The Arab-American Association of West Michigan (AAWM), in conjunction with protests around the world, is calling for a rally this Monday (June 7) to condemn the Israeli attack on the Freedom Flotilla, which was bringing humanitarian aid to Gaza.
The Press Release that AAWM sent out states:
“The Arab-American Association of West Michigan will host a rally in front of the Gerald R. Ford Federal building on Monday, June 7 at 5pm to condemn the recent Israeli assault of a flotilla bringing humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.
The Israeli assault violates International Law and is morally reprehensible, especially since those on board the flotilla were non-violent activists on a humanitarian mission. This humanitarian mission was of vital importance because the people living in Gaza have been suffering from lack of food and medical supplies due to the Israeli blockade of Gaza since 2007 and the 2008/2009 Israeli military assault on Gaza.
The Arab-American Association of West Michigan and dozens of local supporters call for a full investigation into these crimes, an end to the Israeli blockade of Gaza, and the suspension of all US aid to Israel until these crimes are fully investigated.
We are inviting the public to join us on Monday, June 7 at 5pm to take a stand against these atrocities and join millions of people around the world who have already condemned these actions.”
One reason that the group thinks it is important for Americans to speak out on this issue is because of the massive aid ($3 billion annually) the US government provides Israel, as well as weapons, some of which were used in this most recent attack on the Freedom Flotilla.
(This article is a re-posting from the Center for Responsive Politics and Public Citizen.)
Organizations in the financial services sector have deployed at least 1,447 former federal employees to lobby Congress and federal agencies since the beginning of 2009, according to a joint analysis of federal disclosure records and other data released today by Public Citizen and the Center for Responsive Politics. (Download the full report here: FinancialRevolvingDoors.pdf )
This small army of registered financial services sector lobbyists includes at least 73 former members of Congress, of whom 17 served on the banking committees of either the U.S. House of Representatives or the Senate. At least 66 industry lobbyists worked for these committees as staffers, while 82 additional lobbyists once worked for congressional members who currently serve on these key committees.
Further, at least 42 financial services lobbyists formerly served in some capacity in the U.S. Treasury Department. At least seven served in the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, including two former comptrollers.
“Wall Street hires former members of Congress and their staff for a reason,” said David Arkush, director of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division. “These people are influential because they have personal relationships with current members and staff. It’s hard to say no to your friends, but that’s what Congress needs to do. Listening to them would result in a bill that would fail to get the job done and would disappoint the American people.”
Added Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, “Companies pay a premium for lobbyists who’ve spun through the revolving door because it can be a small price to pay relative to the huge payoff if they can shape legislation. These lobbyists tap insider knowledge and personal relationships, knowing that their old friends and former co-workers won’t want to let them down.”
Prominent former congressional members now lobbying on behalf of financial services sector interests include two former Senate majority leaders (Bob Dole, R-Kan., and Trent Lott, R-Miss.), two former House majority leaders (Dick Armey, R-Texas, and Dick Gephardt, D-Mo.) and a former speaker of the House (Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.).
The analysis is drawn from lobbying disclosure information filed with the secretary of the Senate, as well as the Center for Responsive Politics’ data.
The report includes an appendix listing each industry lobbyist who previously worked for the federal government, as well as tables listing former members of Congress, former staffers for the banking committees and lobbyists who previously worked for current banking committee members.
Yes, Obama is “Engaged” – in a Colossal Crime
(The article by Glen Ford is re-posted from Black Agenda Report.)
In a rational polity, the great abomination to Earth and Man in the Gulf would spell the end of the Obama presidency. We are witnessing cataclysm on a geological scale, an event with the potential to alter planetary destiny, precipitated not by the three hundred million year arc of wayward comets or the incremental slide of continent-molding tectonic plates, but by the routine exercise of corporate power in the United States.
The man in charge of the government that both permitted and abetted the heinous corporate crime (“Drill, baby, drill!”) should, by all rights, be in terminal disgrace. Instead, much of Obama’s “base” behaves as if the First Black President is an innocent party – a victim of circumstances – rather than a facilitator of the corporate enterprise that has spawned the Mother of all Pollutions. But then, Teflon is a petrochemical product.
