Kafukule in Mzimba District. She is the first Malawian woman to hold a cabinet post. She was appointed Deputy Minister of Community and Social Development in 1963 after winning the Mzimba South seat. She began mobilizing Malawian women in 1952 into a political force. She fled the country in 1964 following a cabinet crisis. She stayed in exile for 30 years, until her return in 1993 at the advent of multi-party politics. She is now settled in Mzuzu doing charity work, concentrating on HIV/Aids prevention.

She says: “I don’t believe in putting children in orphanages. You alienate them from the protective environment of the family. Giving orphans some sense of hope is worth every energy and time”.

She says also: “It’s pathetic, especially here in Mzuzu where traditional practices worsen the irresponsible ‘city life. People need education on the impact of HIV and AIDS. Behavioral change must be seriously addressed because closing down the dozens of ‘rest houses’ is not a solution. Alongside promiscuity, there are traditional practices including circumcision, polygamy, ear-piercing and tattooing, widow inheritance, forced marriages that must be tackled”.

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Sorry, I can not find any photo of Rose Chiwambo (Chibambo), Malawi in the internet.

She works for Church Action Relief Development Card.

When Mzuzu town, the only major town in the northern region of Malawi, was raised from town to city status in 1985, northerners thought it a big joke. In hushed voices, away from strangers, they quipped that their president had a sense of humor. “How can a town with a population of 50,000 with only one-storey buildings and a main street of 300 meters of tarmac be a city!” they asked. The ‘Dead North’ as the region was described in the colonial era, changed very little during Banda’s rule. Twenty years into independence, little had changed, except for a Chinese-built referral hospital and a university.

With the advent of pluralism in 1994 and liberalized trade, Mzuzu’s population was transformed. The opening of the ‘Northern Corridor’ - a modern tarmac road that connects the country to the important port of Dar es Salaam on the Indian Ocean in Tanzania, has seen Mzuzu become an important transit city. Huge trucks, laden with goods rumble through it day and night headed to and fro the capital city, Blantyre, 200 miles south. Tanzanians and other regional citizens trade cheap goods and wares from Dar es Salaam along the border for retailing in Mzuzu.

Entrepreneurs from Blantyre, Lilongwe and other towns converge in Mzuzu to buy goods that from clothes, hardware to cosmetics. The market square is called ‘Taifa Market’ so dubbed due to the hundreds of Tanzanian women who trade here. Taifa means nation in Tanzania’s national language, Kiswahili. The economic boom, however, has brought its vices. There are no official statistics, but the high prevalence on HIV and AIDS is attributed to the city’s prosperity. Like other parts of Malawi, HIV/AIDS has wrought havoc in communities, leaving behind thousands of destitute orphans, widows, widowers and old people.

Unfortunately, the family’s breadwinner is usually the victim.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.
Violet Chavula is the women’s coordinator with the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (Ccap), in charge of Blantyre presbytery. After living in London for several years, she moved to a remote village in Malawi. She is engaged in advocacy for the rights of girls and women and the protection of orphans.

She says: “Influencing age-old tradition requires one’s patience and perseverance. You must be humble, use tact and respect their beliefs”.

She says also: “When you educate a man you educate an individual, when you educate a woman you educate a whole family”, Charles D. McIver’s words epitomize Violet Chavula’s passion.

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Sorry, I can not find any photo of Violet Chavula, Malawi in the internet.

She works for the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian Ccap.

Violet, 70, has dedicated her life to empowering women and girls and caring for orphans.

As the women’s coordinator with the Presbyterian Church in Blantyre presbytery, she champions equal rights for girls and women using a holistic approach.

Violet begins by encouraging women in the spiritual walk. From bible studies to women fellowship meetings, “The fear of God,” Violet says, “is the beginning of wisdom.”

Violet runs adult literacy classes for women. Education as a sound foundation for self-growth and community development cannot be emphasized enough.

