Friday, July 19, 2013

Prez Jimmy Carter: America has no functioning democracy!

‘America has no functioning democracy’ – Jimmy Carter on NSA

Published time: July 18, 2013 12:15
Edited time: July 19, 2013 10:39

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter (Mario Tama/Getty Images/AFP)

Carter lashed out at the US political system when the issue of the previously top-secret NSA surveillance program was touched upon at the Atlantic Bridge meeting on Tuesday in Atlanta, Georgia.

Former US President Jimmy Carter lambasted US intelligence methods as undemocratic and described Edward Snowden’s NSA leak as “beneficial” for the country.

"America has no functioning democracy at this moment," Carter said, according to Der Spiegel.

He also believes the spying-scandal is undermining democracy around the world, as people become increasingly suspicious of US internet platforms, such as Google and Facebook. While such mediums have normally been associated with freedom of speech and have recently become a major driving force behind emerging democratic movements, fallout from the NSA spying scandal has dented their credibility.

It’s not the first time Carter has criticized US intelligence policies. In a previous interview with
CNN, he said the NSA leaks signified that “the invasion of human rights and American privacy has gone too far." He added that although Snowden violated US law, he may have ultimately done good for the country.

"I think that the secrecy that has been surrounding this invasion of privacy has been excessive, so I think that the bringing of it to the public notice has probably been, in the long term, beneficial."

Jimmy Carter was President of the United States from 1977 to 1981. After leaving office, he founded the Carter Center, an NGO advocating human rights. The ex-president’s human rights credentials won him Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.

Carter has frequently criticized his successors in the White House. Last year, he condemned the Obama administration for the use of drone attacks in his article "A Cruel and Unusual Record" published in the New York Times.

Link to Marvin X Harambee Radio interview of Friday, July 19, 10pm EST.

Here is the link to the Marvin X interview with Dalani Aamon on Harambee Radio

https://www.yousendit.com/download/bWJxb3BKQk5WRDhsYzhUQw

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Marvin X and students in anthology Stand Our Ground, for Trayvon Martin and Marissa Alexander

Stand Our Ground: New Global Poetry Anthology Raising Funds for Justice!

Books

April 9, 2013

Title: Stand Our Ground:Poems for Trayvon Martin and Marissa Alexander

Publisher: FreedomSeed Press (Philadelphia, PA)

Paperback, 272 pages

Publication Date: April 22, 2013

ORDER NOW!

$25.00

All proceeds will be shared with the families of Martin and Alexander to aid in their respective pursuits of justice.

READ AN EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK!

For more information on the book: StandOurGroundBook.com.

In Stand Our Ground: Poems for Trayvon Martin and Marissa Alexander 65 poets from all over the world join together in one voice for justice, freedom and peace. Stand Our Ground is the definitive testament of a revolutionary generation. In this historic collection Black Arts Movement legends Amiri Baraka, Sonia Sanchez, Haki R. Madhubuti, Marvin X and Askia M. Toure’ are joined by poets of all ages from across the United States and around the world representing countries in Africa, Asia, Europe as well as North and South America and the islands of the Caribbean.

The cases of Trayvon Martin and Marissa Alexander expose the duplicity of an American justice system that remains rooted in racism and sexism. Stand Our Ground is an effort to raise funds for both families to aid in their pursuit of justice even as it raises the consciousness of a generation toward the pursuit of a movement of justice for all!

The book’s editor, Ewuare X. Osayande, is a poet, educator and activist. The author of several books including Blood Luxury with an introduction by Amiri Baraka (Africa World Press) and Whose America?: New and Selected Poems with an introduction by Haki R. Madhubuti (Black Proletariat Press). He is an adjunct professor of African American Studies at Rutgers University.