Any meaningful discussion of the oceanic version of Chernobyl would challenge a political system in which huge corporations are empowered to seek profits with absolutely no regard for the consequences to Earth or Man. Viewed from that angle – the only sane perspective – questions of whether Obama is fully or only partially “engaged” are ludicrously ill-framed. Engaged in what, in subduing and caging the corporate animals that are defecating in humanity’s only nest? Clearly not: BP is the operative government in the Gulf, with the Coast Guard as its muscle. BP is also the surgeon in charge of mending the Earth’s wound and preventing the spread of septicemia in its life-sustaining fluids – the equivalent of Jack The Ripper tending to his own victims. Under such circumstances, the more Obama assures us he is “engaged,” the greater his confessed complicity in the crime.
For purposes of assigning culpability, Obama was fully engaged in setting the stage for the atrocity from the moment of his campaign reversal on off-shore drilling in August, 2008 – after he had the nomination locked up. “My interest is in making sure we’ve got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices,” said candidate Obama. “If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well-thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage — I don’t want to be so rigid that we can’t get something done.” So Obama bent over like a contortionist to pleasure the oil barons.
The full scope of Obama’s “compromise” was announced almost two years later, on March 31. The White House gave Big Oil virtually everything it wanted that was politically possible, with no protections for the public or Mother Earth in the form of a “well-thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage.”
“The federal government is fully engaged and I am fully engaged,” said Obama, last week. OK, we’ll accept that he has been engaged in furthering the oil industry’s plans to drill at depths at which current technology makes mistakes irreparable – as the damage from the current ecological holocaust is already irreparable.
Obama has been engaged in killing the planet, in concert with his corporate co-conspirators. He did nothing more than cosmetic changes at the federal Minerals Management Service, which Obama finally admitted, at last week’s press conference, “had been plagued by corruption for years” and had a “scandalously close relationship” with Big Oil.
The unbroken chain of “corruption” at the agency in both Bush and Obama administrations is one small expression of the continuity of actual rule of the country by sometimes feuding cousins in Big Oil and Wall Street and the Military Industrial Complex – the permanent government. Obama is “engaged” as their servant, like his predecessors in the Oval Office.
The corporate cousins have raised the stakes of the game. It’s either them or Earth itself. When history passes its verdict on the current era, she will not assign much import to the advent of the First Black President of the United States. Rather, history will mark 2010 as the year a servile political operative in the White House exposed the seabed to deep defilement by the oil colossus, from which the world never fully recovered.
Former President George W. Bush was is Grand Rapids yesterday to speak at the annual dinner of the Economics Club of Grand Rapids. Bush requested no media at the event, no pictures and no videotaping.
The three local TV stations did stories from the lobby of the downtown convention center site, where Bush spoke to a sold out audience. Channel 13 mentioned that some area politicians were present and did a short interview with State Senator Bill Hardiman.
WXMI 17 talked with Pete Seechia, Congressman Vern Ehlers, State Representative Roy Schmidt and an area student, all of which talked about the event but said nothing about what Bush talked about in his speech. At the end of the story, the channel 17 reporter said that one person they talked to said that Bush, “was very interesting and very funny.”
WOOD TV 8 did not speak with anyone who attended the event, but they did make mention that they were the only TV station to film the former President’s motorcade as it arrived, which of course has nothing to do with journalism.
Unlike the TV stations the Grand Rapids Press paid the $175 per person fee to get into the event. The article by Press reporter Ted Roelofs was not very long.
The reporter identified four things that Bush addressed. First, Bush confessed that he tortured (water-boarded) Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, whom Bush claimed was the “master-mind” behind the 9/11 attacks. Bush said, “I’d do it again to save lives.” However, Bush is not cited as provided any evidence that his administration’s use of torture saved any lives or prevented further attacks against the US and the Press reporter doesn’t question the former President’s assertion.
Second, Bush states, “Getting rid of Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do and the world is a better place without him.” Getting rid of Saddam, however, was not the reason the Bush administration gave for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, rather it was to find and destroy Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs). Again the reporter accepts the claim without question or verification. Numerous political analysts, such as Patrick Cockburn, have pointed out that the standard of living for most Iraqis is worse now than under Saddam Hussein and that the US invasion/occupation has resulted in over 1 million dead Iraqis.
The only other points that Bush made was that he prayed a lot and has decided not to publicly criticize President Obama.