But without food security, education appears futile. Violet trains women in basic agriculture. “I teach these women how to improve and sustain good harvest using basic agriculture methods like making compost manure. There is enough for the family’s nourishment and the surplus is sold for other household uses”.

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Linked with Ex-UN prosecutor’s organ trading claims challenged, with The belated confession of Carla Del Ponte, and with Swiss block del Ponte over controversial book’s claims.

Carla Del Ponte (born February 9, 1947 in Lugano, Switzerland) was a Chief Prosecutor of two United Nations international criminal law tribunals. A former Swiss attorney general, she was appointed prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia ICTY and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda ICTR in August 1999, replacing Louise Arbour. In 2003, the U.N. Security Council removed Del Ponte as the Prosecutor for the ICTR, and replaced her there with Hassan Bubacar Jallow in an effort to expedite proceedings in that Tribunal. She remained the Prosecutor for the ICTY until 1 January 2008, when she was succeeded by Serge Brammertz. Del Ponte was formerly married, and has one son … (full text).

Her Profile on BBC: … Del Ponte sees herself as the victim of political pressure … Numerous other men once wanted over the wars in the Balkans in the 1990s have been brought to trial by her office. They included the Serb leader regarded as a key instigator of the turmoil - Slobodan Milosevic … (full text).

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Carla del Ponte - Switzerland

She works now as the Swiss ambassador to Argentina (Embajada de Suiza, Buenos Aires).

… “Del Ponte hid the truth and left this information about the grave crimes committed against the kidnapped Serbs out, in this way helping the crime, although she received the list of names of those kidnapped and those who kidnapped them in 2001. She never arrested anyone and she must answer for this,” Spasić said … Del Ponte says in her book that she learned from a group of reliable journalists that some 300 Serbs were taken to Albania in the summer of 1999, after the end of the NATO bombing of Serbia and arrival of their forces in Kosovo. The victims had their organs removed and were then killed, the former prosecutor says … (full text).

“Moscow is carefully following developments regarding the former Hague chief prosecutor’s memoirs on activities in investigating war crimes,” the Russian Foreign Ministry, said in a statement … In its reaction to the Swiss ban, Russia said they were not surprised. Such discoveries, Moscow said, did not fit into the scenarios of a series of countries where “propaganda portrayed the Kosovo Albanians as great martyrs and therefore legitimised Kosovo’s independence” … (full text).

Organ smuggling accusations … : The Hunt (La caccia: Io e i criminali di guerra / the hunt: I and the war criminals), for the moment the book is available only in italian language:

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Linked with A video called Firewall, and with Biofuels Are Famine Policy.

Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. (born September 8, 1922 in Rochester, New Hampshire) is an American economist, philosopher, political activist, and founder of several political organizations in the United States and elsewhere, jointly referred to as the LaRouche movement. He is known as a perennial candidate for President of the United States, having run in eight elections since 1976, once as a U.S. Labor Party candidate and seven times as a candidate for the Democratic Party nomination … (full long text on wikipedia).

He says first: “A diagnosis: The nation is not only very sick; the nation is terminally ill and we are in the final phase of a terminal illness“.

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Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. - USA

In These New York Times: Predident George W. Nero, August 6, 2006.

Then he says: “Corporate business is a gambling table. It is not an enterprise. It is not a business with a purpose. In the old days, somebody would have a business. The business would have a speciality. Their purpose was to be successful at that business and to have the business survive for the coming generations. But with the corporation, you have people who invest in a stock for one or two days. There is no real long-term commitment to doing something. There is a short-term commitment to becoming rich, but not a short-term commitment to building the future. They’re always looking for a short-term get-rich, they’re always looking for ME, not for what they do for the country. Therefore, forecasting is based on these kinds of ideas. But the world doesn’t work that way … (full interview text, Nov. 22, 2005).

Duggan Hoax Rewarmed Again, Nov. 8, 2006.