In the introduction for Stand Our Ground Osayande writes, “This book has been a labor of love. My love for my people. My love for humanity. I acted because I knew it was not enough for me to just march, or write an editorial or to just allow myself to sit and simmer in the face of wrong. I acted because I knew that there were others like me. I knew that if I acted, others would join with me, and, together, we could create a work that would simultaneously raise collective support for these two families and raise the collective consciousness of our generation. So in the Summer of 2012 the call went out and this is the result. A collection of poems. But not just any collection of poems. Herein are contained –

Death-defying poems

Injustice-decrying poems

Poems that speak truth to power

Poems that break chains in freedom’s name

Poems that confront abuse

and provide sanctuary for the bruised

Poems that escape from cells

Poems that provide a pathway back from hell

Poems that refuse to be silent

Poems more just than the judge’s gavel

Poems that have tasted cop’s mace

stared down the barrel of a gun in defiance

Shackled poems trying to break free

Poems picking the locks on our minds

Poems that transcend place and time

that tell the histories and herstories

that have been banned from the textbooks

Poems that refuse to look the other way

Poems that say what needs to be said

Poems that resurrect the dead

Poems that refuse to sell their souls

Poems that revolt and rebel

that holler, scream and yell

Poems that leave us speechless

that tell us truths we don’t want to hear

Poems that leave the status quo

quivering in fear

Poems that know that justice is like rain

to the seeds of peace

Poems that move us to act

like you know

Marching poems

Chanting poems

Ranting poems

Poems sick and tired of being sick and tired poems

Poems that inoculate us against ignorance

Poems that make us think

Poems on the brink

Poems that challenge us to see

the world as it could be

as it should be

Poems in love with freedom

Poems that resist

that resist

that resist racism and sexism

that refuse to be conned

Poems for a mother named Marissa

and a young brother named Trayvon.”

Available for purchase exclusively at http://standourgroundbook.com/.

Free Marissa Alexander!

Dear Friend,

Please join the Free Marissa Now Campaign. The terrible injustice of the not-guilty verdict for Trayvon Martin's killer has brought Marissa Alexander's racist and sexist treatment by Florida courts to center-stage of U.S. and world attention. It is infuriating to think how Stand Your Ground was used to avoid any penalties for killing a Black teenager, while a Black woman is serving a 20-year sentence for firing a warning shot that injured no one to stop an attack by her abusive husband.

As the national Free Marissa Now campaign has stated: "The dramatically different outcomes of these cases is a lesson in how the criminal justice system routinely fails to support black people who defend themselves from violence on the streets, in their homes, and from institutions."

Over the last year Radical Women has collaborated with other organizations to build a massive outcry to win justice in this case. Lead organizers of the Free Marissa Now Campaign include: African-American/Black Women's Cultural Alliance, INCITE!, New Jim Crow Movement, Pacific Northwest Alliance to Free Marissa Alexander, Radical Women, and Southern Freedom Movement. The campaign has worked in close collaboration with Marissa Alexander and Marissa’s mother, Ms. Helen Jenkins.

The Free Marissa Now Campaign issued an excellent statement about the Zimmerman verdict that you can find on their facebook page or watch a videoof Radical Women Organizer Helen Gilbert reading it at a 7/14/13 protest in Seattle. For more information about the how the dynamics of race and sex come together in Marissa Alexander's case, read the Radical Women statement issued June 2012.

What you can do immediately:

Visit the Free Marissa Now facebook page; "like" the page and be part of updates and discussions.
Join conference calls to build an international mobilization to free Marissa. Email freemarissanow@gmail.com to receive information about the next conference call.
Sign and forward the online petition.
Donate to Marissa’s legal defense via Paypal at the websitewww.justice4marissa.com.

Write to Marissa to let her know that she has supporters working for her release. Send messages to:
Marissa Alexander #2012033887
500 East Adam St.
Jacksonville, FL 32202

Endorse the Free Marissa Now Campaign and ask organizations you know to endorse. Download an endorsement form athttp://radicalwomen.org/Marissa_endorsement_form.pdf
Spread the word with friends, families, co-workers, and via social media. Follow Free Marissa Now at facebook.com/freemarissanow andfreemarissanow.tumblr.com.