How unfortunate for people who read the Grand Rapids Press that for $175 all we got was a weak report on what a former President said, especially since Bush is considered by many to have been a war criminal.
Reporting Israeli Assault Through Israel’s Eyes
(This Media Alert is re-posted from Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting.)
On May 31, the Israeli military attacked a flotilla of boats full of civilians attempting to deliver humanitarian supplies to the Gaza Strip. Reports indicate that at least nine and as many as 16 of the activists on board were killed, though details remain sketchy due to Israel’s censorious limitations on media coverage. Much of the U.S. media coverage has been remarkably unskeptical of Israel’s account of events and their context, and has paid little regard to international law.
The New York Times (6/1/10) glossed over the facts of the devastating Israeli siege of Gaza, where 1.5 million people live in extreme poverty. As reporter Isabel Kershner wrote, “Despite sporadic rocket fire from the Palestinian territory against southern Israel, Israel says it allows enough basic supplies through border crossings to avoid any acute humanitarian crisis.”
Asking Israel to explain the effects of its embargo on the people of Gaza makes little sense, especially when there are plenty of other resources available. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported (IRIN, 5/18/10):
As a consequence of Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip, 98 percent of industrial operations have been shut down since 2007 and there are acute shortages of fuel, cash, cooking gas and other basic supplies….
Water-related health problems are widespread in the Strip because of the blockade and Israel’s military operation in Gaza, which destroyed water and sanitation infrastructure, including reservoirs, wells, and thousands of kilometres of piping….
Chronic malnutrition has risen in Gaza over the past few years to reach 10.2 percent….
In Gaza, Israel’s blockade is debilitating the healthcare system, limiting medical supplies and the training of medical personnel and preventing serious medical cases from travelling outside the Strip for specialized treatment.
Israel’s 2008-2009 military operation damaged 15 of the Strip’s 27 hospitals and damaged or destroyed 43 of its 110 primary healthcare facilities, none of which have been repaired or rebuilt because of the construction materials ban. Some 15-20 percent of essential medicines are commonly out of stock and there are shortages of essential spare parts for many items of medical equipment.
Those facts, though, aren’t persuasive to everyone. The Washington Post‘s June 1 editorial page had one of the most appalling takes on the killings: “We have no sympathy for the motives of the participants in the flotilla–a motley collection that included European sympathizers with the Palestinian cause, Israeli Arab leaders and Turkish Islamic activists.”
Many of the analysis pieces in major papers focused on the fallout for Israel and the United States, rather than the civilians killed or the humanitarian crisis they were trying to address. The Post‘s Glenn Kessler (6/1/10) framed the U.S. response, not the Israeli attack, as the complicating factor: “Condemnation of Israeli Assault Complicates Relations With U.S.” Kessler lamented, “The timing of the incident is remarkably bad for Israel and the United States,” while a Los Angeles Times account (6/1/10) called the raid “a public relations nightmare for Israel.” The New York Times‘ Kershner wrote (NYTimes.com, 5/31/10) that “the criticism [of Israel over the attack] offered a propaganda coup to Israel’s foes, particularly the Hamas group that holds sway in Gaza.”
Other news accounts presented misleading context about the circumstances leading to Israel’s blockade. Kershner (New York Times, 6/1/10) stressed that “Israel had vowed not to let the flotilla reach the shores of Gaza, where Hamas, an organization sworn to Israel’s destruction, took over by force in 2007.” The Associated Press (6/1/10) reported that “Israel and Egypt sealed Gaza’s borders after Hamas overran the territory in 2007, wresting control from Abbas-loyal forces”–the latter a reference to Fatah forces affiliated with Mahmoud Abbas.
Both accounts ignore the fact that Hamas won Palestinian elections in 2006, which led the United States and Israel to step up existing economic restrictions on Gaza. An attempt to stoke a civil war in Gaza by arming Fatah militants–reported extensively by David Rose in Vanity Fair (4/08)–backfired, and Hamas prevailed (Extra!, 9-10/07).