… LaRouche is the author of ” So, You Wish To Learn All About Economics?” and “The Science of Christian Economy”. Taxes & Spending:

• Increase federal spending and taxes–if needed to provide services and protection to the Americans.
• Regardless of increases or decreases, it is vitally important that federal spending and taxes are balanced.
• Full employment for all Americans should be federal policy.
• Advocates a national program modeled after Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and its TVA, including a detailed plan to create a “Super-TVA” to upgrade and fix the country’s transportation network, with high-speed magnetic rail.

Such emergency infrastructure resolution would make millions of jobs, and be the first step toward America becoming a producer society again. His program reportedly influenced Kucinich to announce his running as an FDR Democrat. “We must shift from the Wal-Mart to reality. Reality means infrastructure building as the leading edge of a revival of durable goods production” … (full text).

It Happened in Berlin Last Week, July 4, 2005.

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Linked with Echoes of 1968.

Todd Gitlin (born 1943) is an American sociologist, political writer, novelist, and cultural commentator. He has written widely on the mass media, politics, intellectual life and the arts, for both popular and scholarly publications. In the 1960s, Gitlin was a political activist. In 1963 and 1964, Gitlin was president of Students for a Democratic Society; he was elected, he writes, because “none of the other four candidates, each of whom was experienced, was willing to serve,” since “we mistrusted power, including our own! Recruiting leaders was hard.” Letters to a Young Radical, p. 117. Indeed, he writes, the SDS abolished its presidency and vice-presidencies in the mid-sixties. He helped organize the first[citation needed] national demonstration against the Vietnam War, held in Washington, D. C., on April 26, 1965, with 25,000 participants, as well as the first[citation needed] civil disobedience directed against American corporate support for the apartheid regime in South Africa - a sit-in at the Manhattan headquarters of Chase Manhattan Bank in 1965 … (full text).

His Homepage.

He says: “My generation of the New Left — a generation that grew as the [Vietnam] war went on — relinquished any title to patriotism without much sense of loss. All that was left to the Left was to unearth righteous traditions and cultivate them in universities. The much-mocked political correctness of the next academic generations was a consolation prize. We lost — we squandered the politics — but won the textbooks”. (wikipedia/quote).

Todd Gitlin Reviews Obama’s Speech, March 18, 2008.

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Todd Gitlin - USA

Video: The Mark Bauerlein - Todd Gitlin in Dialogue, 72 minutes. More on this page: Links mentionned in this dialogue:

• The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage;
• The Intellectuals and the Flag;
• Bruce Bartlett’s Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy;
• Wilfred McClay’s review of The Intellectuals and the Flag.

The Kagan Subtext, April 9, 2008.

Gitlin regrets that state of affairs. He suggests that in the United States, “the pot is still melting. There are clumps that don’t melt, that refuse to melt.” He was thrilled by Obama’s speech, but as a race warrior who’s been around a lot longer than the senator from Illinois, he’s enthusiastically skeptical: “I don’t know,” says Gitlin. “I suspend disbelief. That speech was flying on two wings and a lot of prayers. It is a very American hope on his part that you can face it and transcend it” … (full text, March 20, 2008).

He says also: ” … those who still cling to gauzy dreams about untainted militancy need to remember all the murders committed in the name of various radical ideologies that accomplished exactly nothing for the victims of racism”. (wikipedia/quote).

Todd Gitlin alerts us to a new Robert Kagan book excerpt in The New Republic. Kagan’s idea, it seems, is that since neoconservatism has proven such a complete and utter failure as an approach to the challenge of transnational terrorism and WMD proliferation, we ought to use use it as a guide for dealing with Russia and China instead. If you’re a sociopath like Kagan, a renewal of Cold War-style conflict with other great powers is good news because, as Todd says, it serves the goal of “conjuring a proper target for unilateralist belligerence” … (full text, April 10, 2008).

Too Much to Ask, March 23, 2008.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She was born a peasant and indigenous woman (1952). She tended the sheep and cows and cultivated potatoes and broad beans. She learned to read late. She was a reading promoter. She established Mother’s Clubs where women could be trained. She unified the efforts of different organizations working to support the communities. She was arrested, tortured and was obliged to flee the country. She became a paramedic and returned to help the poor of Bolivia. She is Nicolasa Machaca.