In solidarity,
Anne Slater
National Organizer, Radical Women

Statement from Free Marissa Now Campaign

July 12, 2013
Free Marissa Now Statement:

The political climate created by the George Zimmerman trial has shed light on the opaque imaginations of what some think is a post-racial nation. We are heartbroken for Trayvon Martin's family, who have demonstrated brave resolve throughout this ordeal and we hold them in our thoughts as we move forward. We send strength to the family of Jordan Davis, another unarmed Black male Florida teen murdered by a white male who claimed Stand Your Ground, and many others who are gearing up for their journey through these same halls of due process. As long as the Florida justice system has a double standard for identifying criminal behavior, it breaches our core right to safety. The Zimmerman case is about the freedom to safely walk the streets without being profiled and pursued as a criminal based on reemerging Jim Crow codes, especially in the south. Paradoxically, this trial has been juxtaposed to the Marissa Alexander case; a black woman who stood her ground in her home to defend herself from domestic violence and was consequently sentenced to twenty years in prison when no one was physically injured by her actions. The dramatically different outcomes of these cases is a lesson in how the criminal justice system routinely fails to support black people who defend themselves from violence on the streets, in their homes, and from institutions.

The Free Marissa Now Campaign is organizing to win freedom for Marissa Alexander, a proud African American mother of three with an MBA and a survivor of domestic violence. In August 2010, Marissa fired a single warning shot in the ceiling to halt her abusive partner during a life-threatening beating in her home. Marissa's husband, who has previously landed Marissa in the hospital after beating her, admitted in a sworn statement that he was the aggressor, threatened her life and was so enraged that he did not know what he would do. Despite the fact that Marissa caused no injuries and has no previous criminal record, and despite the fact that Florida's self-defense law includes the right to Stand Your Ground, she was arrested by Jacksonville police, charged with aggravated assault, and sentenced to twenty years in the Florida criminal correctional system.

We must take a stand against the criminalization of all survivors of domestic and sexual violence. Marissa's case is one of many that shows us how Black women and other marginalized people are especially likely to be criminalized, prosecuted, and incarcerated while trying to navigate and survive the conditions of violence in their lives. Freeing Marissa is a social justice action against intimate partner and systemic violence against all women, and an urgent call for the end of mass incarceration and support for truly transformative solutions to violence.

The Free Marissa Now Campaign is calling for the grassroots community to stand your ground about your right to give voice to this situation and not be complacent. Our hope was to see justice done for the death of young Brother Trayvon Martin, who couldn't tell his side of the story, and for his family. We grieve deeply with them and for others whose lives have been impacted by violence with no opportunity for redress. We will continue to support survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault to defend themselves without fear of criminalization and to tell their stories. We see this as another defining moment for racial and gender justice that comes on the heels of the rollback in voting rights.

There is justifiable cause for rage and protest of the violence of racism embedded in the Florida criminal justice system. This is not the time to shut down but show up and turn rage into resistance through organized and peaceful protests. We need to build a movement to stop racist murder and race and sex bias in the courts. We encourage people to use their resources to organize and voices to speak truth to power to create change.

We are standing our ground for peace and justice. We encourage organizers and survivors to share in our collective power and take action to Free Marissa Alexander!

Join us online at facebook.com/freemarissanow andfreemarissanow.tumblr.com and contact us at freemarissanow@gmail.com

Donate to Marissa Alexander's legal defense fund at www.justice4marissa.com

Sign the petition at http://www.change.org/petitions/florida-governor-rick-scott-free-marissa-alexander

More ways to take action: http://freemarissanow.tumblr.com/action

Join Radical Women — you are needed! Connect with a chapter near you or contact the Bay Area chapter at baradicalwomen@earthlink.net.

You can learn more about RW through The Radical Women Manifesto, an exhilarating exploration of Marxist feminist theory and organizing methods, buy a copy or read it on Google Books. Find other fiery Radical Women writings atwww.RadicalWomen.org.

Donations are appreciated! As a grassroots group, Radical Women is sustained by support from people like you. Please contribute online or mail a check, payable to Radical Women to 5018 Rainier Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98118.

Radical Women, Bay Area Chapter
747 Polk Street, San Francisco, CA 94109
Phone: 415-864-1278 * Fax: 415-864-0778
baradicalwomen@earthlink.net
www.RadicalWomen.org