Much of the U.S. press coverage takes Israeli government claims at face value, and is based largely on footage made available by Israeli authorities–while Israel keeps the detained activists away from the media (not to mention from lawyers and worried family members). The Washington Post (6/1/10) reported the attack this way:
Upon touching down, the Israeli commandos, who were equipped with paint guns and pistols, were assaulted with steel poles, knives and pepper spray. Video showed at least one commando being lifted up and dumped from the ship’s upper deck to the lower deck. Some commandos later said they jumped into the water to escape being beaten. The Israeli military said some of the demonstrators fired live ammunition. Israeli officials said the activists had fired two guns stolen from the troops.
As Salon.com‘s Glenn Greenwald wrote (5/31/10): “Just ponder what we’d be hearing if Iran had raided a humanitarian ship in international waters and killed 15 or so civilians aboard.”
The Times‘ June 1 report included seven paragraphs of Israel’s account of what happened on board the Turkish ship, the Mavi Marmara, where the civilians were killed; the paper reported that “There were no immediate accounts available from the passengers of the Turkish ship” because the Israeli base they were taken to “was off limits to the news media and declared a closed military zone.”
The Times piece also showed little interest in international law, mentioning Israel’s claim regarding the legality of their actions but providing no analysis from any international law experts to support or debunk the claim: “Israeli officials said that international law allowed for the capture of naval vessels in international waters if they were about to violate a blockade.”
According to Craig Murray (5/31/10), former British ambassador and specialist on maritime law, the legal position “is very plain”: “To attack a foreign flagged vessel in international waters is illegal. It is not piracy, as the Israeli vessels carried a military commission. It is rather an act of illegal warfare.”
Arizona Is No Joke — Tell Clear Channel to Apologize
(This Media Alert is a re-posting from the National Council of La Raza.)
You might have already heard, but last week a local radio station in Columbus, Ohio, WTVN-AM, took the debate over Arizona’s new law too far.
Apparently they weren’t happy that the mayor of Columbus, Michael Coleman, recently decided to ban city employees from visiting Arizona on official business in protest of the new law. So the radio station responded by launching a contest in which the “winner” received a free trip to Phoenix, Arizona “to spend a weekend chasing aliens and spending cash in the desert.” Check out the promotional image for the contest below.
Make sure to bring your green card? Really? Is that funny?
This contest has triggered considerable outrage in Latino communities in Ohio, Arizona, and other states throughout the nation. NCLR released a statement on Friday calling on WTVN-AM and its parent company, Clear Channel Communications, to apologize for the station’s contest. NCLR President and CEO Janet Murguía said in this statement that “the passage of SB 1070 has provoked a lot of reprehensible anti-Latino and anti-immigrant rhetoric, but a radio station bankrolling someone to ‘hunt’ human beings for sport represents a new low. The owners and directors of WTVN might think that this is all in good fun, but what is happening to Latinos — citizen, legal, and undocumented alike — in Arizona is no joke. We are asking for an immediate and unequivocal apology from the station and its parent company.”
If you are as outraged as we are, join us in sending letters to both the management of WTVN in Columbus and executives at Clear Channel and ask them to apologize for this irresponsible contest.
Thank you for joining us in telling WTVN and Clear Channel that Arizona is no joke!
Polling the Governor’s race
The Grand Rapids Press posted a short story today on new polling data for the Michigan Governor’s race. The poll was conducted by a North Carolina-based company called Public Policy Polling.
Based on their client list, the polling organization doesn’t seem to have any overt partisan biases. However, the polling they conducted only spoke with 377 likely republicans and 314 likely Democratic voters, a small number, which makes the polling data less credible.
The article does not provide readers with the actual language of the poll, so we don’t know what question(s) those polled were asked. We do know the data, which shows that Rick Snyder polled highest amongst likely GOP voters and Virg Bernero was first among likely Democratic voters.
However, this included people who called themselves independents, so when they talked to straight republic voters Pete Hoekstra topped the poll. That distinction make the headline of the story a bit misleading, since it says that Snyder was leading all Republicans, which one could argue is not true, based on what was said in the article.
The only person sourced in the story was a staff member of the polling company who said, “Voters really aren’t tuned into the governor’s race yet. The numbers could change a lot as the candidates become better known.” This comment begs the question how a pollster who only talked to only 700 likely voters can know what most Michigan voters are tuned into, especially since the polling company is not based in Michigan.