She says: “Beautiful is my land from the outside. Bitter inside with its oppressed children”.

She says also: “Now, we have enough trees in my community. And we know how to take care of them to avoid erosion. We have transplanted some of them onto the river bank”.

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Nicolasa Machaca Alejandro - Bolivia

She works for the Tomás Katari Polytechnic Institute (named on Cambridge Univ.Press), for the Juana Azurduy Center,
and for the Small Milk Producers Association.

And she says: “I worked at a training centre for women directing courses, among other things on dress making and health and gender matters”.

Nicolasa Machaca Alejandro is 15 years old, a little shepherdess in Bolivia. She has woven herself a poncho and her mother has woven a skirt to her. She wears a man’s hat, as is customary for the indigenous women of her land. She is very pretty. She does not know much about the world. She goes to a meeting of the Mother’s Club of the Caritas Catholic Association.

It is 1970. She is not yet a mother, and hardly knows the Lord’s Prayer. But they give courses in reading and this calls out to her.

Now as time goes by, she remembers her childhood in a song:

• “Aquel ranchito donde he nacido en rinconcito
• Pobre he nacido, pobre he crecido con mis ovejitas en aquellas lomitas
• A mi ranchito un día caminito
• Por eso se olvidan de mi existencia
• Por eso se olvidan de mi existencia”.
• Continue Reading…

Linked with The Raoul Wallenberg Institute, with Visiting Professor in Human Rights at Peking University Law School 2008-2010, and with The Jewish Virtual Library.

Raoul Wallenberg (August 4, 1912 – July 16, 1947?)[1][2][3] was a Swedish humanitarian sent to Budapest, Hungary under diplomatic cover to rescue Jews from the Holocaust. He was of the prominent Swedish Wallenberg family. Inspired by the the tale of the Scarlet Pimpernel[4], he worked to save the lives of Hungarian Jews in the later stages of World War II by issuing them protective passports from the Swedish embassy. These documents identified the bearers as Swedish nationals awaiting repatriation. It is impossible to determine exactly how many Jews were rescued by his actions, but Yad Vashem credits him with saving 15,000 lives[5] … (full text, see also References).

The Wallenberg web-page.

Raoul Wallenberg (* 4. August 1912 in Kappsta bei Stockholm; Schicksal nur bis Mitte 1947 bekannt) war ein schwedischer Diplomat … (Biographie auf de.wikipedia).

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Raoul Wallenberg - Sweden (1912 - 1947 ?)

Holocaust Essays: The Story of Raoul Wallenberg.

… Raoul’s grandfather, Gustav Wallenberg, took care of Raoul’s education. The plan was for him to continue the family tradition and become a banker, but he was more interested in architecture and trade … (full long text on Jewish Virtual Library, not dated).

An Angel in Rescue.

Introduction: Raoul Gustaf Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat and businessman who saved a hundred thousand Jews from the Nazi Holocaust. If you ask anyone who Raoul Wallenberg is, the chances are, they haven?t heard of him. This great feat which he performed surely deserves more credit than that? Oskar Schindler, saved a thousand Jews from the holocaust. A mere figure compared to that of a hundred thousand. Schindler has had a book written about him, a film made about him, Raoul Wallenberg deserves more, and should be more well known to the world … (full long text on geocities, not dated).

Raoul Gustav Wallenberg and the Holocaust.

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She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Creuza Maria Oliveira (1957) became a domestic worker at age ten. Her first payment, which was worthless, came at 15. As thousands of Brazilian children, she increased the child labor statistics. As not many of them were able to do, she changed her life. President of the National Federation of Domestic Workers FENATRAD, she is currently a national role model in the fight for the rights of her working class, for racial equality and for the elimination of child domestic labor.

She says: “We, women, are responsible for changing this society. How can we live in a country that turns its back on 500.000 children and teenagers being abused”.

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Creuza Maria Oliveira - Brazil

She works for the Federação Nacional das Trabalhadoras Domésticas FENATRAD (named: on Ministerio do Trabalho e Emprego; on ADITAL; on Trabalhadoras Domésticas no Brasil) / (she is President of) the National Federation of Domestic Workers.

In Brazil, half a million kids and teenagers between 5 and 18 years old are domestic workers. They have to leave their toys and books behind, in order to support themselves. Creuza Maria Oliveira is the portrait of something that still happens all over Brazil. “A lot of girls leave school, move out of their families’ house, and lose touch with children of their age and social class. As they grow up, their only role model is their employer.”

Creuza used to live in the countryside in the hinterland of Bahia. There was not enough food for everyone. Her mother sent her to the city. She used to cook, clean and do the laundry seven days a week. This lonely life lasted until she was 26, when she found out, through a radio show, that domestic workers were meeting to discuss their rights.

In 1985, along with her colleagues, she created an association. They joined leaderships from other states and managed to include domestic worker’s rights in the new 1988 Brazilian Constitution. She founded the Union of Domestic Workers of Bahia and she also founded the National Federation of Domestic Workers, presided by her.

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Linked with The National Visionary Leadership Project.

James Forman (October 4, 1928 - January 10, 2005) was an African-American Civil Rights leader active in both the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Black Panther Party. Forman spent his youth growing up mostly in Chicago and spending summers with family in Mississippi. After finishing high school, he served in the Air Force in Okinawa during the Korean War. Discharged from the Air Force in 1952, he enrolled at the University of Southern California before an incident of police brutality involving two Los Angeles Police Department officers led to an emotional breakdown. He returned to Chicago and ultimately finished his undergraduate studies at Roosevelt University graduating in 1957. Forman spent most of the late 1950s and early 1960s working as a graduate student, journalist and teacher [Washington Post Obituary. Accessed 15 March 2007]. (full text).

The Washington Post Obituary, January 11, 2005.

Find many short videos about him and his life on the National Visionary Leadership Project.

This was his personal website.

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James Forman - USA (1928 - 2005)

You find a long Bio on the Georgetown University Law Center.

Forman served as president of the Unemployment and Poverty Action Council (UPAC) before returning to his academic studies, receiving a M.A. from Cornell University (1980) and his Ph.D from the Union Institute (1981). Foreman has also written several books including Sammy Young Jr.: The First Black College Student to Die in the Black Liberation Movement (1968), The Political Thought of James Forman (1970), The Makings of Black Revolutionaries (1972) and Self-Determination (1985). (full text).

His book: The Secret History of School Choice: How
Progressives Got There First.

Older than most civil rights activists, Forman gained the respect of SNCC’s staff of organizers because of his militancy and willingness to undertake mundane administrative chores that were avoided by other staff members. In 1964, after participating in the unsuccessful effort of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party to unseat the regular all-white delegation at the national convention in Atlantic City, he and other SNCC workers went to Guinea at the invitation of the African government. After his return, Forman became increasingly outspoken in his criticisms of the federal government and of cautious liberalism. Within SNCC he advocated staff education programs to make civil rights workers more aware of Marxist and Black Nationalist ideas.

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Linked with The American Civil Liberties Union ACLU.

Gregory T. Nojeim is a Senior Counsel at the Center for Democracy & Technology and the Director of its Project on Freedom, Security & Technology. CDT is a Washington-based non-profit organization dedicated to promoting democratic values and constitutional liberties in the digital age. In this capacity, Mr. Nojeim conducts much of CDT’s work in the areas of national security, terrorism, and Fourth Amendment protections. Nojeim is also Co-Chair of the Coordinating Committee on National Security and Civil Liberties of the Individual Rights and Responsibilities Section of the American Bar Association. (full text).

He is Chief Lobbist of the National Legislative Office, on Patriot Act Reform.