The article also does not say who paid the polling company to conduct the poll. Often those paying for the poll are candidates or political parties who want to pump up their own numbers. But polls are often paid for by news agencies as a way to try to generate better ratings or increase news interest with horse-race polling, where there is nothing more than numbers and no information about issues or candidate platforms.
Media Bites – Coca Cola and the World Cup Games
In this week’s Media Bites we take a look at a new commercial from Coca Cola in preparation for the 2010 World Cup games in South Africa later this month. Coke wants to associate their brand with the celebratory aspects of the game, the players and the fans, but all the branding in the world can’t undo Coke’s record of profiting from Apartheid and the role it plays in water privatization in today’s South Africa.
(This article is re-posted from Electronic Intifada.)
Early this morning under the cover of darkness Israeli soldiers stormed the lead ship of the six-vessel Freedom Flotilla aid convoy in international waters and killed and injured dozens of civilians aboard. All the ships were violently seized by Israeli forces, but hours after the attack fate of the passengers aboard the other ships remained unknown.
The Mavi Marmara was carrying around 600 activists when Israeli warships flanked it from all sides as soldiers descended from helicopters onto the ship’s deck. Reports from people on board the ship backed up by live video feeds broadcast on Turkish TV show that Israeli forces used live ammunition against the civilian passengers, some of whom resisted the attack with sticks and other items.
The Freedom Flotilla was organized by a coalition of groups that sought to break the Israeli-led siege on the Gaza Strip that began in 2007. Together, the flotilla carried 700 civilian activists from around 50 countries and over 10,000 tons of aid including food, medicines, medical equipment, reconstruction materials and equipment, as well as various other necessities arbitrarily banned by Israel.
As of 6:00pm Jerusalem time most media were still reporting that up to 20 people had been killed, and many more injured. However, Israel was still withholding the exact numbers and names of the dead and injured. Passengers aboard the ships who had been posting Twitter updates on the Flotilla’s progress had not been heard from since before the attack and efforts to contact passengers by satellite phone were unsuccessful. The Arabic- and English-language networks of Al-Jazeera lost contact with their half dozen staff traveling with the flotilla.
News of the massacre on board the Freedom Flotilla began to emerge around dawn in the eastern Mediterranean first on the live feed from the ship, social media, Turkish television, and Al-Jazeera. Israeli media were placed under strict military censorship, and reported primarily from foreign sources. However, by the morning the Jerusalem Post reported that the Israeli soldiers who boarded the flotilla in international waters were fired upon by passengers. Quoting anonymous military sources, the Jerusalem Post claimed that the flotilla passengers had set-up a “well planned lynch.” (“IDF: Soldiers were met by well-planned lynch in boat raid”)
The Israeli daily Haaretz also reported that the Israeli soldiers were “attacked” when trying to board the flotilla. (“At least 10 activists killed in Israel Navy clashes onboard Gaza aid flotilla”)
This narrative of passengers “attacking” the Israeli soldiers was quickly adopted by the Associated Press and carried across mainstream media sources in the United States, including the Washington Post. (“Israeli army: More than 10 killed on Gaza flotilla”)
Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon stated in a Monday morning press conference that the Israeli military was acting in “self-defense.” He claimed that “At least two guns were found” and that the “incident” was still ongoing. Ayalon also claimed that the Flotilla organizers were “well-known” and were supported by and had connections to “international terrorist organizations.”
It is unclear how anyone could credibly adopt an Israeli narrative of “self-defense” when Israel had carried out an unprovoked armed assault on civilian ships in international waters. Surely any right of self-defense would belong to the passengers on the ship. Nevertheless, the Freedom Flotilla organizers had clearly and loudly proclaimed their ships to be unarmed civilian vessels on a humanitarian mission.
The Israeli media strategy appeared to be to maintain censorship of the facts such as the number of dead and injured, the names of the victims and on which ships the injuries occurred, while aggressively putting out its version of events which is based on a dual strategy of implausibly claiming “self-defense” while demonizing the Freedom Flotilla passengers and intimating that they deserved what they got.
As news spread around the world, foreign governments began to react. Greece and Turkey, which had many citizens aboard the Flotilla, immediately recalled their ambassadors from Tel Aviv. Spain strongly condemned the attack. France’s foreign minister Bernard Kouchner expressed “profound shock.” The European Union’s foreign minister Catherine Ashton called for an “enquiry.”
What should be clear is this: no one can claim to be surprised by what the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights correctly termed a “hideous crime.” Israel had been openly threatening a violent attack on the Flotilla for days, but complacency, complicity and inaction, specifically from Western and Arab governments once more sent the message that Israel could act with total impunity.
There is no doubt that Israel’s massacre of 1,400 people, mostly civilians, in Gaza in December 2008/January 2009 was a wake up call for international civil society to begin to adopt boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel similar to those applied to apartheid-era South Africa.
Yet governments largely have remained complacent and complicit in Israel’s ongoing violence and oppression against Palestinians and increasingly international humanitarian workers and solidarity activists, not only in Gaza, but throughout historic Palestine. We can only imagine that had former Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni indeed been arrested for war crimes in Gaza when a judge in London issued a warrant for her arrest, had the international community begun to implement the recommendations of the UN-commissioned Goldstone Report, had there been a much firmer response to Israel’s assassination of a Hamas official in Dubai, it would not have dared to act with such brazenness.
As protest and solidarity actions begin in Palestine and across the world, this is the message they must carry: enough impunity, enough complicity, enough Israeli massacres and apartheid. Justice now.
Grassroutes Caravan
The Bloom Collective Potluck & Discussion
6 p.m. Sunday, June 13
4th Street Garden Oasis
Pettibone Ave. & 4th st. NW, Grand Rapids 49504Grassroutes Caravan Variety Show
7 p.m. Monday, June 14
Blandford Nature Center Farm
3143 Milo St. NW, Grand Rapids 49534
On June 13 and 14, The Grassroutes Caravan will stop in Grand Rapids during their bicycle trip to the US Social Forum in Detroit. The 30 cyclists will also stop in Milwaukee, Lansing and White Lake before arriving in Detroit by June 22. In each community where they stop, they will share information via discussions and guerilla theatre as well as volunteer with local community service projects.
“We wanted to create an event prior to the trip that would both raise money and celebrate the upcoming journey to Detroit,” said participant, Kristine Pettersen.
At 6 p.m. Sunday June 13, The 30 cyclists will join The Bloom Collective for a potluck discussion at the 4th Street Garden Oasis, Pettibone and 4th St. NW. Grassroutes Caravan folks will share information about the USSF and demonstrations aboard the Permibus traveling permiculture exhibition.
At 7 p.m. Monday, The Grassroutes Caravan Variety Show will entertain with clowns, a puppet show and live music by Thistle. The Permibus will be on site at Blandford that evening as well. Local cyclists are welcome to join the Caravan when it sets out for Detroit.
“The main idea of the (World) Social Forum, which started as an annual get-together of world communities and organizations in Brazil, is that ‘another world is 
possible,” added Seth Jensen. In Detroit, the imperative that “Another U.S. is Necessary” has been added to the Social Forum’s idea. “We take those ideas very seriously. When you consider all the volunteer stops we have planned, the cultural exchange, the opportunities for relationship building, then we’re really talking about much more than a bicycle ride. I like to call it a mobile village.”
Once in Detroit, the Caravan will set up a bicycle city at the corner of Temple and Woodward, about a half mile from Cobo Hall, where the USSF takes place. The bike city will offer on-going bike maintenance and workshops.
Cross country caravans and marches have been a strategy for social change since 1966, when Dr. Martin Luther King walked in a mobile village from Memphis to Jackson, Mississippi in a March Against Fear. Another example, the 1986 Great Peace March for Global Nuclear Disarmament traveled for nine months from California to Washington DC.
Anarchists and anti-authoritarian organizers used the mobile village strategy during the Democracy Uprising March, of 2004, a 28-day march from the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Boston to the Republican National Convention (RNC) in New York. In 2008, activists in Madison, Wisconsin traveled in a mobile village of resistance from the People’s Networking Convention to the RNC in St. Paul. And, The Peoples Freedom Caravan traveled from Albuquerque, New Mexico to the 2007 USSF in Atlanta, Georgia.
“The main thing to remember is that we are striving to be a whole, cohesive village, looking after one another in an atmosphere of care and concern for ourselves and the towns we pass through,” Jensen wrote in the Caravan’s zine. “ If we all do that, our ride is certain to be a blazing success.”