He says: “The ACLU has always stood up for communities and individuals whose rights have been put at risk. It is the hallmark of our entire history. Since 9/11, Arab Americans have faced particular difficulties because the government has often focused its law enforcement efforts on Arab Americans. Some of the powers of which are used to target Arab Americans” … (full text).

A video: Greg Nojeim, Chief Lobbist of the National Legislative Office, on Patriot Act Reform.

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Gregory T. Nojeim - USA

Listen him on this short ACLU-video.

Nojeim works to limit the threat to privacy posed by governmental wiretapping and monitoring of Internet communications. He was instrumental in bringing together the broad coalition of groups from across the political spectrum that worked to strip overly intrusive wiretapping proposals from the 1996 anti-terrorism law. He has substantial expertise on the application of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and on the civil liberties protections it affords. Other areas of his expertise include governmental data mining, the PATRIOT Act, the state secrets privilege, and the privacy implications of aviation security measures. (full text).

HEARING CHRONOLOGY: House Judiciary Committee Consideration of the USA PATRIOT Act, As of June 21, 2005.

He says also: “I chose this battleground—defending our civil liberties against encroachment by the federal government—because I love this country,” says the 45-year-old Nojeim, a veteran Constitutional lawyer who often testifies on Capitol Hill. “I’m the guy who stands up at the soccer game with his hand on his heart whenever they play the national anthem. As an American, I know the freedoms we enjoy are what make our country great. And those freedoms are worth fighting for—especially in light of the Patriot Act, which I’m convinced is threatening to undermine our Bill of Rights” … (full text).

The Truth about (Telecom) Immunity.

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Linked with The Women’s International Perspective WIP, with The Inside Story of Zimbabwe, and with the Association of Zimbabwean Journalists.

Sandra grew up in Zimbabwe. She moved to the UK in 2002 to do a masters degree in International Journalism at City University London. Although she planned to return to Zimbabwe to take up her job as political editor at the Daily News, the newspaper was closed down by the authorities just before she went back. Sandra decided to stay in London and works for the Association of Zimbabwe Journalists. She still hopes to return to Zimbabwe. (observers).

Matibenga urges Diaspora to influence March vote.

I think the biggest challenge for us is to be able to work and to be able to break a balance and to become women leaders in the newsrooms. Most newsrooms in Zimbabwe are not headed by women, despite the fact that women are the ones that really work hard. They toil for the newsrooms, but don’t get to get the positions like becoming an editor. I’m the only political editor in the whole country, and the first one. It was sort of like taboo to leave women in such positions. So our biggest challenge is to be able to get as many women as possible in leadership positions in the newsrooms. (full interview text).

Zimbabwe’s mock elections also start in London and New Zealand.

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Sandra Nyaira - Zimbabwe

Pre-election irregularities endanger Zim elections: U.S.

Courage Winner Sandra Nyaira’s Life in Exile: After winning the IWMF’s Courage in Journalism Award in 2002, Sandra Nyaira of Zimbabwe’s independent Daily News received a master’s degree in journalism from the City University in London. She never returned to her country. Instead, she became one of at least 90 Zimbabwean journalists now living in exile as a result of President Robert Mugabe’s crack downs on the independent press. Elizabeth Witchel of the Committee to Protect Journalists reported on Zimbabwe’s Exiled Press in the Fall/Winter issue of Dangerous Assignments … (full text, scroll much down). Read the CPJ article, October 19, 2005.

A cartoon, April 2, 2008: Would Zimbabwe really be better off without Mugabe?

Under current rules, Zimbabweans abroad are not allowed to vote, apart from embassy staff and others such as policemen serving with the United Nations duty. The “Rock the Vote” campaign includes billboards scattered around areas where large numbers of Zimbabweans live, especially inner-city suburbs like Berea, Hillbrow, Yeoville and Ellis Park. Similar billboards have been placed on the Zimbabwe-South Africa border. “Power to the People - We demand: one citizen, one vote, independently-run elections and an end to political violence,” reads one large poster outside Park Station,